The Alberta Project - Interview with Cory Morgan┃AB Project

00:00:00.000 uh hello everyone uh merry christmas and i think it'll be the new year by the time i

00:00:06.660 upload this um today i'm joined by uh cory morgan he was his him and his channel were like the kind

00:00:16.580 of antidote i guess to my um like post april election uh rot that i was in just the prospects

00:00:26.220 of everything the doom and gloom it was through him i kind of discovered the um like the movement

00:00:33.720 as a whole and that this was like an organized thing and was starting to become more and more

00:00:38.540 organized um so cory how like if you'd like to introduce yourself sure no i appreciate the

00:00:46.380 invite i guess just the best way to describe myself i'm a columnist for a couple of publications with

00:00:52.120 the western standard and epic times i as you pointed out have my own youtube channel where i

00:00:56.300 kind of rant on independence issues i've been an independence advocate for over 20 years i'm afraid

00:01:02.200 i've been showing some patience and uh well we're into some very interesting times and uh i think

00:01:09.520 patience is going to pay off yeah for sure yeah um and we're going to get into that um but before that

00:01:15.800 yeah so you've i think you've mentioned that you're an oil and gas surveyor or were at one point

00:01:22.480 at um like also in in alberta and also in texas right so like if you were to like break down like

00:01:30.100 the two differences in like jurisdiction i guess and like how the pace at which projects were done and

00:01:37.460 sure i mean they're definitely a different attitude south of the border yeah so for the first

00:01:43.980 20 years of my adult life i worked in energy exploration as a surveyor and project manager

00:01:49.240 and i did a lot of american work whether in pennsylvania or texas or canadian work in alberta

00:01:54.400 and in the arctic and just wherever there's oil and gas i ended up there at one time or another

00:01:57.960 um the difference the largest difference of all is the attitude of regulators in south of the border

00:02:06.860 for the most part and there's exceptions uh i worked upstate new york and there were some serious

00:02:10.820 problems getting things done there but for the most part for texas for example or new mexico oklahoma

00:02:15.680 the attitude is what can we do to help get this project done what can we do to get this product

00:02:23.040 online and employing people and bringing in revenue and all of the good stuff

00:02:28.360 in canada the regulators are all about how can we stop you what can what are you doing wrong that

00:02:35.180 gives us a reason not to allow you to do the project they're they're both regulators it's not

00:02:40.040 a wild west in texas you can't just punch a hole in the ground and spill oil on it and make a mess so i

00:02:45.960 admit their environmental controls are weaker than ours but the attitude is different um maybe if i

00:02:52.360 could just go a little further with the analogy it reminded me later on i made a a crazy decision

00:02:57.460 and bought a local pub and it's a i tell you the food service industry is very very regulated

00:03:02.340 and i dealt with with two different levels of inspectors one was the aglc which is the alberta

00:03:08.980 gambling and liquor corporation and one was the uh alberta health services you know the health inspector

00:03:15.340 yeah and i tell you what the health inspector totally different attitude when they would come in

00:03:20.540 very thorough i mean he would go into every cooler and and check every corner and and and everything

00:03:27.580 and he would write up things he felt might not be reaching you know where compliance should be but

00:03:30.860 he came along with it this is you know your this cooler is two degrees too warm this is how you got

00:03:35.980 to bring it up to temperature you weren't cleaning well enough over in this corner maybe you need

00:03:40.060 a better form for your staff to know where to clean things and closing and things like that

00:03:45.100 they really tried to work with you to bring you up to standard they wanted you to stay open they

00:03:50.300 just wanted to make sure you were healthy and and you know not putting anybody at harm the liquor

00:03:54.780 inspectors on the other hand were gestapo they were always looking for a reason to play gotcha

00:04:01.340 they wanted to see you know they're testing your liquor levels they were they were checking the size

00:04:06.300 of your signage in case you had advertising from a beer company that's a little too big versus another

00:04:11.180 beer just insane not a cooperative attitude they were looking to catch you do something wrong one was

00:04:17.820 trying to help you along and the other was really much of a a punitive approach and i felt that sort

00:04:24.540 of different feeling between canadian regulators and energy and american regulators they're both serving

00:04:30.300 the same thing but a much different attitude yeah absolutely and it also i guess comes down to like um

00:04:37.340 regulatory clarity right is the big thing here like is that like like what you said there are like so

00:04:43.180 many interest groups that can just derail everything through like infinite court processes and you know

00:04:50.620 there's it's just like yeah nothing is ever viewed in like the national interest it's like where i guess

00:04:58.700 yeah it's very it's very galvanized almost um almost a zero risk goal they're trying to apply to energy

00:05:06.620 development just try and say well gee you know if a meteorite hits that pipeline and you haven't gone over

00:05:11.820 eight feet deep with it you might get a leak of a hundred barrels of oil and it'll take a month

00:05:16.380 to clean up and three squirrels might die yeah that might happen well we can't we can't approve you

00:05:21.660 until you've come up with a meteor plan for your pipeline for that section it really is getting that

00:05:26.300 absurd i mean the reality is you mitigate risk you bring it to a minimum and then you go ahead but

00:05:33.820 that's what i was saying with that difference in attitude the reality is that the activists

00:05:37.340 it's in the regulatory area they don't want to mitigate risk they want shut the project down

00:05:43.020 that's that's the difference between the two so they're not trying to find something and bring you

00:05:46.780 into compliance they're trying to find a reason not to allow you to do it and they've been very

00:05:50.940 effective at it yes absolutely yeah this is um yeah canada is just i don't know i mean i've always

00:05:57.820 thought of canada as having kind of like um more robust uh lobbying laws like aren't like exploited but

00:06:06.220 then you just like compared to the u.s at least but then you like come to like the reality of um

00:06:11.180 like all the special interest groups and the non-profits like who's i guess uh monetary funds

00:06:17.420 and like their donations aren't always disclosed and like just like the insane amount of yeah just

00:06:23.180 cronyism it is it is crazy um and like it's always very like distressful when like people kind of put it

00:06:31.340 off by like um making comparisons to the u.s like it's like a kind of maple leaf nationalism kind of

00:06:38.940 thing it's like we like it's like the sort of thing where you complain about health care here

00:06:44.300 and it's like well why don't you move down to the u.s if like it's it's just it's a whole loop of like

00:06:49.740 nothing ever happens kind of thing where like you like you just don't want to address any of the issues

00:06:55.180 it's just like meandering about like something entirely different um one of my professors uh

00:07:02.780 recently i'm in um first year engineering the transfer doing the transfer program uh red year

00:07:08.460 polytechnic right now and then i'll be at uve but um yeah he's uh he's a good guy bless his heart but

00:07:14.700 like i remember one time i don't know the discussion came up about like the land claims in bc like the

00:07:19.980 unseated land and the aboriginal title and like his response to that was like oh well at least uh

00:07:27.580 we don't have ice here in the u.s or in canada like you guys would all be uh kicked out by ice

00:07:33.980 implying that everyone other than the indigenous are like illegals like just very like uh i don't i

00:07:42.860 don't even want to think about it almost it's just it's just self-defeating to the level of of just

00:07:49.020 crazed absurdity with what's going on in british columbia and the enablement they're embracing of

00:07:55.340 that you know the united nations uh declaration on the rights of indigenous people which was an

00:08:00.220 aspirational document written by a bunch of uh lunatics basically in an organization dominated

00:08:05.660 by dictators uh and then to have bc though embrace that and say we're going to enshrine that with drippa

00:08:11.420 so we're doing the same thing on a provincial level which now gives a racially based veto authority

00:08:18.140 to a minority over anything happening in that province they have created a catastrophe for

00:08:25.180 themselves and i hate to say it because i love our bc neighbors but part of the independence movement

00:08:30.460 had always been more against federal uh you know overreach control a broken federation and it's just

00:08:35.900 systematically but now i want us to isolate more from bc too because i got a feeling there's going to

00:08:41.500 be a real catastrophe coming there pretty soon and i would rather distance ourselves from it while we

00:08:47.260 can yeah because unless they have the courage to uh repeal drip up which i don't think they have the

00:08:52.300 courage to do there's going to be an economic disaster over there uh the the richmond uh area

00:08:59.420 with the couch and ruling is is just the tip of the iceberg on what's going to happen and and it's and

00:09:04.700 nobody's got the courage to speak up yeah exactly yeah it's um it's just very like what's happening

00:09:13.020 is crazy like and i've talked about bc like even before um like bc especially lower mainland being

00:09:19.980 like a contingency like because of like all the um foreign money and like the the dirty money like it's

00:09:28.700 like a the way that like i view it is like a so like in video games you have like a play we have

00:09:36.140 zones for example in an online game where people it's like a pvp zone right or like you have these

00:09:42.060 factions all fighting each other right bc is kind of like a pvp disabled zone except for surrey that's

00:09:48.380 like straight up pvp but like other like the casinos and like the money laundering you have like so many

00:09:54.540 foreign interest groups you have like the irgc i think they operate in bc like they launder money

00:10:00.060 in there like it's crazy it's it's just like a massive contingency but yeah even this this just

00:10:05.340 compounds everything like in terms of wexit i think well this sounds mean but like this is

00:10:12.300 geopolitics but like yeah any like cooperation with bc would have to come from like either like a mutual

00:10:18.540 understanding for like economic development or like straight up strong army but like as a from

00:10:24.620 the perspective of an independent alberta like oh yeah like a horde versus alliance at least you've

00:10:30.220 only got two sides uh you've got uh 25 interests now all fighting it out in lower mainland bc uh whether

00:10:37.820 it is overseas i mean yes you said the casinos have been turned into money laundering operations uh the the

00:10:43.660 the ports are overrun with corruption uh which is a separate issue all around uh you know it has

00:10:49.820 become a hub for for drug smuggling human smuggling many other things there's just so many things

00:10:54.700 unfortunately with such a a rich rich province and resources human resources i mean great people too

00:11:01.100 uh but they've they've created a catastrophe and uh yeah having that line of independence i guess

00:11:09.580 we could almost i guess stand back and put up a border and uh just say you know we'll help you

00:11:16.380 out as much as we can until you get your crap together but in the meantime uh we just want no

00:11:21.100 part of that mess you guys have got to sort yourselves out because this is yeah this is normal yeah it is

00:11:26.940 it definitely is yeah economic development in bc is going to be interesting i i think i've seen the um

00:11:32.380 conservatives come up in polling like the bc conservatives have had a rough time with their

00:11:37.820 leadership uh thankfully that's been resolved almost or i don't know i think they're going to vote on it

00:11:44.060 yeah in general i won't just fault bc for that we we love doing that in alberta we've split each

00:11:49.980 other many a time and federally it's happened you know yeah stockwell david joey's he had

00:11:54.940 uh that just seems to be the nature of it but boy yeah it really has blown up in bc lately on a

00:11:59.180 provincial level yeah for sure yeah yeah and speaking of um i guess yeah on a federal level

00:12:07.820 the like pauliev and like cpchq just kind of like dismantling like the candidate selection process

00:12:16.940 and all this stuff just being so garbage that everything is like falling apart now um and i

00:12:23.580 kind of i don't know like the way i see pauliev like when people say he's very um like he's almost

00:12:30.940 dangerous that's like one of the critiques of that a lot of um progressives progressives make

00:12:37.020 about pauliev and like in a sense like if you look at his track record and like what he has and hasn't

00:12:44.220 done it's kind of correct like the way i see him he's like the like final amalgamation of like um

00:12:50.860 like western uh like kind of lobbies not like when i say lobbies not just corporate like just generally

00:12:58.220 like the reform sphere and like harper and everyone like those kinds of people of like

00:13:03.420 trying to game the system like trying to play by those like the parliamentary rules like you see it

00:13:10.620 with a lot of the diaspora politics like pierre has gone like overboard with that stuff and sometimes

00:13:17.500 like you see it in his eyes like a lot of the functions that he's in he's just like he's like he

00:13:23.100 doesn't want to have it but it's like a kind of thing i don't know whether it's cpchq pushing him

00:13:27.580 or like he himself is kind of like standing behind it as like a means to an end but it like yeah pauliev

00:13:35.180 kind of speaks to yeah just how like i guess like as a independent supporter because a lot of people

00:13:42.780 follow him i don't really talk about it that much but like in like a little niche clique to like have

00:13:47.980 these conversations like that's just the way i kind of view pauliev like how's your take on like

00:13:53.740 federal conservative leadership right now yeah well he's trying that that balancing act that juggling

00:13:59.580 and it kind of all does come back to canada's broken system probably have strongest strengths whether

00:14:05.260 it's voter wise whether it's donor wise whether it's you know even the most loyal of members of

00:14:09.660 parliament tend to be in the west in the in the central canada it's a lot more mushy because his

00:14:15.820 the mps that he have are sitting in seats that they won really very narrowly so they're nervous

00:14:20.140 or there's a whole lot of seats that he didn't win at all so he has to keep his western base happy

00:14:25.660 because that's where the funds come from the organizers come from and the base of the party

00:14:29.500 comes from but he will never win a federal election unless he appeals to central canadians

00:14:35.260 and that's just math i mean i say often don't take it personally it's political math yeah and that

00:14:42.060 leads to infighting because when he gives what looks like concessions to central canada his western

00:14:47.180 base and different factions within it and so on are going to get a little upset or they're they're

00:14:51.660 they're you know their feet will start stomping if it looks like he's leaning to more too much towards

00:14:56.460 small c conservatism to pacify the west then you see uh cold feet in central canada from organizers

00:15:04.140 or existing mps across the floor for their own sake he's caught in the middle uh his only kind of hope i

00:15:09.420 think we'll see there's years to come but was to really win that last election and and now

00:15:15.020 to sit there when you're in that opposition role spinning your wheels for potentially three more

00:15:18.780 years uh he's got a real tough task ahead of him to try and build that big tent the liberals have

00:15:24.540 figured it out they just don't care what the west thinks they couldn't care less they don't bother

00:15:30.220 they don't need saskatchewan they don't need alberta they don't need interior british columbia

00:15:34.300 so they don't even cater to them they just cater to quebec toronto and lower mainline vancouver

00:15:40.380 area and it works it wins them uh in there so paulia is in a lot of trouble and i think he's

00:15:45.740 just treading water hopefully to find that out he's a smart skilled politician i think in general

00:15:49.660 he's principled but he's in an impossible situation yeah yeah exactly i think yeah the like the ruthlessness

00:15:57.900 of the liberals um in regards to like playing like the parliamentary like math kind of game do

00:16:02.860 like the numbers game whether it was like you know the 1980 election which was just outright

00:16:09.500 like division like just crazy group of the west will take the rest yeah oh and like you know people

00:16:17.740 talk about the national energy program today as being like a good thing and it's just like

00:16:23.660 no it was solely to buy like buy votes there was no heritage fund like there was nothing to hold

00:16:29.180 this money it was just straight up expropriation for the sake of like appeasing the east and it's

00:16:36.220 just it's bizarre and yeah they were they still go to meetings and i've had times where people almost

00:16:42.540 break down with their memories of the early 80s they were young their parents lost their homes and

00:16:48.140 it was purely due to policy not due to a world recession or anything like that we had double-digit

00:16:54.380 interest rates going on because of the mass borrowing on the part of the federal government

00:16:59.020 yeah uh we were in in grave trouble and then suddenly the value of your home plummets you lose

00:17:05.260 your job the economy locally is in the toilet and people literally had to walk away from their homes

00:17:10.860 because they had negative equity they they everything they worked for they lost all because of

00:17:16.060 an embittered misplaced policy out of pierre elliott trudeau and yeah the generation that remembers it is

00:17:22.460 getting older and forgetting it you know and for some people to dare and say that that policy was

00:17:28.220 good uh is just vile to be honest it's just vile the damage it did for purely political purposes

00:17:36.940 should never be forgiven uh and certainly never repeated and that's the scary thing you know when

00:17:41.660 people talk about how how bad it was similar to hear you something people talk i've seen now

00:17:46.540 apologists for the soviet union and they're usually people that are activists who are you know maybe

00:17:52.060 in diapers when the soviet union collapsed so they don't even remember that the news stories

00:17:56.300 and i mean i got to travel over in the there in the 80s i was very fortunate of it but

00:18:00.540 people forget failed policies and then they go and run them through the ringer again and uh it's

00:18:08.220 dangerous so if we had another national energy program yeah it'll end just as well as the last one

00:18:12.700 except this time there's a much bigger independence movement on the go i got a feeling there would be a

00:18:17.260 a positive vote this time if they tried to pull such a stunt again we're in for a very interesting

00:18:22.060 2020 yeah absolutely yeah everything comes down to what the federal party does and so far they've

00:18:28.540 just been working for us like like you've said like um a lot of the stuff that what's funny what i've

00:18:33.740 been thinking about like like if you look into like diaspora politics and like the game that smith

00:18:39.740 has been playing like so much of what the federal government like so much of their impositions

00:18:45.180 like directly like misaligned with like religious groups like whether or not like christians or

00:18:51.900 like whether they're like like heritage like religious groups or have like come it's crazy like the

00:18:58.460 support for independence that can be like like to play that game like not but like in like a

00:19:04.380 self-deprecating way where you're like kind of like what um or you're like dressing up and like

00:19:09.580 giving them lip service like what the federal government's doing with a lot of the citizenship laws

00:19:15.180 it's just like kind of completely like devaluing canadian citizenship and just having people

00:19:21.500 it's crazy but like it's what i'm trying to say is like there's so much cannon fodder right now

00:19:27.740 that's just been handed and like the mou won't hold up uh like the the public perception of it i guess i

00:19:34.140 mean yeah like just like which i i like what smith is doing like kind of um proposing that yeah we'll go to

00:19:41.740 and you like get our uh bitumen to port to the u.s coast um if if canada doesn't work out if um bc

00:19:50.220 doesn't work out and it definitely like like this kind of just putting everything on um

00:19:58.060 like just just pushing everything on like uh the federal government side where like where the ball is

00:20:05.660 on in their court and we saw it like what pierre tried to do with the um to use sections of the mou

00:20:13.020 to like uh i guess propose like an actual like policy for a pipeline to be built or like i'm not

00:20:19.580 sure exactly what it was i have to look over it and just the indecision that comes from that i think

00:20:26.380 yeah canada is just like a well it's hard like you can't really call it a country because of like how

00:20:33.900 much it's like dismantled its own like cultural uh like relevance and like just

00:20:42.220 but yeah like it's turned into an like an economic pact but like a really shitty economic

00:20:47.740 pact like it's just bad like it's it's not a functional one yeah i mean it gets right down

00:20:53.420 to the very bare basics of what the point of a federation is and part of that is the central

00:20:59.580 authority the federal government part of their role is supposed to be an arbitrator between the

00:21:04.220 provinces which all hold a fair degree of independence among themselves but they understood

00:21:08.780 when they founded this country that for it to work you have to have an authority that forces

00:21:15.500 some degree of trade across these these provinces where you're not different much different than

00:21:21.020 different countries yeah and no province is supposed to be able to hinder the trade of goods or people

00:21:26.940 or anything like that from province to province and they've been doing it and the government's been

00:21:31.020 too cowardly to enforce that so if the federal government abdicates its role as being that arbitrator

00:21:38.620 that has to put the law down and eventually tell david eby or tell the goal it's not your job you don't

00:21:45.740 have it your authority to stop a pipeline any more than alberta can stop a railway coming across it this is

00:21:52.140 the way the federation works now if they won't do that then the federation doesn't work and then

00:21:57.740 people are starting to realize that and that's where they're starting to feel like it's pointless

00:22:01.820 uh polyev it was a political play he put a motion forward just to get the liberals just to stand up

00:22:06.860 and say they support the mou that's really all they had to do was say it was not even binding it's just

00:22:11.260 a motion and of course they wouldn't do it they twisted and squirmed and they pulled away yeah okay

00:22:17.180 he scored some political points out here in alberta but did that do poly have any good in ontario

00:22:20.860 quebec no probably not it's just parliamentary games uh what i do see whether it's by design or

00:22:28.540 accidental with the mou and other things i kind of wrote about that in the book i wrote

00:22:34.860 a lot of people i see and they're the ones who are on the fence they consider themselves reluctant

00:22:40.300 separatists i don't like using the term separatist but it kind of rolls off the tongue better

00:22:43.660 reluctant separatists they only want to go once we've tried every other possible avenue to make

00:22:49.660 things better so what i'm seeing with smith is she smacks her head against the wall with the mou

00:22:55.260 and smacks her head against the wall with other trade agreements and snacks is she's showing

00:22:59.500 everybody else she's showing that nothing else will work yeah yeah exactly maybe she genuinely

00:23:05.340 thinks these things will work and and she's naively going ahead but she's just not really the naive type

00:23:10.380 but she's at least saying look i'm trying okay i'm giving every rational approach to this i'm trying to

00:23:16.460 make this work i'm trying to play within the rules and this is what we're getting and every time ottawa

00:23:22.940 drags its heels and shuts her down and screws with it it makes the independent support go up so carry on

00:23:29.100 premier smith exactly yeah do what you will do because people realize that you're really pissing in the

00:23:34.060 wind if you're trying to negotiate with ottawa and uh and then she's doing other things politically uh

00:23:39.820 the interesting one is is talking about uh cutting benefits for for non-citizens uh who are in

00:23:46.060 alberta i mean permanent residents she'd still have benefits for and uh for citizens of course but

00:23:51.900 but for people in that she did a good analogy for whether it's a person if they're here very

00:23:55.180 temporarily or not you know do we provide full health care and schooling and all of the social

00:23:59.740 supports for a tourist well no that's because they're coming here and leaving well we are providing

00:24:04.460 all of those for temporary residents right now and uh if there's those who are only here to draw from

00:24:11.740 the services uh there's some people who are some are temporary people who are working their asses

00:24:15.820 off and and good on them it's a delicate balance but those who truly are being parasitic well they're

00:24:21.100 gonna leave they're gonna chase the benefits they're gonna go to bc they're gonna go to toronto they're

00:24:26.140 gonna go to montreal and it's kind of a passive way to drive them out and it's gonna be very interesting

00:24:31.740 to see how that develops too because that's going to cause a lot of tension between alberta and the

00:24:36.940 other provinces and we've got a prime minister who's too cowardly to play the the over uh you

00:24:41.660 know overseeing role so we've got a lot of a lot of irons in the fire right now yeah what smith has

00:24:47.740 been doing is very interesting like sort of um passively playing the demographics game i think

00:24:54.860 that she's also been doing it a lot with um i mean there is a mandate but like with the enforcing of

00:25:00.380 like the castle law or like giving a mandate to like um lawyers and whatnot sort of just

00:25:06.700 making alberta so much more economically viable alberta next i think a lot of progressives uh

00:25:12.700 fling shit at alberta next because it's like been effective at like securing like a better demographic

00:25:19.980 like the people that come to alberta sort of like whether that be for um like successive conservative

00:25:26.780 governments or for independence like you've mentioned right like i remember your video talking

00:25:33.020 about like the importance of like demographics and i've been i've been trying to it's kind of hard

00:25:39.660 to like you don't want to push people to come to alberta if they don't already want like if there

00:25:44.940 aren't opportunities for them that's crazy that's like that's suicide but like yeah just like a kind of

00:25:51.500 nudge to people that like have been thinking about it i've been seeing a lot of um yeah uh instagram uh

00:25:59.020 lots of like channels and lots of stuff on social media um and yeah i think yeah smith has been

00:26:05.420 definitely playing that game very well too just like people a lot of like conservative-minded people

00:26:13.500 just see alberta as like maybe the last beacon like you like you just like sifting through the comments

00:26:19.420 and everything it's like the last like uh like the last part of the federation that just isn't like

00:26:27.020 self-cannibalizing and maybe saskatchewan too but saskatchewans unfortunately they're kind of more

00:26:33.740 sidelined in that discussions but they've been doing great work um in regards to a lot of this stuff

00:26:38.620 they've like predated uh smith on a lot of these policies um but yeah speaking on that like one of the

00:26:45.980 interesting things about um that i see coming up in the 2026 election if there is one that there

00:26:54.700 have been people meandering uh about there being potentially a 2026 federal uh provincial election

00:27:00.620 and like what's what's really interesting to me right now is that um like smith has like

00:27:09.820 like the sort of like when we talk about like a lot of um like the ethno-religious enclaves right

00:27:15.980 and like the the sort of policies that have that like um the end the provincial ndp have stood against

00:27:24.220 like i think like a 2026 election like with a combination of all these factors and like nenshi

00:27:31.740 trying to like be mamdani but like not sort of getting there because he because he is gay like

00:27:38.780 not i'm not saying that as a thing against him but like what i'm trying to say is like a lot of these

00:27:45.340 communities i don't know if he is or not he's never shown a propensity towards women or anything but

00:27:50.540 i mean i really um oh really oh what is it oh it might have been a rumor oops okay well i just i

00:27:57.260 don't know i guess maybe i might have deduced that from his demeanor that's not right he does you know

00:28:03.100 again yeah i mean i'll laugh but you know he comes across a bit effeminately and he's not been a

00:28:08.380 ladies man by any means but again yeah i do like to be fair on these things he's never said he's gay

00:28:13.740 he's yeah yeah and as you said it doesn't really matter but yeah uh it's uh i like to attack him

00:28:21.340 for his socialism yeah yeah oh no i'm saying it doesn't matter to us is what i'm saying like to you

00:28:27.500 and i but like like when you look at like mamdani for example in new york and like just the stuff that's

00:28:35.660 been happening there like his um his whole platform of like running for like all of these different like

00:28:43.340 ethnic blocks in these countries like talking about all this stuff like pandering to them almost

00:28:47.900 like he's he's seen as like a kind of a figure that's um like he's very charismatic and then she

00:28:57.260 is to like some extent not as much clearly uh and i only make these comparisons because then she wants

00:29:04.940 to fill in that role for alberto like his ad recently um was from the same agency uh that memdani

00:29:13.820 yeah yeah he paid for it like the yeah the ad was paid for by the ndp was made by uh the us agency

00:29:22.380 that carried out memdani's campaign in new york which is crazy to me like how that's not like headline

00:29:28.060 news right now and um shout out to the cbc for reporting on it but yeah sorry go ahead i was about

00:29:33.180 to say of all outlets that grabbed that one it was the cbc and you're right uh you know when it's

00:29:38.460 any foreign money potentially coming into a conservative cause the country likes his hair on

00:29:42.540 fire but well wait a minute the the ndp in alberta has been dealing with american ad agencies with

00:29:48.460 one of the most extreme uh you know mandem he's he's nuts uh you know he's he's uh personable as

00:29:56.540 you said and he's winning elections he's gotten himself into a position of authority but boy people

00:30:01.580 break down that man's policies he's he's only two steps away from uh stalin yeah and new york's in

00:30:08.140 for some really hard lessons oh for sure yeah and i think the they're gonna come into force with like

00:30:16.380 the kind of having to to like make grand bargains on all these sorts of things like when you have

00:30:22.780 these like when you have people trying to like um amend the system from the inside you kind of like

00:30:29.340 realize that like not not in a bad way obviously like if you want to make those kinds of reforms

00:30:34.780 it's going to be a lot of like back and forth between developers especially like on his housing

00:30:39.340 stuff and he's soon going to find out that um like the promises that he's made like are cannot be kept

00:30:47.180 and even if they are even if he strong arms through them it's just it's going to be uh it's going to be

00:30:53.100 be very very bad like pretty much like the outcome is like pretty much like guaranteed to just be

00:31:01.180 garbage oh yeah and to so i mean just to talk about a little bit of political tactics because you we've

00:31:07.660 all been hearing these rumors about a 2026 provincial election which uh you know in our system it's never

00:31:13.900 impossible i mean you know a party in power can call an election at any given time i personally don't

00:31:19.500 think there's very much basis to that whatsoever uh but i'll lay out what i think which could be

00:31:25.660 dead wrong but what i think that the tactics of premier smith are on the go because i think she

00:31:29.900 wants more time in office to head into another election uh for one she wants to see a referendum

00:31:35.820 happen on the independence i don't think she wants to see it win necessarily i i i think she'd be

00:31:40.220 perfectly happy if it came in at 40 percent but it's a tool that gives her a bunch of leverage when

00:31:45.980 she is trying to negotiate things to be able to keep pointing over look there's a referendum campaign

00:31:50.460 on right now if we don't get these things this could get really close to 50 or more guys you've

00:31:55.420 got to change this system or something and and she can play that part she's still the regionalist

00:32:01.180 but she doesn't go full independence support yeah so let's say the referendum comes and goes and ends at

00:32:07.180 40 next october that's a year from the scheduled election time that she's anticipated to go

00:32:14.220 that gives her a year now for cool down a year where now all the alberta prosperity project and

00:32:20.140 and the independence movement is off her back because you've had your referendum it's not like

00:32:24.940 we're gonna go away i you know we're still gonna be independent supporters now we're just kind of

00:32:29.180 biding our time heading for the next referendum where there might be five more years whatever it is

00:32:33.420 but it's not immediately pressing uh the regional issue is still huge yeah but the referendum's out of

00:32:39.020 the way then she can have one solid year where you're working more really on her reelection

00:32:44.140 campaign that's when she's really pushing to say this is what i've accomplished and that's what i've

00:32:47.580 accomplished plus if a bunch of negative things happen in new york as we think they probably will

00:32:53.100 i would try to tie nichi to that sort of leader i would connect them i would paint it and say he's

00:32:59.340 gonna bring to alberta what happened in new york and right now it's just a threat but give give it a year

00:33:05.740 in new york and actually we're going to see some of the problems happening yeah and they're going

00:33:09.580 to tactically beat nichi up really hard with that of course yes yes absolutely yeah that's my thinking

00:33:16.460 i could be completely wrong no you're right i've been thinking about that too um just like the aligning

00:33:21.100 themselves with that with the ad campaign like i've always thought of like memdani's coming into power

00:33:27.180 as a good thing not for new york obviously like here like especially you have like uh avi gould i think his

00:33:32.780 name is or i think he's one of the ndp uh leadership candidates he's the popular one oh avi lewis oh

00:33:40.140 sorry yeah he just like a super green like anti um like any like natural resource development just like

00:33:49.500 oh he's way over renewable renewable yeah he's yeah the ndp is not trying to moderate if they go with

00:33:54.540 him yeah oh okay i see yeah sort of um and i think that the liberals would love to see avi lewis win

00:34:02.060 it yeah because the ndp is is really lost touch with their labor roots they really they're not

00:34:07.420 the ndp of jack layton's days you know which had broader appeal that had a bit more of a pragmatism

00:34:13.260 to it and a lot more of a labor tie they've gone from i think somebody i'm using somebody else's

00:34:17.820 analogy but from the trade unions you know with the lunchbox guys and so on into the teachers lounge

00:34:24.300 unions which is a whole different that's the blue-haired woke the the lunatics and you can't

00:34:29.180 get broad appeal that way stephen harper won thanks to there being a strong ndp vote i mean

00:34:34.780 that helps that's part of that that formula in canada you need something to take a bite out of

00:34:38.940 the liberals yeah and as long as the ndp keeps self-destructing uh the conservatives really really

00:34:44.860 have a bad bad outlook on the on the there so avi yeah he's he's he's out there and and he could be

00:34:51.260 their front run yes yeah for sure but i think i think the position on energy development will always be

00:34:57.420 the same like i'll never forget uh the misalignment between not lee ndp and uh the federal ndps and

00:35:05.660 how they coat like the with the liberals coercively like it just worked against anything as much as

00:35:11.260 you try to make these grand bargains with like the greenwashing stuff like the social the social

00:35:16.780 kind of build up to that and just watch like watching that like far like yeah completely fall apart

00:35:22.300 like in those few years like it was comical like the like the notion that people still think

00:35:29.020 that uh alberta can like kind of like win these like bargains and like make these deals for like

00:35:35.580 itself in like the in a federal system that's like in the near future at least very much so is like

00:35:43.580 destined to be liberal for like a very long time it's it's like preposterous to me like the liberal ndps

00:35:51.420 could very well be a thing like as as a coalition i guess but yeah yeah well and so we'll see how

00:35:59.100 things shake out you know and with bc being in such a mess uh people talk about if there's an

00:36:03.740 independent alberta you'll never get a pipe to the coast well i i don't know you know if we keep going

00:36:08.220 down those lines which is certainly speculative and a couple of years from now let's say there's

00:36:12.700 been a vote and alberta's in the middle of negotiations now and moving towards uh independence

00:36:17.900 well bc by then is really going to be an economic basket case and in a heck of a lot of trouble and

00:36:22.380 i tell you people get a lot more receptive to things like pipelines when they get hungry

00:36:26.780 so when bc is flat broke when they're having trouble keeping up with their social services

00:36:31.340 when they've got low employment when the real estate industry has completely collapsed because

00:36:35.580 they've given it all back uh probably to be able to get another billion a year because you're

00:36:41.420 allowing a pipeline across your territory looks a lot more appealing yeah because you just don't

00:36:46.620 have a choice anymore yeah yeah for sure yeah that's definitely it's going to be very interesting to

00:36:51.980 just see what plays out and um yeah just like the yeah the counterbalance to um independence and i guess

00:37:01.580 yeah like all of these things will happen right but like i still see like a yeah like the federal

00:37:11.500 like kind of block like the parliamentary that like and there's the distribution of votes unless

00:37:17.500 like ontario is um you know switches up how they vote it's done like and it'll be exacerbated so like

00:37:27.580 i guess the best outcome as like independence minor support obviously i don't want can obviously i want

00:37:33.500 good things to happen right but just like like out of like straight up conjecture like i think the best

00:37:39.500 outcome would be to like the just the province is just going ham completely right like we're going

00:37:45.820 to have saskatchewan's uh independence's movement is very strong maybe even like a little bit of

00:37:51.740 like in the single digits one or two percent higher like in a lot of polling so you're going to have

00:37:57.180 maybe three independence referendums you know one from quebec like i think you've talked about this

00:38:03.340 one from sask and one from alberta within the 2026 2027 um time frame and what's really interesting

00:38:10.380 to me i wanted to segue into this portion um is how that affects how a referendum could affect the um

00:38:20.060 like the the court case that's going on right now in regards to how much of the pension fund

00:38:25.580 is belongs to alberta as like we're trying to do a takeout oh there has to be a mandate first here

00:38:32.940 obviously but i think that's one of the bigger um things that's happening with them like that

00:38:39.500 like u.s uh cosmo renegotiations is like they're really eyeing that like they want like a

00:38:47.100 like a province with a pension that's like kind of the guarantee that puts it into resource development

00:38:52.940 right like those kinds of funds or like maybe not like not as like a leverage of like a pension but

00:38:59.980 like i don't know how to explain it but like what do you see like for an alberta pension plan obviously

00:39:05.020 it should be like um very like pragmatic in its um like approach to like yeah yeah my personal my

00:39:15.100 personal view i mean if we get an alberta pension plan we should be very very careful if we're talking

00:39:19.260 about using it to reinvest in local projects or development or things like that because the the

00:39:24.380 mandate of a pension manager should just be to maximize return yes and keep the funds safe no

00:39:29.900 matter what if it turns out that it's a couple of local companies in alberta that are maximizing

00:39:34.540 returns and they're safe investments then cool let's do it yes but if it's better off making investments

00:39:39.980 in american companies or gold or diversifying the whole portfolio there's people far more skilled than me

00:39:45.660 let them do that keep the politics out of it whatever you do don't let the politicians manage

00:39:50.860 the pension um that happened with kenny i think with aimco or no with aish is a mess and it's managing

00:39:59.740 some provincial funds and pension plans and you know just stay out of it you got to get better

00:40:04.620 management for those things yeah and that's the biggest hang up i think for the independence movement

00:40:09.260 the biggest fear i've been seeing at public meetings i've spoken at with people is their pension

00:40:13.740 plan because a lot of older people they're that's all they got you know it might be a minor pension

00:40:20.220 plan but i tell you what a crappy pension plan zero better than zero pension plan absolutely and

00:40:25.500 they're fearful that disruption will uh leave them broke yeah and i mean everybody's you know fearful

00:40:31.340 of that especially that late in life it's not like you can pick up and just grab another job and start

00:40:35.180 again uh so that has to be addressed yeah and that's why i i think again smith has been pushing hard for

00:40:41.180 the alberta pension plan with the alberta next uh and uh the opponents to it have been very effective

00:40:47.020 and sowing doubt and fear yes in moving away from that uh i think part of the problem smith made a

00:40:53.260 mistake with was overshooting and being too generous saying you know that alberta should take a third of

00:40:57.180 it i understand that interpretation of it uh that one report said but let's say i i think it was trevor

00:41:03.660 two even said well let's say it's 15 we're entitled to let's say it's even 10. that is a good nest egg to

00:41:11.260 start with because alberta every year is still contributing far more in absolutely than we take

00:41:17.020 out of it yes so if we start with just that just 10 even less than our population makes up in the

00:41:23.020 country we will immediately be better off while still paying benefits for everybody here uh we will

00:41:29.740 immediately be better off than what we left and we'd be able to build a larger fund yes absolutely

00:41:34.860 yeah the 150 million or billion sorry estimation i think yeah trevor said is like a pretty good

00:41:41.100 starting point even yeah just but i guess the the trouble is just how like obtuse the federal government

00:41:48.620 is and like how they come up with these numbers it just casts so much doubt over everything but um

00:41:54.460 yeah i think i guess yeah like one of the like what troubles me about like the pension talk is

00:42:01.020 like the generational divide like i don't see anyone like my age talking about this which is crazy like

00:42:05.900 you're going to be the one paying into this like it's your future on the line like the pensioners

00:42:11.500 that are collecting right now like it's like they're in like dump mode essentially and some people

00:42:18.460 should understand at the least i mean when i was in my 20s now i didn't think about a pension a bit

00:42:22.060 either i wasn't saving well or doing all those nice responsible things i know some young guys were

00:42:27.580 uh and i don't know how much we'll be able to convince the younger generation of that because

00:42:31.740 sometimes it's just those priorities don't jump into our head that much until we get a bit older

00:42:35.900 a lot of us yeah but it's so important to them uh yeah but to be fair the younger generation now is

00:42:41.420 kind of in like survival mode as in oh yeah you can't buy a house you can't yeah exactly uh so they

00:42:47.900 might be more aware of it than mine exactly yeah they're coming into the realities of yeah

00:42:54.060 yeah so i mean the other part i think to lay out to people who don't understand bad pension plans

00:42:59.180 which is what we've got and it's uh not a proper or real pension plan it's actually closer to an

00:43:06.060 insurance plan yeah when you think of it because if i die when i'm 64 i'll have been paying into the

00:43:13.420 pension plan my whole adult life and guess what my family i think gets 2500 or something to help uh

00:43:20.140 you know dispose of my remains and that's it it's done it's gone it vanishes there's no

00:43:24.780 uh well i shouldn't say that there's a survivor's benefit for a widow so if my wife outlives me

00:43:29.340 uh it goes that way but the bottom line is if you've paid all the way in and you're not married you die

00:43:33.580 early that money evaporates it's not yours yeah that's not a pension plan that's a welfare plan

00:43:39.900 yeah that's uh or an insurance plan you know i mean if i made it all the way to my the end of my

00:43:45.020 home ownership and the house never burned down i don't get all the insurance payments back because

00:43:49.420 i never collected on them fair enough but with a pension plan there should be a fund there that's

00:43:54.300 mine that i put into and it's not so that i think is what's going to be explained to the younger people

00:44:01.340 you know you guys are going to pay in for 30 more years of this or or 40 and guess what if we don't

00:44:08.140 change the fundamentals of this plan it's gonna be a really crappy plan by the time you get your

00:44:12.460 your turn at the end of it and hopefully we can make that case better yeah yeah what i've been

00:44:17.740 thinking about yeah for yeah that's the pension like like the pragmatism of like a pension and like

00:44:23.500 just maximizing returns and like through like stable like long-term investment not like the cuckoo

00:44:29.420 stuff just like going ham on like um trying to play the market and like getting into so many different

00:44:35.580 things like like what cpp has been doing since like late 90s i think they've they've went on that

00:44:42.860 track um but yeah i guess from my perspective i also think of the pension which i think is wrong

00:44:51.100 well in a sense but like you look at for like an independent alberta the way i envision it it's like

00:44:56.220 there has to be some buy-in right to the industry like you look at equinox and norway and like how you

00:45:04.220 have like a public system right it's not like it's not like expropriation like the ndp or sorry the nep

00:45:10.620 but you have like uh like provincial or like i guess national buy-in from the alberta government

00:45:16.460 right into whether it be projects themselves or um what you might call it like uh yeah or like shares

00:45:25.660 in the companies and like what's important about that what's so good about that kind of um

00:45:31.020 um like hybrid approach is that like like a publicly traded company it kind of wanes off from

00:45:37.580 like um the government being the sole developer and therefore just being like the cash cow and like

00:45:43.980 just print just printing money like without remorse but like i think i view the public system but it's

00:45:50.620 it's like you said like the if we go that route of like say maybe like a little bit of investing in

00:45:58.700 like i don't know enbridge or whatever it has to be extremely like pragmatic and they have been

00:46:03.980 doing well like they've been doing quite well in the american oil patch which is crazy but yeah it's

00:46:10.620 definitely it's a far off discussion i think yeah well the energy sector you know in any sector really

00:46:18.060 especially large capital investment based ones where they gotta really spend a lot to get in

00:46:22.540 and they thrive on security they want to know that what they're putting in can go and canada has

00:46:29.020 rug pulled so many big developments over the years that they are very very gun shy so there's kind of

00:46:34.460 only two ways now to draw those big investors back and the easier one which is unfortunate but is to

00:46:42.540 the first one that governments often jump to is we'll give you loan guarantees or we'll jump in on it

00:46:46.780 and we'll invest a bit i understand that that's the rationale i'm bringing in and you know they

00:46:51.580 always say if we invest these dollars as the government you'll get this many back later yeah

00:46:55.420 but let's not forget kenny putting 1.5 billion into keystone yeah and it blew up because that was the

00:47:01.260 only way they would move forward was because they were saying look we don't feel safe this is looking

00:47:05.340 like it might blow up uh we're probably gonna blow out you say well here i'll reach into the taxpayers

00:47:10.300 wallets and we'll guarantee your your your funding for it and then you'll be okay and then we all lost

00:47:15.340 that's one route to go because i mean hey maybe the pipes would have gone through and would have

00:47:19.260 been producing and we'd all be better today but it's gambling with taxpayers dollars yeah the idealist

00:47:25.500 i guess and the libertarian in me and the capitalist in me would say i just want to see a government

00:47:30.460 that's gonna guarantee it because they're going to strip those regulations mercilessly not talk about

00:47:36.300 stripping them strip them and they're going to talk to the neighbors and say this is how that product

00:47:41.500 is going to get to you this is how we're going to guarantee or at best and i think smith's talked

00:47:46.300 about that build a utility corridor find the government takes that on here's this 300 meter

00:47:52.220 wide chunk that we can put a few pipelines and a power line and a whatever into there the government

00:47:58.540 expropriates the land the government pays the landowners the government deals with the negotiations

00:48:03.740 gets it done and gets it done fast yeah and then the companies know they've got somewhere they can

00:48:08.380 get their product out with exactly yes that's a guaranteed right of weight exactly yeah that's

00:48:13.340 and that's been the norway approach as well like they they have blocks of land essentially that's um

00:48:18.940 i think paul jeff talked about this too in his um during his campaign trail where you have these plots

00:48:24.300 of land that the government already kind of like gives like guarantee like sets these like

00:48:30.140 regulatory like checklists kind of for and like or i guess what has to be met and there's just ripe

00:48:36.220 for investment and like it's that's a that's we should definitely be following that model

00:48:41.180 in an independent alberta but one of the things and like i guess in an independent alberta the greatest

00:48:47.980 thing is the regulatory um freedom right of like a like an energy positive system but then one of the

00:48:56.140 things that uh comes back is like the the like possibility of a hostile u.s administration

00:49:05.980 because that could definitely like derail things like that's what happened with keystone essentially

00:49:10.140 i think if keystone had gone through and like the the government buy-in from the provincial government

00:49:15.980 that would have been that would have been great but it was i mean you could say that uh trudeau could

00:49:21.900 have advocated on behalf of keystone you know to the biden administration to like make it happen

00:49:27.740 and they didn't and we just lost all of that so i guess how how does that counterbalance play like in

00:49:33.500 that regard we need to diversify our customer base and it's funny because carney knows this he's talked

00:49:40.300 the right language because we've got on a different end a hostile american neighbor right now and there's

00:49:46.060 that realization for people that boy you know what they would talk a lot more respectfully to us if we had

00:49:51.100 three pipes going to the west coast yeah defeating asian markets and other competing buyers uh where

00:49:57.260 the americans who do rely on a lot of ourselves were which you suddenly bought more respectful you know

00:50:02.140 uh if you've got a girlfriend nobody else is coming on to you don't sweat it much but if there's five

00:50:06.540 guys propositioning you better treat her right or she's gonna go somewhere else um so we got to

00:50:14.940 whether it's post-independence or not try to get coastal access through british columbia i do

00:50:21.500 believe the negotiation it would still be tough would be a heck of a lot easier in a post-independence

00:50:25.740 scenario than currently because that's the thing with people too look we're not getting there now

00:50:29.020 anyway we really don't have much to lose anymore yeah there's if anybody really believes that mou is

00:50:34.060 going to lead to a pipeline i got a bridge to sell you but if we've got an independent alberta and then

00:50:39.660 suddenly bc's ignoring international trade laws on landlocked countries well then we shut off their

00:50:46.860 railway and how long would they sit with no containers shipped getting to toronto and montreal and eastern

00:50:54.460 markets and likewise stuff coming back towards them for the outward going on the port this would not last

00:51:00.220 long we would negotiate a deal and uh go from there we would have a lot more leverage independently

00:51:07.580 than what we're sitting on provincially because we don't have the ability to shut down these pipelines

00:51:11.900 because the government will enforce or railroads because the federal government will enforce on

00:51:16.060 the province of alberta but it won't enforce on the province of bc so uh changing that dynamic would i

00:51:21.500 think uh uh greatly expedite and hey we're not talking about shoving a pipe down bc's throats you

00:51:26.540 know we really need to get some education pipelines are benign they do less environmental damage than a road

00:51:32.380 yeah they really do they don't leak they they a roadway you're gonna have cars coming up and down

00:51:38.220 and running over the fluffy bunnies and the deer and it's gonna raise up dust and it's gonna bring

00:51:42.060 people in and hunters and pollution a pipeline's just a right away through the trees that a lot of

00:51:46.860 hikers hike across them and don't even know it was there and so we're not asking bc to take on

00:51:53.180 something all that bad and yes they should be paid and compensated for it there should be some degree

00:51:58.860 of return on having that further yeah we've got to make that clear to them too that we're not asking

00:52:04.060 you to do it out of the goodness of your hearts we want you guys to pocket some money out of this too

00:52:07.900 yeah um and those deals can be made but they can't be made in the current federation they really can't

00:52:12.860 absolutely yeah yeah yeah just the um yeah federation just kind of gives everyone a veto despite it

00:52:22.780 being built around you know avoiding that pretty much right yeah yeah and um yeah what was yeah what

00:52:31.260 okay so there's have been some interesting developments uh keith wilson has been talking

00:52:36.460 about this and i've also just as a like as like that the us's uh national security doctrine

00:52:44.300 as of late it's been like a really hot topic and sort of like um just like hemispheric dominance

00:52:52.780 right and i think like the issue that we're having right now like i think the us is like um

00:53:00.380 conjecture about like there being like a real issue like north you know in canada i guess in regards to

00:53:10.540 immigration and like very lax criminal laws and but um i think the way i see it is that

00:53:19.580 all this could have been preventable like all this could have been like scaled back for canada's sake

00:53:27.260 right not because of u.s strong arming or anything right but this this is where we've come to now

00:53:34.540 and like in a so of course you mentioned like um sort of like getting port access um to bc and that's

00:53:42.700 i've all i've said that as well like it doesn't matter how energy positive um the us admin is like

00:53:47.820 we always have to push those buttons like in every direction um but like how how do you think that

00:53:55.340 would pan out in a like like in an independent alberta and like a do you think that national

00:54:03.020 security doctrine is like temporary or like as long as the us has some kind of like hemispheric dominance

00:54:10.540 like over like the even like the canadian ports that that would still be a viable route or will it

00:54:18.220 always just be american kind of stuff for an independent alberta i guess well yeah there's

00:54:25.020 a lot kind of packed in there you know i i think if it was an independent alberta we'd kind of have it

00:54:29.500 easier because we have an easier border to control for ourselves yes so if we were getting um you know

00:54:36.220 if there were products or people that were coming into alberta and using alberta as a jumping

00:54:40.060 off point to going to the united states which is the concern being expressed a lot whether it's

00:54:44.460 fentanyl or illegal immigrants or gangs and things like that we are in a much better position to

00:54:50.220 control ourselves and take away at least that complaint from the part of the united states we

00:54:54.940 have four rail lines coming out of british columbia into alberta you know along with roadways uh that's

00:55:01.020 very easy border to control because you can't really get over those mountains uh easily through

00:55:07.260 other routes likewise to the north it's pretty barren uh saskatchewan's open but i mean how many

00:55:12.060 people are coming in from over there so that dynamic would change i think pretty quickly uh bc has that

00:55:19.740 risk because they have a big coastline there's a downside to having a coastline you can control that

00:55:25.100 you know it's not just what you're shipping out it's what's coming in so i i think we would receive

00:55:30.700 fewer complaints about the security risk that we present to the united states yes bc is the the

00:55:38.220 canadian ports are still a massive contingent and then do we check one percent of our containers coming

00:55:45.100 in i mean it's terrible what we do for for border control in canada uh by the same token and to be a

00:55:50.060 bit fair to the carney who i'm far from a fan of i don't know if anybody could have negotiated anything

00:55:55.420 with trump yeah um i think he does like to play up the risk i mean he doesn't really worry about

00:56:00.860 stats or facts or things like that he just kind of goes with what he feels is going to give him

00:56:05.900 leverage i mean we know realistically that mexico prevents presents far more uh security threat for

00:56:12.780 for people or or illicit goods coming across the border not to mention the american coastlines then

00:56:18.860 then the amount that canada has presented not that canada hasn't presented any we've we've had some

00:56:24.300 odious characters come from canada go in the states we've had some fentanyl come from canada

00:56:28.620 to go in the states but part of it's a political game perhaps you know more than a realistic one so

00:56:34.700 i let's say trump well boy you know to be realistic it's going to be five six years at the fastest when

00:56:40.220 alberta's fully independent uh if trump is still in power then we've got a really weird world world going on

00:56:45.900 yeah yeah but you think he doesn't like he's up with trapped yeah but i guess yeah i guess i guess

00:56:54.540 i guess vance is like the uprunner uh like most likely all right it depends on who wins right it's

00:57:01.260 it's up in the republicans yeah and um and yeah i guess it but i think that like that national security

00:57:08.380 doctrine like it's it's like a post trump thing the way like i see it and like a lot of people talk

00:57:12.940 about it maybe the strong army will be a bit less but like like you said i think being a strategic

00:57:18.780 partner with the us on that front is great right and one of the things in the um national like the

00:57:26.620 security document is that the us doesn't necessarily care so much about like the cultural impositions

00:57:34.940 that they've made in the past like oh like so so much of like um policy like leftist policy in canada

00:57:46.380 has been directed from the us you know from you know lobby groups not necessarily but like lots of

00:57:53.500 fundraisers and whatnot and um the the rockefellers i think at one point which is crazy but um

00:58:01.100 yeah like how do you how do you think albert like an independent alberta could or like buffalo maybe

00:58:08.380 like a pact like the the buffalo pact let's say between alberta and saskatchewan both being

00:58:13.980 independently how do you think um like in like a way of like like a bargain so to speak and like

00:58:20.860 appeasing the us how how could it still like form or like hold on to its identity right because identity

00:58:29.660 is a massive issue like the thing about like western canada is like i didn't know anything

00:58:35.340 about it until i joined the separatist cause to like talk to people like michael wagner and like

00:58:40.700 just the roots that exist here like which is like a issue in the public in public education and one of the

00:58:47.980 um goals that i have is to bolster that and like uncover it really there's so much stuff here like um

00:58:54.380 whether it like yeah like the cattle drive or like the the early settlers that came here from like

00:59:00.140 ukraine and like the the like the just like the politics of everything like i just recently learned

00:59:05.580 about the alberta provincial police like that was um from the 1917 to the 1930s like that that that like

00:59:14.940 alberta history is completely um like memory hold from uh the curriculum which wasn't always the case

00:59:22.940 i guess but um yeah one of the but like that kind of like holding on to um like a national identity

00:59:34.060 which is important right people i think yeah there are definitely ways to bolster it which is what i'm

00:59:40.220 working on right now and like with um different cohorts but um yeah like how do you how do you see that

00:59:47.340 the like the sort of like new u.s strategy while it is like very aggressive on like i guess securing

00:59:55.260 like the sort of like hemispheric dominance in terms of energy but like as long as um like immigration

01:00:03.260 and all these things are kept under control or like a nation is stable rather right unlike a lot of other

01:00:11.020 nations like you know venezuela i guess like how would that how would that bargain kind of work

01:00:18.380 for like a nation being able to actually preserve uh it's like identity being you know right across the

01:00:25.340 border it's challenging and we got to maintain our own identity that's uh and and what is our identity

01:00:33.340 it's not as distinct to say european country here we go france germany you got a linguistic difference

01:00:37.820 you got some very distinct cultural differences even though they're so close together really

01:00:43.420 somebody from southern alberta and somebody from northern montana the difference is not very big

01:00:48.060 whatsoever so distinguishing from that is going to be hard and that's something we've got to do

01:00:55.340 ourselves yeah something i see and as we said i traveled a lot i worked a lot in the states in the

01:01:00.540 south and the east and uh what i see in the west in western states and western canada and alberta

01:01:07.180 is we were always and still are a frontier province we're the place that people pick up and

01:01:12.140 go to to make a living our province keep growing in population but most of it is new people coming

01:01:17.980 in and it always has been but that's a type of person in and of itself that's a type of person who's

01:01:24.380 got some balls who's willing to take the chance and leave their home country or home province or

01:01:29.660 whatever it might be leave friends family comfort zones and make a future for themselves and they

01:01:35.340 want that's why we're so crabby over here because these are individualists these are people who

01:01:39.980 just want to be unrestrained they just want the government to leave me alone and let me do this

01:01:44.380 for myself and my family yeah and we need to build our identity around that so it's a harder one to

01:01:50.300 build it's not as simple as building one around language or religion or race because we have all

01:01:56.700 sorts of albertans with backgrounds of different races languages and religions yeah and it's not a

01:02:03.020 singular thing to bind by go back that's part of why they could do it because they got that one

01:02:07.900 linguistic bond but we can do it with that cultural attitude as i said that that type of person who

01:02:15.900 uh again an individualist who still wants to you know care for their family care for their nation

01:02:21.820 care for their neighbors but they also want government to leave them the hell alone yeah a difficult

01:02:26.620 balance so if we can identify that culture a little more and celebrate it a little bit more and

01:02:31.260 get people feel it that makes it harder for an overwhelming american even uh wave to to kind of

01:02:37.260 overwhelm a province because you've got a population saying well hang on you know i love you guys you're

01:02:41.820 great neighbors you're great customers you're great friends but we are distinct from you yeah yeah yeah

01:02:46.780 i guess yeah what you say is true but i also disagree in the sense of um like not kind of having

01:02:55.260 somewhat at least like rigid like like a state religion like not like a fundamentalist kind of

01:03:02.700 thing like i was born in iran like like you see like the islamist like fundamentalist stuff that goes

01:03:09.340 under has turned like the like the largest like the biggest plurality of the population completely away

01:03:16.700 from religion right sort of state mandated stuff but like i like the way i think of like alberta just

01:03:23.260 reading into some of these things of like yes being a pioneer province but also kind of like falling

01:03:29.980 under the um like colonial kind of british uh aspirations like under dieffen baker especially

01:03:38.940 like that was like a very unifying thing for all of canada i think yeah that definitely places alberta

01:03:45.340 in a very unique place to have like the kind of um customs kind of culture like a state thing and

01:03:53.100 i think i do think that is genuinely important and like what you described yeah like we can

01:03:57.900 definitely filter out by um like immigration policy right like what smith is doing right now

01:04:03.180 which is great like sort of like making sure that the people that are like coming here aren't just

01:04:08.860 there for the benefits and that like there is like a real motivation to do work but yeah just

01:04:15.420 seeing like the degradation of canada like i genuinely do think that a lot of it is um

01:04:24.540 and i say this as like a visible minority right but that being said like for example

01:04:31.820 um like my parents right and like people in iran like they're very very um proud of like the argument

01:04:40.460 like kind of history like say 2000 years years ago like the sort of pre-islamic kind of stuff and

01:04:47.020 that kind of that really binds them right as a people and i think that kind of those kinds of like

01:04:54.460 like defined roots are important obviously like i don't i was and i understand that i personally like

01:05:01.260 for example say like the um like i don't i'm not a descendants of the settlers that came here or the

01:05:09.580 indigenous or the metis or none of that but i think to still have that kind of heritage backbone is

01:05:15.820 like extremely important and that's been the issue for in canada right like the the land claims that

01:05:22.540 are like the kind of um just just like breaking down like all the good aspects of like uh like i guess

01:05:31.020 development here that happened whether it was under colonial rule or uh settlers and it's just been

01:05:39.020 yeah i think it's like a very bad view of history like and like i when i like talk to

01:05:47.260 yeah when i mentioned like the persian history specifically right like my parents they very

01:05:51.580 it's kind of like where like you fall on the other side of it where like they speak of it as it was like

01:05:56.460 extremely angelic and like you know uh very uh purposeful which it is obviously but like as someone

01:06:06.700 i know that it's a bit more nuanced than that like when you're like a empire that big like going in

01:06:12.220 like you were conquering a lot of stuff pillaging right but that doesn't detract from the positives

01:06:18.300 is like my greater point that doesn't detract from the fact that like people should feel like bound to

01:06:25.900 that kind of heritage right and so i guess what what do you think of that kind of um like more like solid kind

01:06:33.580 of based on yeah it's a harder comparison because as you said i mean the persian history is rooted in

01:06:39.820 thousands of years that that's overcame beyond religion i mean bigger you know uh comings and

01:06:46.140 goings threats whether even to the ottoman empire or or and romans and you name it over the the millennia

01:06:52.700 we don't have a history like that you know okay calperta is a hundred and some years old

01:06:56.460 yeah uh what i mostly want to at least my thoughts are and there's the thing as you said we've got to

01:07:02.620 define an identity we don't have an easy quick one like that as there is in in iran or i i also just

01:07:11.500 want to make sure things stay secular and that you know there's a concern i get a bit with the app

01:07:17.180 where they lean a little too hard uh with the the christian aspect was certainly nothing is christians

01:07:22.140 and that's the majority of the province but um i was in israel in october and and i mean you know

01:07:30.380 the hornet's nest is going on over there and then the worst part of israel we're not hearing enough

01:07:34.060 about isn't just gaza which is a mess but it's the west bank which is a hodgepodge at least gaza

01:07:41.260 gaza's one walled city of palestinians stuck next to egypt and israel you can kind of deal with that

01:07:47.020 through isolation and you know not successfully and that's a whole different we could spend more hours on

01:07:50.940 that but the west bank you've got a christian population you've got a muslim population

01:07:56.380 you've got jewish settlers coming in and those three different peoples all fighting with each other

01:08:03.900 yeah because of the faith portion of it yeah uh and and i don't see where resolution is going to come

01:08:12.060 in that complicated mess of an area and that's another area with thousands of years of history

01:08:16.460 yeah but it's the religion that's making them come at each other's throats yeah but i guess the

01:08:20.620 broader point is that that that kind of speaks to the fact that like for example um like i personally

01:08:28.940 uh like i sympathize more with the palestinian side obviously but i recognize just like

01:08:35.180 the insane like influx of you know people that have these ethnic or not ethnic but religious ties

01:08:43.340 and how that's like spilling onto the streets doesn't that kind of make for a

01:08:47.260 uh like especially for a country that you you kind of have control over like an immigration immigration

01:08:53.980 for right going into beyond doesn't that make the case for like a like a kind of a mandate or at least

01:09:01.500 to at least mandate assimilation to some extent for like people coming in like under like a state

01:09:08.700 religion because what's like one of the the biggest issue with canada right now is the doctrine like

01:09:14.780 the multicultural doctrine is that it's made everyone unassimilable pretty much like it's and i speak

01:09:21.980 to like i speak to this right like i didn't it's still crazy to me how like i didn't know the background

01:09:27.980 of this of alberta pretty much right before i uh i started going into the separatist cause you know because

01:09:35.100 of uh pros like reasons for my future right like those kinds of economic uh grievances which has always

01:09:43.020 been uh the backbone of western separatism but still i think yeah like what like the stuff that's going

01:09:49.980 on it just like canada like a an albertan nation state that kind of like call like calls for like

01:09:57.820 the kind of um on and off immigration that even reformers advocated for a lot which is very taboo

01:10:04.940 now like it's crazy like if you go against like the like the cultural mosaic kind of thing of like okay

01:10:12.220 let's like mandate immigration so that like at least yeah if we are bringing people in from like

01:10:18.060 completely different backgrounds at least we have like these periods where we like they are they

01:10:23.580 integrate or i guess assimilates has turned into a dirty word unfortunately but yeah i just i just see

01:10:30.300 that as being very important i guess i guess i mean i don't know it's a huge huge issue especially as an

01:10:36.940 immigrant reliant uh culture and that's the reality of us i i i look at you know we can have people

01:10:43.260 from totally different cultures who can still assimilate very comfortably while maintaining

01:10:48.060 their cultural background go to any chinatown in uh you know a western city and they faced a lot of

01:10:53.500 challenges from intolerant canadians a hundred years ago and even less but they still they're not

01:10:59.740 marching in the streets and fighting battles with other aspects of beijing and so on here they realize

01:11:05.660 we're canadian we're chinese canadian fine we still speak mandarin and uh you know have tight

01:11:11.820 communities but we're not going to make waves in the new country we're in either we understand

01:11:15.980 we're here we don't practice that over here yes uh we if we're going to bring people

01:11:22.060 and that's a tough filter to have yeah but have them well the thing is you can filter here and you

01:11:28.300 yeah you can you can filter implicitly right as passively i guess which is what i like about the app is

01:11:34.780 is it at least i don't like the the whole thing about the zero income tax like when i hear that

01:11:40.540 as like a gen z that's like that's that screams like snake oil to me even if it is plausible in

01:11:45.900 like the distant future yeah you don't want to oversell it but um like one of the great things about

01:11:51.340 like the immigration policy that they've uh well this is obviously going to be negotiated by the

01:11:55.820 government and whatever like they're going to be in charge of this but um like just like sort of

01:12:00.700 having like a putting an emphasis on like canadian born citizens and then from there you go to like

01:12:07.660 commonwealth and like you have like a tiered not like a not tiered per se as in like but

01:12:15.420 like backstops right of where you go from where like one isn't met and like i think i don't know that's

01:12:22.060 i think yeah just looking at canada's history and how that's usually been done i think i i this is

01:12:26.940 my opinion obviously i think that's just a it's a great way to go but like without like marginalizing

01:12:33.820 um like other communities right but yeah yeah it's it's tough because i mean it'd be great that

01:12:40.940 there's people of you know the more similar cultures if you're going to move down a checklist we can

01:12:44.620 certainly find them i mean an australian is much more similar to us or even a person from the uk

01:12:50.700 than than somebody from from mongolia yeah uh but some of it comes on where our needs are too and

01:12:56.380 things how many of those communities are offering immigrants who are coming in that might be accredited

01:13:01.900 medical practitioners that we really need if we didn't have india for doctors in canada

01:13:07.820 are already hailing ailing healthcare system would be doing uh horrifically uh you know we'd really so

01:13:14.140 we've got to balance that that i know what you're saying you know try to bring more of a easily

01:13:20.380 culturally integrated person with the skills though that are coming in because other parts of the world

01:13:24.700 might be offering more of that human resource yeah yeah but i think that that is also like a

01:13:33.820 that is a misconception like yes like india for example is a massive landmass and massive populace

01:13:40.460 but the the fact that like there aren't um like especially like right now like the commonwealth

01:13:46.780 like what i see for an independent albert like the the rest of the commonwealth is just drained

01:13:52.300 like in terms of as a populace like people just want to leave it's already happening in canada so like

01:13:59.500 i guess like my line of thinking is right there are you know lots of trained people right that have

01:14:05.260 that are much more like integrated that are are now willing to leave like say independence happens

01:14:11.180 um in like the near future right and it's not going to be like a it's we don't just cut

01:14:16.140 all ties instantly but like once you get control over like immigration to like to sort of capitalize on

01:14:25.020 that portion of like what's going on in the world right now oh yeah i mean if you can make yourself an

01:14:30.620 economic powerhouse we've got all of the the parts of the formula to make that happen between natural

01:14:36.940 resources a generally educated peaceful population you know a reasonably decent work ethic we've got a

01:14:43.020 whole lot of positives and powerful things and if in theory we built this nation and it turned into a

01:14:48.380 very uh you know economically strong place the applications for others from everywhere in the

01:14:53.820 world are going to be coming in like crazy they're going to be stacked up you know 10 feet high yeah and

01:14:58.300 we can afford to be selective we can afford to take from the top and that those measures aren't

01:15:04.940 just the economic qualifications it's the cultural compatibility yes it's the the other aspects they're

01:15:11.420 bringing to the table uh and and we would have to weigh those because we would all be better for it

01:15:17.580 and also i think in zero tolerance if somebody shows up here and their first six months here we see

01:15:22.780 them out you know uh smashing windows at a radio station because uh they said something bad about the

01:15:27.900 calistani cause you know what yeah you should go back to yeah india fight your freaking battle over

01:15:33.740 there we don't need it here and we'll bring somebody else in who wants to obviously settle better here

01:15:38.540 and not bring their baggage into uh we've got enough oh the baggage is such a oh it's crazy it's not

01:15:44.620 just the cal this is just the calistani stuff it's like it's implicit i was just pointing at one you

01:15:50.060 know of course it's like the stuff that i've been hearing about like the caste system and how it's like

01:15:55.420 made its way into like uh toronto school boards is insane to me like yeah it's brutal so so it's

01:16:03.740 kind of two phases it's it's being much more selective with who we let in in the first place

01:16:07.580 and then not being afraid of kicking them the hell out if they aren't absolutely uh proper likewise i

01:16:13.100 don't care if they came out of scotland if they were running organized crime in one of our cities send

01:16:18.300 them the hell back to scotland yeah we don't need it yeah that's not what what i like about albert is

01:16:23.340 that's not a taboo issue here like at all like it may be like an inner city like edmonton uh but

01:16:29.980 otherwise it's like nope that's the thing like smith has talked about having a referendum on whether

01:16:35.900 illegal immigrants should be deported like that's crazy like why do we there is they're already

01:16:41.260 illegal yeah it's like it's trying to fight back like the taboos that exist in canada and it's just

01:16:48.940 oh i hate it i hate it so much but like i feel for the people who did all the proper channels

01:16:55.020 and checked all the boxes and then they watch somebody say ah we'll just let's throw those

01:16:59.180 rules aside for you and and we'll just let you settle in you know we'll give you a separate

01:17:03.740 sentencing so you don't have to risk deportation because you're molesting girls like good lord and

01:17:08.940 that adds to prejudice that overflows on everybody else as well and it adds to the division we've got a

01:17:14.380 lot of opportunity though so i mean i i kind of running out of time here a bit yeah oh good yeah

01:17:18.860 yeah oh definitely yeah that's that being being able to select on just on the basis of like having

01:17:25.660 so many applicants out of like a strong economy yeah that's definitely yeah that's something that should

01:17:29.740 be pursued but yeah so i guess i'll we'll end it there because it went on for like an hour 15 i think

01:17:37.100 maybe a bit more yeah but anyways thank you so much for coming on and uh yeah carving out the

01:17:41.660 appreciate the invitation yeah it was a great time yes anyways have a good rest of your day and uh

01:17:49.580 thanks everyone for watching

The Alberta Project - January 02, 2026

Interview with Cory Morgan┃AB Project

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