The Candice Malcolm Show - DEFUND Foreign Aid

00:00:00.000 Hi, I'm Candice Malcolm, and this is The Candice Malcolm Show. Happy Friday, everyone. We have a

00:00:12.620 great show put together for you today. We're going to be joined in a little bit by Preston Manning

00:00:17.480 to talk about Canada and the future of North America. Before we get to that, I just have to

00:00:23.280 tell you about this unbelievable story that is breaking overnight and has been uncovered by the

00:00:30.440 many, many wonderful people on the internet that exposes one thing, that our government is lying

00:00:36.120 to us. So they're taxing Canadians, they're taxing more than ever, taking more and more of our hard

00:00:42.040 earned money away, and they're wasting it on programs that are patently ridiculous and woke 0.83

00:00:48.340 and absurd, even for this liberal government. And of course, as soon as Canadians start to notice 0.84

00:00:56.060 this ridiculous waste, the government tries to back down, try to hide their scandalous spending, 0.71

00:01:01.700 and try to lie about what it is that they found. Well, not so fast, because we are on to them. 0.95

00:01:07.800 So here is what happened. It started when Conservative MP from Calgary Shubh Majumdar posted the following

00:01:14.480 on X. This happened yesterday afternoon at around 1.49 Eastern on Thursday. And he wrote this,

00:01:22.020 NDP liberals have wiped Global Affairs Canada's project database clean, hiding where your taxpayer

00:01:29.060 dollars are going. What was once public is now erased. No transparency, no accountability.

00:01:37.360 Really, truly unbelievable. And so to that tweet, I asked the following question. I said,

00:01:42.780 what kind of crazy, woke nonsense are they funding and trying to hide? Well, at 2.10 p.m. yesterday, 0.91

00:01:52.900 our friends over at Canada Proud posted this story as news. This is what they wrote. Breaking.

00:01:59.740 Global Affairs Canada has suddenly wiped their entire public database of foreign aid spending,

00:02:05.900 and the data is no longer available to the public. This is a big deal, folks. This is a big story.

00:02:13.680 So two hours later, two hours after Canada Proud posted that, two hours, two and a half hours after

00:02:19.760 Shubh Majumdar posted on X, this is at 4.19 p.m. Eastern time yesterday. Development Canada,

00:02:27.780 which is the Department of Global Affairs Canada's X account, dedicated to international development.

00:02:34.880 Well, this is what they posted to try to clarify the matters. They wrote,

00:02:39.100 Global Affairs Canada's project browser is currently experiencing technical difficulties,

00:02:45.220 and we are working to resolve this issue. The claims that it was taken down on purpose are false.

00:02:53.500 Okay, convenient timing, wouldn't you say? At a time when Elon Musk is exposing the absolute rot

00:03:01.440 and ideological radicalism of the programs over at USAID, suddenly the Canadian equivalent just happens

00:03:10.500 to have technical difficulties and their website is down. And this is when everything starts to backfire

00:03:17.400 on the Canadian government and its woke Department of Global Affairs. You see, when a community note

00:03:24.700 was later slapped on that Canada Proud post, which by the way was going viral, it now has over 1.1 million

00:03:31.380 views. Well, that community note, which you can see here, posted a link to the correct website

00:03:39.320 containing all the information that we were looking for. And folks, this is why I just love the internet.

00:03:47.500 Because as soon as that community note was slapped on to try to correct the record and say it was all

00:03:52.140 just misinformation. Well, as soon as we got that link, the internet sleuths went to work. And I love

00:03:58.860 this. Dozens of independent citizen journalists jumped into action and began uncovering the crazy

00:04:05.960 woke nonsense. And oh, is there a lot of it. So just a sample of the craziness that we are funding

00:04:13.140 with our tax dollars under the guise of foreign aid, $7.2 million for gender responsive health care

00:04:21.000 in the Philippines, $1 billion to the Gates Foundation's vaccine alliance, $44 million to a

00:04:29.660 climate food system fund in Luxembourg, $10 million for abortions in London, England, oh my goodness,

00:04:38.100 $13 million for a rehab center in Bangladesh. Those are just a few of the dozens and dozens of examples.

00:04:45.480 And we'll get to more, I promise. As True North's Clayton Demain dug up, we also give over a million

00:04:52.520 dollars a year to the BBC, to Britain's state broadcaster. I guess bribing the journalists

00:04:58.540 in Canada wasn't enough for the Justin Trudeau government. So they have to bribe the British 0.99

00:05:03.760 state broadcaster. It makes no sense. And again, there's so much more, which we will get to in a

00:05:09.260 minute. But first, let me just say that in an attempt to do damage control, Global Affairs handed

00:05:15.600 us a link to the database of all the incredible, stupid, wasteful, perverse, and absolutely idiotic 1.00

00:05:23.180 things that they are spending our money on. Now we have the list, we have the database, and all we have 1.00

00:05:29.340 to do is defund it. And that is why today I am calling on the government to defund foreign aid,

00:05:36.000 defund Development Canada, Global Affairs' foreign aid program that has been exposed as nothing more

00:05:43.000 than embarrassing and wasteful, and an arm that promotes a twisted, woke agenda all over the world.

00:05:49.840 Defund the entire Global Affairs Canada's Department of International Assistance, which has wasted over

00:05:56.580 $52 billion from the fiscal year 2017 to 2023. My goodness, that money should be spent in Canada,

00:06:05.600 not on these ridiculous programs. So folks, help me send this message to our elites. Head on over 0.94

00:06:11.480 to my website right now, www.candicemalcolm.com, and sign this petition. Let's end the wasteful spending,

00:06:19.780 end the ridiculous propaganda, and stop pushing this twisted, woke ideology on the world's poor

00:06:27.380 and needy. Again, head on over to my website, candicemalcolm.com, sign the petition. We're going

00:06:33.920 to send this message. Enough is enough, okay? We don't want to fund this stuff anymore. We don't

00:06:38.940 like the ideas. We don't like the ideology. We don't want to do woke anymore. And we certainly don't want

00:06:44.180 to be promoting this all over the world. It really is embarrassing. It's embarrassing, folks. This is what

00:06:49.340 people all over the world will come to know Canada for, that Canada is the country that still believes 0.99

00:06:55.200 in this ridiculous, perverse nonsense. So I'm going to show you the link to the actual website 0.92

00:07:02.920 that I'm talking about. Sean, if we can pull that up for a second. Let me just find it here. This is

00:07:11.200 the website that I'm talking about. And if you just take a look at the kinds of things that they are

00:07:17.040 funding, even just the way they describe themselves, right? Canada's effort to address global issues.

00:07:21.920 So the purpose of this department are actions to promote human dignity and a more just, inclusive,

00:07:29.280 sustainable, and safe world, okay? So the purpose is diversity, equity, inclusion. And they're

00:07:36.200 promoting this all over the world on behalf of Canada. Throw that back up, Sean. Just look at some

00:07:42.500 of the things that they are doing. Canada's, the most requested right here on the right-hand side,

00:07:47.900 you can see it. Canada's feminist international assistance policy. I mean, is anybody else sick 0.90

00:07:56.520 and tired of this stuff? This is not how I want to be represented. This is not how I want people to

00:08:02.720 think about Canadians, that we're pushing woke, intersectional feminist nonsense. Enough is enough. 1.00

00:08:09.100 We really need to defund this entire department. And I hope you'll sign my petition so we can send

00:08:16.420 this message to the elites, to the conservatives, to the liberals, whoever's going to be the next

00:08:20.680 prime minister, whoever's going to win the next election. They need to put this in their sights

00:08:26.160 and just get rid of it. Enough is enough. Just pull the plug. Do what Elon Musk is doing. They're

00:08:30.760 creating a perfect model and example for us, and we should do the exact same thing. So I want to

00:08:36.460 highlight some of these wonderful sleuths, the citizen journalists, the independent journalists

00:08:42.020 on X. So there's one account here called votecanada.com, and they shared an archive snapshot

00:08:50.000 of the database, giving plenty of examples, $75 million for an inclusive economic recovery,

00:08:57.820 $751,000 for a community approach to gender equitable education, $7.2 million,

00:09:06.460 for those gender reassignment surgeries in the Philippines. Another wonderful account here

00:09:11.180 called Freedom of Goose. You got to follow this guy. He is hilarious. He writes, you dumb asses

00:09:16.600 think you are smart by deleting access to the international funds section on Canada.ca. Well, 0.99

00:09:21.520 you're not that bright. I got the whole data dump into a spreadsheet, a spreadsheet, be quick

00:09:27.540 and smart next time. And so that account continues to give more information of just the kind of

00:09:33.120 things that we have seen. There's a 91% spending increase in international assistance between 2021

00:09:40.500 and 2023. So help me understand why they're doubling their budget at a time where Canadians

00:09:48.820 are struggling. Canadians are using the food bank at record numbers. Canadians, more and more Canadians,

00:09:54.040 more than half the country is less than $200 away from not being able to pay their bills.

00:09:58.960 And we have something like 40% of Canadians are worried that if there's an interest rate hike

00:10:04.920 increase, interest rate increase at the banks, they won't be able to afford their mortgages anymore,

00:10:09.580 and they might lose their house. And meanwhile, we have our foreign aid budget doubling in that

00:10:14.160 exact same time. It makes no sense. I'll continue reading here. Ukraine has received the most of any 1.00

00:10:20.340 country with $5.8 billion in funds, $5.8 billion between 2017 and 2023, $18 billion going to Africa

00:10:31.080 during that same time. Another one of these great YouTube accounts, or sorry, X accounts you should

00:10:36.480 follow, TableSalt13, writes that there has been a $10 million contribution for something called

00:10:44.420 actions buy-in for women to adapt climate change from Global Affairs Canada, that $44,000 climate fund

00:10:52.300 in Luxembourg. And Ryan Gerritsen, another great X account to follow, writes that our government has

00:10:58.880 given Gavi, the vaccine alliance founded by the Gates Foundation, almost a billion dollars. It truly,

00:11:05.880 truly is unbelievable. And you know, you look down at what's happening with Trump in the States,

00:11:11.200 and Elon Musk, sorry, with President Trump, President Trump and his efforts to basically

00:11:17.160 just get rid of so much wasteful spending that's happening in the United States. And seeing what

00:11:23.000 Elon Musk has come up with, Elon Musk has basically recommended that they completely defund USAID.

00:11:28.840 Like he said, you know, you're looking for a few worms in a bad apple, and then you open it up and

00:11:34.240 it's all worms. There's no apple. It's just all worms. And you have to get rid of all of it. So there's

00:11:38.760 been a lot of really funny stories that have been making the rounds in the US. You know, you had $15

00:11:44.840 million for condoms to the Taliban. This is through USAID. $400,000 to promote atheism in Nepal. $47,000

00:11:55.600 transgender opera to Colombia from the State Department. $32,000 LGBTQ comic book in Peru. $70,000

00:12:05.380 for an Irish musical promoting DEI. And not to be outdone has $7 million for a BIPOC speaker series

00:12:15.420 in Canada that was all funded by the Americans. No wonder they're getting rid of their program. And

00:12:21.960 you know, it really is more than enough evidence that we need to do the same. Say it one final time,

00:12:27.960 head on over to my website, CandiceMalcolm.com, sign that petition, help me send the message that we need

00:12:32.600 to defund foreign aid in our country. Okay, I want to show one clip before I get to Preston Manning.

00:12:39.580 And this is of Justin Trudeau. Justin Trudeau was speaking at a Black History Month reception

00:12:44.380 in Ottawa. And things got a little weird. This is this is Justin Trudeau, I guess,

00:12:49.920 letting his hair down in the last few days of work as Prime Minister of this country. And let's play that

00:12:55.200 clip. One of the things that comes with knowing that you're on a countdown clock to your last day

00:13:02.960 means you get to be really ruthless about the things you want to do, and the things that you

00:13:10.260 don't want to do. So there it is, folks, I guess, be prepared. Trudeau is going to get ruthless. I

00:13:20.020 wonder what he thinks the last nine years have been like. Now I guess he's going to show us what

00:13:24.720 he really believes, what he really wants to do. Probably won't be defunding foreign aid,

00:13:29.120 but that's okay, because he'll be gone soon enough. And hopefully the next government will listen.

00:13:34.000 Okay, let's get to the big interview. I recorded this earlier with Preston Manning. And for those of

00:13:40.480 you who don't know, Preston Manning is the founder and leader of the Reform Party, which was active in

00:13:45.880 Canada from 1987 to 2000. He represented the constituency of Calgary Southwest in the House

00:13:52.000 of Commons from 1993 until 2002. He served as the leader of the opposition from 1997 to 2000. And

00:14:01.060 then he founded the Manning Foundation for Democratic Education. He's really just an absolutely incredible

00:14:08.020 leader in Canada. We have so much that we can learn from him. And even, you know, in his retirement,

00:14:13.140 he's still active in government. He recently chaired the review of Alberta's COVID-19 response

00:14:18.880 and the national citizens inquiry. Did an incredible job. We get to all of it. This is really a wonderful

00:14:24.900 interview. We talk about North America, about Trump. We talk about energy security and national

00:14:29.860 security, the things that Canada needs to do if we're a serious country, if we wanted to take

00:14:34.780 seriously our sovereignty and our independence. These are the things we need to do. And then later in the

00:14:39.980 interview, we talk about the COVID response, how it diminished trust in institutions, and what

00:14:45.720 Preston thinks that Canadians can do to fight back and to restore faith in our institutions. It's a great

00:14:51.060 interview. And it was really my pleasure to conduct it. So without further delay, I will show you this

00:14:57.060 interview now with myself and Preston Manning. Preston, thank you so much for joining the podcast.

00:15:04.660 Yes, good to talk to you. It's great. Great to see you. And I'm really looking forward to this

00:15:10.620 conversation. So first of all, let's start with Donald Trump and the tariffs that he threatened

00:15:16.360 and then reversed. So, you know, right off the top, what is your takeaway on all of this?

00:15:21.320 Well, I think it's necessary to go back to square one. What was the first instance in which he linked,

00:15:28.640 even mentioned tariffs on Canada and Mexico? This goes back to November 2019, when he was

00:15:36.920 president the first time. And he mentioned tariffs as a threat to try to get Canada and Mexico to be

00:15:46.500 serious about stopping the illegal movement of people and drugs across the border into the United

00:15:54.600 States from Canada and Mexico. That was what the threat was linked to. So it seems to me the

00:16:01.620 starting point, and Premier Smith has made this point over and over again, would be to tighten up

00:16:07.760 the border and stop illegal movement of drugs and people across that border from Canada or anything

00:16:14.460 connected with it. And if the prime minister and the premiers are getting together, the first thing

00:16:19.840 on their agenda should not be talking about tariffs. It should be talking, here's what we are going to

00:16:26.020 do. Here's what we are doing to stop that illegal movement of drugs and people. And I think this

00:16:34.680 business of getting off onto the tariff thing, when it was the illegal movement of drugs and people,

00:16:40.240 it was the thing that triggered this, is a big mistake.

00:16:43.800 Well, certainly. And I mean, we saw everybody jump into action. So going back to last Saturday,

00:16:49.440 when Trump came out and said, yes, it's going to be a 25% tariff, 10% on energy, which I think you can 0.99

00:16:56.080 credit that to Danielle Smith and the advocacy diplomacy that she did, that oil was only going 0.99

00:17:01.940 to be 10%. Everything else was 25%. Trudeau instantly jumped in and said that they were going to retaliate

00:17:08.660 with our own 25%. Now, luckily, we avoided all that, or at least for now, because Trump did just

00:17:13.620 say that it's a 30-day pause and that we'll be revisiting it in March. By then, I think we'll have

00:17:20.080 a new prime minister, Preston. But I want to point to your essay that you wrote in the National Post

00:17:26.480 on January 30th, where you said Canada's response to Trump needs common sense, not mindless hysterics.

00:17:33.320 So I think you would, you said that the political and media establishment got off on the wrong foot

00:17:39.620 by responding foolishly rather than sensibly. Now, I just want to read a little bit from this,

00:17:44.960 because I think you make such a good point here that is not being made elsewhere. You wrote that

00:17:49.200 Trump is a businessman and a dealmaker. Common sense further suggests bringing a positive response

00:17:54.960 to an item which clearly is on Trump's agenda, which also happens to be very much in Canada's

00:18:00.540 interest, energy security. This is a subject dear to Trump's heart, referenced in his inaugural address

00:18:06.320 and a front on which Canada can lead with its strengths, not its fears. And then you go on to

00:18:12.480 say, thus, surely common sense suggests that the most important component of Canada's response to

00:18:17.700 Trump, the Trump administration should be making North America more self-sufficient, especially with

00:18:23.300 respect to energy. I didn't hear very many people making this case in this point. But it's so obvious that

00:18:30.580 Canada and the United States need to be energy secure. So why don't you elaborate on that a little more?

00:18:35.540 Well, and yes, from Canada's standpoint, what is the one front on which we are stronger and bigger than the

00:18:42.060 United States? It's not population that we, they got a bigger population than us. It's not financial resources,

00:18:49.000 they got more financial resources than us. It's not, we don't have the smartest government, that's

00:18:53.480 certainly the case. But what we do have, because we're the second largest nation on the face of the

00:19:00.200 earth, area wise, we have the largest or second largest stock of natural resources. That is Canada's

00:19:09.080 strength. And it seems to me the second item on any agenda in dealing with the United States after

00:19:16.440 cleaning up this border question is to say, what can we do to make North America more

00:19:23.800 sufficient, self-sufficient, which is what Trump has talked about, and particularly self-sufficient in

00:19:30.680 energy. And that's an area where we lead with our strengths, not our weaknesses. Ontario, Quebec,

00:19:39.560 and BC particularly have a capacity to export much more electricity to the United States. Alberta,

00:19:45.800 and Saskatchewan, of course, have the petroleum resources. Ultimately, no matter what Trump says,

00:19:52.280 that North America will not be self-sufficient in petroleum without the exploitation of the

00:19:57.160 Athabasca oil sands. So that, that's our strengths. And so it seems to me, if we're developing an agenda

00:20:04.680 for talking to Trump, and you notice in his interviews, he uses the word deal about every

00:20:10.440 five minutes. Let's make a deal. Let's make a deal on Gaza. Let's make a deal in the Ukraine. Let's make a 0.85

00:20:16.200 deal. He's a deal maker. So our second item, if we want to lead with our strengths, seems to me to be

00:20:24.440 on this area of energy self-sufficiency in which Canada's got a great deal to offer. And let's not

00:20:29.960 talk about tariffs. Let's talk about how to make this continent energy self-sufficient. This is getting,

00:20:35.800 I'm showing my age on this, but the first time I heard the phrase continental energy security

00:20:42.840 was from J. Howard Pugh with the Sun Oil Company back in the early 1960s. Pugh developed that first

00:20:50.920 oil sands plant in Fort McMurray. He was 80 years old at the time. He was one of the richest men in the

00:20:57.320 United States. You might ask him, what is this old guy doing up in Fort McMurray? He didn't need the

00:21:04.920 money. The Sun Shipbuilding Company manufactured a lot of the tankers that were used to haul

00:21:15.000 oil in the First and Second World War. Pugh was familiar with how many of those tankers had been

00:21:22.520 sunk by submarine traffic and so forth. And he was convinced that North America was vulnerable

00:21:29.560 from an energy standpoint, particularly a petroleum standpoint. He was going to go

00:21:34.120 let the Texan boys go and find the conventional oil. He was going to go find the unconventional oil

00:21:39.320 and develop it. So this is a subject that's been around for a long, long time. And it seems to me

00:21:45.240 it's very much in Trump's mind and it's something that Canada should cater to. It ought to be the second 0.98

00:21:50.520 item on our agenda and talking with them. Well, I agree that the most important issue is

00:21:56.200 immigration and cleaning up the drugs. I know that Pierre Polyev is trying to hit that straight on with

00:22:02.520 declaring that he would impose life sentences upon fentanyl dealers and kingpins in the drug war.

00:22:09.880 But when it comes to energy security, Preston, I want to ask you because if it was an easy solution,

00:22:14.520 I think we would have done it already. Obviously, Justin Trudeau's priority and agenda was towards the

00:22:20.360 environment and making sure that everything was green. But it's led to a point where Canada now

00:22:24.760 imports oil from the United States, Saudi Arabia and Nigeria that were not energy sufficient even in

00:22:31.640 our own country, let alone as a continent. So how can we fix this and how can we actually make it so

00:22:38.280 that we don't have to import oil? Well, first of all, we have to permit and encourage pipeline

00:22:44.280 development in this country to be able to get Western resources to Eastern Canada. This has been stalled or

00:22:50.040 objected to or obstructed by the Trudeau government and by the Quebec government. So getting the movement

00:23:00.440 of petroleum in our own country would be an item I think that you're referring to. The other point is

00:23:08.040 that the last people to make these arguments in Washington are the Trudeau gang. Trump thinks of

00:23:17.880 Trudeau as a weak, narcissistic, lame duck leader. He's got no credibility there. Freeland is, in Trump's 1.00

00:23:27.240 view, if he gave any thought to it, is the Canadian equivalent of Kamala Harris. Jolie, as a foreign

00:23:36.600 minister, is considered a joke by our own foreign affairs people, let alone the Americans. Guy Beau is

00:23:43.400 considered to be a climate change fanatic. These are people that ought to be sent on a cruise to

00:23:53.640 Antarctica for the next six months and don't let them get anywhere near Washington. And this gets

00:24:00.760 back to your point. There needs to be a change of government and get a government that is going to

00:24:06.680 be credible with the Canadian people in dealing with Trump. And the sooner that can happen, the better.

00:24:12.920 But even since all of this news came out and we saw a newfound approach, it seemed like all

00:24:18.520 the parties suddenly wanted to break down interprovincial trade barriers and everybody was

00:24:22.680 suddenly all in favour of trying to figure out pipelines. Even in that scenario, the Quebec Premier

00:24:28.760 still came out and said no to Energy East pipelines. So how do we get something like that approved when you

00:24:35.160 have sort of veto power by interests in Quebec? Well, I guess maybe the first place is to appeal

00:24:42.440 to Quebec's own interests. Is Quebec interested in exporting more power to the United States as part of

00:24:49.960 the continental energy security? If it wants cooperation from the federal government of the

00:24:54.440 rest of the country with respect to that, then it's going to have to cooperate with respect to the

00:24:58.360 government of petroleum. The worry in Quebec is that that government is in a lot of trouble too.

00:25:05.560 If there's an election, provincial election next year, you're liable to get a separatist government

00:25:11.720 elected in Quebec, which is even more opposed to pipeline development. So that's going to be a real

00:25:17.400 internal problem for Canada and the next government, no matter who it is.

00:25:22.120 Further to this idea about resource development, it was interesting. Steve Bannon, who used to be a

00:25:28.280 close advisor to Donald Trump, he was on with Global News. I want to play part of this clip because

00:25:34.760 so Steve Bannon, I'll set it up. He's a US media executive, political strategist, former chief

00:25:41.080 strategist for Donald Trump. And he said that Canada and the Arctic has been thrust into the centre of a

00:25:47.800 geopolitical war between Russia, China, and the United States. And so whether we like it or not,

00:25:53.960 Canada is the centre of that. And we may choose to say we don't want to align ourselves with America,

00:26:00.520 but the reality is if we don't, you have China and Russia knocking at the door. So let's play this clip,

00:26:06.920 it's a bit longer, it's 45 seconds, but here he is explaining why Canada is so important.

00:26:11.960 China and Russia, the great powers and the United States fighting it out over the Arctic with the

00:26:20.360 vast resources of the Arctic is going to be the new great game of the 21st century. Canada,

00:26:25.080 you are thrust into the middle of that. And quite frankly, you are the greatest, I don't know if

00:26:31.080 target or prize. You're, you're like asking you, you're the great prize of that. That is that,

00:26:36.040 as you awaken in the geo economically, he's saying, Hey, the United States market's so lucrative,

00:26:41.240 you're going to have to pay a premium to get through the golden door, right? Canada could be

00:26:45.400 all part of that. The geo economics of the, of North America combined in the geo strategic

00:26:52.120 interest of North America combined, and particularly hemispheric defence all the way from Argentina

00:26:57.160 and Brazil under Bolsonaro, all the way up to the Canadian Arctic is what the first half of the 21st

00:27:03.080 century is going to be about. Now, I think it's interesting because he's talking about it

00:27:08.280 strategically. He's being a realist. He's not saying that he's not trolling. He's not saying

00:27:12.840 like, Oh, we're going to take Canada because we want it to be the 51st day. He's saying like,

00:27:16.760 whether we like it or not, this is the future. This is what the 21st century will be about. What's your,

00:27:23.080 what's your take on that? Well, I think he makes a very good point. And in fact, I think it's been made

00:27:28.680 even more strongly by Mike Waltz, who's Trump's current national security advisor, that the,

00:27:38.360 the Canadian Arctic, there's other interests, there's the Russian interests and the Chinese

00:27:43.640 interests in that area. And so Canada is going to have to sharpen up its defence and its development

00:27:48.680 of the Arctic, another area that's been completely neglected by the, by the Trudeau government. So if

00:27:54.760 we're developing an agenda for talking to the United States, now we got to tighten up the borders.

00:28:00.360 Number one, we got the continental energy security and what we can contribute to it. Number two and

00:28:07.800 number three, what are we going to do to beef up our defences of the Canadian Arctic?

00:28:12.760 I had author and sort of controversial thinker Diane Francis on the podcast a couple of weeks ago. 0.71

00:28:18.680 Now, a decade ago, she wrote a book called the merger of the century and how it was a business

00:28:23.000 proposition that Canada could potentially join in with the United States. And what one of the things

00:28:27.960 that she pointed out to me was that Canada has failed to develop the north. Like we don't have

00:28:32.520 seaports, we don't even really have roads up there. And if you look at the development of Alaska

00:28:37.240 and compare it to Yukon Northwest territories, or none of it, I mean, it's just starkly different.

00:28:42.920 The Americans have the ability to build and they focus on that and they prioritized it. I'm not even

00:28:47.480 talking about military, I'm talking about even just communities that we don't really have a lot up

00:28:51.960 there. There's not really much that has been built, let alone seaports up there. I wonder,

00:28:57.480 why do you think that is? What can Canada do to show that we do have serious sovereignty up there?

00:29:04.200 And maybe talk a little bit about Canada's military, because I think the goal is supposed to be 2% of

00:29:10.920 GDP to meet our NATO targets. I think Canada barely spends 1.2% of our GDP. Our military is not a serious

00:29:19.480 force and with all due respect to the men and women who serve and who wear the uniform. I think

00:29:25.720 everyone admits that our military has become a little bit of a joke in recent years.

00:29:30.600 Well, that's a huge subject, but your first point about there's a need to develop infrastructure

00:29:37.400 into the Arctic, into the Northwest Territories and into the Yukon Territory. Incidentally,

00:29:47.960 the province has done more of that than the federal government has been Alberta. The one big road

00:29:52.600 between Yellowknife and the rest of Canada is from Alberta. It's 600 miles from Yellowknife to Edmonton,

00:30:01.640 it's 3,000 miles from Yellowknife to Ottawa. I think the province has got a lot more to do with

00:30:07.960 developing that infrastructure, but that ought to be a priority. And then the second point you make

00:30:14.520 is very valid, that the Canadian military has been neglected, particularly by the Trudeau administration,

00:30:22.200 so the next administration is going to have to beef that up. I think one lesson from the Second World 0.93

00:30:26.760 War, while Canada contributed directly in terms of soldiers and equipment, its biggest contribution

00:30:35.880 was basically made by CD Howe in organizing defense production. Canada produced a lot of the equipment

00:30:45.480 and the background materials that were needed by the Allies in order to conduct activities in the Second

00:30:53.560 World War. And whether particularly NATO would accept if Canada's contribution to NATO included the

00:31:00.520 direct contributions that they're talking about, a percentage of the defense budget, but also what

00:31:05.800 can Canada contribute in that defense production, supporting its allies with equipment and things

00:31:13.560 like that. Will that be counted as a 2%? That's where Canada had a strength in the Second World War,

00:31:18.920 and that could be repeated. You need someone like CD Howe, though, to do that. And there's nobody like

00:31:24.840 that in the current Liberal government at all. Well, yeah, I mean, Canada does need to focus more on

00:31:31.240 building up its manufacturing base in general. I think that's something that we can take away from

00:31:35.720 these trade threats. I want to go back to this Steve Bannon interview in the Global News report on it.

00:31:41.480 So I'm going to show what that looked like. Their headline says, Trump's plan for hemispheric control.

00:31:45.960 Steve Bannon on why tariffs may only be the start. And they show this sort of scary, ominous picture

00:31:52.440 of Donald Trump pointing to Canada, and it's labeled as MAGA land. You know, they make it seem kind of

00:31:58.760 dark. But then even if you just listen, Preston, to what Steve Bannon said, he said, you know, Canada's

00:32:05.560 a prize or maybe the target. And he was talking about the golden age of America that Trump has promised.

00:32:11.560 I think this is complete nonsense. I think this is complete nonsense. And the first time Trump 0.84

00:32:18.680 mentioned this, he said, well, Canada should be the 51st state with Wayne Gretzky as the governor.

00:32:23.880 Like it was a joke. It was one of his off-the-cuff jokes. And it should have been treated as a joke,

00:32:31.080 say, haha, that is funny. Let's get on to border security and energy security. But particularly the

00:32:37.480 central Canadian media, the hysteria in the Toronto Star, for example, and central Canadian politicians

00:32:46.840 took this as a serious policy of the Trump government. And I think I've blown it way out of

00:32:54.680 proportion. It's a ridiculous proposition. For one thing, Trump couldn't get it through the US Congress. 0.98

00:33:01.400 There's no way that could happen without getting it through the American Congress. You've got to get

00:33:07.160 that through the Congress as it's formed now. Secondly, Trump's got to watch it. He's a populist

00:33:14.680 leader who's got a populist base. One of those mistakes populist parties can make, and Western

00:33:20.760 Canada has had more experience and knowledge about this than any other part of North America, is if you

00:33:26.360 get elected as a populist government and get off the agenda that got you elected by the ordinary

00:33:33.000 people, you will not be the government very long. And there was nothing in Trump's platform about

00:33:41.480 Canada as a 51st state. There was nothing about the Panama. There was nothing about Greenland. And

00:33:48.360 he's got to watch it. His own voters will say, look, we elected you on issues of affordability and

00:33:55.560 controlling this immigration thing. Don't stray from that proposition. The other thing, 0.89

00:34:01.800 why on earth would Trump want to get a hold of Canada in its current condition? If he did annex,

00:34:08.200 the first thing he'd have is three separatist movements. A separatist movement in Quebec,

00:34:12.360 a separatist movement in Alberta, and a separatist movement in Newfoundland and Labrador. What

00:34:16.920 American president would ever want to get into that kettle of fish?

00:34:22.200 Yeah, I think you're right. Well, and there'd probably be a separatist movement by the Laurentians

00:34:27.240 to separate from the new, newly formed North America, because they wouldn't want anything to

00:34:31.000 do with it. But the thing that I thought was interesting about what Steve Bannon was saying there

00:34:35.480 was that he wasn't talking about it, like, like, I think a lot of the media presented like, you know,

00:34:42.360 Trump has this vision, and it's all about protectionism, and, you know, America first,

00:34:49.320 and all that kind of stuff, which is true. But Steve Bannon said right in his discussion there,

00:34:54.840 that Canada can be a part of it all. So I don't think that he means that from like a sovereignty

00:34:59.560 perspective, like we're going to take Canada. I think he means that Canada can be part of the

00:35:03.480 prosperity, part of the new golden age that Trump wants to build. And we can all be part of this

00:35:09.080 fortress North America, we just need to get our self in order, get our get our house in order,

00:35:14.760 mainly with immigration, drugs, and those are the three things.

00:35:18.600 That's an interesting point, Candace, but it bothers me, why does Canada need to be told by

00:35:24.120 an American president what its future is going to be? Why does Canada need some initiative from the

00:35:29.880 United States to restore pride in this country? Where's the capacity to do that ourselves? And

00:35:37.000 one of my concerns about this whole debate is what it says about the state of Canadian democracy,

00:35:44.040 everything on this agenda we've talked about, beating down internal barriers to trade,

00:35:49.160 strengthening the protection against illegal immigration and importation of drugs,

00:35:58.360 energy security, all of these things have been advocated by Canadians for years, by Canadian think

00:36:06.200 tanks, by Canadian political people, including myself, years and years ago. Why is it that

00:36:13.640 that gets nowhere in our democratic institutions? It does not get a reaction from the current government,

00:36:22.760 it's on another agenda that 50% of the country thinks is nonsense. Why does it take some initiative

00:36:30.120 by an American president to do the things that are self evidently in our own interest and have been

00:36:35.560 advocated by Canadians for years? I think we've got to pull up our own socks, restore some pride in our

00:36:42.680 own country, get rid of these anti-Canadian crowd in the universities and the schools that trash Canada

00:36:51.080 every opportunity they get. How are you going to get pride in the younger people in the country in a future

00:36:56.360 vision? I think we've got to pull up our own socks and we ought not to have to be told to do that

00:37:02.920 by an American president, no matter who he is. Such a good point. And I agree. When the

00:37:10.520 countermeasures were announced, when Justin Trudeau announced the new measures that he was going to

00:37:14.120 take to secure the border, putting more money on, making sure that we have enough people at the border

00:37:19.720 and all this stuff. It's like, why did this take 10 years? You know, this should have been happening

00:37:23.880 from the beginning, not at the very, very end of his role. Well, that leads me to Justin Trudeau and his

00:37:29.880 decision to resign on January 6th. So at least Preston, that's what he told us that he was

00:37:34.600 resigning, but he's still around. So he didn't actually resign. He just intended to resign.

00:37:38.680 He prorogued parliament and now they're holding a liberal leadership race so that a prime minister

00:37:44.920 can be selected by an elite few. I mean, I think that the leader has already been selected. I think the

00:37:51.000 banks, the World Economic Forum have already given us the next prime minister of Canada, Mark Carney.

00:37:56.680 But as someone who's been advocating for democratic reform and who's been frustrated

00:38:01.640 with the Canadian political system for decades, what did you think of Trudeau's move that he pulled

00:38:07.160 here in early 2025? Well, it's regrettable because it's crippled the country at the crucial time when

00:38:15.560 it needs strong federal leadership. It's just left the country in limbo. You've got a lame duck

00:38:24.280 prime minister, but still purporting to represent the country. I'm sure if you can record some of the 0.80

00:38:32.280 internal comments that are being made by some of these premiers with respect to whether Justin Trudeau

00:38:38.200 ought to even be convening these conferences, I think it'd be pretty revealing. So it's just regrettable

00:38:45.480 that we've got this lame duck situation. What should have happened was they should have recalled

00:38:49.320 parliament. The fact that you've got this whole crisis situation and the parliament isn't even

00:38:56.440 meeting. They should have recalled parliament. The parliament would have moved a non-confidence

00:39:01.480 motion. We'd be into an election and that'd be the process to decide who should be the next leadership

00:39:07.240 of the country. And I know the leaders they're putting forward, Mark Carney, you can imagine what

00:39:14.280 Trump thinks of him. You know, a central banker, an elitist, a snob who has nothing but contempt for

00:39:24.040 the rank and file of people that elected Trump or that will elect the next government in Canada. It's a

00:39:30.520 regrettable situation and the sooner we can get to an election and get a new government, the better.

00:39:36.920 So do you think that the Governor General should have said no to Justin Trudeau's request?

00:39:41.000 Should she have said, you're not going to vote?

00:39:43.320 That should have been done. There's actually a precedent for that occurring in the British 0.73

00:39:49.800 parliament and that would have moved things along further. But of course, the Governor General's

00:39:54.520 a Trudeau appointment with loyalties to Trudeau and just did what he said.

00:40:01.560 Well, it's really unbelievable that we don't have a say. What about there's a,

00:40:05.960 I don't know if it's a conspiracy theory because I think it's legal and it could happen, but there's

00:40:09.720 a theory going around online that there won't be an election in 2025, that there's an Act,

00:40:16.680 an Elections Canada Act that says an election should happen every four years, but it's not in the

00:40:20.440 Constitution. The law can be changed, it can be amended, that potentially, whoever leads the

00:40:25.240 Liberal Party, presumably Mark Carney, could strike another deal with NDP leader Jagmeet Singh

00:40:29.880 to prolong their time in power, blow past that October 2025 election date and possibly not have

00:40:36.520 an election for another 18 months. What do you think of that?

00:40:39.720 Well, I think if they resorted to that, it would be a desperation measure which would

00:40:46.680 almost ensure that they're replaced in that election. And I would think members of Parliament,

00:40:52.440 particularly NDP and Liberal members, would think twice about getting part of that kind of an

00:40:59.000 operation. They might be guaranteeing the loss of their own seat.

00:41:02.200 I think they might be losing their own seat anyway. I think Canadians are so frustrated

00:41:07.080 at Jagmeet Singh in particular for propping up this government for so long that he's going to lose his

00:41:12.120 seat. So why would he trigger an election if it just means that he's going to basically get fired? I mean,

00:41:16.360 I think that that's the concern that these people…

00:41:19.000 But again, you can look at the composition of that current department, 153 Liberals,

00:41:23.960 120 Conservatives, 33 Bloc members, 3 Independents. The Bloc members and the Independents voting

00:41:34.120 together in a confidence motion would still defeat the government. It's not entirely dependent on Singh,

00:41:40.760 but it's a big mess.

00:41:43.080 What about this story, Preston? We learned at the end of January that Justin Trudeau is going to fill

00:41:51.320 the Senate vacancies before retiring. So he's planning a final wave of appointments to fill the 10 empty

00:41:57.640 seats in the Senate. The move will allow him to mark on Parliament for years to come with unelected

00:42:04.120 legislatures. I know you've been a critic or at least someone who has advocated for reform when it

00:42:10.200 comes to Canada's upper house, upper chamber. What do you think of this move by Trudeau?

00:42:15.480 Well, that'd be regrettable too, because that cripples the federal parliament even further.

00:42:21.240 In the end of the day, the House of Commons would have the whip hand over the Senate. The Senate could

00:42:26.040 block legislation from the House of Commons, the House of Commons could pass it again. The Senate can block

00:42:31.000 that, the House of Commons can pass it again. The House of Commons at the end of the day can have

00:42:35.640 the whip hand. If the Senate blocked a piece of legislation three times or four times, unelected

00:42:42.120 people appointed by a discredited prime minister, that would make life intolerable. I wouldn't want to

00:42:49.560 be one of those senators. But again, it's a shame that it has to come to that kind of a conflict

00:42:55.480 at a time when the federal parliament should be united in getting down to business.

00:42:59.720 Well, especially when we face a situation where we have an unelected governor general,

00:43:05.720 soon we're going to have an unelected prime minister, and we have a new onslaught of unelected

00:43:11.640 legislatures put into the Senate. I mean, no wonder Canadians are losing faith in these institutions.

00:43:16.200 Yes, and as I come back to, our democratic institutions need to be strengthened, and

00:43:26.200 this current crisis indicates the weakness of those institutions, and the fact that it takes

00:43:33.000 some action by an American president to get us dealing with items which our own democratic process

00:43:39.320 should have brought to the top of the agenda and got action on.

00:43:42.520 I want to move on and talk about the Alberta COVID response report, but before we do,

00:43:47.800 I just want to ask you, because we haven't really talked about it, but Danielle Smith,

00:43:51.800 I think, has just been doing a tremendous job advocating for Canada. I heard Ezra Levant,

00:43:56.440 he was on Rachel Parker's show the other day here on True North, and he was talking about how he met with

00:44:01.480 Danielle in the midst of her basically back-to-back-to-back-to-back meetings. She rented

00:44:06.920 a hotel room right in Washington, had a conference room, and apparently her staff had, you know,

00:44:12.760 minute-by-minute interview, interview, meeting with different officials, lawmakers, Republican

00:44:17.560 insiders, Republican staffers. It sounded incredible. I mean, just such hard work. The fact

00:44:22.120 that Trudeau and no one from the federal government was doing that, and it fell on a provincial premier

00:44:27.960 is remarkable in and of itself. But I wonder, what do you think of the job that Danielle's doing?

00:44:35.160 And, you know, you think she's hitting the right marks in what she's doing?

00:44:38.040 Oh, yes. No, I think she's been the strongest Canadian leader on the particular points that we

00:44:44.120 should be emphasizing on the border security. That's where she linked that to the tariff issue,

00:44:53.560 the way Trump did, on the energy security basis. Alberta premiers have often had a good relationship

00:45:01.000 with the Western governors of the United States, who tend to think a lot like we do, and she's been

00:45:07.160 active on that front. So I think she's done a commendable job, and this is a job she never asked

00:45:13.000 for. You know, the provincial premier didn't ask to have to get involved internationally with the United

00:45:19.320 States in this way. She never asked for it. But there's a vacuum. This is not being done by the

00:45:24.520 current leader. Our current federal leader is discredited, and so I think she's doing an

00:45:28.760 excellent job, and people should support her. And some of these other premiers ought to support her. 1.00

00:45:34.040 She's providing more leadership than Trudeau, and that is self-evident to them at these meetings.

00:45:39.160 So I agree with the approach she's taking and believe she should be fully supportive.

00:45:44.440 Well, it seems like some premiers are coming around. When they first initially met with the

00:45:48.200 premiers and Trudeau, they signed a joint statement. Danielle said, no, I'm not signing that.

00:45:52.440 And she was sort of the odd man out. But then, you know, over the course of the next few weeks,

00:45:56.280 with her advocacy and Trudeau sort of vacancy, you know, we saw Saskatchewan come around. Even Quebec

00:46:02.200 came around to her perspective, and I think it did win the day. I want to talk about this report,

00:46:06.760 also commissioned by Alberta Premier Danielle Smith. So she, I think she's one of the only

00:46:13.000 leaders, political leaders in the world to do this sort of introspective look at what happened

00:46:19.000 during COVID. So the Alberta COVID report, it was commissioned by Smith in 2022 with a mandate to

00:46:25.320 explore the province's response to COVID. The task force included prominent medical professionals,

00:46:30.360 including doctors Gary Davidson, Jay Bhattacharya, who's been appointed into the Trump administration

00:46:35.640 now, and Barry Brittle. The final report recommends the provincial government stop providing vaccines for

00:46:42.200 healthy children and teenagers. The report revealed evidence to suggest it was not effective. For

00:46:47.880 example, it highlighted that the original Pfizer vaccines did not prevent death compared to the

00:46:53.560 placebo in their clinical trials in any group. Further, the report alleged that Alberta Health Services

00:46:59.880 removed a dashboard after it showed higher hospitalization rates among the vaccinated than

00:47:05.880 the unvaccinated. It also said there's a lack of reliable data that COVID-19 vaccines protect

00:47:11.400 children from severe cases of COVID. The task force that published the research said that vaccines

00:47:17.000 were not designed to stop transmission. This is all really incredible stuff, things that you could not

00:47:22.360 have even said on YouTube two, three years ago. Now it's out in the open. Again, Alberta's one of the only,

00:47:28.200 if not the only government to do this kind of research and this kind of report. So I wanted to hear your

00:47:35.480 reaction to the report and what you make of it all. Well, first of all, there are two reports that were

00:47:43.000 commissioned by the Alberta government and I chaired the first one. The first one was called the Public

00:47:49.800 Emergency Governance Review Panel and its instructions were to look at the legislation which authorized the

00:47:58.360 initiatives that were taken by the Alberta government to cope with the COVID crisis and to recommend there's

00:48:04.040 the changes in the law that had to be made. That report was done, finished in February of 2023,

00:48:13.080 recommended a bunch of amendments to the Public Health Act, to the Education Act, to the Alberta Bill of Rights.

00:48:18.920 It takes forever to get these things through. You have to make a presentation to a cabinet committee,

00:48:24.760 you have to be a presentation to the cabinet, there has to be a presentation to the caucus, that then has to go to the

00:48:29.880 legal services branch of the Justice Department to do the draft legislation, which then has to be checked

00:48:35.560 with the Treasury branch if it involves spending any more money. Finally, in the fall session,

00:48:42.440 the Alberta government did make a number of those amendments, particularly amendments to the Alberta

00:48:47.240 Bill of Rights to tighten up the protection of rights and freedoms by law during a public emergency.

00:48:53.880 So that was that report. Now, this report you're talking about was not to look at the legislation,

00:49:00.200 it was to look at the data base that informed the decisions of the government during that period.

00:49:06.040 And as you mentioned, it's produced a number of questions, the modelling that was done, what was the basis of that modelling.

00:49:14.440 It's questioned the validity of masking of the vaccination programme and of the validity and efficacy of the vaccines

00:49:24.600 that were used themselves, a whole list of things. Now, the interesting thing too, that panel had about 12,

00:49:32.200 15 basically medical people on it. It's been reacted to by the College of Physicians and Surgeons,

00:49:41.320 which has a list of people with medical credentials. And its report is contrary to what the scientific

00:49:48.760 advisory group of the government that it had at that time. So you have two groups of medical scientists

00:49:55.000 with conflicting views on what should have been done. And the bigger question is, how do you reconcile it?

00:50:01.160 How does a government bring science to bear on a public issue like the COVID issue when there's this

00:50:06.760 conflicting opinion within the science community? And we had a recommendation in that report of ours to

00:50:12.680 address that. Two recommendations. One is that the overall coordination of the response to a public

00:50:23.240 emergency like the pandemic should not be assigned to the subject department like the Department of

00:50:29.000 Health, because it's got broader ramifications in health. It should be assigned to the Alberta Emergency

00:50:35.160 Management Agency. That's what it's for. And if it had been responsible, it would have had a lot more

00:50:41.880 than just internal medicine people on that scientific advisory panel. It would have had a psychiatrist,

00:50:50.360 and it would have had people dealing with the mental health impacts. It would have had an economist. It

00:50:56.360 would have had a broader group. And our second recommendation was that that Alberta Emergency

00:51:02.760 Management Agency should have a senior science advisor whose job is to have an inventory of the

00:51:10.520 science that you need to deal with the issue, and who could adjudicate disputes between groups like

00:51:17.160 the panel that was currently done and the people that actually manage the crisis. So that's a long

00:51:24.600 rambling answer. But I think the bigger problem here is that you've got two groups, all with good

00:51:32.440 to the layman, good scientific credentials, but they don't agree. The College of Physicians and Surgeons

00:51:40.200 has labeled this report as misinformation. So how do you adjudicate that? And our suggestion was with the

00:51:47.640 senior science officer attached to the Emergency Management Agency. Well, I appreciate you laying that

00:51:54.760 all out and explaining the difference between the two reports, but I think both of them had the same goal. And

00:52:00.200 I actually think it's a good thing because the fact that scientists don't all agree,

00:52:06.280 doctors don't all agree, that's the reality of the world we live in. And that's the frustration

00:52:09.960 that so many of us had during COVID, when people like Justin Trudeau would say, we believe in science,

00:52:15.640 and our method is completely science-based. And it's like, well, no, it isn't, because we have scientists

00:52:21.000 over here that are saying the exact opposite thing. So I think proving the disagreement and proving that

00:52:26.280 there are different sides was kind of the point. I did want to ask you about the media response,

00:52:30.200 because from my perspective, it was quite hysterical, labeling it disinformation, misinformation,

00:52:37.000 you know, saying these people were anti-science. It brought me back to 2020 and 2021. It was like

00:52:41.240 we were there all over again, with all of these people in the media quoting experts,

00:52:46.280 saying that the other side was wrong. What did you think of the media response there?

00:52:51.240 Yeah, well, I think it's misguided. There were headlines. The worst reporting, I think,

00:52:58.920 on it was by the CBC, which is almost hopeless when it comes to reporting anything that's going on in

00:53:03.960 Alberta, or anything initiative by Premier Smith. But they had headlines that Alberta doctors oppose the

00:53:14.120 panel report. Well, there were as many Alberta doctors on the panel as there were

00:53:22.440 with the College of Physicians and Surgeons. That's just nonsense. And what is needed, though,

00:53:28.280 is when there is this conflict, some way of adjudicating it, and somebody with the responsibility to do

00:53:33.560 that, okay, we've got this group that's saying this, and this group saying this, let's hear the

00:53:37.160 arguments out, and see who carries our judgment. And we've tried to provide that mechanism. That

00:53:43.960 recommendation has not been acted upon yet by the Alberta government, but we're hopeful that it will.

00:53:49.880 Well, it's such a great initiative. And I appreciate you being one of the ones that was spearheading it.

00:53:55.400 President, I want to be respectful of your time. But you know, while I have you, I have to ask,

00:53:59.720 you know, we are just closing up nine, almost 10 years of Justin Trudeau's rule. And I think if you

00:54:05.880 look at public opinion polls, one of the sort of unfortunate, sad things that's happening is that

00:54:11.080 pride in Canada has gone way down. I think only 34% of Canadians now feel a pride in our country.

00:54:17.320 When you look around and you see just everything from crime to homelessness to drug addiction, the cost

00:54:25.000 of living, cost of groceries, cost of gas, the number of Canadians using a food bank, there's

00:54:29.400 every statistic that you look at economically, is bad. I mean, it's a sad state of affairs in Canada,

00:54:36.040 to say the least. I'm wondering, what can be done at this point in Canadian history? What's your sort

00:54:41.720 of final assessment of the Trudeau years? And what do you think it's going to take to turn Canada

00:54:46.760 around and turn ourselves into a great country once again?

00:54:49.880 Justin Trudeau Well, I think this Trudeau year, somebody's

00:54:54.280 labeled it a lost decade. Canada has lost international prestige. It's lost credibility

00:55:03.400 with the G7. It's lost credibility with NATO. It's lost credibility internationally. But the worst

00:55:09.640 effect is that it's lost its own self-confidence. And I think a major effort needs to be made to restore

00:55:17.880 that. And that's going to be dependent on the next government, which is not going to be, in my

00:55:22.200 judgment, is not going to be a liberal government. And I think there's things individual Canadians can

00:55:28.200 do. When you hear people trashing the country, and even ask your school children, ask your grandkids,

00:55:35.800 I would say this to seniors that are going to university, if they have a professor or a program

00:55:41.960 that is trashing the country, protest that. This is anti-Canadianism. Try and root out the anti-Canadianism

00:55:50.680 from our institutions. And one simple practical suggestion I've had to friends is to fly the flag.

00:55:59.240 You know, when you go to the U.S. and go through the Midwestern towns, or even in New England,

00:56:06.120 every eight or nine house has one of these American flags on it. Americans, for all their

00:56:15.480 faults that we continually point out, are basically proud of their own country. And one of the ways they

00:56:20.520 show it is to fly the flag. Well, why don't we fly the flag? Why don't we fly the flag? If somebody

00:56:25.640 watching and you're concerned about this anti-Canadianism, at least fly the flag. Fly the

00:56:29.880 flag on your house. Fly the flag on your business. Fly the flag on your church. Fly the flag as a symbol

00:56:35.960 that you have pride in what this country is and what it can become, and are opposed to anti-Canadianism

00:56:43.960 in all its shapes and forms. Well, I think that's a perfect note to end the interview. Preston Manning,

00:56:50.280 I really appreciate your time and your insights. Thank you so much for joining the show.

00:56:53.560 Well, thank you very much, Ken. It's good to talk to you.

00:56:55.960 It's always a pleasure. All right. Thank you so much. Thank you for tuning in. We will be back

00:57:00.680 again on Monday with all of the news. I'm Candace Malcolm. This is The Candace Malcolm Show.

00:57:04.360 Thank you and God bless.

The Candice Malcolm Show - February 07, 2025

DEFUND Foreign Aid

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