In this episode, I give my thoughts on the recent United Conservative Party leadership debate in Calgary, and why I don't think Rachel Notley is going to win the next election. I also talk about the other candidates in the race and why they are not going to beat the UCP.
00:00:00.000I hope you guys are all proud of me, because I actually sat through the Alberta NDP's recent debate in Calgary, and boy, was this a sinker. It was just boring. All of the candidates, pretty much all the candidates, I guess, just said absolutely nothing.
00:00:16.520It's kind of funny, because when you actually watch UCP debates, some of them can be a little bit boring, but it's usually because they're being really technical and policy-heavy and arguing about farm bills that really only affect certain parts of the province, and that can go on for a while.
00:00:30.160But this one, it was just like people sitting around agreeing with each other and just saying, well, you know, the United Conservative Party and Daniel Smith are very bad, eh?
00:00:39.660And that would kind of be it, and the person would then say, yes, I agree with you, and I talked to a nurse, and that nurse said that the government sucks, and it was just full of a lot of things that were not true.
00:00:49.060I think at one point, one of the candidates claimed that we had the most underfunded school and healthcare system in the country, even though we spend the most per capita on those services in the province of Alberta, like over top of any other province in this country.
00:01:04.280We spend far and away the most on those type of public services. I agree, they're not very well managed. That's not exactly a UCP problem, that's just an Alberta government problem, because the problems got worse when the NDP started trying to deal with it.
00:01:17.180But this is why the UCP is really out fundraising the NDP, and some of this could be a consequence of campaigns in the NDP leadership sucking up a lot of campaign donations that would usually go to the party.
00:01:29.460But the party usually gets a cut of those donations, so they should be benefiting from all this fighting going on, but, you know, not really.
00:01:37.460So I want to go from the top and just start talking about each of the candidates.
00:01:41.400I'll eventually get to Nahed Nenshi, who, in my opinion, had a terrible debate.
00:01:46.460I think he could easily start losing a lot of the people he signed up, because after Nahed Nenshi got into the race, the former Calgary mayor, memberships for the NDP spiked.
00:01:56.080So he definitely sold a crazy amount of memberships. Could be, I'm not sure if it was like 50,000, 100,000.
00:02:01.860I'm not sure what the numbers are. I just know that the party memberships doubled a month and a half after he had joined the race.
00:02:08.500So I assume a lot of that is him, probably other candidates as well, but he's a big player in this race.
00:02:14.840But I'll first start off with sort of the also-rans. Let's just start off with Jody Callahue-Stonehouse.
00:02:21.680Edmonton MLA, she jumped in because I don't know why. I don't know why she's here. She's just here for a minister's position.
00:02:28.620She said absolutely nothing in the debate. She's one of those people who just gets up and, like, recounts family stories.
00:02:34.840Like, I remember when I was in Bowness and we were jumping off the rail lines into the Bow River and we were having fun.
00:02:42.340Okay. Okay. Do you have anything to say? If you don't, you can move on and get off the stage.
00:02:47.380She's not really going to win. She's maybe going to throw her support behind someone else.
00:02:50.900But she's going to be, like, every race has one. She's going to be the Lila A here of this NDP leadership race.
00:02:57.480Funnily enough, I'm running against Lila A here for the Calgary Signal Hill federal nomination.
00:03:01.720So if you're a member in this riding, you better vote for me. Membership deadline passed, but vote for me number one.
00:04:15.220I thought Court Ellington or someone like that would have been better.
00:04:17.960And I'm saying all this is conservative.
00:04:19.480So even though I don't like the NDP, I hate all their policies, I still like to talk about these things from the perspective of who would be most expedient for that party to nominate.
00:04:30.340Kathleen Gangly, I think, just does you no favors.
00:04:34.980A lot of what she said was platitudinous.
00:04:37.540It seemed like she kind of leaned into the idea that she was going to be the only Calgary politician running in this race.
00:04:43.800So she keeps talking about bringing people together and that we need to, you know, win next or just win a couple more ridings in Calgary and we'll be past the finish line as if she was going to be the only one saying that and that that was going to make her unique.
00:04:56.220But she's not because then she is there.
00:04:58.000But she looks like going back to Jody Stonehouse.
00:05:01.460D performance shouldn't have been there.
00:05:15.520OK, now I'm going to move on to Gil McGowan.
00:05:18.160Now, this is going to be a very strange thing for me to say.
00:05:21.140I give Gil McGowan on a letter grade scale an A.
00:05:24.620He actually did well as the, I think, the Alberta Federation of Labor president.
00:05:29.180And he's still somehow the AFL president, despite the fact that he's running for the NDP leadership race.
00:05:34.560That should really say something about the union relationship with the NDP.
00:05:38.460But he actually said stuff that was substantive.
00:05:41.900He actually talked about the weaknesses the NDP have, which was a subtle jab at some of the other candidates for basically being these hopelessly out of touch.
00:05:50.220Hyper progressives who only care about what people who have arts bachelor degrees think.
00:05:57.460He got really good shots in on Sarah Hoffman talking about oil and gas and pointing out that Hoffman was incapable of talking about oil and gas in a non-negative way.
00:06:08.380Every time it was brought up, Sarah Hoffman would talk about how, well, we need a climate corps where we hire everyone below the age of 35 to go and do climate action.
00:06:17.500It was it was something that somebody in a student union would say.
00:06:20.940And Hoffman looked horribly callous towards oil and gas jobs and oil and gas industry, which built this province.
00:06:28.060So Gil actually hit her pretty hard on that.
00:06:47.300He had people stand up at the start and point out the entire crowd was full of university graduates.
00:06:52.180And there wasn't people who worked in the trades or were small business owners with high school degrees or stuff like that, that the UCP tends to do really well with.
00:07:00.240I thought he was good, which is so weird because he's one of the most thin skin, nasty people on social media.
00:07:07.380He even blocked me for pointing out that he's a trade unionist, a.k.a. fascist.
00:07:12.180But whatever I give I give McGill McGowan an A relative to this NDP debate.
00:07:17.600Now, I want to move on to Sarah Hoffman and Nenshi at the same time, because two of the moments I want to highlight here really include both of them.
00:07:26.040And I'll give the letter grades after I talk about it a bit.
00:07:28.400But starting off with Sarah Hoffman, you can tell this entire race is kind of coming down to Hoffman versus Nenshi.
00:07:34.840Hoffman is the progressive almost farther left of the candidates between her and Nenshi.
00:07:43.920She very much appeals to the more female nursing and teacher type base that the NDP has, very much pushing things like rent control, hyper progressive social policies, higher taxes, all this stuff.
00:07:58.040She is somebody who, if you like Rachel Notley, you would generally really like Sarah Hoffman.
00:08:04.000And she's even a little bit more left wing to try and monopolize that Janice Irwin progressive NDP pro Hamas type vote.
00:08:11.720And then you have Nenshi, who is playing the role of the everyman.
00:08:16.400He is the candidate for you if you just don't like Daniel Smith and the UCP and you simply want the NDP to win.
00:08:25.460But Nenshi in this debate basically proved that he actually might not be the safest candidate to run if you just want the UCP and Smith gone.
00:08:34.800He actually could be one of the worst candidates.
00:08:37.180And it's clips like this that highlight it really well.
00:08:39.940The man is just kind of a nasty person.
00:08:42.500He's good and slick when he debates, a little too slick, and I'll get into the rest of his performance.
00:08:47.960But he has way too many gaffes like this, unable to not demonstrate his contempt for the people that he deals with.
00:08:56.600I'm sure that every Albertan has a successful opportunity in the future.
00:09:00.540You know, Jody, you've been sitting opposite these guys.
00:09:03.120And I have been to question period a grand total of once in my life.
00:09:06.140And I was watching you and your colleagues and watching these monkeys on the other side.
00:09:14.560Can we influence them at all from opposition?
00:09:17.140From what I've witnessed, Rachel and the team have been there day and day out.
00:09:22.160Okay, and then Jody just starts into an answer that really proves why she shouldn't be there in the first place.
00:09:26.240Just boringly talking about how great the current party leader is who you're supposed to prove that you can do better than.
00:09:34.680But Nenshi, one, there's also one of his debate tactics is demonstrated very well in that clip.
00:09:40.380But Nenshi calling the UCP MLA's monkeys is not a good move.
00:09:45.980Like, it's always good to rib your opponents.
00:09:48.720But he is just going down the same line that other NDP politicians have in the past.
00:09:53.920Calling Albertan sewer rats or hillbillies or hicks and this stuff.
00:09:57.360That ticks people off because the NDP is a horrifyingly elitist party.
00:10:01.800It's people who have bachelor's degrees and master's degrees in the arts.
00:10:06.820They believe they're more intelligent and sophisticated than UCP voters.
00:10:10.640And that's why people don't like them.
00:10:12.780They barely lost in 23 despite the fact that they were running against Danielle Smith who had had a ton of mud slung on her for over a year and a half by the media, by the NDP, activist groups, whatnot.
00:10:25.140So, and they were also having to deal with kind of a sluggish economy coming out of COVID.
00:10:50.600At one point, he almost revealed his own tactic when he was talking to Gangly and she was answering something.
00:10:56.020And he says, oh, well, yeah, you know, like, I want to hear what you have to say and then I'll move on to what I was going to talk about in terms of reforming the healthcare system.
00:11:05.640She gives like an answer where she even admits that she doesn't exactly know what the issue is with the healthcare system.
00:11:11.300And then when it comes back to him, he's like, oh, wow, I only have 30 seconds left.
00:11:15.340And then he starts for 15 seconds just saying, well, it was really great that you, you know, you broached that issue.
00:11:22.720And I like hearing people's perspectives.
00:11:24.940And then he just talked about how well in the past I've advocated for some reforms to the way we engage with our nurses and the way that we are, like, are administering healthcare.
00:11:38.240And then he ran out the clock and it moved on.
00:11:40.240The man said nothing in the entire debate.
00:11:42.520He never took a solid position on any issue.
00:11:44.600He never took a solid position on what reforms that he wants would look like.
00:11:48.440He never even made a, he never even built an idea of what he'd like the party to look like.
00:11:53.120Not even say, I think he said at one point we need to be a bigger tent party.
00:11:56.880But this is why I give Gil McGowan an A.
00:11:58.900At least Gil McGowan actually said that it needs, we need to be more working class and we need to be less elitist and stop only targeting women with bachelor degrees and master degrees.
00:12:09.140So I won't, again, I'm going to hold off saying what I think of Nenshi's performance just because I want to get to this exchange he had with Sarah Hoffman because it is a slugging match between them.
00:12:18.780And then I'll rate both of them because I thought this was a very telling interaction between the two on the attitudes and the positions that both of them are taking in this race.
00:12:28.100I've mentioned housing is one of the biggest crises here in Calgary and there were 170 affordable housing homes in Midfield Park and I need to know from Unahead, why you closed that park, why you evicted those folks.
00:12:40.660I've talked to many of them and they are still paying their mortgages and many of them experienced homelessness.
00:12:45.700Sure, I'm happy to answer that off topic but happy to answer it.
00:12:58.820I think immediately dismissive, just immediately talking down to her and immediately always presenting himself as the only person worth listening to in the room.
00:13:08.340Incredibly difficult one but we ensured that every single tenant who was there had the opportunity to move into a Calgary housing home with priority and every single one of them who needed to be rehoused in a better place got that better place.
00:13:22.520Well, I talked to Callan and Callan had an affordable home.
00:13:28.220They were excited to start their family.
00:13:29.880It was a great place for them to live and they had a great time there and he ended up having to move in with his in-laws and leaving Calgary.
00:13:35.600He took that $55,000 mortgage with him.
00:13:38.660Thanks for the $10,000 but he's still paying off that mortgage today six years later.
00:13:42.980He and his family did not think that that was a good move.
00:13:46.700They were all begging to have their homes preserved.
00:13:48.440They were originally promised by you and council that they would be moved to another area but that never came through.
00:13:53.800So many people experienced homelessness and I did not expect somebody to identify as an NGP man.
00:13:58.400Did anyone experience homelessness to actually have a single example of someone who experienced homelessness or are you fear-mongering here, Sarah?
00:14:03.100Well, I'm telling you, I had to move in with his in-laws and live in their basement so they didn't have a home.
00:14:07.080I love this moment where he's basically saying, hey, Sarah, can you name 10 homeless people for me right now?
00:14:13.000I bet my dad's tougher than your dad, Sarah.
00:14:16.120He always uses these really weaselly debate tactics where he's like, name 10 homeless people on the spot right now.
00:14:22.180As if anyone can do that, obviously people don't have a Rolodex of names of people that apply to a specific situation.
00:14:29.060And the funny thing is both of them are wrong about this situation.
00:14:31.600Both of them don't know what they're talking about in terms of good policies to solve the issue with housing.
00:14:36.440Both these people are in favor of mass immigration.
00:14:38.820They do not want to lower taxes and make it easier to build homes.
00:14:43.000They're in favor of things like blank rezoning because it's a band-aid solution to just overall bad regulations and bad tax systems and rates in the province.
00:14:54.700And so Nenshi is just basically belittling her and pretending that all of her concerns with these temporary homes that people purchase
00:15:02.920and then they were moved out of and then still paying the mortgages for, that she's wrong because she can't name enough people to satisfy my requirements.
00:15:14.440He's someone who acts hopelessly above you.
00:15:17.100He is so far above you that you have to prove yourself to him before he will engage with you honestly.
00:15:49.720He, when, when a challenge, he barely again runs out the clock by saying that, well, we need, we need individual solutions to these problems.
00:15:57.400He can't even prove he helped actually fix that solution because obviously the people are still suffering from him basically selling them temporary housing outside, like a little bit outside Calgary and trailer units.
00:16:08.720And then taking them away and then saying, well, I actually sat down with them.
00:16:12.660Like, and then just merely bulldozing her for the rest of the time.
00:16:16.160Like I had my friend Raheem Mohamed, he posted a thread on Twitter that was interesting where he was talking about what his wife's reaction to this debate.
00:16:25.020Because, of course, he's a conservative journalist.
00:16:26.900So then both of them were watching the debate to see what they thought.
00:16:30.100And she thought the entire, his entire attitude and the way he talks to other people, especially women, is a massive turnoff.
00:16:37.280And that's terrible when you're in a party that is disproportionately female and that you come across like somebody who belittles women, that's not going to do well.
00:16:47.740Again, if he's going to be the guy who you are going to vote for because simply he can beat Smith and the UCP, and then he starts acting like this.
00:16:57.280He's proving that actually up against Smith, he'll actually make Smith seem like a much more sympathetic figure.
00:17:03.060When I say seem like, not because Smith is not sympathetic.
00:17:05.680But the whole point is that he is an awful optical contrast between someone like Daniel Smith, who can actually come off like a normal person.
00:17:13.620And then she is so detached and elitist.
00:17:16.180He comes across as somebody who is constantly making you prove yourself to him and that he never has to prove himself to you.
00:17:22.180That is what the debate felt like because he said nothing and he acted like everyone is here to challenge me.
00:17:27.960And they had to prove themselves smart enough for me to even deign to really debate them on an issue.
00:17:33.240So I would give Hoffman a B in this debate.
00:17:38.060She came off very, just like kind of an orthodox NDPer.
00:17:43.300I don't think she really, you know, shook the pillars of heaven in this debate and made it so that she was like the clear one to come and beat Nenshi.
00:17:51.620But Nenshi, I think, just lost momentum in this debate.
00:18:03.980That monkey comment was just an unforced error.
00:18:07.720Him debating and belittling multiple different people and then actually being bested by Gil McGowan just demonstrated that he's a lot of flair.
00:18:16.900But on the actual issues, I think he's going to turn off tons of middle class voters.
00:18:21.860And again, I want all these people to lose.
00:18:23.440I want somehow no candidate to win this leadership race.
00:18:27.160But I am less freaked out about the possibility of Nenshi being able to lead the NDP into a victory simply off of brand recognition in Calgary.
00:18:36.920I think that in a lot of ways, I don't think he could become the mayor of Calgary again simply because I think he's become an old politician.
00:18:45.640You can even tell by the crowds he draws in a lot of older people who are just nostalgic for something from the 2010s, early 2010s, that it felt better back then.
00:19:30.120I think that this leadership, even if he wins it, is going to be far closer than a lot of people predict because people think everyone's going to shift to Nenshi because they desperately want to beat the NDP.
00:19:39.840But as Nenshi is proving he can't put away these other also-ran NDP candidates or Sarah Hoffman, he's going to demonstrate that he can't probably beat Daniel Smith either.