Western Standard - Canada is arming back up

00:00:00.000 G'day, today is June 25th, 2025.

00:00:30.000 I'm Derek Fildebrand, publisher of the Western Standard, and you're watching The Pipeline.

00:00:34.520 I'm joined by my two usual partners in crime, Western Standard opinion editor, Nigel Hannaford.

00:00:40.900 Criminal number one.

00:00:43.080 Criminal one.

00:00:44.680 And partner in crime, criminal number two, Corey Morgan, Western Standard senior, Alberta colonist.

00:00:50.420 Charged, but never convicted.

00:00:52.480 There you go.

00:00:53.280 Not yet, but it's always tough.

00:00:55.460 Yeah.

00:00:56.220 All right.

00:00:56.800 Well, we're going to be talking about a commitment made just today by Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney that Canada is signing on to the new NATO spending commitment of 5% of GDP.

00:01:14.220 That would be a roughly threefold increase in Canadian military spending.

00:01:18.560 I mean, 5% is not a particularly heavily armed country, but it's a hell of a lot more than we have.

00:01:26.340 And it's probably a fairly reasonable peacetime amount to be at.

00:01:31.800 We'll be talking about that.

00:01:32.520 We'll also be talking about what's been happening with U.S. intervention in the Iran-Israel war.

00:01:40.380 War of words between Donald Trump and CNN, I think, and the New York Post?

00:01:47.040 What times?

00:01:47.540 Times.

00:01:48.160 New York Times.

00:01:50.440 About if they were successful or not.

00:01:52.360 We'll be talking about what's going on with Iran.

00:01:54.040 And Alberta Premier Danielle Smith has launched her Alberta Next panel, which will be touring Alberta.

00:02:02.700 Coming up, we're listening to Albertans about what they want to do going next forward.

00:02:08.300 And footy forward, potentially a whole series of referendum questions around Alberta sovereignty-related issues.

00:02:16.380 But that comes right on the hills of fresh by-elections in Alberta.

00:02:22.000 And Alberta NDP leader Nahid Nenshi was, as expected, he won Rachel Notley's old seat, the safest NDP seat in Alberta.

00:02:31.720 He won it by something 80% supermajority, so he'll finally be in the legislature.

00:02:37.540 There was another by-election, another safe NDP seat in Edmonton, no surprises there.

00:02:42.400 But there were, there was a lot more interest in a by-election in Old Disbury Three Hills in central Alberta.

00:02:50.980 That's a constituency where the upstart Republican Party of Alberta

00:02:56.600 ran its leader and kind of threw the kitchen sink

00:03:01.460 and tried to make an impact.

00:03:03.060 If not win, at least make an impact.

00:03:06.980 The conservative vote there fell.

00:03:10.040 I mean, it was still a solid win around 65, 62, 61, I think.

00:03:15.340 I could be.

00:03:15.840 Yeah.

00:03:16.300 I mean, a win's a win, and that's still a big win.

00:03:20.220 But it's down from the roughly 75% that it was in the general election.

00:03:26.160 Almost all of that, pretty much all of that vote went to the Republicans who are running on an explicitly independence ticket there.

00:03:34.000 And there's, I mean, and the Republicans ran third place behind the NDP, just behind the NDP.

00:03:41.420 But, you know, I think going into this, I had no expectations they could win it.

00:03:46.900 But Daniel Smith is very popular right now, particularly with conservatives and in rural Alberta.

00:03:54.300 You know, this is not like when, you know, Ed Stelmack is sitting around and there's a lot of discontent.

00:03:59.240 There's not a lot of discontent for Smith, especially coming from the sovereigntist and nationalist right in Alberta.

00:04:06.280 So, you know, the Republicans, you know, I put it this way, a contextual win for them would have been to come in second place.

00:04:13.980 to break into the 20s and beat out

00:04:16.620 the NDP for second. And I think they would have been

00:04:18.540 able to claim a contextual

00:04:20.720 victory in that.

00:04:22.660 This is a wildly safe

00:04:24.700 UCPC.

00:04:28.140 There's, I think,

00:04:30.420 different ways we can parse this, but we'll talk to the reaction

00:04:32.840 about it first.

00:04:35.480 The legacy media

00:04:36.660 has almost universally

00:04:38.220 said this is a

00:04:40.620 repudiation of the independence movement

00:04:42.260 in rural Alberta, and some history

00:04:45.200 for this seat, this holds Disbury Three Hills in

00:04:46.980 1982.

00:04:49.100 A different configuration of that same writing

00:04:51.080 elected Gordon Kessler of the Western

00:04:53.020 Canada Concept Party, an Alberta nationalist

00:04:55.200 who supported independence

00:04:56.480 in a by-election.

00:04:59.940 You know, it held it for a few months

00:05:01.040 until it was a general election. But, you know, it had

00:05:02.980 it's a storied constituency

00:05:04.920 for this. So if there was going to be a place

00:05:06.940 for an independence candidate to break through,

00:05:09.460 that was it.

00:05:12.260 So yeah, legacy media panned this and said, this is people rejecting independence.

00:05:18.840 I mean, you could read it that way.

00:05:20.500 I saw it differently in my column.

00:05:22.980 I said that I see this as Danielle Smith relatively successfully keeping the independence movement within the UCP tent.

00:05:34.280 Now, the UCP candidate there does not appear to be a nationalist.

00:05:37.580 She appears to be probably a federalist. 0.57

00:05:42.260 um i'll put it to you first cory uh you know do you see this uh is a glass half full glass half

00:05:50.400 empty there's different fair ways to come at this i suppose the actual candidate supporting

00:05:54.920 independence lost came in a i think a semi-respectable third for a third party 20 uh

00:06:01.020 you know 18 is not bad for a third can third party candidate um but i i didn't see it as

00:06:07.180 repudiation of independence necessarily no it definitely wasn't a repudiation of independence

00:06:11.900 I'm still more on the glass half empty notion of this one, though.

00:06:15.600 As you said, as you kind of framed it, this was, in my view, the perfect storm for an

00:06:20.060 independence candidate.

00:06:21.380 You had the spike in support for independence from the recent election.

00:06:25.280 It's been polling high across the province.

00:06:28.520 By-elections are an opportunity for malcontents to safely vote for a different party because

00:06:33.160 you don't have to worry about flipping over the party in power or anything like that.

00:06:36.880 I mean, a disaster would have been a nine or single digit support number for this party

00:06:41.260 but I think if they were running exclusively on the independence thing, perhaps that's part of

00:06:46.680 where they went wrong. They should have scored higher. I mean, polling is showing much higher

00:06:50.880 for independence support, but they spent a lot of time too. And that's what some people were

00:06:54.500 getting a feeling that maybe there's a bit of a personal vendetta is the UCP and Daniel Smith in

00:06:58.300 this. They should have focused more on the independence because that's what they were

00:07:02.440 standing for and less time sniping at the UCP. And maybe they could have cornered that market

00:07:07.740 and cornered that as a vote to make a statement and they didn't do that and so I think they kind

00:07:13.640 of grabbed the default of hardcore independent supporters but now as you said it's provided an

00:07:19.140 opportunity to be framed and saying there isn't much support for it. I mean if you couldn't break

00:07:23.400 18% support in the strongest constituency in the whole province and they got 0.7% support in

00:07:29.940 Strathcona which nobody expected much but how are you going to do across the province and it doesn't

00:07:35.700 bode well. And I don't think it is representative

00:07:37.940 of the independent support, but it's

00:07:39.800 given opponents to independents

00:07:41.800 some good ammunition now to claim there

00:07:43.740 isn't support there, and it's unfortunate.

00:07:46.000 Another

00:07:46.520 reason I'd chalk up for

00:07:49.580 the result the Republicans

00:07:51.740 got here, Nigel, I think

00:07:53.660 is the

00:07:55.880 vote-splitting

00:07:57.680 PTSD that Alberta Conservatives

00:07:59.580 have.

00:08:01.240 The 2015 win of the NDP

00:08:02.980 is just

00:08:05.400 mentally scarred conservatives in Alberta.

00:08:09.820 And some of that was good at jolted conservatives

00:08:11.520 that get their act together, come together.

00:08:14.100 But some of it's not very rational.

00:08:17.700 A constituency like that,

00:08:19.260 you could run four conservatives in

00:08:20.860 and the NDP are still not going to win.

00:08:23.440 You could run, like there's just a 0% chance,

00:08:27.000 but I don't think the average voter has a,

00:08:30.420 I don't mean to sound elitist here,

00:08:31.960 but I don't think the average voter

00:08:32.840 has a particularly nuanced view

00:08:35.200 of the electoral system that, yeah, okay, if you did have multiple conservatives running

00:08:38.820 in, say, downtown Calgary, yeah, you're probably going to elect the NDP. If you did it in suburban

00:08:43.580 Calgary, you might elect the NDP. If you did it in Old Vizbury, Three Hills, there's just a zero

00:08:50.520 percent chance. You could safely vote for the most radical, right-wing, independent supporting

00:08:55.600 candidate you want to your heart's content, and the NDP will never win. But I don't think the

00:09:00.960 average voter gets that. And I don't think the Republican campaign there just appreciated how

00:09:07.040 ingrained that is now in the conservative psyche in Alberta.

00:09:11.560 Well, the other aspect of all of that is the very name Republican is not really a winner in

00:09:19.940 Canada and not really a winner in Alberta, even though we think differently to the rest of Canada.

00:09:25.380 calling yourself the alberta republicans is just i think that was i'm going to put some people off

00:09:31.680 there was no relationship between the alberta republicans and the republican party in the

00:09:38.840 united states well it'd be illegal yes exactly so but that said it sort of sounds like it and

00:09:48.940 you just made the point in yourself there that a lot of people aren't deep thinkers on this stuff

00:09:53.840 is this Trump running here

00:09:56.980 you know 0.98

00:09:57.340 I mean silly as it is that's the kind of thing 0.90

00:10:00.840 that puts people off

00:10:01.840 I was actually surprised I got the 17%

00:10:04.860 but where I

00:10:06.940 where I may have a slightly

00:10:09.020 different take on this

00:10:11.160 with you two is

00:10:12.880 I certainly have a

00:10:14.960 different take for the mainstream media

00:10:16.860 saying well that's it that's

00:10:18.100 repudiation of

00:10:19.700 independences all over no no no

00:10:23.020 this is coming back in about a year's time and in the in the air what we're

00:10:27.480 gonna see people will give fair-minded people will give mr. Carney a chance he

00:10:32.140 will work things you will work with Daniel Smith it won't work I don't

00:10:37.060 think they're gonna come together I don't think they're gonna find a column

00:10:39.880 ground and see how they can and we're gonna be where we were just before the

00:10:45.280 election with Eastern Canada and all of its presuppositions and all of its

00:10:51.460 prejudice is about the West, it'll still be there and the value difference, never

00:10:56.440 mind the money, the value difference between Alberta and the rest of Canada is

00:11:00.520 still going to make people say, I want out of here.

00:11:03.460 Yeah.

00:11:03.680 Well then a referendum is going to be a whole different animal and it takes

00:11:07.640 out, as Derek was talking about, that party aspect of it.

00:11:10.360 There's no fear of a vote split.

00:11:11.620 There's no strategic voting.

00:11:13.580 This is a yes or no when it comes to that, on that issue itself.

00:11:16.760 And you can add a lot more clarity on where you're going, you know, I'm not

00:11:20.680 intended on that but so I mean that's you lose a lot of those complications that come with trying

00:11:25.160 to take a party approach when you move into a referendum situation so marking this outcome is

00:11:30.720 something that would reflect on a referendum no and I mean as Nigel was saying too the Republican

00:11:35.480 Monitor I mean I heard some people say well they're talking about Alberta being a republic well fine

00:11:39.640 but we know as campaigners before if you're explaining at the door you're losing you don't

00:11:45.020 have time to spend a minute to explain your definition of your party name at every door

00:11:49.660 and you can't be explaining vote splitting at the door

00:11:51.600 that was an issue I've had

00:11:53.560 where people are sold on you

00:11:55.560 but then they say oh but I can't

00:11:57.660 split the vote and then you're trying to explain like

00:11:59.520 well we're in a rural constituency the NDP

00:12:01.720 can't win here we're not running there

00:12:03.560 but we are running here

00:12:04.480 the average voter is just like

00:12:07.700 you know they're going to vote based

00:12:09.740 on kind of a gut feeling and their gut says

00:12:11.580 hey we had two conservative parties before

00:12:13.840 and we got the NDP

00:12:15.000 and that definitely puts them at a

00:12:17.600 disadvantage and it's going to be much

00:12:19.560 more so if the party does

00:12:21.360 continue to exist and tries

00:12:23.540 to run in a general election, I think people

00:12:25.440 are going to be, many are going to be very

00:12:27.200 upset with them with the potential that they might bring

00:12:29.540 about another NDB. So let's

00:12:31.540 chat about

00:12:32.780 the party approach

00:12:35.560 for independence versus the

00:12:37.540 pressure

00:12:39.220 group approach.

00:12:42.460 I mean, if

00:12:43.280 in a different universe, say Jason Kenney was

00:12:45.420 still the premier and

00:12:47.220 the United, UC

00:12:49.480 was an unconditional Federalist party.

00:12:53.720 They were not going to allow a Citizens Initiative to do a referendum on independence,

00:12:57.580 something like that. I'd be inclined to say, yeah, that's the time for

00:13:01.460 something like the Republican Party. You're going to have to take the UCP down, and

00:13:05.400 maybe that does split some votes and whatnot, but if that's your goal, you're going to

00:13:09.440 have to take them down. Smith, I think,

00:13:13.140 recognized that, that that was an issue that would

00:13:17.240 cause a mass exodus from the right

00:13:19.140 flank of Hervardy.

00:13:21.500 Maybe beyond just the right flank of it

00:13:23.260 at this point. You know, 66%

00:13:25.520 of UCP voters in Alberta support

00:13:27.280 independence.

00:13:29.260 I mean, that's not a majority of Albertans, but you don't

00:13:31.220 lose the majority of your own party either.

00:13:33.880 You know, so if the UCP was taking

00:13:35.100 an unconditionally federalist approach,

00:13:37.980 I think

00:13:39.320 something like the Republican Party or before that

00:13:41.160 the Walrose Independence Party,

00:13:43.380 all the different iterations we've had at these things,

00:13:45.380 they would

00:13:48.460 you know, they'd have a better

00:13:50.360 casus belli for war

00:13:52.240 themselves, I'm using that word

00:13:54.360 too much lately, but they would have their own justification

00:13:56.500 for that kind of partisan warfare

00:13:58.300 they don't seem to have it now

00:14:00.400 and Smith

00:14:01.600 I think has been successful in trying to keep

00:14:04.480 it within the tent

00:14:05.560 but does that have the horsepower to go all the way

00:14:08.280 because I don't think you win a referendum unless the UCP

00:14:10.440 is actually more

00:14:12.400 on side, putting the full

00:14:14.440 weight of its campaign organization behind a referendum it's hard to say i i mean the ucp is

00:14:18.420 not going to go full independence it's not going to happen but they're getting as close as you

00:14:22.880 possible she loves walking that line though i mean as this thing here bouchard is holding a

00:14:27.260 an event you know a sovereignty uh that's a ucp mla in south california yes and a federalist party

00:14:34.720 would never even allow it for a second in mla to hold an event like that so they're kind of walking

00:14:40.020 that line. And it gives, as you said, too, though, it's like a pressure cooker, but you got that

00:14:45.440 little valve to let off some steam. And the referendum allows independence minded people

00:14:51.320 to be channeling their energy towards that towards a vote, whether or not it could succeed or not,

00:14:56.120 as you said, it'd be very difficult, no matter what, especially without UCP support. But it does

00:15:01.700 keep an organized group that would eat up 20% of their party or 30% of their party and possibly

00:15:07.160 cause that it's tactically quite smart

00:15:09.380 whether or not people agree if she's a federalist or not

00:15:11.140 it's a separate question. I think Smith has gone

00:15:13.080 as far as she can go right now

00:15:15.160 but I'm not sure that

00:15:17.180 she and the UCP are

00:15:18.680 as far as they will go

00:15:20.440 I mean there is going to be a convention

00:15:23.360 for the party and a GM in the

00:15:25.340 fall. I can

00:15:27.380 very much foresee

00:15:28.240 a situation where a

00:15:31.300 change to policy of the party comes forward

00:15:33.300 or a change to the party's constitution comes forward

00:15:35.460 66% of the general voting members

00:15:38.040 of the UCP, not members,

00:15:40.200 just of the public. And those are motivated

00:15:42.220 ones. Those are the ones that would come out to conventions.

00:15:44.120 Yeah, they're much more motivated.

00:15:46.520 Just as we saw around COVID

00:15:48.220 with the insurrection against Kennedy.

00:15:51.880 I think if you're going to

00:15:54.000 be fighting

00:15:55.140 in a partisan way on this,

00:15:57.920 they could do it within the UCP and

00:15:59.480 formally make the UCP

00:16:02.100 an officially sovereignist party.

00:16:03.680 they could do it by simply winning a vote there i mean that's probably that's much easier than

00:16:09.160 starting another party going through a full civil war wild rose pc style probably have an

00:16:14.380 nep government at least in the interim you know so now you're talking eight to 12 years to get there

00:16:18.300 you could do it in the fall you could simply just take over the ucp and that would be dangerous for

00:16:23.420 the ucp though because you gotta remember 35 of them and this is a very there's not many in-betweens

00:16:27.860 on that when it comes to that level there's some people that much connected to the federation that

00:16:33.600 debate. That's where you could actually get them swinging. Well, the NDP, the only one's representing

00:16:36.780 federalism. I will go there. Like, it would be very, very dangerous if the UCP took on a formal

00:16:44.240 sovereigntist stance, I think. But there's that damage with the reserve.

00:16:50.220 This is not a debate over what the curriculum is or what the marginal tax rate should be. This is

00:16:54.480 an existential constitution. But if you can keep it towards the referendum and not party policy,

00:16:59.240 you can potentially sidestep that. But we'll see. But it does give Premier Smith a good,

00:17:05.080 strong hand when she's dealing with Carney. She represents herself as the voice of reason that

00:17:11.480 stands between hardline separatists within her own party, that we do have these legitimate demands. 0.99

00:17:19.080 And, you know, sir, do you want to be the prime minister who stood on your principles

00:17:25.720 and caused massive disruption in Confederation.

00:17:30.700 I'm, you know, off camera, you know, we have the same problem.

00:17:35.980 Sure, if our goal is to try yet another round at saving Canada, 0.75

00:17:41.160 I think that is a fool's errand.

00:17:43.420 I think she has to at least attempt, because I think, 0.98

00:17:46.180 don't win a referendum.

00:17:46.800 But that's really my point.

00:17:48.440 Before she can actually, even if she wants to lead an independence movement,

00:17:54.580 and I actually don't see anybody else with a persona

00:17:57.460 who could pull it off at the moment.

00:17:59.520 Maybe there's somebody out there and maybe you know who they are,

00:18:02.920 but at the moment, I don't think anybody's got the credibility.

00:18:07.560 But everything that we put towards holstering the independence movement

00:18:13.660 actually strengthens her hand when she is negotiating with Carney.

00:18:19.560 Sure, yeah.

00:18:20.660 But I don't think a referendum will actually win in the end

00:18:23.560 unless you've got Smith and the full

00:18:25.680 campaign machinery of the UCP

00:18:27.660 because the NDP's full machinery

00:18:29.200 is going to be on the stay side

00:18:31.020 the federal conservative party

00:18:33.700 is going to put as much of its machinery

00:18:35.840 as it can into the stay

00:18:37.720 side because

00:18:38.420 what's not going to be good for the conservative party of Canada

00:18:41.320 losing Alberta seats and voters

00:18:43.520 you know they're going to

00:18:45.620 have to be on the no side

00:18:47.680 here so there's going to be massive campaign organization

00:18:49.940 funding human resources

00:18:51.940 on the federalist side

00:18:53.480 the independent side

00:18:55.480 as it's got

00:18:57.960 the Republican Party.

00:18:59.500 To strengthen Smith,

00:19:00.740 it only has to be

00:19:03.280 a strong response. It doesn't have to be

00:19:05.680 a majority response. If she's got

00:19:07.720 45% of Albertans

00:19:09.160 voting in a referendum for

00:19:11.460 independence, Carney's got to listen to that.

00:19:14.400 Yeah, but I'm just not interested in

00:19:15.600 threatening. I'm interested in action.

00:19:17.620 We've threatened and we've threatened and we've threatened.

00:19:19.700 We've tried Reform Party. We've tried Social

00:19:21.560 Credit. We've tried Wild Rose. None of

00:19:23.460 it will ever work, you know, if Barney doesn't budge.

00:19:28.040 But you're only going to get one vote.

00:19:29.320 You're not going to get two votes.

00:19:30.420 You're not going to get one.

00:19:31.140 That's what's interesting, though.

00:19:32.240 This year, we're having that discussion for real because there's going to be a vote coming.

00:19:35.720 And there's a lot of variables, as you said.

00:19:37.400 Where's the party going to sit?

00:19:38.500 How's the organizations on either side going to get together?

00:19:41.540 This is unique.

00:19:42.340 I got to admit, as a political weenie, I'm just pumped.

00:19:44.460 I know the outcome I want, but it's also the process I'm looking forward to.

00:19:49.380 you know, as an Albertan, I want to see it gone. Just as a political watcher, I'm just looking

00:19:54.560 forward to the intrigue and the tactics we're going to be observing this next year.

00:19:58.900 Okay. Well, we'll move it into the next, the logical progression of this conversation.

00:20:08.120 So the day after the by-elections, yesterday, Premier Smith announced the appointments of this

00:20:15.760 Alberta Next panel. Fairly

00:20:18.340 broad. It's not all just

00:20:19.640 the people you'd expect.

00:20:22.180 It's got people a bit more on the national

00:20:24.320 side. It's got some pretty well-known hardline

00:20:26.260 federalists. It's got some expert opinion.

00:20:28.600 It's got politicians and whatnot. 0.75

00:20:31.580 It's pretty

00:20:32.260 rounded, but it's

00:20:34.300 going to travel around. Chaired by

00:20:36.220 Smith herself. This is not like Kenny's

00:20:38.160 fair deal panel where he just says, okay,

00:20:40.240 go off and write rumor report that I can ignore.

00:20:42.920 She's sharing this herself.

00:20:44.520 So she's going to have to wear this.

00:20:46.820 She's going to be expected, I think, Corey.

00:20:48.980 Why don't you elaborate on what she's doing here?

00:20:51.780 Well, I'm glad you mentioned the Fair Deal panel, though,

00:20:53.680 because that's one of the concerns is it smacks a bit of the deal.

00:20:56.440 And that thing was something that Kenny did,

00:21:00.100 speaking of taking pressure off from the regionalist and independent side.

00:21:04.540 Okay, well, let's just hold a bunch of hearings, let everybody vent,

00:21:07.060 and then we'll just kick the can down the road and not do anything about it.

00:21:10.140 And that's part of, I think, what built, the people who crossed the line,

00:21:13.000 said, well, that's it. We got to go all out because we can't. So that's some of the first

00:21:17.020 thing with this Alberta Next that the Smith and her panel are going to have to deal with are the

00:21:20.600 people saying, again, like a lot of these things we've discussed already. How long is it going to

00:21:24.300 be before you actually do something? But it is an interesting panel. She's got, yeah, like Trevor

00:21:30.200 Toome on it. He's certainly not a hardcore independence type. He's not going to be

00:21:33.780 towing an independence line. No. And he's been critical of the Alberta Pension Plan, for example,

00:21:38.240 but he's given, I think he gave actually a very good balanced interpretation of it.

00:21:41.200 So, I mean, we're going to see some good discussion, good policy, something that's different.

00:21:44.640 Yeah, she's wearing it.

00:21:45.480 She is the chair.

00:21:46.560 It's going to be Premier Smith sitting at these, listening to it.

00:21:51.180 I guess a lot of the question, though, is are they going to follow through on what they find at these?

00:21:58.380 I just saw today Kathleen Canley. 0.98

00:22:01.240 You know, so we know the opposition is coming.

00:22:03.220 And the UCP has been planning this for a while.

00:22:05.680 They already had like a promotional video on it on the concept of an Alberta provincial police force.

00:22:09.800 so there's already the

00:22:11.720 promo and you can see that they know which direction

00:22:13.880 they want this panel to go. Kathleen

00:22:15.620 with the NDP called it

00:22:17.000 she put this on the X today, absolutely

00:22:19.680 disgusting that they're

00:22:21.740 discussing this. That says a lot too 0.87

00:22:23.900 though. It's still disgusting that Ontario 0.89

00:22:25.720 and Quebec have it. Yeah, they have their own police force

00:22:27.540 apparently they're disgusting too 0.93

00:22:28.820 but it shows how this rhetoric is going to go 0.95

00:22:31.760 out of this whole thing

00:22:33.180 it's going to be interesting to watch

00:22:35.960 and you notice the timing of it, these things are going to be spread

00:22:37.920 out all the way between now

00:22:39.080 and shortly before their AGM.

00:22:41.680 I think they're going to have their conclusions.

00:22:43.340 They're talking about putting things on a referendum this time, though.

00:22:45.600 They weren't talking about that with Jason Kenney's Dog and Shoney Pony Show.

00:22:50.300 So I think their plan is to come up with a number of items

00:22:53.060 that would probably be coupled with an independence referendum.

00:22:55.340 We'll have a referendum with a number of questions on it.

00:22:58.160 And this will be the tactic they'll use to defuse

00:23:00.440 or try to use to defuse attempts at the AGM to bring about more policies.

00:23:05.720 They'll say, well, that's going to be on the referendum question.

00:23:07.860 We don't need to embrace that.

00:23:08.820 That's going to be on the referendum.

00:23:10.440 So I think we're seeing some deep political strategy going on here.

00:23:14.020 Nigel, my concern with having, you know, a whole bunch of referendum questions at the same time is, you know, Albertans, I think, share the Canadian compulsion for moderation.

00:23:28.600 And if you give Albertans, Canadians or Albertans, a choice of one, two, and three, they always choose two.

00:23:36.120 You'd say one, two, three, four, and five, they choose three.

00:23:38.820 it's just kind of a natural instant.

00:23:40.940 Even if you kind of like one or three more,

00:23:43.680 it just seems reasonable to choose two.

00:23:46.580 And so if your question is,

00:23:47.580 it's not just independence over here,

00:23:48.920 but you've got all these other things.

00:23:50.980 I kind of feel like that's going to come into play

00:23:53.760 that they say, well, okay, I want independence,

00:23:55.780 but let's be reasonable here.

00:23:58.040 And I'll just check yes to all these things,

00:23:59.540 but then no to here.

00:24:01.260 What do you think?

00:24:02.420 Well, I'm not sure that that's actually really

00:24:04.760 what's going on here.

00:24:05.640 To me, you know, the point's made, well, you know, we've been through all this before.

00:24:12.320 Yeah, but you can't really expect anybody to rely on discussions that took place in 2020, which is the Fair Deal panel, which under a different premier.

00:24:26.100 So even if you take the thing at face value, she almost has to go out and ask the questions herself and get the answers and make it her own.

00:24:34.780 Yeah, but I'm talking about the referendum, of course.

00:24:36.680 Well, we'll get there.

00:24:38.100 But I'm not even sure that that's the idea.

00:24:41.000 Really, what she's doing is getting people engaged.

00:24:43.680 She is making them get up out of their armchairs, go to the meetings, listen, react, and frankly, put some wind in her sails when she goes to deal with the Prime Minister.

00:24:56.180 That's what this is about.

00:24:58.140 I mean, I'm going to play cynical devil's advocate here.

00:25:02.060 What, again?

00:25:02.820 Yeah, I know.

00:25:03.740 Just still.

00:25:04.360 for once

00:25:06.420 we've all been to

00:25:10.120 town hall meetings for

00:25:11.960 political matters and things like that

00:25:14.840 it's the hyper engaged who show up

00:25:18.440 average people tend not

00:25:20.380 to really come to these things

00:25:21.960 it's going to be, you're going to have hardcore independence

00:25:24.360 supporters, sovereignty supporters show up

00:25:26.280 you're going to have

00:25:27.620 organized unions and

00:25:30.120 lefty groups show up

00:25:31.680 I think that'll be

00:25:33.960 that's about it like you know if they go to

00:25:36.040 you know Airdrie

00:25:37.560 it's just good it's not going to be many people

00:25:40.120 actually from Airdrie there it'll be people

00:25:42.020 from elsewhere who have really

00:25:44.000 strong opinions on different sides

00:25:45.620 they're going to be talking about

00:25:47.800 RCMP well you know

00:25:49.480 the federal police union is going to

00:25:51.980 show up they're going to be there

00:25:53.120 as well as like people like us who want

00:25:55.600 them gone I just don't think

00:25:57.840 the average people don't go to these things

00:25:59.680 they've got better things to do with their lives

00:26:02.120 that is largely

00:26:03.900 true. However, the very fact that on this panel, we've just resurrected a set of discussions that

00:26:11.140 took place five years ago, shows that those discussions actually had some weight and some

00:26:18.180 impact at the time. And indeed, they led to a vote on the equalization, and then nothing happened,

00:26:24.340 which soured a lot of people on the process. But the actual act of going out generates headlines.

00:26:32.860 that every time she has a meeting,

00:26:35.060 well, what did they talk about today?

00:26:37.060 This is what they said.

00:26:38.740 And so it becomes a live issue, even if it is,

00:26:41.660 I mean, you're quite right about the likely participation

00:26:44.100 of who's going to show up.

00:26:45.680 I wouldn't challenge that for a moment.

00:26:47.640 In fact, it would be a daunting prospect for, you know,

00:26:51.340 what is it, Harry and Martha, the Rothkline,

00:26:54.760 you know, for them to go to these kinds of meetings,

00:26:56.900 but it'll be an event, and it'll be an event

00:26:59.000 that'll make headlines for several months,

00:27:00.720 and then it'll go into the public recollection of that this thing happened and this is what

00:27:05.340 this is where we had so as a as an exercise in generating um i i like the phrase wind in her

00:27:14.460 sails as she goes to meet mr carney it has value yeah well and is that no matter who shows up to

00:27:20.220 it you know speaking is the cynical tactician sort and with what they're doing and as you said

00:27:24.380 they're going to be bringing it to the dis to the debate and bringing the subject up if you

00:27:28.360 want it to die you don't want to hold a bunch of meetings all over the place keep it in the news

00:27:31.040 scroll i had mike thomas one of our columnists in to speak about municipal things one of the things

00:27:35.880 he talked about is these pre-ordained consultation meetings where you go there but the city already

00:27:40.120 knows what conclusions they want to see they're just going through the motions of doing it you

00:27:44.520 just lately require it to consult and and i've got to admit that's kind of what it looks like when

00:27:48.480 these were just declared and already there's videos that are basically making the pitch for

00:27:52.500 an alberta police force that the premier is posting on x before these meetings even happened

00:27:57.000 that they want to just reaffirm

00:28:00.040 kind of where they're already going with it, which I'm fine

00:28:02.080 with because I like where they're going with it.

00:28:04.140 But as for, you know, so it's going to

00:28:06.040 be a room full of, not full of undecided

00:28:08.180 people. They're going to have their one side or another, and

00:28:10.000 then we're going to see whatever outcome they want to see.

00:28:11.860 I think the Premier has a pretty good idea where she wants to 1.00

00:28:14.000 go, but, you know, she's got panel members like

00:28:15.860 Trevor Toome, who

00:28:17.000 I don't think has a

00:28:19.340 smart economist.

00:28:22.760 He's typically pretty good

00:28:24.120 for being balanced, actually. Yeah, but I don't

00:28:26.060 think he has you know a particularly strong alberta nationalist drive you know like for me

00:28:33.580 the biggest reasons for an alberta pension plan and alberta police force these things

00:28:37.800 is not that we would save money and they'd be better financially which i believe they would be

00:28:41.660 that's not why i want them i want them because it's alberta way i don't want yeah i don't want

00:28:46.600 anything to do with ottawa that's not negotiated in a treaty that's why i want it has nothing to

00:28:52.040 do actually with the dollars and cents. And I don't think dyes like him have any shared sense 0.99

00:28:58.720 of that. Yeah, we can't get out of equalization as constitutionally entrenched right now. But

00:29:02.440 I think we should reframe it as foreign aid. There's a lot of things we could do to start

00:29:06.240 moving away. We'll funnel it through the UN. Yeah, there we go. Yeah. Okay. Well, let's look

00:29:14.420 a bit more

00:29:15.620 to federal

00:29:18.260 and then international here.

00:29:21.860 You know,

00:29:23.020 there was a meeting of NATO

00:29:24.480 just today, Nigel.

00:29:27.200 And Canada's

00:29:28.520 arming back up. Well, 5%.

00:29:30.680 We haven't even

00:29:32.500 done 2% forever.

00:29:34.700 So that's a trickling of the military.

00:29:37.460 Well, that's the thing.

00:29:39.120 It's one thing to say we're

00:29:40.500 going to spend the money. The other thing is

00:29:42.380 well how how quickly can you buy something like even if you want to buy a motor car

00:29:47.500 that if it's uh if it's ordered from the factory it's going to take six months to get here now you

00:29:51.740 imagine plump by a destroyer or a tank or fighters we can't procure anything like this is this has

00:29:59.420 always been the issue that first they could first in the defense industry they can't make their minds

00:30:04.700 up when they do make their minds up it's got to be bilingual and then after they've sorted all that

00:30:11.340 then they then they actually get to place the order by which time the prices increase so it

00:30:15.580 goes back to the start for a further uh for a further review now i mean mr kearney has

00:30:21.660 pledged a tremendous amount of money into this thing but i we had a we ran a piece by roy remple

00:30:28.220 just last week now roy remple was a defense policy advisor to stephen harper back in the

00:30:34.780 get home in the days 2010 to 2015. So I knew him fairly well. We talked about this stuff a lot at

00:30:41.100 the time. And they just don't actually know how to say yes and write a check. A lot of the

00:30:48.220 departments where you would think, well, they would be able to, they should be able to buy

00:30:52.840 bullets. You find that actually, no, they count. It's got to go back through public works and then

00:30:56.920 it goes through a whole separate chain of approval. Well, that's one of the pauses of

00:31:02.840 delay, but what it says about adding all of this money to the budget, it's just going

00:31:10.560 to go in cost overruns.

00:31:12.940 So much of it will just be eaten up by the length of time it takes to actually place

00:31:19.100 an order and take delivery.

00:31:20.920 I mean, the F-35 program is a perfect example. 1.00

00:31:24.100 If we have bought those fighters...

00:31:25.340 Trying to get it going.

00:31:26.240 Frigates, all of it.

00:31:27.240 Yeah.

00:31:28.200 It's all going to cost more by the time.

00:31:30.140 Well, this 5%, it probably is not going to produce the effect that Mr. Carney is promising.

00:31:39.100 You know, the only procurement I ever saw that really worked fast was during the Afghan war.

00:31:46.060 Even with the armed services at war, you still couldn't actually buy equipment, but you could lease it.

00:31:53.100 So they wanted a drone to keep an eye on things.

00:31:55.940 They rented one for Donald Detweiler in Vancouver.

00:31:58.640 shipped it to afghanistan the mda guy went with it and he would jockey the thing out to the button

00:32:06.140 on the runway get up out of the chair the canadian armed forces uh personnel would occupy the chair

00:32:11.580 take control of the joystick fly the mission bring it back land it get up out of the chair

00:32:17.080 the mda guy would come in taxi it into the hangar that way they maintained the fiction that they

00:32:21.480 were buying a service that's why we should just subcontract up the whole military at this point

00:32:25.940 You know, I only half jokingly saying that.

00:32:28.160 Yes, that's the way they did it.

00:32:29.820 And if you have to go to that much trouble, even in a war to get stuff, then you have got a problem with spending money on military.

00:32:39.220 And it's not the unwillingness.

00:32:41.260 Mr. Carney has clearly demonstrated that it is simply the way that bureaucracy works. 0.92

00:32:46.280 Absolutely ridiculous.

00:32:48.440 Well, it's also, Corey, the issue of manpower. 0.55

00:32:51.860 uh maybe you know they'll get some more recruits with more attractive pay for you know soldiers

00:32:59.600 and airmen and sailors here but morale is beyond crater i mean uh you know i've got family members

00:33:07.460 who who quit not that long ago from the forces uh you know they joined up to be in the in the army

00:33:14.400 instead they're and they go to the washroom and there's tampons of the men's room i mean it's uh

00:33:20.280 Yeah, can you imagine, you know, the drill sergeant from Full Nipple Jacket walking in?

00:33:26.400 I think his head would have popped.

00:33:27.820 He would have preferred the bullet he found in the men's room over the tampons. 0.99

00:33:31.920 Yeah, he'd rather see the crazy guy with a gun than the tampons. 0.94

00:33:35.880 At least he ties the soldiers back.

00:33:37.640 Well, I mean, like, I mean, people don't want to join.

00:33:40.900 Like, we've spent over a decade at least denigrating the very existence of Canada.

00:33:46.660 denigrating a real sense of nationalism,

00:33:50.940 not this faux-Canadian, post-nationalist, anti-American

00:33:54.620 elbows-up nationalism. No one joins the military for that.

00:33:59.660 And then the military itself denigrated as an institution

00:34:03.000 and prizing things like DEI

00:34:06.920 over warfighting capacity. Unless there's a huge cultural 0.57

00:34:10.820 change in the forces, I'm not seeing large numbers

00:34:14.840 of young men and women lining up to uh to go through the hell of boot camp and then serve

00:34:21.560 you know in a fairly spartan existence in the military for their career yeah well and and so

00:34:26.440 i mean you've hit on it there's kind of three problems going on the big one though credit

00:34:30.440 we're due with carney where nobody else really was willing to do it that was the first part was

00:34:33.960 committing this signing a big check i mean that that nobody else had the courage to say even to

00:34:38.600 get to two percent much less commit now to five and in the short term getting to two so okay you

00:34:43.400 you did that. But yes, procurement's

00:34:45.500 a god-awful mess, and if they really, I mean,

00:34:47.460 they just recently changed out their

00:34:49.340 World War II-era sidearms,

00:34:51.540 and they spent 20 years

00:34:53.220 navel-gazing, messing around. They could

00:34:55.380 have gone to Cabela's and upgraded them

00:34:57.080 cheaper and faster. That's what everyone

00:34:59.400 did the day the Liberals announced they're banning. They're going to

00:35:01.300 end concert, but they can't do it. And

00:35:03.380 then, yes, the huge one is the culture. In a

00:35:05.400 recent article that just came out, there was apparently

00:35:07.160 raises for the existing members

00:35:09.220 aren't on the table, so they aren't...

00:35:11.400 Now, I got a feeling that 0.99

00:35:13.120 they probably, that was an oversight, pretty stupid because most people are going to realize, 0.99

00:35:16.580 well, for one, if you've got this extra money, start paying your personnel a little better. 1.00

00:35:20.720 And yes, they have to change that culture, that woke garbage that they've really let sink in. 0.92

00:35:25.040 You know, rainbow flags are pretty, but they make terrible camouflage. 0.97

00:35:28.980 And people join the forces with a vision in mind. They aren't going out to join the trades.

00:35:35.200 They aren't going, they're, we have to admit it, they're young people looking for adventure,

00:35:39.260 for a tough world, for that sort of experience as they're going forward.

00:35:44.500 And they want to serve as well.

00:35:45.760 They want to feel proud for it.

00:35:47.020 They realize that they're never going to be getting rich through that course

00:35:49.820 and they're going to put themselves at risk.

00:35:51.720 But they want to also feel that, that they're part of something important, 0.86

00:35:55.380 that they're part of something that's more than just a woke exercise of foolishness.

00:36:00.240 So they've got to take that on.

00:36:02.140 A little bit of your sense of honor.

00:36:03.440 Yes, exactly.

00:36:04.380 It's a martial culture.

00:36:05.580 Kearney's done step one.

00:36:06.860 And we're explicitly anti-martial culture.

00:36:07.920 So hopefully they've got a plan to get on with those other two steps.

00:36:11.860 As, as, as Nigel said, I mean, he even, we could raise it to 10%,

00:36:15.820 nothing will change unless they change their processes a bit,

00:36:18.240 because it's a bottomless pit you could throw money into,

00:36:20.740 and it's not going to be effective unless you make those personnel change

00:36:25.060 that culture and turn it into what a military force is supposed to be. 0.83

00:36:29.600 Works for the civil service though.

00:36:31.220 Oh God.

00:36:32.140 They scare me more than the military.

00:36:34.240 Well, they're getting the people they deserve.

00:36:35.860 uh well so this kind of feeds in uh trump was at nato uh today um and he was feeling questions

00:36:45.100 uh the cnn and new york times are reporting uh from a leak somewhere in the department defense

00:36:53.840 department uh claiming that uh the u.s airstrikes on iranian alleged nuclear facilities were not

00:37:03.560 as successful as claimed

00:37:05.340 it's a bit

00:37:07.920 it's he said she said because

00:37:09.760 I think it's I mean even if

00:37:12.060 these facilities were

00:37:13.340 in perfectly working order it's pretty

00:37:15.960 hard to get someone in to take pictures of

00:37:17.660 the thing

00:37:18.300 I mean one

00:37:21.860 level of destroyed or not

00:37:23.760 it's going to be

00:37:25.900 hard to provide that kind of evidence

00:37:27.600 Nigel it's kind of

00:37:29.980 he said she said on two fronts

00:37:31.760 One is, did Iran pose an imminent threat of obtaining nuclear warheads?

00:37:39.280 That's one question that, I mean, there's been some claims around it, but no hard evidence yet to substantiate it.

00:37:46.560 That's he said, she said one.

00:37:48.700 He said, she said two is, were these facilities completely destroyed, as Trump said?

00:37:55.700 So, there are two things here.

00:37:57.560 The first is that for 45 years, Iran has terrorized the Middle East, caused enormous problems, killed people, and threatened to kill Americans. 0.99

00:38:09.060 Meanwhile, they point to their atomic facilities and have basically said, when we get a bomb, we're going to use it.

00:38:16.160 Maybe against America, maybe against Israel. 0.66

00:38:18.800 but they have

00:38:20.760 if this was all

00:38:23.080 a bluff

00:38:24.980 they have paid dearly

00:38:27.160 for their bluff

00:38:27.960 I

00:38:30.940 they have insisted

00:38:33.060 that they're not building a nuclear bomb

00:38:34.520 Israel's never 0.96

00:38:37.340 admitted they have one

00:38:38.220 if they're not building a

00:38:40.800 bomb why do they have to bury the

00:38:42.980 facility underneath a mountain

00:38:44.680 obviously they're really

00:38:46.840 wanting to protect this thing. Other people

00:38:49.020 who are using nuclear

00:38:50.980 power for civil purposes

00:38:52.440 is there in the open.

00:38:54.380 I don't want to be in the position

00:38:57.000 of defending the bloody Ayatollahs here. They're about 1.00

00:38:58.860 the worst people in the world. 0.68

00:38:59.960 You said just now you want to be a devil's advocate.

00:39:02.780 Be a devil's advocate. You don't want to defend the Ayatollahs. 1.00

00:39:04.800 I won't be Ayatollah's advocate. 0.99

00:39:08.060 I'm going to get in trouble for that one.

00:39:09.960 Answer on the way.

00:39:11.540 Peace be upon him.

00:39:12.560 Do not edit that out.

00:39:15.620 But, okay.

00:39:16.840 So we've discussed before, these are the worst guys.

00:39:20.180 They do terrible stuff.

00:39:21.560 But no, these guys are not on the record saying we're building a bomb, 0.92

00:39:24.280 and when we get that bomb, we're going to nuke Israel. 0.98

00:39:26.340 Now, they've said death to America, death to Israel. 0.99

00:39:28.640 They like to say it about 40 times a day, maybe more.

00:39:31.860 But no, they have not claimed that they're building a bomb.

00:39:34.540 They have not claimed that they're going to use that bomb then against Israel and the United States.

00:39:39.020 That isn't to say that they're not building a bomb.

00:39:40.780 That isn't to say that they wouldn't use the bomb against Israel and the United States. 0.77

00:39:43.680 But it is still an unsettled question of if they were on the cusp of obtaining a nuclear warhead.

00:39:52.620 That is still not a settled question.

00:39:54.640 And now there's the second question of, was the American strike successful on destroying the facilities that were allegedly producing a nuclear bomb?

00:40:03.560 So there's two questions.

00:40:04.660 And we only have he said, she said on both of those questions.

00:40:06.680 Yeah, but you've got to consider the source.

00:40:09.660 Same source that said Iraq had them.

00:40:11.780 Yeah, well, so the CNN and the New York Times are part of the anti-Trump lineup.

00:40:19.700 So somebody comes along and says, well, you know, I don't think they really, they seize on that.

00:40:25.980 They say, well, we can't possibly reveal the source.

00:40:28.560 And now they sow the seeds of doubt.

00:40:30.780 And that's all that is intended to do.

00:40:32.840 No, Trump didn't do a good thing.

00:40:34.340 Trump couldn't do a good thing.

00:40:35.420 you don't have to be a defender of trump to say that that is the strategy for that the the left

00:40:43.280 uses to never ever admit that trump ever did a good thing cnn and new york times were both

00:40:50.960 cheerleaders for bombing iran though they were in the pro-war party on this that's that's great 1.00

00:40:56.960 they get to have it both ways on that like sure but what i'm saying sorry on this is there's still

00:41:03.560 the two big questions around this

00:41:06.260 and we still have

00:41:08.100 there's always going to be doubt

00:41:09.940 but I think it was pretty much a wide open secret

00:41:12.320 that they have been pursuing it

00:41:14.060 there's no doubt they've been trying

00:41:16.140 the question is how far along

00:41:18.700 they were

00:41:19.420 were they scratching the luminescent ends of

00:41:22.060 Timex watches to build up their radioactive

00:41:24.300 material or

00:41:25.400 had they actually gotten a hold of some

00:41:27.500 plutonium that they're trying to upgrade

00:41:30.140 into a nuclear

00:41:30.780 But, I mean, they wanted it, you know, but just wanting it alone isn't a crime in itself.

00:41:36.020 I guess we're always going to be debating that.

00:41:37.720 But they were up to it, sure.

00:41:38.700 But it might have been 30 years away from where they were.

00:41:40.600 Or it might have been two weeks as Israel's saying.

00:41:42.180 I don't.

00:41:42.660 Israel has been saying for over 30 years.

00:41:44.360 Yes, they're always two weeks.

00:41:46.380 Now, that doesn't mean at some point that they wouldn't be on the cusp of it.

00:41:49.400 But, I mean, your credibility is a little strained at that point.

00:41:51.820 And whether it's successful or not.

00:41:53.400 I mean, they talked about what these bunker buster bombs, the munitions from the United States.

00:41:56.760 And apparently this is exactly what they're designed for.

00:41:59.900 I mean, not just for bunkers in general, but that Iranian one. 1.00

00:42:03.340 Well, the Iranians are insane and they're bloodthirsty, but not all of them are stupid. 1.00

00:42:08.500 So I would think then you're going to drop that thing even deeper into a mountain. 0.99

00:42:12.500 And as powerful as the big bad U.S. is, if you get a thousand feet below rock, it's just going to be difficult with anything less than a nuke to actually shake it loose.

00:42:21.160 So I wouldn't be surprised if the damage was superficial.

00:42:23.940 and that has been one of the fears for a long time

00:42:26.940 is that it's going to take a tactical nuclear weapon

00:42:28.840 not a strategic nuke that destroys a city

00:42:30.780 but a tactical nuke underground

00:42:33.160 or do it like a hornet's nest

00:42:34.600 find all the entrances, fill them with concrete

00:42:36.560 and whoever's down there will have a good

00:42:38.240 entombment, it's another pyramid

00:42:40.240 yeah, okay

00:42:42.100 well, before we go to our parting shots

00:42:44.000 I think we should actually give a first parting shot

00:42:46.600 to Donald Trump

00:42:47.340 his remarks

00:42:49.900 you know, he's

00:42:51.920 uh he got iran and israel to agree to a ceasefire uh and both sides do not seem to be

00:43:00.480 meticulously abiding by said ceasefire and uh he had some remarks let's give the last word uh

00:43:05.680 the parting first parting shot to donald trump you know what we have we basically have two countries 0.98

00:43:12.220 that have been fighting so long and so hard that they don't know what the fuck they're doing do 0.75

00:43:18.080 understand that all right uh not the most presidential thing i'm not up there with the 0.93

00:43:23.120 gettysburg address or uh you know the day after pearl harbor but um an effective effect of getting

00:43:30.640 his point across is that so i'm supposed to follow that with the parting shot yeah yeah

00:43:36.160 uh you're you're up first a little bit of inside baseball here one of the most popular articles

00:43:41.440 that has appeared in the western standard during the past week measured by pages absolutely

00:43:46.240 astonishing response was the item in which we wrote about 91 year old don cherry who we all

00:43:52.880 thought had retired but he's going to continue with his podcast he's coming back and this is

00:43:59.200 the grapevine tens of thousands of people logged into that a lot of them left enthusiastic comments

00:44:05.520 and i like the one i like this this one that was left on our website he said you know think about

00:44:10.960 don cherry he grew up at a time when it was okay to have an opinion and you could disagree with him

00:44:18.880 or you could agree with him but it was okay and you carried on well of course don't show the don

00:44:26.080 cherry story really is a living proof of how in our bid to be sensitive and kind to everybody

00:44:35.040 we have actually suppressed free speech and it's all to our detriment so i say god bless don cherry

00:44:39.280 I hope he carries on, given his opinions, for a lot longer.

00:44:43.000 Just a little addition to that.

00:44:45.300 When he got canned, the Western Standard was very young at the time,

00:44:48.300 but we got a good scoop.

00:44:49.940 I managed to talk to him myself when he got canned from Hockey Night in Canada.

00:44:55.400 It was a real fangirl moment.

00:44:58.180 Oh, yeah.

00:44:58.760 He's an icon.

00:44:59.700 Yeah.

00:45:00.120 Corey, your parting shot.

00:45:01.360 Well, mine's going to be more of a parting plug,

00:45:02.720 but it segues into this and free speech and being unapologetic,

00:45:06.120 and the Western Standard's been sort of sponsoring that.

00:45:08.500 There's an event coming up, or a few events actually, with a member of European Parliament, Christine Anderson, who some people get upset because she's dared to speak the things that Starmer says today.

00:45:18.240 And I'll be speaking at one of those events as well in Calgary.

00:45:21.200 So if people really want to celebrate speech unrestrained, whether some people all agree or is controversial or not, check it out.

00:45:27.540 It's Trinity Productions and, well, we'll be talking about whatever the heck we want to talk about for a couple hours.

00:45:33.500 Just background for those who don't know, Christine Anderson

00:45:35.380 is a member of the

00:45:37.560 European Parliament for the AFD

00:45:39.200 party, Autority of the Deutschland, the

00:45:41.400 right-leaning party in Germany.

00:45:43.380 No, not that really right-leaning

00:45:45.400 one, though she's accused of it. 0.94

00:45:47.000 They got accused of it, but as you said, the stuff

00:45:49.280 that got them called Nazis

00:45:50.940 yesterday is the stuff that

00:45:53.560 left-wing politicians like Keir Starmer

00:45:55.660 are saying today as people wake up

00:45:57.420 and see that, yeah, maybe Europe

00:45:58.980 she was kind of onto something. Maybe Europe's got a little problem.

00:46:02.420 Yeah.

00:46:03.060 Okay, my parting shot, this is found by Black Locks Reporter, reported in our pages today.

00:46:14.080 There's a federal grant program that's encouraged more women to enter the skilled trades. 0.97

00:46:21.080 Well, shock of shockers, when there's a benefit to be had by being a woman, many men will consider themselves to be women.

00:46:31.200 They believe the apprenticeship grants evaluation report found that applications were approved solely based on self-identification and a few focus group participants.

00:46:42.100 18% reporting that male applicants have received the grant by declaring themselves female on the forms.

00:46:48.880 You bigots who would question that those people are actually, no, trans women. 0.99

00:46:53.920 They were just women with penises, that's all. 1.00

00:46:55.720 It's chicks with dicks, yes. 1.00

00:46:57.780 We've had a lot of swearing between Donald Trump now. 1.00

00:47:00.660 I'm not an alien.

00:47:01.560 That's why I stay clinical.

00:47:03.180 Yeah.

00:47:04.620 So, yeah, you can get an apprenticeship incentive grant for women offered up to $8,000,

00:47:10.180 double the amount available to men to boost female participation in trades like plumbing, welding, electrical work. 0.97

00:47:15.740 Well, if you weld the right parts on or off, you can get in on that, too.

00:47:24.000 Great.

00:47:25.080 All right.

00:47:26.400 Well, gentlemen, thank you for joining.

00:47:28.860 Thank you, John, for producing today's show.

00:47:33.660 We want to thank all of you for being with us and your support.

00:47:37.380 Remember to go to westernstandard.news, click on subscribe.

00:47:40.100 It's only $10 a month or $100 a year to get full access to all Western Standard content

00:47:45.440 and to be supporting the work that we are doing, being the independent voice of the New West.

00:47:50.800 Thank you very much for joining us today.

00:47:52.040 God bless.

00:47:58.420 We'll see you next time.

Western Standard - June 26, 2025

Canada is arming back up

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