Western Standard - Canada’s trade war is forcing us to ask： Who are we？

00:00:00.000 What is the difference between Canada and the United States? That question defies an adequate

00:00:05.320 response. We look alike, we generally have similar ethics and democratic philosophies,

00:00:11.160 and for English Canada, we even sound alike. We will show that there is a profound difference

00:00:17.140 and that that is a quiet source of pride for Canadians. That difference is rooted in our

00:00:22.620 original divergence through our constitutional structure, but it's being diminished by our

00:00:27.940 adoption of an American-style constitution. Our source of pride is also our greatest weakness.

00:00:33.940 Hi, I'm Natalie St. Hilaire. This is Randy Royer, and this is a nation of people.

00:00:57.940 Here we are, as Canadians, in the midst of a trade war with a neighbour that many of us had considered our closest friend.

00:01:05.760 How are we different? What are we fighting for? What are our mistakes? And how do we fix them?

00:01:12.980 Alright Randy, let's start from the very beginning. What makes Canadians and Americans different? 0.99

00:01:17.720 Well, let's start it before contact, where there's two continents, Europe and North America.

00:01:23.280 In North America, the Indigenous call that, to this day, Turtle Island.

00:01:27.440 and they had a completely different worldview because there was no relationship than the

00:01:32.720 Europeans. So Europe was built off of the Holy Roman Empire, which was a top-down oligarchy,

00:01:39.720 then came the divine right of kings, and it was all of a top-down structure. The sovereignty was

00:01:45.840 at the top, and individuals were ruled by their sovereign and ruled by the church. In North 0.72

00:01:51.980 America, they didn't have any of those institutions. They hadn't invented them. So they had sovereignty

00:01:56.280 of the individual. And so it was effectively self-sovereignty. And their governance was

00:02:05.140 bottom-up. And it was all short-term. And it was all at the behest and benefit of what they would

00:02:11.260 call the membership of their tribe. And so it was a very different way of looking at things. In fact,

00:02:16.660 quite the almost opposite ends. Well, that doesn't describe everything. I mean, it certainly doesn't

00:02:22.440 bring us up to date. But was that the entirety of the New World, as they called it?

00:02:26.280 no that was uh south america was very different um so uh south america first the indigenous were

00:02:32.280 different they had developed differently they had top-down uh structure and they had complex

00:02:37.000 societies that were you know massive population so they and the indigenous themselves were different

00:02:42.280 than turtle island and uh when the europeans came over frankly the the british and the northern

00:02:48.760 europeans sent farmers to north america and the spanish and portuguese sent conquistadors to

00:02:55.800 south america so that created a very different dynamic where it exists to this day that much of

00:03:02.280 the ruling elite in you know mexico and south is all about sort of that conquistador attitude

00:03:09.240 how do i gain from pillaging the land and pillaging the people and so that's why they're

00:03:15.000 sort of a little less advanced advanced in terms of economics and what have you whereas in the north

00:03:20.040 they built communities and uh and they became part of communities so totally different story

00:03:25.240 we're only talking about you know turtle island north america okay so turtle island refers to

00:03:29.800 north america just to be clear for those of us that um yeah if you look at it it kind of looks

00:03:34.200 like a turtle okay so like how did they figure that out yeah but you know it's how did they

00:03:39.080 figure that out no nobody knows but okay you know they certainly didn't have a high elevation view

00:03:43.640 of the of north america but it actually does look like turtle island notwithstanding all that when

00:03:48.360 did canada and the u.s really diverge in terms of you know their sensibilities because i'm

00:03:54.520 imagining that we're the europeans are coming in and exploring this area and encountering different

00:04:01.240 indigenous groups and developing communities in the way that it happened so when was the split

00:04:05.160 what precipitated the split between what we now call canada and america um it all happened sort

00:04:10.920 of 1763 to 1776 in in that time period and precisely what happened was uh the 13 american

00:04:21.160 colonies were getting more you know king charles and all that stuff charles ii i believe uh you

00:04:26.760 know they were getting more and more distant from the royal crown and um and specifically i mark it

00:04:33.000 as the declaration of 1763 where the the royal crown and through the government um declared that

00:04:41.400 the indigenous had self-sovereignty and then in 1774 in the quebec act um declared that the uh

00:04:48.600 that french canadians had self-sovereignty and the americans viewed those as intolerant

00:04:56.520 provocations they call them the intolerant acts and so they and part of the 17th sorry 1764 quebec

00:05:05.160 act was that much of ohio was designated as part of quebec but uh indigenous land the americans

00:05:13.560 were very upset that the french had rights uh they uh they didn't think that was right and

00:05:18.520 they didn't want to see indigenous have rights they ultimately at that time called the indigenous

00:05:23.400 they determined them to be aliens even though they were on their own land and and treated

00:05:29.000 them as aliens so the u.s in 1776 created a constitution canada had no codified constitution

00:05:39.720 and that's really the point of demarcation okay so what's the what's important about

00:05:46.040 those constitutional acts or specifically the constitutional act in the united states

00:05:50.600 how did that make us significantly different and you know what evolved out of that the the basic

00:05:58.600 difference was that in a codified constitution you create a rules-based society so that's

00:06:06.280 That's very different than what we had, which in, without a codified constitution, we had a rules, sorry, a principles, principle-based society.

00:06:17.740 So that's the, that's the primary demarcation.

00:06:21.160 The Americans went to a constitution and they said, here's the rules, here's how we must act.

00:06:26.460 And Canada said, and Canada through the British said, well, here's our principles, conduct yourself according to those principles.

00:06:33.540 I see. It seems like principles are a deeper way of understanding the world than rules, because there's sort of like a why inside of a principle versus just a you may do this, you may not do that. Seems to me that way. But how did that end up playing out?

00:06:48.320 Well, the rules-based approach is very rigid, and it has harsh enforcement.

00:06:56.720 It leads to excess lawsuits, harsh penalization, and even heavy enforcement, whereas the principle

00:07:06.280 base gives you an approach that it's situational.

00:07:10.980 It's what was actually happening on the time, and given our principles, what was the right

00:07:15.620 thing to do.

00:07:16.280 And so there's guidance in terms of laws, but there's also a latitude as to which way you go.

00:07:21.980 So the enforcement is really put on the individuals to enforce it upon themselves rather than a third party police force or army or something like that.

00:07:34.840 The Canadian system relied on individuals to police themselves and to live within the principles of what we what we had.

00:07:42.100 I mean, given that Canadians have such a difficult time with their identity, and I mean, this is definitely something I think that it's at the forefront of a lot of conversations right now is like, what does it mean to be Canadian when we're not just not being Americans?

00:07:57.180 and you know there is a definite difference in the in in the principles-based approach versus

00:08:03.820 a rules-based approach but like how do we see that playing out in terms of our identity as a

00:08:08.860 people because i think that's really what what most people are well it's a huge topic i know

00:08:14.040 amongst a lot of my friends yeah well um the answer to me is in in one particular survey

00:08:20.120 and i think it was uh it was pew research that did the survey and they found that they asked the

00:08:25.020 question uh do you do you view your fellow citizens as moral or amoral you know good or bad

00:08:33.260 and uh 50 let's see was 53 percent of americans said that they view their fellow citizens as

00:08:41.580 fundamentally morally bad 53 percent a 48 reciprocal said that they were good in canada

00:08:50.220 same question was asked and in canada 92 percent 92 percent of canadians felt that their fellow

00:08:58.860 citizens were fundamentally good seven percent said that they were bad so to me that is the

00:09:06.060 difference between a rules-based approach versus a rule-based society with strict enforcement

00:09:14.860 strict laws and all that stuff versus a principle base people you just trust people more because you

00:09:21.740 know they're acting on the same set of principles that you are so 92 versus 7 in canada for 53

00:09:30.940 versus 42 and or 40 uh 40 46 in in united states yeah so just to restate that and to get really

00:09:38.220 clear on it because that's like a significant difference cultural difference between canadians

00:09:43.020 and americans and i don't really know that before i heard this study i was aware of any so it's

00:09:48.940 about half of americans think their neighbors are morally bad versus over 90 percent of canadians

00:09:56.740 would say our neighbors are good people like in general we believe other people to be good people

00:10:01.980 um you know and there's all sorts of downstream effects from those beliefs i would say but that's

00:10:07.400 like a that's a really serious cultural difference in attitude and it's interesting how you've drawn

00:10:14.680 it back to our fundamental documents like the constitution which just goes to show how important

00:10:20.040 these documents are but okay so that's like a cultural belief it's shown up in the data

00:10:24.620 now how is that reflected at the individual level well the americans then are very highly

00:10:31.300 compliance oriented uh they're you know they're divided uh which is i've always said in these

00:10:38.040 episodes that the constitution drives you to division well this is why it drives you to

00:10:42.560 division it makes it's rule-based and you can basically go right up to that line of the rule

00:10:48.220 and do whatever you want there's no there's no there's no uh stopping you from doing that whereas

00:10:52.720 in canada we're principle based so you got to be principled yeah and and so that's the difference

00:10:57.940 it's more litigious and and the ethics are defined by legality not by our principles but by the word

00:11:06.480 of the law so it's it's completely different and and it's all governed by penalties and of course

00:11:13.140 it's the state that hires the policeman hires the lawyers hires the judge so it's the state that

00:11:18.920 actually defines what that line of morality is and again we've talked about that in the past

00:11:24.580 But this is how it happened. This is the consequence of the principle-based versus rules-based.

00:11:31.780 And in Canada, you know, we're integrity-based.

00:11:35.200 And so we govern our own actions and we rely, and we don't rely strictly on enforcement.

00:11:42.340 So we rely on each other.

00:11:45.000 And so the net part of the result is also that we have traditionally had a higher degree of belief in the morality of the people making decisions in government, in the bureaucracy, or what we call the civil service before 1982.

00:12:03.220 You know, we had more faith in that.

00:12:04.720 And police, we had belief that they were running by the same principles that we were running.

00:12:09.920 So we always had that.

00:12:10.960 Now, then in 1982, we switched teams, and we got rid of that principle-based attitudes, and we went to strict enforcement, constitutional, and the Constitution tries to make us American.

00:12:26.100 And this is what I voted against in 1982 when I voted against the Constitution.

00:12:32.680 I didn't want us to lose the concept of principle-based society.

00:12:37.560 and and now we've been relatively resilient and and we have resisted it but the constitution

00:12:45.740 still drives us towards the way the americans think yeah it's occurring to me as a little bit

00:12:50.720 of a paradox because just to sort of restate or just reaffirm what you're saying is you're talking

00:12:55.280 about the difference from a system where the rules or the morality is externally defined

00:13:01.960 versus something where it's internally or intrinsically defined. So integrity or

00:13:08.040 principles would be intrinsic to me and rules are extrinsic to me. They are externally defined by

00:13:13.920 the state. But the paradox is that what you're saying is because when something's internally

00:13:19.240 defined by me and I believe that, you know, the bureaucrats or the government is also run by

00:13:24.060 people that have that internal integrity, I tend to trust it more. Yes. Yeah. Well, and there's

00:13:30.960 there's two points here that i want to make and one is that that goes right down to our own

00:13:35.300 individual morality so for example in the united states extramarital affairs well 90 percent of

00:13:41.540 americans say that that is against the rigid rule that we have uh and on the flip side canadians say

00:13:48.240 well and like 76 say that that means that it's immoral it's because we we put it in the context

00:13:54.640 of what's going on and we say as long as so the same applies to like homosexuality which is

00:14:00.260 39% of Americans say if you go over that line that's wrong whereas only 13% of

00:14:06.860 Canadians view that as as as actually wrong again we put it in context the

00:14:12.820 other thing that I really want to bring up here is that we have talked about the

00:14:16.900 colonial mindset and the pioneer mind and mindset the two different characters

00:14:20.760 in Canada this is very much the colonial mindset this is this is what we got from

00:14:27.880 Ontario Quebec and absolutely Quebec and the Maritimes this is what when we were born if you

00:14:35.160 will by Eastern Canada they transcribed those principle-based morality principle-based values

00:14:41.880 into our uh into our societies in the West and this so if you ever ask what has Ontario ever

00:14:48.720 done for me the very first thing is that they gave us a very highly valuable principle based

00:14:55.120 principle-based society which i think is something that we need to recognize okay well then relate

00:15:01.520 that back to the whole like the state apparatus and how what's coming up today as far as like

00:15:06.960 uh going on in the united states versus going on in canada that really reflects

00:15:11.280 what you're saying well i think the first place to look is is uh incarceration and uh so in in

00:15:17.840 In the United States, for 100,000 citizens, there are 550 citizens in jail, in the incarceration system.

00:15:30.120 In Canada, that number is 96.

00:15:33.000 So just off of that number, you can see the difference between a principles-based versus rules-based.

00:15:39.240 The Americans have to put people in jail because that's what defines society.

00:15:44.980 The other thing that I want to throw in here is, by the way, that rate of incarceration is well above Western Europe.

00:15:53.520 And only Russia, Kazakhstan, and I think South Africa are kind of not even close to the United States, but kind of halfway between.

00:16:02.160 So these have played out and created some very fundamentally different cultures, which I think until now I walk around feeling like I know.

00:16:09.660 but this is giving me some good context for placing that within, you know, why we might be different.

00:16:15.620 But how does that impact us when we're trying to deal with each other?

00:16:18.660 So when Canadians are trying to deal with Americans at any level, what happens?

00:16:22.440 Well, it's interesting because, you know, you judge your own success by your own standards.

00:16:29.160 And in Canada, we have a certain set of standards, and it's about our morality and about how we treat people,

00:16:35.780 and it's about how we respect each other and a little less about our economic advancement

00:16:43.380 in the u.s they measure themselves by what not a surprise by something that they actually excel at

00:16:48.820 which is financial advantage and financial success so we look at ourselves and say well

00:16:55.620 we're nice people uh 64 percent of canadians think that they are nicer and more polite than americans

00:17:02.740 64 and then we say that we have a 54 believe that we have have a better culture and more are

00:17:12.100 on are more worldly than the united states and then um two-thirds of 66 percent of canadians

00:17:20.580 think that americans are arrogant which kind of relates to that issue of they measure themselves

00:17:26.500 by their financial success we measure them by their moral success their social success

00:17:32.740 And then the last one is that 82% of Canadians feel that Canada is more admired internationally than the United States.

00:17:44.700 So that's all Pew Research information, by the way.

00:17:47.640 That's interesting differences between the...

00:17:51.360 I mean, it's one of the only times I've actually heard a lot about the differences between our two cultures.

00:17:55.460 Although, like I said before, I can certainly feel it the way I can feel the difference in the different regions in Canada.

00:18:00.680 So, okay, how do we as Canadians view Americans and vice versa?

00:18:05.980 Well, Americans view us not in the same way.

00:18:08.960 Americans view us as, I think the number is 79% of Americans view Canadians favourably,

00:18:14.600 whereas conversely, 48% of Canadians view Americans, sorry, 48% view Americans unfavourably.

00:18:22.820 So again, this is pure research.

00:18:24.340 And 34% of Canadians do not admire the United States.

00:18:30.680 Okay. So, I mean, ultimately, there's these senses and these ideas and research showing us the ways that we're different.

00:18:40.100 But what fundamentally makes the two countries different? What's the crux of the matter?

00:18:47.680 The crux of the matter is that through our constitutional structure, through our history, we took a different path.

00:18:54.180 we took the path of basically human path and that coincides with what we talked talked about in

00:19:01.220 earlier episodes about we took the path of putting the sovereignty at the individual level

00:19:06.140 and the americans took the path in 1776 of putting sovereignty at the at the level of the state and

00:19:14.720 then the state uh and all the people surrendered their sovereignty to the state and that's through

00:19:20.360 the pledge of allegiance then the state in turn protects certain rights and americans are very

00:19:25.640 jealous about those rights that are protected and we have found out recently they are poor probably

00:19:31.080 more malleable than people realized you know suddenly there were the rights of reproduction

00:19:36.200 that a lot of women thought they had and etc you know voting rights are different and what have you

00:19:41.000 but it also comes from a history in the united states where you know black people were not

00:19:44.440 included African Americans were not included in their in rights the

00:19:49.400 indigenous were you know considered aliens and then they were considered

00:19:53.320 wards of the state in 1830 or something and so they had a very different

00:19:57.640 approach and that's that's the biggest divide and and and and it and it

00:20:06.340 continues to this day and then us adopting an American style Constitution

00:20:11.740 has been, I don't think it's diminished it much,

00:20:16.100 but it has a little bit.

00:20:17.480 So we have become more litigious.

00:20:19.600 We've become more divisive.

00:20:21.420 We've become more adversarial.

00:20:23.440 And we have, it feels like, and it's anecdotal,

00:20:27.080 it feels like we don't trust our fellow citizens

00:20:29.960 as much as we used to.

00:20:31.560 And there certainly is, you know, regional divides

00:20:33.720 and we have, you know, fiefdoms and all that stuff.

00:20:37.320 and a bureaucracy has become self-engaged and self-enlarging rather than being the civil service

00:20:44.360 that it was before 1982 so there are changes in canada because of that change in constitution

00:20:50.600 so what about generally canadian u.s relations and you know what's going on right now well the

00:20:58.840 the terrafore well the terrafore is the terrafore started uh with softwood lumber was that 15 years

00:21:05.400 ago and uh and then the keystone xl that was cancelled both of which were absolutely contrary

00:21:11.960 to the rules or the agreements that we had with the united states and it should have been clear

00:21:17.640 to us that the united states was no longer going to adhere to the rules to the agreements that they

00:21:23.800 had with us and we should have had our politicians talking about diversifying our interests away from

00:21:31.960 from the United States at that time.

00:21:33.760 And it was obvious to anybody who would take half a look

00:21:36.600 is the United States was becoming isolationist.

00:21:40.000 And their history is they go from expansionist to isolationist.

00:21:43.920 It's like Russia goes, they have a free law cycle,

00:21:46.960 sometimes they have democracy, then they go back to autocracy.

00:21:50.480 Well, the United States has the same cycle.

00:21:52.240 It goes a similar cycle, but it goes expansionist and isolationist.

00:21:57.720 And I even said at the time, the real danger is going to be

00:22:01.180 if the united states has becomes isolationist and expansionist at the same time and that's

00:22:07.180 where they are now so um so uh to me what was what was going to happen with the trump election

00:22:17.260 and it would have happened as i said slower with the democrats is the two countries were pulling

00:22:22.700 apart and it was because of u.s isolationism and they are just they don't want to they don't want

00:22:29.660 do it anymore they don't want to rule the world anymore okay so knowing this and being able to

00:22:35.420 see this you must have felt like canada was going wrong in some respects because if you can see what

00:22:41.180 the united united states is doing and the direction that they're going um you must have had a sense

00:22:46.940 that there could have been something that we could have corrected and so randy what would that have

00:22:51.180 have been well you see i think that we've got um we got into a fallacy of our own superiority

00:23:00.120 so we uh we said you know we we have a moral superiority vis-a-vis the americans because of

00:23:07.740 that you know principle-based stuff and so we became very complacent and so we you know we

00:23:14.940 we dropped our guard relative to being competitive economically and you know a couple you know from

00:23:22.920 the Fraser Institute they talk about this that's in 1999 the gap between this is an example of how

00:23:29.460 we dropped our guard the gap between Canada United States was ten thousand dollars that their income

00:23:34.620 was ten thousand dollars per person that's per person okay yeah for higher than us in 2024 that

00:23:40.860 gap was $24,000. So that gap expanded. We got weaker, they got stronger. And then if you look

00:23:48.060 at why did that happen, then the Fraser Institute talks about productivity. And in the change

00:23:55.580 between 1999 and 2025, the U.S. increased their productivity by 68% and Canada increased it by

00:24:03.880 28 percent we got lazy yeah if i was investing i'd rather invest in the united states based

00:24:10.200 on those numbers well and then investment was the next thing that um per one dollar of investment in

00:24:16.520 19 uh 2007 actually for every dollar that the americans invested uh in their productivity

00:24:24.280 canada invested 90 cents pretty close by 2024 for every dollar americans invested in productivity

00:24:32.680 canada invest 54 cents so we're not even investing in productivity we're not even investing yeah

00:24:39.160 we're falling back onto this moral superiority myth and and that's also why we succumb to

00:24:48.200 politicians that wanted to do um virtue signaling and wanted to say well we're going to save the

00:24:54.920 world for you know because of our environmentally 1.7 it was all virtue signaling because of our

00:25:01.640 myth of superiority and so that's where uh what made us better has actually also made us weaker

00:25:09.240 yeah pride cometh before the fall i think is that the right expression that's perfect that's

00:25:14.360 exactly what we did okay so though one of the arguments that has been being like i know trump

00:25:21.320 has made this argument or various american officials have made this argument though maybe

00:25:26.200 not in these words but did canada just like we must have been to have invested this little in

00:25:32.440 our own economy in our own productivity we must have been relying on someone and it seems like

00:25:37.020 maybe we've been relying on the united states is that the case absolutely that's the case yeah for

00:25:41.720 sure we we made the mistake of of believing that the united states was going to eternally be the

00:25:48.220 nation that it was after world war ii where they did the marshall plan saved europe you know they're

00:25:52.380 very generous nation and we as we relied on that generosity and let our own guard down and so we 0.94

00:25:58.980 did a bunch of stupid things that quite frankly they can't get rid of now uh you know you'll 0.93

00:26:04.280 notice that when you know Carney talks about doing infrastructure he doesn't change the rules 1.00

00:26:09.100 he has to do carve-outs and that's because we still have this myth that we're we cling to this

00:26:15.860 myth of of superiority that we cling to and so he can't actually change the rules all he can do is

00:26:21.360 carve out i mean there's an there's a real irony there because it seems like even though we as

00:26:27.680 canadians and the pew research showed this would call the americans arrogant i mean it kind of

00:26:33.840 seems like we've been arrogant about our moral superiority you are exactly right and it is

00:26:41.360 bringing us down and it has put us in this position so instead of having a you know a reasonable

00:26:48.960 approach to our moral principles and our principle-based society but understanding

00:26:55.920 that we still have to provide economically and it's true that we have made the mistake we made

00:27:01.520 the mistake with nafta uh without you know rolling our economy into that united states without any

00:27:07.680 political protection uh we made the mistake of of assuming their political structure with the 82

00:27:13.600 constitution and we made the mistake of not paying any attention to softwood lumber and

00:27:18.560 and the keystone xl cancellation but those were all our mistakes and we are going to pay for them

00:27:24.720 we will be paying for them in the price that we have to pay to disengage our economy but i want

00:27:30.640 to tell a story about my personal experience going over to europe and uh and over there of course you

00:27:36.720 run into people from from europe and and uh and and the united states and it was very interesting

00:27:42.160 because when you talk to somebody from europe the attitude is well when they find out where you know

00:27:47.440 know we're Canadian they kind of go well what do we do you know the United States is your best

00:27:53.000 friend what are we supposed to do now and they really really looked and they are looking to

00:27:58.580 Canada for leadership and they look to us because we really do understand the United States better

00:28:03.460 than anybody else in the world and we probably understand the United States better than they

00:28:08.020 themselves understand the United States and so they're looking to us for leadership the other

00:28:12.940 thing was when i uh you know often people would approach us thinking that we were americans they

00:28:18.300 want to talk politics and then they'd find out we were canadians and the first thing they'd do

00:28:22.460 is they'd apologize and this was like a year ago so it was just starting uh they would apologize

00:28:27.020 and say you know sorry about that we we don't really want to do this but you know we're doing

00:28:31.740 it and i said no you know don't don't apologize you know first of all we as canadians want to

00:28:38.940 say thank you to the united states because you have given us 80 years of stability peace and

00:28:45.500 relative wealth and you've given that generously you've spent fortune and blood to protect all of

00:28:52.860 the world you know the world owes you a big thank you and i say but we understand that you don't

00:28:59.740 want to do that anymore and we're okay with that and we're okay that we now we got to go our own

00:29:04.860 way we'll make we'll make our own plans and and we're gonna you know go go our own way now a

00:29:10.620 little bit uh but i want you to know that that um using american vernacular because canadians don't

00:29:17.340 actually say this but we want you to know that we still love america and when you've got people

00:29:23.420 being held hostage we'll be there for you when you got people that can't get home because of

00:29:27.660 a building that got blown up we'll be there for you and we will always be your best friend it

00:29:33.420 does feel like that's the moment we're in a little bit and that is that's a that's a hard moment but

00:29:38.060 an exciting moment for canadians so given that you've set it up that way what are we going to do

00:29:43.580 next what should we do next well i think the you know the alberta referendum in my mind is a point

00:29:50.220 of inflection so this is an opportunity for can't for alberta to decide how it's going to lead now

00:29:58.300 what does that mean um you know i think it's number one lead the western provinces uh you

00:30:04.300 know our brothers and brothers and sisters in saskatchewan british columbia and manitoba

00:30:09.900 they think very much the same way we do well let's let's gather together and uh and frankly

00:30:15.980 the more friends you have the better off you're going to be and then as we move forward keep in

00:30:21.980 mind that the world has changed and the united states has decided that it's going to be different

00:30:27.820 and that's fair that's their right to do so but the world is in fact looking to us and they're

00:30:33.020 looking to canada and specifically they're looking to alberta so uh this is a very important time

00:30:39.660 right now well thanks for sharing your insight and experience and education randy i look forward

00:30:45.820 to talking to you more look thank you all the best canada is the author of its own precarious

00:30:52.460 and vulnerable position reliant on a much stronger neighbor that has now turned on us

00:30:58.860 socially our original foundations led us to be kind and accepting of each other economically we

00:31:05.100 had an independent national economy flawed but ours we abandoned our human-based constitution

00:31:11.660 structure and surrendered our economy all just to be like americans the reliance became a weakness

00:31:19.020 the weakness has become a threat to regain our independence we have to struggle ahead but on top 0.98

00:31:25.980 of that are challenges of excess immigration that then is the topic of our next episode

00:31:31.900 of the nation of people, immigration. Join us.

Western Standard - September 15, 2026

Canada’s trade war is forcing us to ask： Who are we？

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