Western Standard - From the Liver to the Knees： Israel pager bombs

00:00:00.000 good day today is september 18th 2024 i am derek phillibrand publisher of the western standard

00:00:29.760 and you're watching The Pipeline.

00:00:32.540 I am joined, as always, by Western Standard Senior Opinion Editor,

00:00:37.260 or no, just Opinion Editor, Nigel Hannaford.

00:00:39.880 I was going to say, how many Opinion Editors do we have?

00:00:42.360 I was referring to you as a senior.

00:00:44.160 I see.

00:00:47.280 There's no pension plan, but anyway.

00:00:49.720 It was a good save.

00:00:50.800 I was actually mixing it up with then Corey's title,

00:00:54.060 Senior Alberta Columnist, Corey Morgan.

00:00:56.820 I was mixing it up, but instead I just made an old joke.

00:00:59.760 i'm happy to be here too they joke like an old joke oh yes it doesn't get old all right uh we've

00:01:06.400 got a great show uh just tons of stuff um the uh we're gonna be talking now that jake meet singh

00:01:13.920 has ripped up his agreement with justin trudeau we're heading for an election right right no no

00:01:20.320 we're not because there's a new coalition in town the bloc quebecois and the liberals uh doing a

00:01:26.480 dance, the Bloc will be supporting the Liberal government by voting that they have confidence

00:01:31.240 in Justin Trudeau and the government next week when Pierre Polyev and the Conservative

00:01:35.860 Party's non-confidence motion comes up.

00:01:38.440 So we're going to be talking about the dance the Bloc de Croix and the Liberal government

00:01:41.740 are doing, and just how much this just might cost the rest of us outside of Canada, the

00:01:47.440 ROC.

00:01:50.280 Now this is, I don't know how to talk about this one, the straight face.

00:01:54.440 They did it again.

00:01:58.480 They did it again.

00:02:00.780 Man, the Mossad, I'm guessing this, there's got to be Mossad. 0.64

00:02:04.880 The Israelis have executed what has got to be one of the most interesting covert operations in world history,

00:02:13.680 targeting a bunch of Hamas terrorist bosses.

00:02:16.840 Well, they didn't use drone strikes.

00:02:18.320 They didn't shoot them.

00:02:20.660 They didn't snipe them.

00:02:21.260 They sold them a bunch of modified pagers, and simultaneously they went, boom, castrating many terrorists across the Middle East region, particularly in Lebanon, all at once.

00:02:38.420 And, well.

00:02:41.700 Say it. What's the new Hamas slogan?

00:02:44.520 From the liver to the knees. 0.65

00:02:45.940 I mean, that headline writes itself from the liver to the knees. So we're going to be talking about that. Speaking of interesting body parts being rearranged, Alberta MLA, Jennifer Johnson.

00:03:04.740 And she was the conservative nominee in the constituency of Lacombe Pinocca.

00:03:08.940 She made some comments during the last provincial election, was not allowed to sit with the conservatives.

00:03:14.920 Her comments were deemed by some to be transphobic.

00:03:17.800 They were at a very, at the very least, they were indelicate.

00:03:21.260 And so she's been doing penance since the last election. 0.70

00:03:24.940 She's had to sit as an independent MLA, supposed to go through some kind of sensitivity training around trans things and all that.

00:03:33.420 And, well, a biological male who identifies as a woman, well, we're going to play the video for her.

00:03:41.600 But he very publicly tried to bully her and say things that she knows is scientifically and factually false.

00:03:49.220 And this has caught the attention of J.K. Rowling, the author of the Harry Potter series.

00:03:55.700 And so it's become a global phenomenon now, the kind of trans-bullying of this Alberta MLA and trying to force her to lie publicly.

00:04:06.120 And it seems to have blown up in her face quite spectacularly.

00:04:11.160 And, you know, we're going to start a new segment today, Parting Shots.

00:04:15.700 Some final thoughts from myself, Nigel Corey, that maybe don't have to get the time for a full segment,

00:04:22.880 but really just need to be said before we close the show down.

00:04:26.560 Okay, so let's go take the news to Ottawa here.

00:04:31.460 Last week, I believe it was last week, Jagmeet Singh walks in front of the cameras and says,

00:04:37.240 I'm ripping up my agreement with Justin Trudeau.

00:04:40.680 I am done being his patsy.

00:04:43.800 Justin Trudeau's a bad guy.

00:04:45.700 It doesn't matter that I've been responsible for keeping him in power for the last two plus years here.

00:04:52.500 He's a bad guy. I'm against him. We're ripping it up.

00:04:56.420 That changes the dynamics because then all of a sudden, Pierre Polyev, to no one's surprise, says,

00:05:03.400 Oh, well, let's see if you really mean it.

00:05:05.780 Do you really? If you ripped it off, that means you must be saying you don't have confidence in Justin Trudeau.

00:05:10.460 Well, let's vote on a motion of non-confidence, shall we?

00:05:14.640 So Pierre Polyev has indicated he's introducing a plain motion of non-confidence, just simple language.

00:05:22.560 And Justin Trudeau has been forced to find a new dancing partner.

00:05:26.260 And, well, he may have broken up with Jagmeet, but he looked at the other end of the dance hall.

00:05:33.060 And there is Yves Blanchette, the leader of the Bloc Québécois.

00:05:38.020 And God, sometimes I wish we had our block out west, because they are ruthlessly pragmatic.

00:05:44.500 He says, we don't care who the prime minister is, but we want to squeeze the government for,

00:05:49.800 we want to squeeze the west of Canada as much as we can for the profit of Quebec.

00:05:55.440 Yeah, it's cynical, but good God.

00:05:59.360 I think only the block Quebecois speaks about how Canada really is.

00:06:04.460 None of the federalist parties will talk this way and actually talk about the truth of how transactional Canadian federalism is.

00:06:11.360 We're a corporation at this point.

00:06:13.540 We're just, it's purely transactional.

00:06:15.380 And the Bloc understands this the way no one else does, and they say it out loud.

00:06:20.320 So God bless them.

00:06:22.160 So it was announced today, the Bloc Québécois will not be voting non-confidence in Justin Trudeau.

00:06:29.880 And their price has been only a few, I think, I don't know the exact amount, but it'll amount to roughly $5 billion a year in perpetuity by increasing the OAS, which will disproportionately benefit Quebec.

00:06:43.780 It's a blocky McQuadre bill that needs liberal support to pass.

00:06:47.840 So, Nigel, do you think it's just a one-off,

00:06:56.360 or do you think we're seeing the beginning of maybe the new,

00:06:59.420 maybe not long-term dancing partner, but medium-term dancing partner for the liberals?

00:07:02.780 The Prime Minister needs the bloc to get him to the next election.

00:07:08.600 Theoretically in October of 2025, constitutionally possibly in October 2026.

00:07:15.920 That one won't happen, but yeah.

00:07:18.360 I love it when you say that will never happen.

00:07:21.440 But then it does.

00:07:22.380 Because this is Canada.

00:07:23.900 This is Canada.

00:07:24.780 It could happen.

00:07:26.400 He'll never invoke the War Measures Act to deal with some bouncy castles.

00:07:30.080 For viewers who are not familiar with it, the Constitution does permit five years between elections.

00:07:37.380 We have run on four years between elections as being appropriate for the last 40 years.

00:07:42.820 No, Mulroney went to five.

00:07:44.320 That was in a case of a majority government. And that was before we had fixed election date legislation. So nothing stops under the fixed election date legislation. The Prime Minister can call an early election, especially if he has a minority, then he has an excuse. But to go past four years, you would need to repeal the fixed election date.

00:08:02.280 Well, they've already done that once.

00:08:04.540 That was for their pensions. They've moved it back by a week.

00:08:06.700 Yes.

00:08:07.180 But they would have to outright repeal it to go to five years.

00:08:10.280 Well, they could do that.

00:08:11.820 They could. 0.76

00:08:12.100 Alberta had a balanced budget act too.

00:08:13.700 But I think, you know, really...

00:08:15.120 We had a fixed election date law, and it didn't mean anything to Jim Prentice.

00:08:20.760 The thing that really makes it hard to talk about this with compassion is that here we have the liberal government,

00:08:29.140 the most unpopular government, I think, that we have seen in this country since, actually, since the Kim Campbell government.

00:08:38.180 And they are staving off certain defeat by making an alliance with who?

00:08:43.700 the party that wants to break Canada up, the Bloc, Rebecca, the party.

00:08:52.460 So, you know, it reminds me of 2008 when there was that coalition of interest

00:08:57.820 between the Bloc, the NDP, and the Liberals to bring down the Harper government.

00:09:02.080 In the end, they were called on that very thing.

00:09:05.400 How can you make this depend on the participation of separatists?

00:09:10.000 Answer, you can't. They backed off, but now they're doing it.

00:09:13.700 It's a shameful day.

00:09:14.700 I don't know.

00:09:16.700 Minority governments have operated with the support of the bloc in the past, including Stephen Harper's.

00:09:20.700 Now, that was those were always one off deals.

00:09:23.700 And this does not appear to be a coalition of the informal kind, like it was between, you know, until Jagmeet Singh ripped up his deal with Justin Trudeau with much fanfare,

00:09:34.700 or the formal coalition that had been proposed in, I think, was it 2008?

00:09:42.700 Yeah, 2008-9. Yeah, between 2008-9 kind of went over that period.

00:09:49.780 This is more akin to, I think, when Harper worked the block.

00:09:53.160 But it's a qualitative difference. I mean, here is a we will back you for a year. Give us money.

00:09:58.700 Harper, I need your support today.

00:10:01.560 Well, no, no, no. I don't think we've seen a written agreement with the block.

00:10:05.580 That's equivalent to, say, with the way the liberals have to deal with the NDP.

00:10:08.980 I don't think they're going to show it to you anyway.

00:10:11.240 No, no.

00:10:13.100 Perhaps they achieve an informal understanding

00:10:15.560 because Jagmeet Singh, Corey, has been humiliated.

00:10:20.060 No one, like even his own supporters,

00:10:22.480 were kind of facepalming a bit about his bravado

00:10:26.180 that I'm ripping up the agreement.

00:10:27.720 He sounded like a frog.

00:10:29.560 Rip it, rip it, rip it, rip it.

00:10:31.640 Like the talking points were absurd

00:10:33.780 after he spent so long backing Trudeau.

00:10:35.520 So Jagmeet Singh has been humiliated for over two years in his position.

00:10:41.220 He cannot back the Liberals again in the first confidence vote that comes up, the Conservative putting forward here.

00:10:50.220 I think, I don't think the bloc intends to be a permanent fixture in the government the way the NDP has been for the last two plus years.

00:10:59.660 I think they are looking for kind of one-off transactional deals so that when the next election comes,

00:11:04.760 they could say here's what we accomplished because the biggest knock against the bloc in Quebec

00:11:10.760 is generally that well you can't be a part of the government you can't deliver the goods this is a

00:11:15.620 way for them to turn around say here's how we delivered the goods you would have never got it

00:11:19.580 without the bloc and they're coming off a fresh by-election win just yesterday where do you think

00:11:25.480 the bloc is that strategically in this well actually they're kind of similar to where Singh

00:11:29.640 was they're both parties that know that they'll never be anything more powerful than being in a

00:11:34.160 kingmaker position. I believe that Polyev is going to try and get a confidence vote whenever

00:11:38.220 possible. And when that happens, the bloc's going to come forward and say to Trudeau,

00:11:42.160 if you want to stay in, you've got to do something for us. And something that's different this time

00:11:46.700 is the bloc is well-placed to go into the next election. Jagmeet Singh never was. I mean,

00:11:52.120 you know, he was, they're not a well-funded party. They're not going to do any better than

00:11:57.140 where they're sitting right now. As you said, the bloc has just come off of a by-election win.

00:12:01.880 they're not afraid to go to the polls. So their threats of saying we will support a

00:12:06.020 non-confidence motion are real. And that really puts Trudeau over a barrel when it comes to those

00:12:10.860 negotiations. And the really strengthening their hand today was winning that by-election in

00:12:17.620 Verdun something on the island of Montreal. That seat has been continuously liberal for 40 years.

00:12:25.560 Before that, it may have been PC or something at some point, but it's never been a block seat.

00:12:30.380 The Bloc has never been particularly competitive on the island of Montreal.

00:12:34.100 They just took, this is the Quebec equivalent of the Toronto St. Paul's seat.

00:12:39.440 The Liberals are losing their very, very safest seats.

00:12:43.640 They're losing the keep of the castle, and the Bloc just took that from them.

00:12:48.500 So they have a lot of leverage right now.

00:12:50.380 The Liberals are terrified of an election, and I think they'll do anything to avoid one.

00:12:56.280 And that's a powerful point. That's a very salient point you made, Corey, that the NDP have always been terrified of election.

00:13:03.400 They had no money. They literally just paid off their campaign debt.

00:13:05.560 They have no money in the bank. They're low in the polls. They're going to lose seats.

00:13:09.200 The bloc stands to gain seats. They've got money in the bank. They're doing decently in the polls.

00:13:14.200 But they also know that they have more leverage in a minority government than in a majority.

00:13:18.440 And they've already said, Pierre Pauliev's going to win the next election. He's got it in the bag.

00:13:21.680 he's gonna have a majority government so we're we're in no rush to give up our leverage yeah

00:13:28.400 and i mean it's it's but they will in a heartbeat if they don't get what they're asking for yeah

00:13:32.560 and uh hopefully trudeau knows it i mean what he knows and doesn't know those

00:13:38.240 i think mr trudeau is very well aware of how much he is going to have to pay the block in one way

00:13:44.000 or another to stay in that position for another 12 months. What could he possibly not understand?

00:13:52.160 Well, I mean, the thing that gets me though is, you know, I was tormented by question period in

00:13:57.040 the newsroom today and I listened to Trudeau get up there and give his stock lines on the carbon

00:14:01.680 tax and everything else. He sounds exactly though, he's giving the exact same line he did in the

00:14:06.480 House of Commons that he did a year ago. He won't change his tune. He's incapable of changing his

00:14:11.280 tune, even though he's this low in the polls, tells me that this is a man who really doesn't

00:14:15.760 know how precarious his position is.

00:14:17.860 Yeah, but Corey, you sort of misunderstand the purpose of those dumb lines. It is not

00:14:23.080 to inform, it is merely to get through the hour.

00:14:25.680 Yeah, treading water.

00:14:27.580 All he has to do is say something and make it sound good, and that's all that is required

00:14:33.300 of him.

00:14:34.300 Well, the Liberals just had their caucus retreat in Nanaimo, where we had Western Stead

00:14:39.320 reporter Jared Yager out there. And the conclusion the liberals came to, to, to address their low

00:14:46.500 numbers is, drum roll, more Justin Trudeau. The reason Canadians don't love Justin right now is

00:14:54.600 because they just haven't had enough of them for the nine years. We just don't understand him right.

00:14:58.220 Yeah. So, ugh. Canadians need to engage more, right? Yes, Canadians need to engage more. That's

00:15:04.560 why they lost the by-elections. Okay, well, let's, we're going to move it on now. So this is one of

00:15:12.160 my favorite headlines in a long time. From the liver to the knees. Israel's pager assassination

00:15:21.780 program. I mean, if the Jews had been in charge of the CIA, they would have got Castro. They would 0.98

00:15:28.300 of castrated gastro. I mean, we're going to roll some of my favorite memes and photoshops and

00:15:36.960 videos going aside. But I mean, gentlemen, you've probably seen some of the security footage coming

00:15:42.820 out of Lebanon of some Hezbollah guy, and he's at the grocery checkout counter, and all of a sudden

00:15:49.260 And his midsection disappears. 0.98

00:15:55.100 It's, you know, I mean, there are rules to war.

00:15:59.520 And doing that kind of thing would normally, I'd be like, even to the worst kind of guys, I'd be like, I don't know.

00:16:08.560 I don't know.

00:16:09.240 That's a little much.

00:16:10.060 But then I was reminded yesterday that these guys brag about rape.

00:16:15.920 They love rape. 0.69

00:16:17.300 they use rape on industrial scale as a weapon of war. So you know what? I think it's quite apropos 1.00

00:16:23.840 that the Israeli, we'll just back out to the story for a second. Maybe I got ahead of myself.

00:16:29.880 The Israeli government, I guess, intercepted these pagers from, I think they're from like

00:16:33.020 Taiwanese company. And then in Budapest, they're assembling or manufacturing or something.

00:16:37.740 And then they got modified. Maybe they took out a bit of memory, a bit of RAM, and they put in

00:16:43.740 some C4. And all of a sudden, there's a Twitter account you were talking about before we said

00:16:49.700 the show. I saw a satirical account, which is a comms branch of Mossad. They have inside info

00:16:56.120 so quickly, it's quite humorous. And then I guess literally as all these pagers were going off,

00:17:02.720 that account tweeted, boom, beep. What the heck are they tweeting about beep? And then, you know,

00:17:09.960 So suddenly the Twitter scroll starts because suddenly Hezbollah members are going off like firecrackers throughout Syria. 0.75

00:17:15.860 Yeah.

00:17:16.620 So, Corey, I guess let's back up to the point I was making that, I mean, it's covert operations.

00:17:22.880 There's going to be assassinations.

00:17:24.140 I mean, it's a dirty business, but all governments engage in it.

00:17:28.620 Israeli government under particular threat engages in it maybe more than others, but they're under more threat than others.

00:17:34.820 My initial reaction was a bit of a chuckle at these guys.

00:17:38.080 But then I thought, ah, I don't know.

00:17:41.160 I mean, for the guys who survive it, that's a particularly nasty meme.

00:17:45.800 But then I thought, these are people who particularly delight in industrial-scale rape. 0.79

00:17:51.800 This is everything that people supposedly have been demanding of Israel for a long time.

00:17:56.680 Israel's been getting hundreds and hundreds of rockets sent weekly from Hezbollah out of Lebanon into residential areas that they're constantly having to battle off and fight off.

00:18:05.540 They're completely indiscriminate about who they kill in Israel.

00:18:08.080 If Israel dares to have any collateral damage and a defense retaliation, they get pilloried.

00:18:14.440 This was pretty targeted. 0.85

00:18:15.160 I've never seen any, nobody's ever seen anything as brilliantly targeted as this, where it only hit Hezbollah combatants. 0.74

00:18:22.680 Yeah, it hit a certain part of them, but it hit them. 0.86

00:18:25.580 They'll have trouble penetrating Israel or anything now. 0.83

00:18:27.960 Yes, exactly. 0.78

00:18:29.580 But I mean, you know, what do you want Israel to do that? 0.53

00:18:31.480 Because Israel could launch missiles and artillery straight into Beirut if they wanted. 0.63

00:18:35.940 they could turn it into glass if they wanted. This was a brilliant move. It terrified the other 0.99

00:18:42.420 remaining Hezbollah. They don't know what to trust. Now the walkie-talkies are blowing up on them. 0.98

00:18:48.420 Nobody aside from a Hezbollah member was using a pager in the last 20 years.

00:18:52.900 Yeah, that was my very first reaction was, are you sure it was pagers blowing up?

00:18:58.980 That really helped because they're analog and they realized they've been getting tracked by

00:19:02.420 their digital phones and of course being nailed by drones so they said well let's go analog now 0.57

00:19:06.340 israel can't track us except some smart smart people in israel figured out that well if we

00:19:13.220 just hit the pagers nobody else is using them it was a brilliant tactical move plus the other aspect

00:19:19.140 i mean you know i don't know how far down the rabbit hole we want to go but an injured soldier

00:19:24.740 is far more devastating in a war than a dead one because they have to be treated they have to be

00:19:31.060 taken care of. They walk around crippled or handicapped or mutilated as a reminder to

00:19:35.860 everybody else of what can happen. It's demoralizing. It was a brilliant tactical strategy from a

00:19:42.740 country that's been getting it from all sides. Just, you know, don't join Hezbollah and your 1.00

00:19:46.020 balls won't get blown off. Nigel, it's a nasty move. It's a nasty move. I don't think it could

00:19:54.980 happen to much more deserving people than Hezbollah or Hamas, but it's a nasty move. 0.91

00:20:01.060 It is. You know, and we've played it light, as we should. 0.98

00:20:04.900 It's hard not to chuckle at that. 1.00

00:20:06.660 But, you know, I would just say this to anybody who feels strongly that somehow the Israelis have done something. 0.99

00:20:15.800 We're assuming it's the Israelis. Who else would it be? 0.95

00:20:18.080 You know, that they have done something rather nasty, especially nasty.

00:20:24.560 You know, look at those images from October the 7th again.

00:20:28.560 and you will see what nasty really looks like.

00:20:32.780 You know, the women bleeding from the, you know, it's just awful, awful stuff.

00:20:40.640 We have no idea what those hostages have suffered in the past year.

00:20:45.500 Some who have been released seem to have come through it okay.

00:20:49.520 The ones who are still there, hard to know, but my word, I have no sympathy.

00:20:56.040 I just can't work up the sympathy.

00:20:57.280 this was deserved. Yeah. I've been trying to be sympathetic. I've been trying to have

00:21:02.840 sense of balance. And then I just, I just have a hard time feeling bad for these guys.

00:21:08.160 It puts out some messaging that maybe even these guys will get. I mean, it's been happening since,

00:21:12.080 you know, the Olympic atrocities in the past. Israel has a long memory. They're very patient. 0.96

00:21:18.120 They're very meticulous. Put that bloody thing away, Derek. No, no, I am.

00:21:22.520 And they're going to get you. If it takes them years or whatever.

00:21:27.180 I'm reading here from the Mossad, satirical and awesome. This is the account you were talking about.

00:21:33.540 They tweeted, the International Olympic Committee announced today that hundreds of Hezbollah fighters now qualified to compete in women's boxing.

00:21:41.260 That's right.

00:21:41.840 I mean, let's take a few shots all in one.

00:21:44.360 Or a Castorati choir. I mean, you know, the high pitched voices in Lebanon now.

00:21:48.540 Yes.

00:21:48.740 something else. Yes. In some ways, that's worse than death. It's worse than death in some ways,

00:22:00.100 especially if you fancy yourself a martyr. Like, because, you know, these guys, you know,

00:22:04.660 martyr culture, getting your 71 or 72 versions? 72. 72? I only got 71. I got cheated.

00:22:12.820 And it's versions, right? Not Virginians. That's right. Maybe it is Virginians. That would be 1.00

00:22:16.820 another great irony. I mean, it depends which translation you're looking at. You got George

00:22:21.180 Washington, Jefferson kicking you for it. That is the most humorous part, but some of them really

00:22:25.260 did meme them other ways, actually, which is, you know, again, it's war. It's ugly. But a lot of

00:22:29.700 them, the first thing they did when it beeped, because I guess they picked it up if they could

00:22:32.840 get it off and they held it so a lot were blinded because it went off in their face. Yeah. But again,

00:22:37.540 these were small charges. They weren't blowing up whole rooms. They weren't the reduced, not zero

00:22:44.540 collateral damage but reduced was was outstanding as far as an act of war like this goes when you can

00:22:50.060 take 3000 combatants out with only a handful of other individuals harmed. That's amazing.

00:22:56.220 You know what this is? Okay, I'm going to get in trouble for going down this rabbit hole because

00:23:01.340 some of the semantics but we've been wrestling with the issue since 9-11 of defining what is

00:23:08.700 terrorism and you know generally terrorism is bad violence committed by the other guy

00:23:14.780 our side never engages in terrorism and well that's not true i'd say terrorism terrorism is

00:23:21.340 a flexible concept but i generally define it as an act of political violence where the act of violence

00:23:28.300 is uh where the the psychological effect is disproportionate to the actual act of violence

00:23:34.780 9-11 killed a lot of people but the psychological effect was no different than an atomic bomb

00:23:42.220 drop it this this was smart but it terrorized the terrorists they are now part of my friends the

00:23:56.020 crap in their pants so they don't know like how can they okay well we have to stop using cell

00:24:00.940 as they were tracking us so they use this and then they literally blew their mid sections off

00:24:05.340 and the walkie-talkies when they switched to those those blew up too yeah so now they really

00:24:09.580 know they said you know they're going to watch their digital toasters now yeah so like it is

00:24:13.900 putting terror in the hearts of terrorists and and that is smarter than just simply killing your

00:24:20.300 enemy and that's what the west often does is say okay here's the bad guys eliminate them this is

00:24:24.780 you have to put terrorize terror to them but a little bit just on the definition of terrorist

00:24:28.940 too, though, is a terrorist is indiscriminate with who they target. In fact, they might go out of their

00:24:33.820 way to target civilians. That's what I mean. They hit a music festival. They hit young ladies.

00:24:39.100 You know, people can accept combatants hitting combatants. Terrorism can also be against the

00:24:43.420 military target. We tend to think of it as targeting civilians, but... Yeah, depending on what you did,

00:24:49.020 if you lined them all up and then slowly castrated them, that would certainly be an act of terrorism.

00:24:52.540 Yeah. Well, look, I'm trying to use it in a non-judgmental term, that terror is, and has always been, a tool of warfare.

00:25:03.420 Yeah, and there's a strong psychological aspect to this attack.

00:25:05.580 And the West is very careful about not using it too much. This terrorizes them, and I think it was a good thing.

00:25:12.500 As a disincentive, as I said, for up-and-coming terrorists, when they see their uncle, you know, waddling around, missing his parts, 1.00

00:25:19.400 You know, maybe law school looks a little better than joining Hezbollah, actually. 0.68

00:25:24.140 Meanwhile, small boys will make a fortune carrying letters by bicycle from one host to another. 0.96

00:25:31.460 That's what they're going to go to now.

00:25:32.040 They're going to go pigeons. 1.00

00:25:33.420 And the Israelis will find a way to make the pigeons explode. 1.00

00:25:37.780 Okay. 1.00

00:25:39.580 All right.

00:25:40.260 Well, let's move on. 0.97

00:25:42.780 So, yeah, also speaking of rearranging the midsection.

00:25:46.200 um okay so uh jennifer johnson she was elected as the um mla here in alberta for uh lacombe panoca

00:25:55.440 and uh she had won the ucp nomination uh in that writing she was the ucp candidate

00:26:01.880 during the election i don't recall exactly what she said but she said something very clumsily that

00:26:07.620 that they came across very poorly i don't think i don't think it was intended the way it became

00:26:14.040 spun but she said it and she had she wore she played the political price for it danielle smith

00:26:19.240 to kind of save the rest of the ticket said uh well if this person's elected she'll have to sit

00:26:23.320 as an independent not with the ucp so she's been sitting as an independent since and you know they

00:26:28.760 essentially said well for you know for for the party to take you back bring into the caucus you

00:26:33.420 have to neutralize yourself as a political risk to us that means going out and doing essentially

00:26:39.640 long story short sensitivity training earning some endorsements from sexual minority communities etc

00:26:46.280 she's been out doing that but uh someone from the trans community really really overplayed their

00:26:55.000 hand uh with a video i don't know if it happened yesterday or if just the video came out yesterday

00:26:59.400 but let's let's roll at least a clip of this video of uh jennifer johnson being re-educated

00:27:04.920 I'm going to throw it over to Victoria now, and she'll just touch on a little bit more 0.87

00:27:10.920 about that.

00:27:11.920 Hi, Jennifer.

00:27:12.920 I really want to thank you for meeting with us today and taking the time to try to signal

00:27:18.920 that this is more of a priority for you.

00:27:20.920 Absolutely.

00:27:21.920 Delighted to meet with you all.

00:27:22.920 Yeah.

00:27:23.920 Thanks for having us.

00:27:24.920 Before I would ever say that this was a productive meeting and be counted to the list of contacts

00:27:29.920 that you've reached out to in the queer community, I have to know a few things of where you sit.

00:27:33.920 it. Will you state on the record right now that trans women are women?

00:27:41.840 I've never been asked that before. Will you say that on the record right now?

00:27:46.880 No, I want to have some time to think on that. Okay, well that's me. Have a great day and I will

00:27:53.040 be speaking out against this meeting because you are clearly not ready to have this. So I'm not

00:27:57.600 going to be added to the list of meetings that you are going to have with people where you say,

00:28:01.200 well i met this person and this person because no no no no you can't say i've had these consultations

00:28:07.760 and use that as justification for you to work your way back into caucus which is why we know

00:28:12.000 you're really here this only happens this meeting is only happening because you're on twitter in the

00:28:19.760 twitter sphere and people are debating whether or not you're going to be led back into caucus

00:28:23.440 and premier smith is debating that and so you need to do some pr work and i'm not going to be your

00:28:29.040 band-aid i'm not going to be your pink washing unless you can tell me right now that you believe

00:28:34.480 that i as a trans woman right now right here am a woman then we don't have a lot to work on here

00:28:41.360 you want to talk about listening to the community if you can't start with that basic foundational

00:28:45.680 principle that we are who we say we are in our bones then i don't think we're on the same page

00:28:52.400 for working forward so i'll give you one last chance are trans women women will you say that

00:28:58.400 that on the record right now. Victoria, we can disagree on things. Not on that. Not on my

00:29:03.560 identity. No, no, no, no. And I can still care about you even if we disagree. Wonderful. But I

00:29:08.840 will be speaking out against this meeting 100% if you can't say that right now because I'm not

00:29:13.900 going to have you add my name to the list of meetings that you've had to show that you're

00:29:17.320 quote doing the work because you're not doing the work. The work is the inner work. You're learning

00:29:22.140 the outer work. You're learning what you're allowed to say in public and what you're not

00:29:25.480 so you don't get in this situation again

00:29:27.060 because you got caught saying what you really thought

00:29:29.260 and you did think that

00:29:31.040 but you haven't shown that you've changed

00:29:33.360 because if you can't respect us

00:29:36.040 then how can I work with you?

00:29:38.520 If you don't believe that I am a woman

00:29:40.840 sitting right here, right now

00:29:42.800 how on earth are you saying that you're working with me?

00:29:46.560 What work have you done then

00:29:47.840 if you can't start with

00:29:49.000 yes, Victoria, you are a woman.

00:29:51.880 can we disagree and still respect each other no goodbye okay so what you saw there was a

00:30:00.600 biological male uh xy chromosomes demanding that jennifer johnson evidently a woman a real woman

00:30:09.760 uh uh demanding that she say something that she does not believe to be true i would assume so

00:30:18.560 she was extremely professional and calm and courteous. She showed no ill will towards this

00:30:25.040 trans person. She was actually remarkably polite, and to use perhaps the wrong term,

00:30:32.140 gentlemanly in the face of this berating. Can we not say ladylike? Ladylike, yeah,

00:30:38.320 that's what I was... Just grasping for words here. I was looking for someone, I was like,

00:30:42.620 I know gentlemanly is the wrong term. Thank you for that intervention.

00:30:48.180 Keep me around.

00:30:49.260 Yeah, yeah.

00:30:51.680 So, and then J.K. Rowlings, the author of the Harry Potter series, said that this is a man bullying a woman.

00:31:00.420 So very rare that a big international figure like J.K. Rowlings chimes in on local Alberta politics in La Coma and Pinocca.

00:31:08.200 I did not have that in my bingo card for News of the Week, but that's what happened.

00:31:14.500 I'm sorry with you, Nigel.

00:31:17.460 I think she was eventually going to be let into these because I guess we can't say back in because you never access out the UCP was technically elected as an independent, but it said conservative on the ballot was too late to change it.

00:31:31.460 It seems to me that this bully who tried to force her to lie and say something she did not believe to be true in public has probably helped her.

00:31:44.060 And at this point, you know, you and I are still working on our sources on the UCP side.

00:31:50.360 I think Smith and the UCP caucus have to let her back in now.

00:31:53.760 I think their next meeting, she's going to be coming out of that as a UCP MLA.

00:31:57.340 I would certainly hope that you were correct on that, Derek.

00:32:02.760 The matter of what she actually said is quite hard to uncover now

00:32:08.100 because the news reports are all by agencies which we identify as mainstream

00:32:15.680 and they are therefore tend to take a pro-gay, pro-trans interpretation of everything.

00:32:23.780 but as much as i can say the discussion was how well the alberta education system was doing and

00:32:32.180 but she was making the point that we've got children identifying as cats and the teacher

00:32:39.380 puts a litter box in the classroom for them and then she went on to uh to talk about um

00:32:46.420 to make the comparison of feces in like we're doing so great but we have these weak spots it's

00:32:55.700 like feces in your cookie dough metaphor is a very dangerous thing in political rhetoric and

00:33:04.020 this one was like an exploding pager for for her so she just paid the price on that and more it was

00:33:13.620 It was, at the very least, a very clumsy way of expressing herself.

00:33:17.640 It was.

00:33:18.520 However, I think most people who know her know that she's actually a pretty decent person,

00:33:23.780 and that came through on the video.

00:33:26.000 But there's a larger point that, and you actually laid it out very well,

00:33:32.420 when you introduced this subject, when you said that she was being told by this individual

00:33:40.600 to say something that she did not believe

00:33:43.400 as the price of continuing as a public person.

00:33:49.680 Continuing on her apology to her.

00:33:52.480 So this is the,

00:33:54.020 but this is actually what is happening to all of us

00:33:57.460 on a national scale here in Canada,

00:34:01.120 down south of the United States,

00:34:02.980 over in Great Britain to excess,

00:34:05.360 all over Europe.

00:34:06.320 We're being told to believe things

00:34:08.740 that we know in our hearts

00:34:10.300 and we know from the education that we receive are simply not true and that individual asked

00:34:17.440 jennifer johnson to say you although you were born a man are actually a woman and in all conscience

00:34:24.920 she didn't she felt she couldn't say that i would never agree to that she just politely said uh i

00:34:31.160 haven't thought about it no one's asked me that before so it was very polite she didn't

00:34:35.860 He didn't tell her off.

00:34:36.980 She wasn't mean in responding.

00:34:38.760 She was ladylike.

00:34:40.420 But this is a microcosm.

00:34:42.300 In that little interchange of what is going on right across the country,

00:34:46.600 and not just in the area of sexuality.

00:34:49.040 Even the prime minister says, if a man says he's a woman, he's a woman.

00:34:52.900 Well, if a man says he's a woman, she is a woman. 0.74

00:34:56.240 Watch your language. 0.86

00:34:57.520 Perhaps he even said that.

00:35:00.320 At any rate.

00:35:01.440 I can't believe we haven't been pulled off of cable yet.

00:35:03.400 Like I'm shocked with CRTC.

00:35:07.020 The Online Harms Act will be, the regulations will be devised.

00:35:10.900 We're on cable, too.

00:35:12.720 It's just a matter of time until they come for us.

00:35:15.480 Well, let's not wish it upon ourselves.

00:35:18.420 But anyway, she's actually carrying the fight for all of us.

00:35:24.120 Yeah.

00:35:25.040 Corey, I really hadn't actually thought much about Jennifer Johnson too much until last night when I saw this. 0.97

00:35:33.400 she's not very, she's kept an extremely low profile.

00:35:36.580 And I think that was, you know, I can imagine that,

00:35:40.600 you know, after the last election,

00:35:42.180 the UCP brass sat her down and they're like, okay, well,

00:35:45.620 we want to bring you home, but it's going to be a while.

00:35:48.500 And here's the stations of lacrosse

00:35:52.160 you're going to have to go through to get there.

00:35:54.500 And you're going to have to be very quiet

00:35:56.220 so that when we bring you back, you're going to be very quiet

00:35:58.460 and you're going to have to have endorsements

00:36:00.220 from some of these groups so that when you come back,

00:36:02.640 There's some cover and the party doesn't take a hit for it.

00:36:06.740 Okay.

00:36:08.520 I think that ended yesterday because this person, I think this actually goes, let's bring it up to a macro level here.

00:36:19.360 The reason the pendulum, I think, is swinging so hard against the radical woke side is because they never actually convinced anyone of their arguments.

00:36:28.880 They imposed false consensus on society.

00:36:31.680 They bullied people. They silenced people. They didn't engage in conversation and change hearts and minds on a mass scale.

00:36:39.320 They had their hardcore that believes this already. And then everyone else, they just, you know, if you disagreed, they just yell whatever the latest excommunicate excommunicatory label is racist, sexist, homophobe, trans flow, ism, is that.

00:36:55.400 That doesn't convince anybody. And this biological male who was trying to bully her into compliance was just doing the way they've done been doing things for the last decade or so in the heyday of the woke era.

00:37:13.400 And we saw it here and it happens to be in 2024, the year of the pushback as the pendulum swings back the other way.

00:37:21.400 way. So this dude will probably end up in the Senate. You realize that? You're probably right.

00:37:30.020 But Corey, do you think that video, I think in the absence of that video, she was probably

00:37:35.720 at least waiting a while longer. I think that video coming out yesterday and the professional

00:37:42.320 way in which she reported herself and the fact that actually her runner up in the UCP nomination

00:37:49.180 there. Dusty, I don't recall the last name, but Dusty, that was a hot nomination.

00:37:57.200 There were hurt feelings. This was a nasty nomination. He came out today and said,

00:38:01.960 Jennifer Johnson needs to go to the UCP caucus. This is someone who's not her friend. This is

00:38:06.600 not someone who feels vested in her political success. I think all of a sudden this has become

00:38:12.880 a political imperative that Smith and the UCP caucus have got to bring her home. They got to

00:38:16.280 do it fast. Yeah, they got to put this bullying to an end. And it's not unprecedented. I believe

00:38:21.440 it's while you were in the legislature during the Deborah Drever thing. Deborah Drever was a NDP MLA

00:38:27.220 very shortly after being elected. It was found she'd made some social media comments that are

00:38:32.100 these days considered homophobic. Well, actually, she was sworn in as an independent. She was elected

00:38:36.900 as a Democrat. But from the very beginning, because those comments came in out like days

00:38:41.320 after the election. Very similar anyways. And she had to do her penance in the legislature for a

00:38:45.820 heirs and say she'd done this and done that. Not as long as Johnson's had been. No, but she was

00:38:51.020 brought back in and they said, okay, she's apologized. And in both cases, we're not talking

00:38:55.880 about people who had a serial pattern of making those statements. These were one-offs that they,

00:39:01.100 you know, the hysteria got going over. I mean, if Johnson had had years of constantly railing

00:39:06.440 and rallying or insulting or something, then it's a little more difficult. If they don't bring her

00:39:12.360 back in. They're making every other MLA in their caucus vulnerable to this sort of thing. There's 1.00

00:39:17.940 going to be the woke who feel that they should be life sentences for one misconstrued or poorly

00:39:22.600 phrased or even insensitive statement. And you can't bow to them. You cannot. Because once you

00:39:29.680 allow that to happen, they're going to want to ruin more political careers. And I think the UCP

00:39:36.420 is cognizant of this. And it's time. There's no better time than now. You're a couple years from

00:39:41.260 the next election, let them have their

00:39:43.180 furor, let them stomp their feet

00:39:45.000 and it's going to be pretty much forgotten 1.00

00:39:47.300 presuming that Ms. Johnson doesn't do anything 0.99

00:39:49.380 to get in trouble again. Well, I think this

00:39:51.240 inoculated her. I think

00:39:52.680 and this is better than her coming in from

00:39:55.360 a groveling apology to her

00:39:57.160 which seemed that she was kind of being

00:39:59.160 forced to do and I get the political

00:40:01.400 reasons for it but it was icky

00:40:03.000 it was icky

00:40:04.000 it gave me a bad feeling

00:40:06.460 but I think

00:40:09.380 you're very right Corey

00:40:10.540 They have to bring her in now to protect everyone else because they need to stand up against this kind of bullying, intimidation, where someone, you know, in very 1984 fashion says, you know, tell me it's noon right now.

00:40:25.780 Tell me it's midnight and look me in the eyes and convince me that you believe it.

00:40:31.320 We're going to force you to lie and say something that we all know you do not believe to be true.

00:40:37.380 that kind of intimidation and silencing.

00:40:39.960 They're overplaying their hand.

00:40:41.220 Like, I'm a libertarian-minded person

00:40:43.020 and out of respect for another.

00:40:44.980 You know, I take it case by case, like other things.

00:40:47.860 If an individual presents to me

00:40:49.300 they've been trying very hard to appear

00:40:51.460 in the gender they are, that's what they feel.

00:40:53.340 And they ask, could you please refer to me as such?

00:40:55.460 You know what, I will.

00:40:56.320 If they're respectful and they're not, talk about it.

00:40:57.840 Some dude who stuck on some earrings says,

00:40:59.440 five o'clock shadow and a bulge in his pants

00:41:01.620 and saying, call me a woman.

00:41:02.760 No, I won't. I'm sorry.

00:41:04.480 You're a man who's made a token effort of seeking attention or something.

00:41:10.000 I will distinguish between what I think are ones that garner my respect and others.

00:41:16.060 I make the call always just depending on the attitude of the person.

00:41:19.660 If the person is respectful and, you know, treats me like a decent human being, I will do the same to them. 1.00

00:41:27.540 Even if I don't believe they are a woman, I just don't care enough. 1.00

00:41:32.000 I'll just be polite and call you by what you like. 1.00

00:41:34.480 But it all depends on the circumstance.

00:41:36.740 It depends on the circumstance.

00:41:38.680 The case of this dude, that is not a respectful person.

00:41:43.440 That is not someone who deserves deference in return.

00:41:47.000 That's not someone I'm going to call man.

00:41:50.400 All right.

00:41:51.580 Parting shots is our first time doing it.

00:41:55.000 You know, we only can generally pick three, maximum four, if we really squeeze it in on the show.

00:41:59.600 So rather than try to squeeze in a fourth topic, parting shots is going to be our new way we're going to try out of being able to bring something up that's maybe gotten missed in the news or just didn't get quite the attention it deserves.

00:42:11.640 And you want to just make a parting shot before we wrap up the show.

00:42:15.020 So, Nigel, first parting shot to you.

00:42:17.540 I take it.

00:42:19.200 One of the unfortunate circumstances of my life here is that we have that TV with question period on right by my desk.

00:42:26.520 I can see it through the studio window.

00:42:28.420 I have to listen to Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister, Chrystia Freeland, 1.00

00:42:32.840 who has perhaps the most irritating voice of any prominent politician. 0.53

00:42:40.340 And yesterday she was trying to explain that we should all be glad

00:42:45.340 because inflation has been brought down to 2%,

00:42:48.540 and it has been as high as 7% in the last three years.

00:42:53.900 Well, good. Glad it's down to 2%.

00:42:57.060 But here's the thing.

00:42:58.800 Because I'm the kind of person I am, I actually saved till slips knowing that it would come in handy one day.

00:43:04.440 So I went to Costco and I have three years of till slips and I have traced the progress of prices of individual items that my wife and I actually buy as opposed to some fancy thing that Statistics Canada puts together.

00:43:22.280 We are up from $100 to $130, and now we're up to $132.

00:43:30.400 I am not pleased with the Liberal record on inflation one bit.

00:43:35.900 Wow. Parting shot.

00:43:37.780 All right, Corey, you're here for your parting shots.

00:43:39.820 Sure, just a quick shot just on the standards of legacy media.

00:43:42.720 I torment myself listening to the radio on the way in sometimes.

00:43:45.760 I won't bother saying which show.

00:43:47.320 Premier Smith announced the big announcement of a massive, you know,

00:43:50.040 $9 billion in funding for schools and infrastructure, and listening to the guests

00:43:55.300 and hosts on a particular show, twisting themselves in knots to try and explain why

00:44:00.400 this is a negative thing. We don't have the staff to fill these schools. We don't have the ability

00:44:06.200 to keep up with them. Can they not, just at least for a change, say she did something that needed

00:44:10.960 to be done? There's plenty of other things to critique, but they will never take a second even

00:44:15.400 to give a little bit of credit. I'm just sick and tired of it.

00:44:17.780 You know, as good practice, when I was sitting at the Canadian Taxpayers Federation dealing with, you know, the Alice and Redford government, I hated 99% what they did.

00:44:25.980 But when they did the 1% I liked, I made sure to note it because it made me sound more reasonable when I went after the other 99.

00:44:32.100 And if you can't be that gracious to your opponents, I think it makes you a lot less credible.

00:44:37.760 All right. My parting shot. Speaking of my old employer, Canadian Taxpayers Federation, they're going after Ninchy right now.

00:44:47.140 trying to get him to make a clear position and statement on the carbon tax.

00:44:54.080 He's had some wishy-washy positions.

00:44:55.900 He's not been firmly for it.

00:44:57.500 He also hasn't been firmly against it either.

00:44:59.760 We've now seen really beginning with when the Liberals brought in the exemption

00:45:04.360 for home heating fuel to essentially give Atlantic Canada a break on the carbon tax,

00:45:09.300 but not anyone else.

00:45:10.620 The consensus around the carbon tax following.

00:45:13.260 We went from the last election.

00:45:14.020 Even the conservatives ran pro-carbon tax under Aaron O'Toole to now, even the NDP are at least on paper against the carbon tax.

00:45:23.820 David Eby's NDP government in British Columbia, sort of against the carbon tax saying, well, if, you know, if Pierre Poloveler wins, we'll get rid of our carbon tax too.

00:45:33.840 Nenshi has had some statements around it in an interview he did on West of Center, a podcast, CBC, where he said, you know, we'll definitely have the industrial carbon tax, thinking that that's a given.

00:45:48.520 I hope it's not a given, but okay.

00:45:50.600 But on the consumer carbon tax, he had very wishy, he just said, well, I'm not sure if there's like political license for it.

00:45:57.480 If there's political license for it, we'll have maybe a very wishy-washy statement.

00:46:01.220 So the Canadian Tax Pairs Federation is trying to get Nenshi to come on the record for it.

00:46:05.940 Anytime Nenshi has spoken to reporters and been asked about it, he's not been very clear.

00:46:11.220 That's a position I think he's going to have to take soon.

00:46:13.120 And considering that if the British Columbia socialists have now turned against the carbon tax,

00:46:21.420 I would imagine that Nahid Nenshi leading the Alberta socialists is probably going to have to side with,

00:46:27.680 to use a leftist term, the direction of history and get on board with where things are going,

00:46:34.680 which is no more carbon tax. That's my part in shot. Amen. All right, gentlemen, thank you very

00:46:40.540 much for joining today. And thank all of you for joining us on this edition of The Pipeline.

00:46:45.680 If you're not yet a member of the Western Standard, you really, really must be. The

00:46:50.660 Western Standard is one of an extremely small number of the remaining independent media left

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00:47:22.440 If the name Ted Byfield brings back fond memories, well, we've got a party coming up for you guys.

00:47:27.980 On September 25th, Toasting Ted is what it's called.

00:47:30.740 It's going to honour a great conservative who published Alberta Report News magazine.

00:47:35.160 It's going to be bagpipes, singing, live auction stakes, speeches by Premier Smith, Preston Manning, Stephen Harper, quite a line-up.

00:47:41.600 The Western Standard is the final incarnation or the latest incarnation of Alberta Report that Ted Byfield founded.

00:47:48.160 And I mean, he was a great Albertan.

00:47:50.320 He really made his mark on this province.

00:47:52.100 And this evening of celebration for him is really going to be outstanding.

00:47:54.960 You get there, toastingted.ca.

00:47:57.100 That's the website.

00:47:58.180 You can get your tickets.

00:47:59.060 This one's going to sell out.

00:48:00.160 I mean, again, if you want to see Smith, Manning, Harper, all in one spot, one night, be sure to get there.

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Western Standard - September 19, 2024

From the Liver to the Knees： Israel pager bombs

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