Western Standard - Guns and (Wild)Roses - The Pipeline, Episode 15

00:00:00.400 You're listening to The Pipeline, the Western Standards National Affairs Program, recording

00:00:15.240 this Wednesday, April 29th, 2020.

00:00:19.320 Each week we break down the issues, discuss them in depth, and examine some of the broader

00:00:24.420 implications for Western Canada and beyond. Featuring, from Calgary, the Western Standards

00:00:31.620 publisher, Grizzly Adams, aka Derek Fildebrandt. How are you, Derek?

00:00:38.200 Mmm. Okay. We'll take that as a good...

00:00:41.840 I will be speaking in a series of grunts for this episode, not to convey my thoughts.

00:00:46.740 But we won't mention why, because we're not talking about that this episode. Featuring

00:00:52.360 also from Dave Naylor from Calgary, the news editor. Dave, how are you doing?

00:00:59.360 I think I'm handling that word. We're not going to speak tonight. The lockdown there. I think

00:01:05.360 I'm handling it a little bit better than Derek.

00:01:07.860 Outstanding. And hosted by myself, digital editor, Paul Holmes, here from Victoria, British

00:01:14.360 Columbia, which you can see behind me.

00:01:16.360 No, we can't. That's an image of a foggy bridge.

00:01:20.360 It truly is. Anyway, from my basement. So topics today will include guns. We're talking

00:01:30.360 about guns again for some reason in this country. We're talking about the Wild Rose

00:01:36.360 Independence Party, which sounds like something old and new again at the same time. And we're

00:01:45.360 also going to be talking about the Media Bailout 2.0. So before we get into the topics today, just

00:01:54.360 wanted to remind everybody, if you're not already a member at Western Standard, please visit our

00:02:00.360 website, westernstandardonline.com. Click on that membership page and you can become a member

00:02:06.360 there, which supports our work and means we can have a lot of fun like this on a regular

00:02:11.360 basis. So Dave, why don't you tell us about the latest with gun control in Canada?

00:02:18.360 Well, breaking news tonight, Wednesday night, it's been reported that the federal liberals are

00:02:24.360 going to ban 11 different types of weapons. Radio Canada has said they've got sources to say

00:02:33.360 that it's already in the hands of the Prime Minister. They don't know which weapons will

00:02:37.360 be banned. And it could be announced as early as tomorrow, which would be Thursday. Obviously, this

00:02:45.360 comes on the heels of the terrible incidents in Nova Scotia, where Canada's worst mass murder took

00:02:53.360 place. 22 people killed, 13 shot to death, nine died by fire that the killer set. Police have only

00:03:04.360 said that the killer had got his weapons illegally. He got them fraud.

00:03:10.360 Sorry, just to clarify, David, was that legally or illegally? We had a bit of a quirk there with

00:03:16.360 the video. Sorry, illegally. Illegally. Okay, that's important.

00:03:19.360 We got them illegally from the United States and Canada. 0.91

00:03:23.360 Okay. So we did not have a, RCMP called it a firearms acquisition certificate. That's now the

00:03:31.360 PAL certificate. He did not have any of those. So all his weapons were illegal. But that didn't stop

00:03:39.360 Prime Minister Trudeau or the Security Minister Blair the very next day, saying that they would be

00:03:46.360 rushing in a weapons ban quickly, even though they admitted they didn't know what type of guns

00:03:52.360 were involved. The RCMP revealed Tuesday that one of the weapons, quote, could be described as a military

00:04:01.360 assault rifle, unquote. And as Derek will explain, those have been banned in Canada for a very,

00:04:08.360 very long time. So it's, stay tuned in the next couple of days. Keep a close eye on our website,

00:04:16.360 because it looks like it's going to be breaking news.

00:04:18.360 Well, obviously, a terrible story out of Nova Scotia. My family member of mine, through marriage, had a cousin that actually died in the, in that

00:04:30.360 terrible incident. And so strikes, I think all of us pretty harshly, and a little close to home for me as well.

00:04:38.360 But Derek, this guy got a bunch of illegal weapons, did a bunch of terrible stuff with his weapons he wasn't supposed to have.

00:04:47.360 Now the government's going to ban a bunch of legal weapons. Is this just political opportunism at a, using a crisis to your advantage?

00:05:00.360 What do you think?

00:05:01.360 Well, the Liberals have already said they were going to do these things, but obviously they've, they are using the timing of this mass murder to, to really give some impetus to it.

00:05:14.360 To use the political opportunity that it presents to try and push this forward, because they know it'll be controversial in rural parts of Canada and across the West.

00:05:24.360 But you know, there is, the media have been reticent to criticize the police during this, because the police are also victims in what's happened.

00:05:34.360 You know, a police officer was, was killed and murdered in cold blood in this. But the police appear to have really dropped the ball, if nothing else in their communications.

00:05:46.360 I don't know how you can have a mass murderer on the loose for 11 or 12. How many hours was this? Can you tell me, Dave? It was a very long time.

00:05:56.360 It started about 10, 20 PM and the gunman was killed about 1130. So more than 12 hours.

00:06:05.360 Yeah. That's a, I mean, I don't think he would have lasted more than about 30 minutes at most, if this had happened in Texas, say, but even in Canada, this is a very long time for a gunman to be on the loose.

00:06:18.360 Even if the citizens around are not armed and able to do anything about it, the police should have done something about this.

00:06:23.360 But the police have been extremely, uh, shown an extreme lack of transparency in providing any information about this.

00:06:31.360 They've not really been answering questions. They've been releasing information, sometimes very misleading information.

00:06:37.360 And so far, both the police and the politicians overseeing them have not released a very key information.

00:06:44.360 Like, did this guy have a gun license? They have not told us. That's a pretty important piece of information.

00:06:51.360 Um, what were the guns used? They're only beginning now, uh, more than a week later to, uh, to, to tell us what kind of weapons are being used.

00:07:01.360 So even under Canada's current gun regime, which is still very tight, um, this guy had no access to any of the guns that he used.

00:07:10.360 He did not have a single gun used legally. These were stolen guns from people that he killed, like the police, or they were guns brought illegally from the United States, we believe.

00:07:21.360 Um, but the police have not, uh, the police and the politicians have done a remarkably poor job in reporting on this.

00:07:26.360 And now the liberals, uh, they're not just pulling this out of their back pocket.

00:07:30.360 They've been planning on doing this, but they are now using the opportunity afforded by, by a tragedy like this to push it forward and, uh, showing a remarkable lack of understanding of fundamental rights.

00:07:42.360 Uh, in, in the story that Dave Naylor did on this, uh, just, uh, a few hours ago, uh, he quoted Bill Blair, uh, liberal cabinet, uh, minister, I think, uh, charge of public safety saying the gun ownership is not a, uh, right.

00:07:57.360 Right. It's, it is a, um, a privilege. And so in this country, uh, you know, getting free things paid for by other people as a right, but keeping your own private property that you've purchased yourself and you're not hurting anybody else with that's a privilege.

00:08:13.360 Well, that's the modern Canada we're living in.

00:08:15.360 Well, definitely a huge tragedy. Um, but I don't, uh, I think I concur with you, Derek. I don't know that you and I are the same level of gun enthusiast, but, uh, I don't think that, um, a tragedy should be used as a backdrop, uh, really ever, but especially because in this case, these weren't legally acquired guns and we see, and I, there's such a disconnect.

00:08:42.360 There's such a disconnect there. Like if they happen to be legally acquired guns, you could make a good case to say, well, you know, maybe certain guns shouldn't be available, or maybe there should be different rules. Some guys like this don't get guns, but it doesn't sound like either of those apply in this case. And so, you know, it shouldn't stand on its, this on its own merits here. Right.

00:09:06.360 And so, uh, the RCMP have said they're, they're looking to see whether he had help. Right. So somehow these, some of these weapons at least got, got from the United States into Canada.

00:09:17.360 Now they're investigating how that happened. You would think that somehow they were smuggled in, uh, the RCMP started out as a complete train wreck in this, in this whole thing. The first press conference they had, uh, was perhaps the worst press conference I've ever seen a police official have in almost four decades of journalism. It was truly awful and cringe worthy. They've gotten better during the, you know, the five or six days afterwards.

00:09:46.360 But they instilled no trust, uh, that first day. Um, and yeah, it's, it's sad that the government is having to come, come in on the heels of, of such a massive tragedy. Uh, you know, and now there's a huge, uh, huge, uh, population of gun owners that are just waiting on tenterhooks to see what is going to be banned.

00:10:12.360 Yeah. And, uh, and, uh, and so many questions around the incident as well. Like what was the motivation of the guy? Of course, how did he get all the weapons? Um, his, he had, he, he had some crime, some criminal history expunged that involved an accomplice. Is that accomplice somebody still connected to, you know, is there, is there more people connected to this?

00:10:34.360 Don't forget all the fake police cars. Well, and, and uniforms and yeah, like there's definitely.

00:10:42.360 Well, and the police knew about these fake police cars. This was well established. He was, he had a reputation. He had several of these things, different models, different years. This was known.

00:10:51.360 So he gets a hold of guns that are already illegal, but we now need to ban other guns that weren't used. Uh, but it's completely okay that this guy has got, like, I get pissed off when I'm driving down the highway and I'm doing, you know, five over and I see a car behind me.

00:11:07.360 And I think it's a cop and I'm slow for about half an hour. And eventually, you know, the guy, I see the guy up close and it's just a decommissioned cop car that someone bought at an auction.

00:11:17.200 That really pisses me off when someone's driving those. And they're not intentionally marked to look like a cop car. They're just decommissioned ones. You know, they got the special hub caps and stuff that bothers me because I have to drive.

00:11:28.460 I have to drive like an old lady for, for quite a while. But, uh, 0.98

00:11:32.500 he had actually purchased four police cars, old police cars at auction. One of them, which he had, uh, put decals on, real RCMP decals and a light bar, the red and, uh, red and blue, red and white lights that they've got on the top.

00:11:48.440 How was that legal?

00:11:49.500 It seemed to be well known about the time, well known around town that he had these. On the press conference yesterday, Tuesday by the RCMP, RCMP said they had absolutely no knowledge of

00:12:02.500 these cars previously.

00:12:04.060 Yeah. Well, and, and the other thing that I saw that was interesting was, and I don't know how authentic it was, maybe David, you know, but, um, the, uh, high school, um, yearbook that talked about in his graduation that he was, he's most likely, he was voted most likely to become a police officer, was it most likely to join the RCMP or something like that.

00:12:27.380 Uh, and so this guy obviously had some love or affinity for the police force. So what did he just decide to collect a bunch of their memorabilia because he was such a big fan, even though he was a dental hygienist or whatever?

00:12:40.940 Oh, he was, he was a denturist, denturist. Yeah.

00:12:43.940 They make a lot more money than an RCMP officer, but throughout, throughout his life, he seems to have been fascinated by police and, and specifically the RCMP, uh, collecting uniforms.

00:12:56.600 Uh, the RCMP said that, you know, they can be bought at auction or in surplus stores and, and stuff like that. But yeah, he was a one man walking and driving fake RCMP officer.

00:13:07.940 So, you know, all of that is, you know, hundreds of kilometers in Nova Scotia, because he looked like an RCMP officer.

00:13:14.880 Yeah. Yeah.

00:13:15.880 You know, he pulled, uh, Western standard sources said he, he was using his vehicle to pull over people or have them stop and he would shoot them.

00:13:24.320 Because is there anything worse as a Canadian or actually anywhere, I guess, that you trust the police, right?

00:13:30.640 And when you see the police behind you and they pull you over, you trust them.

00:13:35.500 Dave, I just watched, uh, the Waco miniseries, so I really don't trust the police right now.

00:13:42.260 So you've, you've moved on from Tiger King, have you?

00:13:44.980 But you'd still pull over it.

00:13:46.460 You'd still pull over if, uh, they pulled in behind you and lit you up.

00:13:50.760 Uh, I, I, I probably would, but if they come to my compound.

00:13:54.680 Ah, well, that sounds like a fantastic place to segue.

00:14:00.440 Um, you know, Derek, I think you heard of a political party at one time called the Wild Rose Party.

00:14:07.880 And, uh, certainly I have heard of, um, the Freedom Conservative Party of Alberta.

00:14:13.580 In fact, interviewed somebody from that.

00:14:15.620 And, uh, of course, we've all heard of Wexit.

00:14:18.560 David, what the heck is going on here?

00:14:22.880 The Wild Rose is back, baby.

00:14:25.740 Uh, the, you know, there, it seems like there's dozens of little separatist parties around Alberta.

00:14:32.460 The two biggest ones are Wexit and the Freedom Conservative Party, the FCP.

00:14:37.300 And for the last nine months, they seem to have got it figured out that the only way that they're going to achieve their goal of independence, or in fact, even just become relevant, uh, is to join forces.

00:14:50.240 So after nine months of negotiations, uh, they, they are setting the groundwork.

00:14:55.020 Uh, they've put out a framework.

00:14:58.600 Uh, they've set a, uh, I think it's June 29th.

00:15:02.700 They're going to have a teleconference or a internet vote and by all accounts, it's, uh, they're going to be, uh, joining forces to become the Wild Rose Independence Party or WIP for short.

00:15:15.200 WIP.

00:15:15.820 And you broke the story for the Western Standard on, uh, Monday, right?

00:15:21.260 Uh, Monday.

00:15:22.120 Yeah.

00:15:22.320 Yeah.

00:15:22.680 It was, uh, and, you know, they'll tell you those stories are, there's a lot of interest in them.

00:15:28.580 A lot of clicks.

00:15:29.720 Yeah.

00:15:29.880 A lot of people want to know about it.

00:15:31.580 A lot of it, a lot of, a lot of people, 40% of Albertans say that they're okay with, uh, independence.

00:15:39.660 Uh, so that's, that's a lot of people out there that are keeping their eye on it.

00:15:44.040 Derek, um, obviously we had, um, a couple of editorials this week, including yours.

00:15:50.280 What are your thoughts?

00:15:53.040 Well, uh, you know, as Dave said a bit there, there, there's a whole constellation of the, uh, Western independence movement across the whole West.

00:16:01.540 And, uh, particularly in Alberta, several official parties, several unofficial parties.

00:16:07.700 And, um, you know, it was just pretty clear.

00:16:11.380 Nothing's going anywhere unless they, uh, they get their act together.

00:16:15.540 And, uh, you know, libertarians, conservatives, and separatists tend to be a rather individualistic lot.

00:16:22.080 So it's very difficult for them to come together and do anything.

00:16:25.600 Uh, they, they tend to splinter apart.

00:16:27.760 Uh, so this is an interesting moment.

00:16:30.000 Uh, independence has become, in the last year or so, has become, uh, a more mainstream topic.

00:16:39.680 It's begun to move from the, uh, cranky fringes into a more broad acceptance in the mainstream,

00:16:45.520 but has not yet had a political party with any horsepower backing it or any kind of significant public leader to do it.

00:16:53.260 Um, this signals the possibility that that could change.

00:16:57.720 It still requires them to attract a credible leader, still requires them to, uh, develop some political maturity

00:17:04.380 and moving away from being a little political bridge club.

00:17:07.500 But, um, I was surprised they got the name Wildrose Independence Party.

00:17:11.680 That's going to have some people very upset that that name was legally allowed to be resurrected,

00:17:17.020 that Elections Alberta allowed that.

00:17:18.420 But, um, and, um, there, there's a lot of, uh, nostalgia, I think, for that name in some quarters in Alberta.

00:17:25.860 Um, I imagine you have a little yourself.

00:17:29.340 I might, I might have a bit of nostalgia for the Wildrose.

00:17:33.200 Uh, but, you know, you know, it's some people have moved past it.

00:17:36.840 They're like, no, I don't want to do it again.

00:17:38.480 Uh, all that matters is keeping the NDP out and that's all that matters, period.

00:17:42.660 But for a lot of people, they've been given the Tories a chance.

00:17:45.320 There's, there's a strange number of people in Alberta who think that, uh, on both the left and right,

00:17:50.580 who believe Jason Kenney might be a secret separatist and they just have to convince him.

00:17:54.180 Uh, the left are convinced he is.

00:17:56.040 Uh, the right has been trying to see if he comes around.

00:17:59.340 That's not been happening and he's not had any wins.

00:18:02.320 A guy elected on a platform of getting big wins against Ottawa for Alberta hasn't had a single significant win against Ottawa.

00:18:10.220 None of the things he's talked about in Fair Deal has happened.

00:18:12.360 So, you know, if, uh, if Kenny fails to deliver and this party can demonstrate some political maturity that they don't want to be just a little tiny social club, uh, and attract a credible leader and do the hard work that's necessary.

00:18:25.120 There is a possibility that, uh, they'll be able to upset, as I put it, upset the, uh, the federalist duopoly in Alberta, the two-party state in which both, uh, agree that Alberta needs to be under Ottawa.

00:18:39.840 You know, it's funny, Alberta loves to, like, burn their politicians at the stake and from an aside perspective here in British Columbia, I, I don't have any opinion on, on Jason Kenney beyond, uh, seems like a pretty nice guy.

00:18:56.380 He, uh, you know, he's credible.

00:18:58.320 He was obviously federal.

00:18:59.980 Um, he, uh, he, uh, was a federal, um, cabinet minister, but, uh, um, um, you know, he sent British Columbia a bunch of, uh, personal protective equipment, which was super nice, as well as sending that to, uh, Quebec and Ontario.

00:19:17.260 I don't know what you guys have a problem with this guy for, so, anyway, that's my, that's my BC opinion for today for whatever it's worth.

00:19:26.200 We can talk about the BC politics.

00:19:27.980 You're just hoping we don't send a rat patrol to invade.

00:19:32.080 It's, uh, I don't see what the problem is.

00:19:34.380 Anyway, I, uh, I do, though, however, um, agree that, um, Alberta has lots of reasons to be, um, unhappy about, uh, their place in confederation.

00:19:45.240 Paul, I think, Paul, it was you, maybe it was David, I think it was you, started talking about something old, something new, and that actually started making me think how relevant that is.

00:19:53.720 Something old, you know, the wild rose, something new, independence, something borrowed, again, the wild rose, and something blue.

00:20:02.720 It's, um, there's a lot that makes sense in that old saying, uh, and it, and it is a marriage of, uh, of two parties that are lesser by themselves.

00:20:13.140 Yeah.

00:20:13.660 And, um, for the record of, uh, for anybody who's listening, the original wild rose party was not a separatist party officially.

00:20:22.820 Officially.

00:20:24.040 As I understand it.

00:20:24.860 Officially.

00:20:25.560 There were definitely, we are all, we are all sympathizers.

00:20:28.580 Sure.

00:20:29.880 Well, and no question, the original wild rose party wanted to secure a better place in confederation officially for Alberta, right?

00:20:38.040 Wild rose was not a, a sovereign to his party per se.

00:20:41.920 It included a bunch of ex active sovereignists.

00:20:45.100 Uh, like Corey Morgan, one of our main columnists, he was the leader of the Alberta independence party in the nineties.

00:20:50.940 Yeah.

00:20:51.500 Um, and he went on to become a founding member of the wild rose party.

00:20:55.060 So it had a bunch of guys who had gone through it.

00:20:56.980 It had not really gone anywhere.

00:20:58.620 And then they went into the wild roses, the next best thing.

00:21:01.040 Um, but I can tell you behind the scenes, we all said, you know, none of us wanted independence, but we all thought it might somehow, it might, we might be forced to come to grips with it someday.

00:21:11.440 And if that party hadn't have disappeared, there's a very good chance it would be actively leading an independence movement today.

00:21:18.040 But that's impossible to say.

00:21:19.780 So, uh, would Corey be, um, kind of the Lucien Bouchard of Alberta politics then?

00:21:26.640 He's even crustier than me.

00:21:28.380 I don't know about that.

00:21:30.860 All right.

00:21:32.280 Um, there we go.

00:21:34.240 Wild rose.

00:21:35.080 So interesting times.

00:21:36.340 We got to get Corey on here, actually.

00:21:38.040 We haven't had him on yet.

00:21:39.480 We should get Corey on.

00:21:40.180 You know what?

00:21:40.900 I did a fantastic interview with Corey quite a while ago and the video sucked and the audio sucked and we ended up not publishing it.

00:21:49.060 I remember that.

00:21:50.100 Super guy.

00:21:51.080 Really enjoyed that, um, experience.

00:21:53.820 Um, not, not sure we agreed on very much politically, but, uh, definitely a charming fella.

00:22:01.120 Um, all right.

00:22:01.960 Let's talk about.

00:22:02.760 You're, you're a Paul.

00:22:03.880 You're now our token Democrats.

00:22:05.340 Well, I, I gotta say without Deirdre here, I'm taking up the left flank a bit.

00:22:10.740 I want to have Corey because I might not even be the right anymore.

00:22:14.940 I'd be great.

00:22:15.680 You know, I admitted on Facebook this week when somebody accused me of defending, uh, Donald Trump that, uh, which I wasn't.

00:22:22.720 Um, that, uh, I was a little bit of a fan of Andrew Yang's, not because of his policies, just because he seemed like a really smart guy.

00:22:32.000 And that seemed really new and such a good idea for politicians.

00:22:37.140 Anyway, on to media bailouts.

00:22:40.880 So, uh, didn't we already have a media bailout?

00:22:43.060 What's going on here, Dave?

00:22:44.660 We did.

00:22:45.500 We had a media bailout, uh, last year.

00:22:49.340 I think it was, uh, close to $600 million, uh, which, uh, uh, fixed everything, right?

00:22:56.300 Fixed everything.

00:22:57.060 Yeah, everything's, everything's good.

00:22:58.880 Uh, then, uh, that thing that we're not allowed to talk about tonight, uh, hit and has, uh, decimated the newspaper, uh, industry, uh, in Canada.

00:23:10.020 Uh, Post Media announced this week, uh, they were closing, uh, uh, weekly or community papers, excuse me, in, uh, Ontario and Manitoba.

00:23:21.240 15 of them, uh, they, uh, all their staff took, uh, pay cuts, 30% for the CEO down to, uh, 5% for the lowly paid reporter and, uh, Quebec Corps are thinking about chopping 10% of their staff.

00:23:36.220 So the media has, uh, has had a, has a really hard time during this pandemic.

00:23:41.880 Um, advertising rates are down 50% across the board and, uh, you know, they're hurting.

00:23:47.700 Uh, you know, for me, this is just a continued part of their slide.

00:23:53.140 They've been hurting for years.

00:23:56.080 Uh, revenues are being going down for years.

00:23:59.140 Advertising has been going down for years and they've been slow to realize that and change their operating structure.

00:24:07.480 Uh, now they, uh, they want some more.

00:24:11.160 Obviously they want a chunk of the, uh, relief money that's coming out.

00:24:15.340 And, uh, the government says, yes, it's coming and it'll be coming soon.

00:24:21.400 One of you guys needs to shut your messenger.

00:24:23.600 You're good.

00:24:23.960 That's, that's, things popping up. 1.00

00:24:25.840 That's stupid. 0.98

00:24:26.680 Um, but, uh, yeah, uh, Derek, you're a big fan of media bailouts, right? 1.00

00:24:33.740 Why don't you tell us what you think?

00:24:36.940 Uh, um, yeah, well, the media bailout last year was 600 million, uh, 600 million.

00:24:43.820 Yeah.

00:24:44.320 Um, but that's a 600 million every single year.

00:24:48.440 That's an annual subsidy.

00:24:50.440 That's a big chunk of cash.

00:24:52.000 And it's every single year that it goes out.

00:24:54.760 It's only half of the CBC.

00:24:56.900 Everybody.

00:24:58.560 Yeah, actually it's about half of the CBC and it's going on.

00:25:01.400 And that's on top of a lot of other, what I would call regulatory corporate welfare.

00:25:05.300 Uh, you know, on the cable side, mandatory carriage, all sorts of stuff.

00:25:09.580 Uh, there's print subsidies already, mail subsidies for distribution.

00:25:13.660 There's a lot of things that are already there.

00:25:16.780 Uh, and so this comes on top and it's, it's frustrating as the only major media outlet,

00:25:23.640 Western Canada that I'm aware of that does not take government money.

00:25:27.380 These guys are taking even more and our advertising has been hurt.

00:25:31.100 Uh, we, we've been spending a lot of time, especially in the last week, trying to correct

00:25:34.660 that and move forward.

00:25:36.240 We've had advertisers canceled because advertising is a discretionary spend for most businesses.

00:25:41.420 True.

00:25:42.160 Especially if you're not an online business and, uh, that's the first thing to go.

00:25:46.440 And so we, you know, we've been hurt by that.

00:25:49.180 All the media have been hurt by it, but the government's coming in, send, throwing even

00:25:53.080 more cash at our competitors, um, and, and there's no way that this does not affect coverage.

00:26:00.600 You do not have a free press in a country.

00:26:02.220 If the press is funded by the government, as much as they say, if you take the money from

00:26:06.900 the government, you're working for the government.

00:26:08.900 So everybody who's working at these places, uh, they might not like Trudeau, but they're

00:26:13.620 essentially employees of them.

00:26:14.960 And, uh, don't believe for a second that it doesn't affect their coverage.

00:26:18.360 So Derek, um, in the middle of the situation that the world has experienced right now, just

00:26:26.420 to play devil's advocate, are we not all employees of the government right now with 75% wage subsidies

00:26:36.320 and all this other stuff going on?

00:26:38.680 Um, and, uh, shouldn't, uh, since that's going on in the world, should we not bend our principles

00:26:45.560 here at the Western standard, uh, to comply with that?

00:26:51.960 You know, I would have, I could have benefited greatly in the past from bending principles,

00:26:57.660 and I'm not going to start now where it's worth even less.

00:26:59.800 Uh, if I'm going to bend my principles, it's going to be worth a lot more than a little bit

00:27:03.720 of cash from, uh, from Trudeau for the Western standard here.

00:27:07.040 Uh, although I'm sure everybody working for the standard might appreciate if maybe I didn't.

00:27:12.560 Uh, I, I, I can't blame anyone else.

00:27:16.000 Uh, I encourage you all to apply for everything you can get.

00:27:19.920 Uh, as far as I'm concerned, you've all paid a bunch of taxes. 0.95

00:27:22.960 Most, most people in the West have gotten shit back from the government. 0.94

00:27:26.360 So get back whatever you can. 0.98

00:27:27.720 I, I, I can understand that argument, but, uh, we're, we're, we're not taking it.

00:27:31.640 Uh, but yeah, fair enough.

00:27:33.000 Yeah.

00:27:33.200 Uh, I mean, uh, the, the number of people who applied for service, uh, some of the preliminary

00:27:38.360 numbers we're seeing is that it might be up to half of the workforce.

00:27:41.720 Uh, that'd be the 10, 10, uh, in parliament, one of the ministers there said that 10 million

00:27:46.560 people have applied for it out of a workforce of 19 million.

00:27:49.520 That doesn't mean 50% unemployment, uh, because you could still apply if you're on part time,

00:27:55.360 et cetera, uh, under certain circumstances.

00:27:57.640 But, uh, clearly, yeah, we're all, we're all working for the government now.

00:28:02.120 It's just particularly dangerous when the press is working for the government and it's permanent.

00:28:07.400 This is not, this isn't even a temporary bailout like GM, which was terrible enough.

00:28:12.560 Um, this, the government is making the media effectively a permanent arm of the government

00:28:19.480 and Canada's media landscape is traditionally already compliant enough.

00:28:24.080 Uh, their disagreements with government are rather perfunctory and around the margins.

00:28:29.400 There's no, there's very little fundamental disagreement with things beyond the extreme fringes.

00:28:33.960 Um, but you know, we do have a light media landscape.

00:28:37.640 Governments can get away with a lot in Canada because there's very little to cover it.

00:28:41.640 Municipalities, especially in small towns, municipalities can do virtually anything they want

00:28:46.280 because there'll be one part time beat reporter who doesn't even know how to file a freedom of

00:28:50.200 information request.

00:28:51.240 And so there, there is a remarkable lack of accountability and there is a problem with

00:28:55.320 the media, uh, economic model in Canada.

00:28:58.280 The media is bleeding to death.

00:29:01.320 The answer to that, I don't really know if there is an answer, but it definitely is not

00:29:05.240 to make us all working for the government.

00:29:08.360 Well, for the record, I have no idea how to file a freedom of information request.

00:29:12.840 That's why I'm the digital editor.

00:29:18.920 I'm wondering if Derek accepts Trudeau money, what kind of compound you could build?

00:29:25.400 There you go.

00:29:26.680 We tie right back to the first story.

00:29:28.680 I, you've got my word now.

00:29:31.480 If I accept, if the Western standard accepts any money, I am going to build a heavily fortified compound.

00:29:36.840 Well, on that note, please listener, you're not a member of the Western standard.

00:29:43.240 Please become a member now so that, that none of this happens.

00:29:47.080 But in all seriousness, of course, uh, we need you guys to become members.

00:29:51.320 So we don't take money and start building compounds.

00:29:53.400 There we go.

00:29:56.040 Of course, you're going to become a member because you want to support, uh, journalism that

00:30:00.520 isn't just another government subsidy.

00:30:02.360 So, uh, thank you in advance, everybody who's rushing to the website right now to sign up.

00:30:09.160 And, uh, that's all I've got on the agenda.

00:30:11.240 Uh, Dave, any closing thoughts?

00:30:12.920 You've been, Dave, you've been a journalist for a long time, right?

00:30:19.000 Yes.

00:30:19.480 Feels like forever.

00:30:20.440 Like, how do you feel about all of this?

00:30:25.400 Honestly, you know, I don't know.

00:30:29.800 Speak from your heart here, Dave.

00:30:31.000 You have to be a bit more specific, Paul, when you say all of this.

00:30:34.840 All of this, all this media bailout.

00:30:37.800 And I mean, I mean, you gotta, you watch, I mean, you've been in this industry, you,

00:30:42.200 you're a professional in this, um, in this field and you're just watching

00:30:48.200 the government run roughshod over, um, all of, kind of, I don't know if I'm being absurd here,

00:30:55.320 but over like the whole principles behind freedom of speech by, you know, it's hard

00:31:02.040 to imagine a press being free and independent when they're, when they're, um, totally reliant

00:31:10.840 on the government for their funding.

00:31:13.480 Am I, am I off base on this?

00:31:15.640 I agree.

00:31:16.440 Uh, you know, I spent almost 40 years in what you would call the mainstream media.

00:31:22.200 Uh, and every weekend I'm seeing my old colleagues getting laid off or, uh, being forced to take

00:31:29.400 retirement to me.

00:31:30.680 It's, uh, I think, I don't know if Derek, I think Derek described it as a, as a long death.

00:31:36.760 To me, it's, it's not working, but whatever formula they've got set up for their business

00:31:42.920 is not working.

00:31:43.800 Uh, CBC wouldn't work if it didn't get one point something billion dollars a year.

00:31:50.120 But, uh, you know, to me it's time to, to, if it needs to wither and die, then it needs 0.86

00:31:55.400 to wither and die.

00:31:56.680 But something will come up from, uh, the ashes that is better.

00:32:00.440 And that's, you know, Western standard, what we're starting to do here, uh, on the,

00:32:06.440 you know, Western standard, uh, uh, website and compound building platform.

00:32:12.040 But, uh, yeah, the, the, the days of the regular newspaper obviously are long gone.

00:32:17.880 Um, uh, the advertiser has way too many options, cheaper options, uh, to, to spread their word.

00:32:26.120 Uh, you know, so yeah, the days of the newspaper are numbered.

00:32:30.200 Even, you know, I mean, you take government subsidies out of the equation and fundamentally

00:32:36.520 the business model still has issues, right?

00:32:38.600 And, and you can, you can say with mainstream media, but also frankly with alternative media,

00:32:44.600 including, you know, publications like the Western standard, we, you know, we care about clicks.

00:32:50.760 We care about eyeballs because that's how we, um, translate stories into dollars. 0.78

00:32:56.600 And I feel like there's a more fundamental issue and maybe this is for another time,

00:33:01.560 but I feel like there's a more fundamental issue with, you know, journalistic ethics in general,

00:33:06.840 because we're not, you know, do, we don't want to be writing the stories for the clicks.

00:33:10.680 We want to be writing the stories for the great content.

00:33:13.480 And that becomes, you know, the self-fulfilling fantastic business, but there's definitely players,

00:33:21.080 I would say in the mainstream media and in the alternative media that are all about clicks.

00:33:26.440 And forget ethics at all.

00:33:28.520 In fairness to journalists, Paul, at the reporter level, I have never met anybody who just didn't

00:33:35.880 want to tell a good story, who loved being part of the action, who loved to be in the front row of history.

00:33:42.120 I agree with you.

00:33:43.240 Yeah.

00:33:44.120 It's when you get up into the upper levels of management that you have to worry about,

00:33:48.840 you know, being a slave to, uh, you know, the federal government, or will somebody be angry

00:33:54.840 about this story? Will an advertiser pull their ads because of this story?

00:34:00.680 But down at the, down at the base level, the reporter level, good group of people.

00:34:05.560 Well, I got to say, Dave, it's been a super pleasure getting to know you better over the

00:34:12.040 last little while. And, uh, you're, you and Deirdre are certainly two of my favorite journalists.

00:34:17.400 So on that happy note, you know, what about me, Derek, uh, Derek, uh, pretty say, I got to say,

00:34:31.480 just pretty good guy. I am looking forward to the Western standard Christmas party at Derek's compound.

00:34:38.600 Yeah. As long as we practice social distancing, cause you know, that's going to go until 2023.

00:34:45.400 If you don't water off things into the night, it's, it'll be awesome.

00:34:49.240 It's going to be exclusive.

00:34:52.840 I guess Paul, I don't pay you enough to force you to say nice things about me.

00:34:56.840 You know, my, well, I, I'm kind of a devil's advocate. So, you know, I'm just playing the role.

00:35:01.640 I do love you, Derek. The, um, my original, my original idea of the Western standard cruise,

00:35:07.240 I guess is out for a couple of years. Hey, no, the Western standard cruise, um, is me,

00:35:13.720 uh, me, Dave and Rick Strankman on, uh, on the dinghy going down the South Saskatchewan stealing

00:35:19.480 wheats and barley. There we go. You don't hear anything more about the global mail cruise

00:35:24.200 anymore. Uh, do you know, they were too high budget. We, we could make the low budget Western

00:35:29.320 standard one where we go pillaging, uh, wheats and barley and, uh, shooting ducks, but, uh, that's because

00:35:36.280 we're not, uh, we're not as pretentious as the global mail. We, we keep our budget under control.

00:35:40.440 That's why we don't need bailouts. Well, great to see you guys again, believe it or not. There's

00:35:49.240 something great to see you guys again. And to everybody who's listening, um, we wish everybody

00:35:55.560 well. Uh, I know this is a difficult time for a reason we're not going to talk about, but, um, uh,

00:36:01.880 we do wish everybody well and, uh, thanks for joining us this week and we'll come to you again,

00:36:06.840 uh, next week. Take care. Cheers.

Western Standard - May 02, 2020

Guns and (Wild)Roses - The Pipeline, Episode 15

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