In this episode of Triggered, host Corey B. Morgan is joined by Conservative Party of Canada leadership candidate Grant Abraham to talk about the party's leadership race, free speech, and the Trudeau government's attempt to take control of the internet.
00:01:14.920Leads to technical bugs now and then, but for the most part, it goes really well, and it makes it interactive.
00:01:20.500I like seeing those comments in the comment scroll.
00:01:22.340I like seeing you guys discussing things with each other, sending questions my way, sending questions towards the guests.
00:01:28.860It's great and, you know, just reminds me that you're all there and actually listening.
00:01:32.500I'm not talking into the wind, so I appreciate that.
00:01:35.380Again, no, let's just keep everything civil to a degree.
00:01:38.480We can differ with each other while still being respectful.
00:01:41.020If you really want to get into it and get rough and tumble, save it for Twitter.
00:01:44.960As you can see, Corey B. Morgan, that's my Twitter handle, and that's where I'm more receptive to having some of the more unsavory debate if we want to.
00:02:01.340I like seeing Melissa coming in from Halifax.
00:02:03.220It's great seeing the East Coast folks popping in here.
00:02:06.200Somebody made a comment recently saying we should be the Canadian standard rather than the Western standard because we cover the national issues on things.
00:02:13.880appreciate that we're going to keep covering it but you know we've got a long tradition as the
00:02:17.600western standard just don't let the name fool you we will talk about things across the country and
00:02:22.180i got a couple of great guests to talk about those it's gonna be a lot of federal issues today
00:02:25.280i've got chauveloy majumder from the mcdonald laurier institute he wrote a column in the
00:02:30.740national post a little while ago he's a specialist in foreign policy things such as that he was a
00:02:35.760close advisor to stephen harper when harper was the prime minister and he's a very bright man to
00:02:41.660discuss some of the things, well, where is Canada's role in the world? What can we do? What should we
00:02:46.100do? It'll be a good nuanced discussion, you know, not just our usual armchair folks who sit on the
00:02:51.740sidelines. This is somebody who's had to deal with foreign policy workers and advise them.
00:02:57.380Then yet another Conservative Party of Canada leadership candidate, Grant Abraham. He's
00:03:02.320thrown his hat into the ring there, and I think there's 10 or possibly 11 now. The race is getting
00:03:08.840very busy, but we're continuing with our coverage and bringing in every candidate we can to speak
00:03:13.600to you. I think Grant's going to be the sixth one of the bunch to come on the show, and we'll see
00:03:17.980what he's got to offer in the conservative race. So before we get to that, let's see what's got me
00:03:23.560going today, and it's again comes to media, free speech, and all those issues. We've had the Trudeau
00:03:30.040liberals flirting with legislation to control independent media for years now. They've always
00:03:34.760wanted to. I remember way back in the 90s, actually, towards the end of the 90s, CRTC
00:03:39.940put out a release. I remember laughing at it. Maybe it was around 2000, but they were just
00:03:44.700saying, we've examined the issue and we've decided for now that we're not going to regulate the
00:03:48.600internet. Actually, what they were saying is they couldn't figure out how they could. There's a lot
00:03:52.360of people in government just want to control information on how we do it. And the liberals
00:03:56.700are no exception. In fact, they are exceptional when it comes to it. Now, despite spending
00:04:00.580hundreds of millions in tax dollars to subsidize their preferred media outlets, independent media
00:04:05.420outlets continue to flourish like this one. Canadians are abandoning legacy media outlets
00:04:10.980outlets in favor of new independent news providers en masse, and it's got the establishment quite
00:04:15.900frightened. Since the approach with the subsidy Carrot has failed, the government's now moving
00:04:20.520on to using the stick. They started with Bill C-10 last year, and that was modeled to control
00:04:25.540digital platforms. As radio and television ratings have been continually tanking, streaming platforms
00:04:31.300of course have been experiencing record growth. Citizens preferred the raw content unfettered by
00:04:36.100government regulation and they voted with their feet. A new world of broadcasting is opened up
00:04:41.300for people. A person or a group of people can set up a decent broadcast with engaging content for
00:04:46.040a mere fraction of what it cost only a decade ago. New streaming productions were purely guided by
00:04:51.760supply and demand. You know, sub-rate productions languished with a handful of viewers and
00:04:56.220faded away while new upstarts sprung up seemingly from nowhere and sometimes took the internet by
00:05:01.560storm. But rather than examine why our traditional broadcasting dinosaurs could no longer draw
00:05:06.680viewers, the government's seeking ways to drag the new media outlets down to the same crappy
00:05:11.140level of engagement as the rest of the legacy media. C10 would have come with rules for Canadian
00:05:16.580content minimums and of course French content. It would drive outside sources of information
00:05:21.380from your screens and force you to consume the mediocre crap that the establishment wants you
00:05:26.860to view. It would, of course, put those small upstart broadcasters at a large disadvantage
00:05:31.800and drive digital streaming services towards large outlets. Now, C-10 died on the order paper due to
00:05:37.800the 2021 federal election, but the government quickly regurgitated the bill as C-11 now in
00:05:43.240the next session, and it's coming down the pipes now. They dearly want to grab and maintain control
00:05:48.200here. Now, on top of C11, the Liberals have now introduced Bill C18. That bill's modeled to shake
00:05:54.120down the larger internet providers and force them into paying media outlets for content that appears
00:05:58.780in their platforms. Now, media outlets and those internet platforms, the heavyweights, have a
00:06:03.380symbiotic relationship. You know, those big ones like Google, YouTube, Facebook, they can reach
00:06:07.800millions of people, but they also rely on those independent content creators to draw the viewers
00:06:12.320and readers. This relationship's far from perfect. I mean, Facebook in particular can be frustrating.
00:06:18.200It's one of the main drivers for traffic for the Western Standard, for example.
00:06:21.780When there's an issue or a conflict, there's nearly no such thing as responsive customer service.
00:06:26.160But outlets like ours are dependent on those social media giants right now,
00:06:29.060and we can't forget that those giants are dependent upon us too.
00:08:58.320Subscribe to multiple platforms like Rumble and Getter,
00:09:00.900and don't become dependent on only a couple of sources to get information.
00:09:05.100There's a war going on right now for the access to your eyes and ears,
00:09:08.140And unless you stand up and fight back, you're going to be the one who loses it.
00:09:12.360That's what's got me going today, guys.
00:09:14.680Okay, let's check in on somebody who's providing news on one of those alternative outlets, that being ours.
00:09:19.500And that's our news editor, Dave Naylor.
00:09:21.520Hey, Dave, how's it going way there across the other end of the Western Standard Enterprises here?
00:09:27.960Yeah, I think I can see you there in the background, Corey.
00:09:30.360But yeah, I'm still riding a high because I got the word Tizwaz into the pipeline show last night.
00:09:36.180Yes. No, exactly. So that's why, you know, you got to expand your vocabulary. So that's, that's what it's all about here. So this morning, our main story right at the moment is UCP has a new caucus member goes by the name of Brian Jean, won the by election up in Fort McMurray last month, with a stated goal of trying to remove Jason Kenney from office.
00:10:02.680And immediately right after he was sworn in, he said that exact thing.
00:10:06.780So he does not expect Jason Kenney to be the premier after May 18th when the UCP leadership votes are announced.
00:10:16.220Ironically, he said Danielle Smith, who's also announced she's going to be running, should sort of maybe stay out of it until the announcement is official.
00:10:26.960So coming from a guy who's spent the last two years sniping at Kenney, that's a bit rich.
00:10:33.560We've got a story from the Canadian Armed Forces Ombudsman who says public knowledge of all the military cases, sexual misconduct cases, is driving morale into the toilet.
00:10:46.760His office has hundreds and hundreds of cases going back several years that they haven't even got to yet.
00:10:53.160But he says his biggest concern is the public knowing about him.
00:10:56.740Our Mike Thomas has done a column on Elon Musk, the world's richest man, and his takeover of Twitter.
00:11:06.120And Mike's got some predictions on what Elon Musk will be doing in the coming days.
00:11:13.340A disturbing story north of Calgary, Corey, where RCMP have discovered two cows dead near a cemetery.
00:11:21.520they were slaughtered and skinned and their meat removed from their carcasses so as we know the
00:11:29.400price of meat has skyrocketed in the last few months so I'm sure they're going to be selling
00:11:35.180that on the black market. Also one that comes as no surprise to Western Standard viewers and
00:11:43.160readers the second arrest has been made in the arson at the Ontario Ottawa sorry the Ottawa
00:11:50.760apartment building you remember that there was a small fire set and the doors were locked and
00:11:55.960everybody fell over themselves media and politicians to blame the truckers for it
00:12:01.160ottawa police have arrested a second suspect now and of course nothing to do with the truckers
00:12:07.240whatsoever uh we've got a uh column from red deer mp sorry mla jason stefan uh talking about uh
00:12:17.000the Liberal NDP axis and how Alberta is threatened by them. Jody Gondek and her Edmonton counterpart
00:12:25.180Mayor Sohi held a climate summit last night talking about how their cities are going to
00:12:31.940battle climate change. And she says Calgary is already starting to see the benefits of her first
00:12:37.560her first thing she did in office was to to declare a climate emergency. So that's on the
00:12:46.520site now, too. Our Matthew Horwood in Ottawa is going to be a busy boy today with the federal
00:12:51.680budget coming down this morning. He's already got a story up talking with Conservative leader Aaron
00:12:58.380or sorry, Candace Bergen about what she expects to see in the in the budget and
00:13:34.620that's an interesting development. I mean, if they start giving money back, I mean, that kind
00:13:40.920of opens the floodgates, I think, to a lot of liability on those actions from the Emergencies
00:13:44.920Act back then, too. So I think that could really snowball into something quite interesting in the
00:13:49.300future here. It does. And hey, look at this, Corey. Look what I got. Oh, the new swag is in.
00:13:57.880Isn't that cool? Western standard hats. So if you ask nicely, maybe I'll grab you one out of the box.
00:14:05.940Well, we'll see what we can do. I mean, you had that nice new haircut this week, though, and you're covering it up with that big old hat there now.
00:14:11.740Yeah, that's true. This will be my weekend non-showering attire.
00:14:16.280Ah, right on. Well, always good to keep promoting the outlet how we can, whether it's covering our thinning hair or with gifts to others.
00:14:25.440you bet anything to cover up the growing forehead right on all right thanks dave i'll talk to you
00:14:32.020later thanks gory yes that was our news editor dave naylor and this is the time course when as
00:14:37.880you can see all of those stories from all across the country all sorts of unique and original
00:14:42.880content and stuff we're constantly putting it up there it's constantly breaking and we do so
00:14:48.240because you guys subscribe to us so thank you all who have already subscribed to the western standard
00:15:51.840I won't call out the individual, but some private messaging that went to the standard of a man that was quite upset that we were behind a paywall and called us just, said it was all just about the money and we should be giving out our content for free.
00:16:05.160Well, we are, you know, editorially a conservative-minded publication.
00:16:12.160We don't expect anything for free from anybody else.
00:16:14.820That's why we don't take any subsidies.
00:16:16.200But we aren't giving things away for free either.
00:16:17.980We have a large and growing news team, and we have to pay them somehow, guys.
00:16:21.840If you want to keep going and getting your, you know, quote unquote free content, sir, go to the CBC and it's not free. They're taxing the crap out of us to fund that garbage. But that's what you get. If you want good coverage, responsible coverage, an outlet, again, that responds to the viewers, readers and listeners.
00:16:40.380subscribe to us we'll keep covering you don't have to agree with everything we say
00:16:44.640but as you can see there's a whole lot of breaking news stories out there uh jackie asking how to get
00:16:50.960one of those hats yeah i i'm uh we just got those in we've got jackets we've got pins actually can't
00:16:56.360quite see it's next to my microphone a little ws pin derek loves getting those uh promotional
00:17:02.020merchandise things going and i believe we have plans to uh start sharing and distributing those
00:17:08.020sorts of things down the road pretty quickly. We're going to be doing a great big upgrade pretty
00:17:12.620soon, actually, for the entire website and system. And that's going to include opportunities to get
00:17:18.340those things out there. So you can, again, find another way to perhaps support us and get a piece
00:17:22.700of value and, of course, help promote us while you're out there on the streets. So the other way
00:17:29.420we do pay our bills, of course, is sponsors. And I should speak to one, the regular listeners used
00:17:34.260hearing me talk about them but i do i you know it's nice to have a sponsor both the sponsors for
00:17:38.740this show the main ones are ones that i believe in and agree with i don't have to make up some
00:17:43.540puffy uh statement to try and pump them up and that's bitcoin well these guys
00:17:49.860are the your gateway into getting invested into digital currencies particularly of course bitcoin
00:17:56.340as you can see that on that map that's all of their atm locations all across canada they're
00:18:01.460They're a publicly traded company, and they make digital currency accessible and practical.
00:19:00.460It's outside of their reach. They cannot touch it. And they want it. And who knows what's going
00:19:05.640to happen down the road. But no, you're getting it. If you want your currency out of reach of
00:19:09.940the government, this is a way to do it. So what's that Claudette saying? The Edmonton Sun's 275 a
00:19:15.380day. I haven't bought a paper in so long. Three pages of local news and the rest of articles from
00:19:19.540Hollywood. Yeah, the establishment media outlets are having a very hard time. I mean, part of what's
00:19:25.500cool and interesting with the way new things are developing, though, is we don't need the massive
00:19:31.360amount of infrastructure that the old outlets had to have in the past. We don't need a giant
00:19:36.160building with printing presses in it. We don't need, as a studio, I mean, yes, and Derek assures
00:19:43.060us it was a big investment, and it has been, and it's still costly, but to be able to put on a
00:19:49.180production like this compared to 20 years ago, if you wanted to have a TV show, a fraction of the
00:19:54.380cost and we can reach out to so many people and they have so many options out there to get into
00:19:59.460uh who goes out and buys a newspaper anymore why would you want to i mean you got to get rid of
00:20:04.940the thing it's uh uh you know it's it says clavette saying 384 papers have folded in the
00:20:10.600last two years and it is unfortunate i don't celebrate the loss of jobs but what i do look
00:20:16.960forward to is an evolution to something better i've used the analogy before i mean when i started
00:20:20.980in the oil field a long time ago. I mean, we're getting up on 30 years ago now. I started as a
00:20:27.240rodman, which is like a helper or an assistant to a surveyor. And I had to put in a couple of years.
00:20:32.560Some surveyors were really nasty, grouchy devils. You know, they're a pain to work for here in some
00:20:38.200rough conditions. It took me a couple of years as a rodman to learn and build up my skills to the
00:20:44.960point where I learned the formulas that were involved with conventional optical survey and
00:20:49.260things like that, or they would even let me out as a junior surveyor to start surveying myself
00:20:53.280out there and doing all that. It was a lot of training, a long ways up. And then shortly after
00:20:57.240I made it up to being a conventional surveyor, GPS came along and basically wiped my trade out.
00:21:04.720Very little need for conventional survey anymore. I mean, it took a few years for it to happen,
00:21:09.080but that trade was fading fast. There were two ways to go about it, and we saw both happen.
00:21:15.120Some of the old-time surveyors just said, we're not going to flex, we're not going to change,
00:21:19.020and well, what happened was they ended up essentially eased out to pasture. They were
00:21:22.660out of work. Flexible ones like myself, and it helps being younger back then anyways, you know,
00:21:29.240but say, well, I'm going to have to learn how to do other things. I had to learn how to
00:21:32.580create maps in a digital format, and I had to use GPS to build those maps, things like that.
00:21:38.960Embrace the new technologies because they're better or get left behind. And that's what's
00:21:44.020happening in the media world a lot now too, is some of the old timers, and I understand,
00:21:48.820They're frustrated. They put in decades. They had to go to journalism school. They did a whole bunch
00:21:53.240of stuff. And then they end up losing viewership to a degree to upstarts and new outlets and social
00:22:00.220media personalities. But the pouting about it isn't going to help. It's not going to change anything.
00:22:05.760It's not going to save anything. They've got to flex and get into the new product. So what we're
00:22:11.120seeing now is a government protecting dinosaurs. They're protecting, you know, for the analogy,
00:22:15.180the old conventional survey, essentially, to compare it to that. And it's futile. I mean,
00:22:22.500you can spend a whole lot of money, but in the end, it's going to go away. And we've got a lot
00:22:26.520of good columnists, good reporters, and good people in mainstream media, but they're riding
00:22:32.680a dying machine, and it's time for them to move on into a new format. Okay, Shubh seems to be
00:22:40.920running a little behind today, but hopefully he comes in. I've had these challenges of live
00:22:46.680shows, of course, as we get these technical hiccups now and then. So let's go into some
00:22:51.600more of the news there. What was that one that Dave was talking about? The way skinned cows
00:22:56.580being found on the side of a road. What on earth is going on with that? This is the sort of thing
00:23:04.420gets people paranoid. And I mean, it was behind a cemetery, no less. You know, people, I imagine
00:23:10.060there's going to be some speculation as to whether or not we've got cultists or things like that
00:23:15.420going on uh i see as uh eva put in that story uh the prices of beef and everything i mean
00:23:21.660cattle are are an expensive commodity these days uh it says skinned it says slaughtered
00:23:27.260farther up in the story so i wonder if that was just what was left to the carcass after somebody
00:23:30.700actually fully harvested as if they were hunting you know we used to string up cattle rustlers
00:23:36.220I don't know if we necessarily want to go back to that, but it's a very serious crime and it
00:23:41.260puts some business operators in a terrible situation. It's crazy to see stuff like that
00:23:46.120going on. But yeah, you look at the price of beef in a supermarket and you can see why somebody's
00:23:50.560tempted to just go out in a rural area and take down a cow. Ridiculous and bizarre stuff going on
00:23:57.260out there. But I mean, it's indications of a very messed up society we have these days.
00:24:02.060All right. I see Shu sitting in the lobby there. We're going to pull him into the show and have a talk here on some more international stuff. I mean, Canadian, but how we're dealing with the rest of the world. So let's bring him in here and have a discussion. Hey, how's it going?
00:24:19.580Very good. Yeah, it's been a while, man. You know, I missed you when you came out West last time. We'll have to corner you next time.
00:24:25.420We're going to fix that problem with great haste.
00:24:27.900Great. So I appreciate you coming in. You know, we've got a really haywire world, as I said, in a lot of ways going on. And we all have opinions and we're watching things develop, but we get mixed news and things. But I mean, the international scene is more volatile, I think, than we've seen in a generation. And you've got a great deal of experience in foreign affairs.
00:24:48.700I mean, it's easy to say the country should do this or do that, but there's always a lot more complication involved in those sorts of actions.
00:24:55.780And I just wanted to bring you in to talk more broadly about those issues, particularly the Ukraine-Russia conflict.
00:25:00.200And you've written a good piece that was in the National Post a few weeks ago on that.
00:25:05.480And perhaps if you could kind of run down what you'd written in that piece and where Canada's role might or could or should be in this mess right now.
00:25:13.160I tried to take a step back, and thank you for noticing.
00:25:15.440I think it's you and my mother that makes two people who've had a chance to read it.
00:25:21.340I tried to take a step back beyond the immediate pressures of the day to supply the Ukrainians0.95
00:25:26.900the equipment they require to defend their sovereign territory and paint a bigger picture
00:25:32.900in terms of what is this age of competition we're in?
00:25:35.780What exactly is happening in this proxy war in Ukraine?
00:25:39.100And in doing so, I first tried to establish that what we all need to come to terms with is that while Russia is featuring in our headlines, in our news, in this devastating conflict in Ukraine that Vladimir Putin has started,
00:25:55.960is the backdrop of the fact that China has replaced Russia as our principal rival,
00:26:03.680that the cooperation between China and Russia in Ukraine and in theaters around the world
00:26:10.400from the Euro-Atlantic to the Indo-Pacific is visceral and real,
00:26:14.680that our own Western weaknesses, where we become preoccupied with performative issues
00:26:22.040ranging from human dignity to energy security have come at the cost of us being prepared to
00:26:28.360unlock the military and economic potential of the world's democracies to confront this
00:26:33.800rising age of authoritarians. And that finally, what my sense is of this conflict is that
00:26:41.640there's really no way that this can end without the end of Vladimir Putin's tyranny.
00:26:47.880And so I tried to, in a few hundred words, cover those big topics around what we're dealing with and what Canada, our democratic allies, our established alliances in NATO and our new and emerging alliances, like the ones we're seeing in the quadrilateral security dialogue with India, Japan, the United States, Australia, need to do to come to a common sense of an understanding of the threats we face.
00:27:17.240and a common plan for how we defeat them.
00:27:36.660But, I mean, there's also the fear, well, do you just let him come in
00:27:39.440and take the place, and that's the least amount of casualties?
00:27:42.460But I don't find it believable that Vladimir Putin would stop with just Ukraine.
00:27:49.500No, I mean, we've seen that what's happening both out of Beijing and the Kremlin are the designs of empires, right?
00:27:58.860Like in China, we've seen Xi Jinping convert the state into a Communist Party one-man rule for lifetime rule.
00:28:08.840We've seen Vladimir Putin do the same thing in the Kremlin.
00:28:11.940Both of these men are in the business of empire building.
00:28:17.420What China is trying to do is restore the Middle Kingdom in which, you know, in Chinese lore, where China was at the heart of internationalization and had their own system of rules for how the world could serve China's rise.
00:28:30.260For Vladimir Putin, he has an obsession with restoring the so-called Russian Imperium in the idea that any Russian-speaking population in the world belongs under the Russian state and that Ukraine as a country does not have to exist despite the agreements of his own country and despite the fact that Ukraine has been a thriving civilization of its own that goes back a thousand years.
00:28:55.380So these are empire builders who are trying to refashion the world in their own image and redraw borders to that effect.
00:29:04.060And in doing so, they're in the process of ending the post-war order that was fashioned after the Second World War and challenging the West and new democracies to resist them.0.61
00:29:18.660And so that's the wider context, Corey, I think we're finding ourselves in.
00:29:23.720So bringing it back towards Canada and around here, though, I mean, we're not a large military
00:29:28.720power, and we're unfortunately not as much of an economic power as we used to be either.
00:29:33.820What role, you know, can we have or do we have or should we have?
00:29:39.540You know, we are still a member of the G7.
00:29:51.960What I think we need to do is dispense with the idea of wishing the world as it were, and to see it for what it really is. And what that means is clearly articulating what our national interests are, militarily and economically, in the security of our people, the prosperity of our people, and in the normalization of the values we all hold dear.
00:30:13.380what that principally means today is to sit back and say listen you know there are some tangible
00:30:18.260problems that canada can solve um european reliance on russian energy is unsustainable
00:30:25.140unattractive they're basically funding the war machine that is butchering these innocent ukrainians0.99
00:30:31.300um and if you know baltic countries can reduce their reliance eliminate their reliance lithuania
00:30:37.940Latvia on Russian energy, then why cannot continental Europe do the same thing? Well,
00:30:42.740one of the great answers to that is Canadian energy and long-term clean Canadian energy
00:30:47.700stability for the world. We have not only just exemplary environmental standards, we have strong
00:30:54.820ethical practices. We don't manipulate prices for the sake of leverage over other countries.
00:31:01.300When we agree to a deal, we stand by our deals. So providing that long term energy security to
00:31:09.700European and Indo-Pacific growth needs is a wonderful alternative that Canada could get
00:31:14.660serious about supplying. The second is we've seen in early February, on the 4th of February,
00:31:21.220Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping stood side by side in the Olympics and declared boundless
00:31:26.260cooperation in that document they explicitly stated their ambition in polar and arctic interests
00:31:35.780um russia has been refurbishing old war bases and naval bases across their north china has a stated
00:31:42.340objective to try and establish shipping and data supply routes and critical mineral interests in
00:31:47.300the canadian north and in the polar and arctic region you know one of the most important things
00:31:52.020that Canada can do today is harden our arctic flank with our nato partners by investing not
00:31:58.260just in the military and defensive requirements that we need to protect our own sovereign domain
00:32:02.740but also in the development the infrastructure the prosperity of the indigenous peoples of the north
00:32:08.180it is a vast swath of territory that is Canadian and we have a national responsibility to grow it
00:32:13.380to be good stewards of it and to ensure that people in it thrive and thrive so safely the
00:32:18.340The third thing that Canada can do is consider how, you know, our democracy can work with other democracies.
00:32:27.180You know, in 75 years, we've seen the emergence of different economies.
00:32:32.840We've seen the decline of others relative to those.
00:32:35.600We know that the center of gravity for global growth is going to be on the Pacific.
00:32:40.120So much of what happens in Ottawa and Toronto focuses on the transatlantic relationship, which is not a bad focus.0.98
00:32:45.400But we also have the opportunity as a Pacific power to establish our interests and to work with other democracies, whether it's Japan, Australia, India, South Korea, as partners in establishing the rules basis, the basis of rules for how prosperity that region would grow.
00:33:03.680But more importantly, how Canadian economic life can participate, inform it and benefit from it.
00:33:09.160So, I mean, those are three simple, big ideas that we can do today. And it requires a government that isn't focused on just being performative on issues in the international stage, but actually back it up with the kind of hard work necessary to achieve them.
00:33:46.560Yeah, well, you know, Corey, you know, I'm not going to diminish the idea
00:33:50.540that, you know, there's a domestic audience.
00:33:52.240Canadian leaders serve the Canadian public.
00:33:53.720It's good that they send things back to Canada that affirm the values of Canada.
00:33:58.480But what I will say is, without backing it up with real concrete steps on getting our energy to markets, on speaking clearly and lucidly about European and Arctic security, on engaging an Indo-Pacific region with the kind of hard work that's necessary, if you don't back it up with real and meaningful action, then you're not going to be considered by others around the world as a genuine partner.
00:34:19.760And that's one of the reasons why Canada is being left out of critical relationships that are forming, whether it's the quadrilateral strategic dialogue that has now commercial dimensions, the deal between Australia, UK and the United States, not just on submarines, but also on cybersecurity and on missile defense, which is important to our Canadian North, on a range of trading relationships.
00:34:44.420You know, we're just not doing the work. I think that's the most frustrating thing to consider when we're looking at what our government is doing is that the amount of work that's necessary to back up the virtue signaling is just not being done.
00:34:58.560And it's coming at the expense of Canadian interests and it can't be tolerated much longer.
00:35:04.180So getting to the other part of your column, you had mentioned China and they've been getting increasingly aggressive as well with regards to Taiwan and other neighboring areas.
00:35:13.560And they've never been really a very nice international player, at least these last few decades.
00:35:19.220And they're kind of sliding under the radar with what they're doing these last six months or so, as everybody's focused on Eastern Europe.
00:35:27.280How should we manage a relationship with them?
00:35:29.160I mean, we've got so much integrated trade going on with them, too.
00:35:33.980We're very dependent on Chinese trade.
00:35:39.840Listen, China is the second largest economy in the world.
00:35:42.220I would say, though, that of our trading relationship with China, while we do have a more meaningful trading relationships on agriculture and some commodities, it isn't as deeply engaged as Australia's trade was with China.
00:35:55.300And Australia being in the neighborhood had realized the threat and the risk of engaging with Chinese commercial interests and has proceeded with not just decoupling from China's weaponized commercial leverages over Australia, but redoubling on relationships like in India.
00:36:11.780They just the Australians and the Indians announced an important and an amazing trade deal.
00:36:16.640And they've been pursuing, you know, the long term kind of trading infrastructure that will supply the Australian economic interest for the long term as they decouple from the risk of what China poses.
00:36:27.360For Canada, you know, when we think of China, while you say that they've kind of slipped under the radar, it's a fact.
00:36:33.140But, you know, the Chinese government issued a massive cyber assault across Ukrainian infrastructure just prior to Russia's invasion.
00:36:42.120The Chinese state propaganda has been echoing the outrageous lies coming from the Kremlin trying to justify what they're doing in Ukraine.
00:36:52.000The Chinese are working hand in glove with the Russians in international institutions, whether it's United Nations or other multilateral forum.
00:37:00.740The Chinese have softened the impact of Western sanctions on Russia by buying Russian wheat, securing long-term Russian oil, providing Huawei to back up Russia's state surveillance system.
00:37:15.940And the Chinese are working with Russia to manipulate negotiations with Iran, which is a whole different issue, against America, against the West, against our interests.0.92
00:37:26.320on one level they are strong cooperative partners with russia in their invasion of ukraine
00:37:33.200on the other i think they're watching how effectively the russians or ineffectively
00:37:38.520the russians have been in ukraine because they have the same ambitions to redraw the borders
00:37:43.380of the indo-pacific by the eventual conquest of taiwan and so i think what they are on one side
00:37:50.840they're active participants on the other side they're taking a long-range view my thesis though
00:37:55.660is that however this turns out for russia and ukraine um russia has is vastly diminished if
00:38:02.220russia succeeds in ukraine and vladimir putin is able to retain some sort of veto over ukrainian
00:38:08.300euro-atlantic decisions or some sort of territory whether it's the ukrainian east or crimea
00:38:14.860if vladimir putin gains any victory out of this china wins because they know that they that you
00:38:20.540you know, intervention can actually result in expansion of borders. And if Russia fails,
00:38:26.580if Vladimir Putin ultimately ends up behind bars or worse, if Russian forces are routed and we
00:38:33.440begin prosecuting these war crimes for what they are, then, you know, Beijing gets to see a country
00:38:40.800that is one-eighth the size of their economy in Russia, completely broken, divested from the0.86
00:38:48.140international system and an opportunity for Beijing to move in to carve out their economic
00:38:52.440interests in Russia, which include energy, agriculture, metals, and other specific things
00:38:59.480that a diminished Russian state would provide for the rise of China. So, you know, China's a very
00:39:07.620important question in this. They are the biggest trading partner for Russia and across Eurasia
00:39:15.940and into Europe, including in Ukraine, China has some very strong economic interests that they're
00:39:20.700going to be focused on yesterday, today, and well into the future. Yeah, well, we're seeing just,
00:39:27.760you know, military moves and things happening that we haven't seen in generations. As you said,
00:39:32.820I mean, whatever way the outcome comes in this, it's going to have long-lasting repercussions. I
00:39:37.760mean, the term you used as well, though, that is troubling, but it's real, is it's turning into a
00:39:41.720proxy war. And, you know, those of us who grew up in the Cold War, proxy wars can turn very
00:39:46.980horrible and extended and prolonged just because, you know, some nations aren't putting their own
00:39:51.780boots on the ground. They can put a lot of resources in that leads to a lot of misery1.00
00:39:54.980wherever the theater of the battle is. And I guess we can just hope that this gets resolved in
00:40:01.220somehow shorter time rather than longer, because this could be awful.
00:40:05.280Listen, I lament about this because I think that if, you know, people have listened to
00:40:09.380Prime Minister Stephen Harper back in 2000, as early as 2008, and others, including George W. Bush
00:40:15.180at the tail end of the Bush administration, on admitting Ukraine and Georgia into NATO,
00:40:20.400I have to believe that Russia would never have invaded. They would never want to trigger Article
00:40:23.8205. They know they would never win in that context. So one is a lament of 2008, not having had a
00:40:29.520chance to prevent this scenario, which Russia had stated it was going to pursue. Then in 2014,
00:40:35.680when all this truly began in earnest with the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
00:40:39.940You know, I think the West did a lot to kind of begin waking up
00:40:42.800and taking the cobweb out of the institutions that it had to confront these threats,
00:40:47.660like NATO and others, but still didn't go far enough to really deter Vladimir Putin
00:40:54.140from making the decision to invade Ukraine.
00:40:57.660Instead, you know, the West pursued energy deals with Russian energy supply, oil and gas supply.
00:41:02.540They wished that Vladimir Putin and China would want to preserve long term economic interests over pursuing, you know, insane imperial dreams in the short term.
00:41:13.740And then even today, you know, we're now seven weeks into this invasion of Ukraine.
00:41:18.040I struggle with the fact that we're incrementally increasing our sanctions regime on Russia.
00:41:23.200They're vast and they're significant and consequential, but we still hear that more sanctions can be imposed.
00:41:28.540And that we're incrementally supplying the Ukrainians the critical weapons that they require to defend themselves. I'm not calling for NATO troop deployments, our young men and women from Canada to deploy into Ukraine. I'm not calling for that.
00:41:40.680What I'm saying is that we're seeing that the Ukrainian army is competent. They are effective. They require material support, which we can provide, even as Canada today. And we continue to pursue this idea of incrementally increasing our support to Ukraine, because we don't want to escalate a scenario that Vladimir Putin has already escalated.
00:42:02.680escalated. So I think the kind of strength and resolve that we should be showing should be much
00:42:07.960more. It should include massive economic blockades against what supplies the Russian war machine.
00:42:14.260It should include secondary sanctions on all these Chinese entities I've described that are0.72
00:42:18.640supporting and propping up Moscow and Russia in their campaign in Ukraine. And it should include0.61
00:42:24.120a plan for how democratic nations around the world from the Quad to NATO and their alliances
00:42:30.600are capable of confronting this threat.
00:42:32.860That's what a real plan, I think, looks like
00:42:35.480that would force these authoritarians back into their borders
00:42:39.940and to realize that, you know, through peace, through strength,
00:43:20.020and, you know, where your publications go?
00:43:22.860That's really kind of you to say that.
00:43:24.320And despite the horrendous nature of the situation, it's always good to see you, Corey.
00:43:29.100I'd love your viewers to visit www.mcdonaldlaurier.ca.
00:43:35.020It's a big independent think tank in Ottawa, which I lead the foreign policy practice.
00:43:39.980I have an incredible roster of colleagues who see the world for what it is and are effective at communicating what the Canadian interest is in it.
00:43:49.360There's no shortage of ideas on what Canada can and should be doing.
00:43:52.860And we're in the business of promoting those ideas energetically to our political leaders so that for the sake of Canadians, we can get it right.
00:45:35.940It's our business to have that, but the federal government feels otherwise.
00:45:40.460They think they should be able to take those away from you.
00:45:43.400They want to keep recategorizing firearms, taking them out of your hands.
00:45:48.640You should be disturbed when a government wants to, you know, I talked earlier, they want to control our speech.
00:45:52.520They want to control our information and what we can do.
00:45:56.180Well, they also want to take away your property, particularly firearms.
00:45:59.260The Canada Shooting Sports Association has a number of legal challenges out on your behalf against those actions by the government.
00:46:07.380So, hey, check those guys out because the only way they can do it, it's kind of like I was talking earlier with the Western Standard.
00:46:13.020you know, real grassroots things. We have to stand up for ourselves. We have to support
00:46:16.760ourselves. You guys are supporting independent media. I really appreciate it. Same sort of thing
00:46:20.740with being as a firearm owner. You've got to support yourself. This group is there to support
00:46:25.160you. Get on there. Check them out. Canadian Shooting Sports Association. Take out a membership
00:46:30.860because that's how they can help. They can keep those court challenges. They have all sorts of
00:46:33.860other resources, by the way, you know, more than just the political stuff. They're an association.
00:46:38.000So they have videos on safe firearm use and links to where there's trade shows going on or events that are of interest to people into shooting sports.
00:48:55.080And no matter how much content you put out and how much you tweeted, they just didn't take off.
00:49:00.220You didn't see, you know, three months before, if I put out what I like to think is some brilliant brain nugget, don't worry, I tweet a lot of stuff that's just stupid too.
00:49:07.380That's one of the things where you can measure it quickly enough.
00:49:09.440You know, if Corey said something brilliant, there's going to be a whole pile of retweets and likes and it'll go around.
00:49:14.040If Corey said something stupid, it's just going to float by the wayside and a few people reminding me and explaining that I'm not so bright.
00:49:22.260But for a period of a couple of months, myself and we saw it with other blue check conservative minded Twitter accounts, they were getting strangled. You were not seeing traffic. I just couldn't get traction out there. The follower rates just kept dropping. And I wasn't alone. So Twitter had basically taken an editorial stance.
00:49:43.520Because you didn't see left-leaning Twitter accounts dealing this.
00:49:47.160You didn't see this happening to anybody else.
00:50:13.300You don't have to go on there. You don't have to take part. But it is a big and influential company. And seeing somebody like Musk coming on saying, you know what, I'm just going to use my dollars, get in there and shake this up myself and improve this platform and allow more discourse. I can only see this as being a good thing. And I'm looking forward to seeing what Elon Musk does further. As I said, I mean, I don't like how his company with Tesla takes so many subsidies and things like that.
00:50:39.360I don't agree with him on everything, but I do agree with his just being willing to get out there
00:50:44.120and tell the establishment to stuff it somewhere deep and dark. And he's putting his money
00:50:49.420literally, you know, where his mouth is and getting in there and being, to use that buzzword,
00:50:53.700a disruptor. Okay, let's get on to my next guest. And this is Grant Abraham. He's one of the latest
00:50:59.860entrants into the Conservative Party of Canada leadership race that we've got going on right now.
00:51:04.360It's going to be a long campaign, this one.
00:51:06.960And boy, we've got a lot of candidates putting their names for us.
00:51:10.100So I'm trying to talk to every one of them and get them on as I can.
00:51:13.640And Mr. Abraham, I believe, is the sixth one so far.
00:51:16.620So let's bring Grant into the room here and see what's going on.
00:51:25.280Well, I appreciate you coming on to join us today.
00:51:29.220You're somebody who's among, I mean, a lot of the candidates are people with established
00:51:33.140political history whether in their provincial legislatures or as members of parliament uh
00:51:38.180yourself you don't you you aren't coming from a political background here no i'm not coming from
00:51:43.460a political background and my view on that is that we've had two elections that the conservatives
00:51:48.260have forfeited and uh perhaps the best minds in the conservative party need some fresh uh
00:51:55.380contributions from people who aren't political and i certainly think some of the doublespeak
00:52:00.820and the double-mindedness I see within the party could benefit from people who aren't perhaps
00:52:06.880colored or have been orientated within the political establishment that we've seen in
00:52:13.240those last five years. So that's exactly why I'm doing it. And I think that Canada is in peril
00:52:19.920ideologically and economically. And unless we engage clearly and strongly with some stronger
00:52:25.800messages, we're going to have some real problems in this country in five years out.
00:52:29.320we don't have time to wait another 10 years to unravel or to uproot what's been going on in the
00:52:38.580nation. Great. And just to clarify for other people then, what's your background then outside
00:52:45.080of political, your trade and such, and where are you based? Well, first of all, I'm a lawyer by
00:52:52.420profession, and most of my work has been outside of Canada this last 20 years. I've been involved
00:52:57.120international development work, social impact funding to fund helping people, individuals,
00:53:04.840families, communities in the developing world.
00:53:07.460And I've been shocked, stunned, actually staggered by what I'm seeing in our own nation in terms
00:53:14.320of lack of opportunity and a movement towards less money in people's pockets.
00:53:20.360but recognizing that what the truckers did was actually take us to Ottawa for issues that weren't about money.
00:53:28.520It was about what the hearts of the people were feeling.
00:53:31.600And when I saw that, I recognized that the narrative about taxes and dollars and pockets and all that is not what Canadians need.
00:53:40.320We're seeing the fabric of the nation torn.
00:53:42.440I'm based essentially in the Fraser Valley in Abbotsford, although I'm a Calgarian historically and I'm born in Alberta.
00:53:50.360raised my early part of my family in calgary before i headed out and lived in hong kong and
00:53:55.800the uk etc so uh i'm a western canadian great yeah well we we've hadn't had uh a lot of western
00:54:04.440representation in this race uh at least initially uh there's a couple of you guys now popping up
00:54:08.920from the west which is great to see and of course many of our readers and viewers are western i see
00:54:12.760from a couple of commenters and that you know it's a nice thing with being live uh the first
00:54:16.360two questions we're asking though where you stand on on climate change legislation uh emissions
00:54:21.480controls whether or not carbon dioxide is a pollutant uh because we're quite concerned with
00:54:26.680those targets that the the federal government has set that sound pretty unrealistic and we know
00:54:30.840when they set those targets it usually comes down on the west absolutely i'm totally opposed to the
00:54:35.800carbon tax uh i deeply care about the environment i'm concerned about the the climate issue i think
00:54:42.280we need to monitor and care for that but i think we need to be realistic as canadians and recognize
00:54:47.560that only 1.6 of the global contribution to carbon is from canada and we have slightly less than 40
00:54:54.600million canadians paying for a global contribution a global tax to offset carbon and that's what the
00:55:01.880carbon tax is and yet the paris accord is not having any kind of stringent obligation placed
00:55:09.880on the biggest polluters in the world, which is India and China. And so the weight, the
00:55:16.740disproportionate weight that Canadians are being asked to carry is ridiculous. It's making Canada0.99
00:55:22.460poor. And we absolutely need to get a responsible, environmentally friendly energy sector reopened
00:55:30.380in the country and start moving our resources. Great. So some questions I've been asking every
00:55:37.400candidate as i get them on and i want to go through some of them our supply management system
00:55:42.280in canada you know it's been a contentious issue it certainly was two leadership races ago it hasn't
00:55:47.000really surfaced as a big issue in this race in particular but when we keep talking about inflation
00:55:52.360and pressures on consumers supply management has often been found to raise the price on a lot of
00:55:57.160grocery staples for people is that an area you'd be willing to start looking into making some changes
00:56:02.440Absolutely. I think one of the biggest challenges in Canada is that we're not necessarily thinking about Canadians first and what the nation needs.
00:56:12.500And the supply management agreement, as I see it, and I've had a fair bit of experience in the agricultural sector, that's one area where our supply management system actually works.
00:56:23.780And I think what we need to do is rethink that and start to see our food as a geopolitical security item and start to make sure that our farmers are cared for, that our supply chains are strong and resilient and recognize that like many of the other assets that Canada has, our food security is an asset that will position our nation as a trading nation and provide us some of the soft power.
00:56:53.180that we need in the world because we're maybe not as influential militarily.
00:56:59.320But if we can be a breadbasket growing food for the world,
00:57:03.280it provides us a position to, first of all, exert our influence on the global stage,
00:57:09.300but also, first of all, care for Canadians and Canadian needs first.
00:57:14.720So I'm not at all convinced that our supply management agreements
00:57:19.120actually means increased prices for Canadians.
00:57:21.920In fact, if I look at a recent example that I've had with someone within the egg sector, we've created a scenario where we have a reliance on American eggs coming in.
00:57:32.940But given some of their biosecurity issues, we're actually at a shortfall and our own food supply is now more vulnerable in relation to egg supply.
00:57:44.540So we need to take care of our infrastructure first in terms of Canada and Canadians' needs.0.86
00:57:49.740all right so getting a little more to the regional front equalization of course is a big area that
00:57:56.880we've been upset with particularly in Alberta we held the recent referendum on that just to
00:58:02.620we know it was non-binding but you know well over 60 some percent of Albertans say we we don't feel
00:58:07.640we're getting a fair deal out of it to get rid of the equalization altogether would take opening up
00:58:12.300the constitution but one of the things that we can do without opening the constitution of course
00:58:16.800the formula is just a matter of policy. Would you be looking to change that formula? Because right
00:58:22.900now it does not serve us very well at all. Well, we have an ecosystem that went back to 1867 in
00:58:28.560Upper Canada and Lower Canada. And that framework was developed when there was a lot less people
00:58:34.600in Western Canada. And I think that as Canada has developed and matured, and the demographics have
00:58:40.920spread more widely across the country. We need to look at those equalization payments and create
00:58:47.320a mechanism that there is a system in place that rewards innovation and entrepreneurship,
00:58:55.060and it doesn't encourage other provinces to not create buoyant economies. And I think
00:59:01.680that's the mechanism. We are a country that cares about the unity of the nation,
00:59:07.520And that includes the principle behind equalization. But we don't want it to become a crutch that enables local or provincial economies to not develop.
00:59:18.900So I think there needs to be discussions where the disunifying sentiment that is felt in the West is engaged and there is a feathering or a harmonization that perhaps creates a much more equitable perception in terms of how people feel about the equalization and how the country operates as well in reality in terms of dollars and cents.
00:59:46.880okay um in matters of quebec itself uh i asked a couple of the other candidates they they didn't
00:59:54.480want to go into it much but as members of parliament when there was that vote recently on
00:59:58.260preserving quebec seats in the house of commons even if their population wasn't keeping up in
01:00:02.880growth with the rest of the country uh some conservative members voted in favor of that move
01:00:07.660some voted against and a number of them abstained i i guess i'm getting speculative but if you were
01:00:13.680member of parliament when that bill was passed how would you have voted well let me just say
01:00:17.840first of all i don't like this abstention thing that is happening within the conservative party
01:00:22.660because people are elected to take positions from their local constituencies and their electorates
01:00:28.580and they know very well the mps what their their local electorates feel and i think the conversion
01:00:33.580therapy bill is an example like that there are a number of abstentions where people simply didn't
01:00:38.820have the backbone to stand up and vote. I think in relation to the Quebec question that you're
01:00:44.260asking me specifically, there is a sense that if there's a firewall being put up around a province
01:00:53.800where there's a declining population, there seems to be a little bit of unfairness about that.
01:00:59.820But at the same time, I think that Canada is moving in a good direction in relation to
01:01:05.000understanding itself better and by that i mean when i observe the discussions uh with fellow
01:01:11.740canadians around auto and the and the the truckers convoy i saw a whole new level of relationship
01:01:18.900understanding and trust being established with people from different parts of the country and i
01:01:25.520saw quebecers uh in a in a psychological way a psychological way embracing the value and the0.99
01:01:33.600significance of unity in the country. So I really want to see our country held together. I think
01:01:39.860we're better together. I think we're better on the world stage together. And that would be something
01:01:46.380that I don't like as a person. But I think if we're moving in the right direction in relationship,
01:01:51.840in terms of understanding ourselves from within this nation, it'd be something that I'd be
01:01:57.200prepared to overlook if we're building stronger national unity. But there are real issues. And
01:02:03.580And one of the main pieces of my platform is truth, transparency, and real conversations.
01:02:10.540And I think we need to have these real conversations.
01:02:13.540And we need to look towards building national unity by having them.
01:02:24.520We're in too vulnerable a position as a nation to be avoiding those kinds of questions.
01:02:30.520And I think the conservative voters out there that are assessing leaders for the leadership of the conservative party should be looking really carefully at people who aren't prepared at this stage in the campaign to engage with those difficult questions.
01:02:46.400So we've got the federal budget coming down in a couple of hours from now, actually.
01:02:51.040A lot of people are anticipating it's probably going to be another big spending budget in a number of areas.
01:02:57.040Where do you think we should be going?
01:02:58.620I mean, inflation, of course, is really pressuring a lot of Canadians right now.
01:03:03.160Some of that can definitely be attributed to the high rate of borrowing on the federal level.
01:03:08.980Where would you be looking in the future for budgets, though?
01:03:12.680More spending, less spending, and how would you, I guess, increase or cut in order to do that?
01:03:19.340Well, I mean, my perception of the Liberal government is that they're borrowing money
01:03:24.600almost with an implicit view that they will never have to pay it back.
01:03:28.620That's a concern and it makes me wonder what's really going on with the discussion about their proclamation of a reset and Canada moving to a post-national state.
01:03:39.540But if we're moving back to responsible government in Canada in relation to our fiscal and our monetary policy, we have to look and say that we can't sustain this debt and we need to look at ways to steward it, to care for it, and to grow our economy without moving to an austerity position that's going to harm Canadians further in the wake of what the Liberals have been doing.
01:04:04.680So my view is that we need to actually develop and return to what has been our heritage of entrepreneurship and small business and family business and encouraging innovation and new technology and protecting our intellectual property.
01:04:24.540We need to be developing the infrastructure that future Canadians are going to need to thrive.
01:04:29.940And so at this stage, I'm not convinced that moving to any kind of austerity position is going to help Canadians.
01:04:36.580We need to look at how we grow our economy and how we restabilize the millions and millions of Canadians that are hurting.
01:04:45.080Because who can afford $2 plus liter of gas or a jug of milk at $8 or $9?
01:04:52.880okay uh yeah it's it's it's pressuring everybody i mean filling the car and filling the fridge are
01:04:59.200just uh a lot of people are having a hard time making the most basic of bill payments right now
01:05:03.440and it's got to be it's got to be addressed we're going to have some very serious problems
01:05:07.760um so somebody uh daryl latimer asking actually what your policy on protecting canada's north
01:05:12.480arctic sovereignty that's been coming up jean chariot was speaking of that recently actually
01:05:16.880he brought that up when he was on the show earlier uh it's a it's a big complicated area
01:05:21.120but people are concerned do you have a policy addressing the arctic i absolutely do i think
01:05:26.080one of the biggest challenges for canada is that we've been getting security intelligence
01:05:31.040on what is going on in the world for the last 20 years starting with the sidewinder report
01:05:36.400back in 20 and 2000 that has been to my mind essentially ignored in terms of the protection
01:05:45.360of our nation and its sovereignty, which is a significant issue, that falls right into
01:05:50.960a discussion about what the UN obligations are that we've brought ourselves under in
01:05:55.920terms of international treaty. But to answer that question specifically, our sovereignty
01:06:00.160is a huge issue. If you read any of the reports that are being generated from this government
01:06:06.880from 2019 on in terms of foreign interference, it's abundantly clear that we have made ourselves
01:06:14.240vulnerable and continue to put ourselves in a position where we are vulnerable. And I think
01:06:19.440we need to be responsibly assertive in terms of defining our position in the north, our resources,
01:06:29.200and have a mechanism that is congruent across the country so that all forms of our borders are
01:06:35.920protected, not just the landmass borders, but also our idea borders, our intellectual property.
01:06:44.240And and ensuring that we're not having elements within the nation that are actually undermining our nation in terms of foreign interference.
01:06:53.420So we absolutely need to engage there.
01:06:56.660And it's nice to see the Liberal government finally took on the position of the Conservative Party to to reinforce our Royal Canadian Air Force with the F-35s.
01:07:06.260okay so uh getting on to uh just another question from a viewer before i we kind of get towards
01:07:13.940wrapping up cheryl don was asking actually about what about mandates and travel bans speaking of
01:07:18.480international i mean federally we still have vaccination mandates we still have people cannot
01:07:22.160get on airplanes there's people who can't uh you know travel internationally at least not easily
01:07:26.900uh where where are you standing on those items right now well many of our parents and grandparents
01:07:32.080went and fought in World War II to ensure that we would have medical privacy, that issues like
01:07:39.360vaccine would be something that would be between an individual citizen and their doctor.
01:07:45.060We've never had a policy in the nation where people have been limited in their charter rights
01:07:50.900and freedoms by the government. In fact, if one reviews the Nuremberg Code, which came directly
01:07:59.660out of World War II. Consent is a significant issue. And yet the government policy to date has
01:08:06.420been to essentially ignore consent by removing rights of Canadians. So now we have a system in
01:08:12.200Canada where people who have chosen to remain private about their vaccination status
01:08:17.700can't travel on flights. They can't travel on our railways that have all been paid for by
01:08:24.860generations of Canadians in their tax dollars. And one may say that Air Canada now is not a public
01:08:31.840utility, but it's been bailed out for 40 years by taxpayers to keep the company going. And
01:08:38.160there's very little difference in it. So I think it's atrocious what's happening in terms of the
01:08:43.960vaccine mandates. It's the only country in the world that's left that their own citizens can't
01:08:49.000fly. And I think we need to take a really close review of that and have it removed immediately.
01:08:56.860Okay. Well, I think that kind of covers the time I had set up for you. There's always,
01:09:01.300you know, many, many more things we could cover, but we got through a good bunch of them. Where
01:09:05.360can people find more information about yourself and your campaign if they want to learn more
01:09:09.480or potentially get involved? Sure. My main webpage is called Canada's Promise, www.canadaspromise.
01:09:17.220and my links for Facebook, for Instagram and Twitter are on that web page.
01:09:25.440Great. Well, thanks for coming in to join us today. It's, as I said, quite a wide range of
01:09:30.200candidates, a lot of ideas and issues out there, and it's going all the way till September 10th.
01:09:34.760So perhaps we'll check in with you again a little later in the campaign and see how things are
01:09:39.020developing. Great, Corey. Thank you very much. All right. Thank you, Mr. Abram.
01:09:42.900so yes that was grant abraham a candidate for the conservative party of canada leadership race and
01:09:49.760there are so many of them i i can see some of the frustration from some of the the listeners when it
01:09:55.260came to it and uh i've seen that when i've had the the other leadership candidates on as well
01:09:59.980where they're these are devoted people towards you know western or alberta independence
01:10:03.240and hey i'm with you guys um i've never made a secret of my feeling that canada
01:10:09.320is fundamentally broken. And I don't think there's going to be any way to solve the bigger
01:10:14.520and larger problems without tearing down the system and at best rebuilding it again.
01:10:20.960I saw somebody talking about how we can trade with each other as regions and provinces.
01:10:25.260I mean, on my own view, it's, I love the Swiss system, for example, where you have, you know,
01:10:29.80026 different states, they call them cantons in one little country, four official languages,
01:10:34.960and you don't have independence movements there because the federal government there is very,
01:10:39.140very limited, and there's a tremendous amount of regional autonomy for policy. And it's something
01:10:44.800authoritarians will never understand. They seem to feel that they can unify people by having a
01:10:50.340distant central leader, such as Ottawa in our case, and mashing everybody into the same setup
01:10:56.620and the same policy under each other. And that's what's just leading to this slow decline and
01:11:01.180constant infighting within Canada and an inability to get good general national policies going.
01:11:07.600but and here's where my big but comes in all of this in the meantime because we aren't anywhere
01:11:12.340close unfortunately yet to having any province on the brink of leaving we still have to be led by
01:11:18.040these federal politicians so it's still important to listen to them talk to them and hey keep moving
01:11:22.880towards independence absolutely keep those efforts going I talked you know to Dr. Modri on the Alberta
01:11:29.400Prosperity Project I certainly like seeing things a lot of those independence-minded movements
01:11:35.320But it doesn't mean we're immune from the policies of the federal government in the meantime.
01:11:40.600So, I mean, the best we could do is try to get as many favorable politicians as we can.
01:11:44.800And I know it doesn't fix things, but it makes them less bad, if you could say that, you know, to put it any other way.
01:11:51.980But we've got a lot of them running in this race.
01:11:54.160And something with Mr. Abraham, and I've seen with all of them, yeah, it's really been hard to find a straight shooter so far, you know.
01:12:02.620a lot of them just like to talk in circles and give political answers and not give definitive
01:12:08.480answers. At the very end, he did say, get rid of those mandates immediately. That was good to see
01:12:13.000something definitive. And supply management, he went talking in circles again. None of them will
01:12:17.420touch supply management. None of them. That's a Soviet-style policy, people. And none of these
01:12:22.100conservative candidates have the courage to go after it. It's really unfortunate. And again,
01:12:26.540it indicates how broken the system is. Because the reason they won't touch supply management,
01:12:31.420but there's two reasons. One is the dairy cartels are very influential. As soon as these guys put
01:12:36.220their hat in on the race, they get a phone call and a meeting with somebody from the dairy cartel
01:12:40.160and often a very generous donation. They're very effective lobbyists and it shows. The other part
01:12:46.560is most of Canada's dairy is in Quebec and nobody on these federal candidates wants to stir up
01:12:54.160Quebec. They won't, none of them want to tick off Quebec because they can't win if they don't have
01:12:58.160Quebec, even in the leadership race. So I keep getting these, these mushy answers when it comes
01:13:03.300to those things, unfortunately. Um, that's that reminder again, you know, we, we need these
01:13:07.680federal politicians, but it's clear we're not going to get relief on the federal political
01:13:12.780front from these guys because they're always going to cater to central Canada. It's not even
01:13:16.960personal, it's math. It's, it's just, they're, they're having to cater to that central area if
01:13:24.400they want to win. Can't do it without them. And like the old saying from one of, you know, Trudeau's
01:13:30.520advisors when he said, and I'm talking the old Trudeau, senior Trudeau, screw the West, we'll
01:13:35.480take the rest. And it worked. They won and won and won. They're winning again and they're in there
01:13:40.160now. That system is broken and we've got to work towards getting our way out of it. And that's
01:13:46.920only going to happen through local initiative, not on the federal ones. Still want to get a
01:13:51.160conservative government in there, as I said, they'll be less bad. They won't bloat the spending
01:13:55.340by quite as much as the Liberals, though probably pretty close. They more than likely, depending on
01:14:02.140which one wins, will back off on the carbon tax. So, I mean, we've seen them flip-flop on that as
01:14:07.880well. It's still in our interest to have to deal with the system we're stuck in right now,
01:14:13.540but we got to start looking at our ways to get the heck out of that system because it's not
01:14:17.640serving as well. I was talking to Professor Barry Cooper yesterday about that. I mean,
01:14:22.480towards the end of the conversation, that's where the bottom line came is that we've got to get
01:14:26.820towards independence. And there's some of that frustration. I mean, that's the main thing. A lot
01:14:32.300of people have been upset with Jason Kenney for his COVID policies or a number of other issues.
01:14:40.140I've been annoyed by a number of them, but the biggest one for me has been his dragging his0.73
01:14:45.280feet on the fair deal panel. There's a lot of things we can do provincially to make ourselves
01:14:51.320more independent, to shield ourselves from Ottawa and that central control. And Albertans made it
01:14:56.920very clear during all those fair deal panel hearings that we want those things. We want
01:15:02.140a provincial police force. We want a provincial pension plan. We want to look into collecting our
01:15:07.360own taxes. We want to look into all of these things that Quebec and other provinces are already
01:15:11.600enjoying, and there's no reason we shouldn't be able to. And he held all those hearings, but he
01:15:18.140hasn't done anything about it. The only thing he did do was the equalization referendum, which I
01:15:23.100still appreciate. It's expressing ourselves, but quit dragging your feet on these other things.
01:15:27.020And for people who want to get independent, there's one of the things I have to keep reminding
01:15:29.860people of, because I've heard a lot of people saying, we got to hold a referendum tomorrow.
01:15:33.260We got to do it as soon as possible. No, we can't. We're not ready. It means we have to get ready.
01:15:39.880If we held a referendum tomorrow on independence, I bet you at best you would get 20%.
01:15:46.860I mean, we're talking not even, there's a lot of people, we see some polls that look
01:15:50.720very favorable towards independence, but they tend to be, would you support the concept?
01:24:22.080Yeah, so it's a blacklist compensations, what they're calling it for people who unfairly suffered a loss as a result of bank account freezes on the convoy sympathizers.
01:24:30.480Well, you shouldn't even have to say anybody who unfairly suffered financial loss.
01:24:34.760Everybody who has had their account frozen had it done unfairly.
01:25:29.780but they did approve, even though they delayed forever on it,
01:25:31.900the Bay to Nord venture. That's that $12 billion oil project off the Newfoundland coast. So that's
01:25:37.020good. But I guess there was a Suncor expansion. They also canceled at the same time. So you
01:25:40.820remember, Eastern oil good, Western oil bad. None of that ever changes. It doesn't matter how much
01:25:46.080the world might need our domestic oil. We got a federal government who will not allow us to
01:25:51.300increase the production of it. They want to shut it down. That's not going to change. We've got
01:25:56.280some serious problems on that front as well. Back to the Ottawa claims, by the way, some people
01:26:00.960talked about, I talked about that on Twitter, and I've talked about that on this show, that stupid,
01:26:05.140ridiculous, bizarre, baloney story of convoy participants taping up the doors of an apartment
01:26:12.880building, supposedly, and trying to burn it down with people inside it. That story stunk to high
01:26:18.360heaven right from the very first day. There was this idiot on Twitter who was saying, I'm an
01:26:23.000apartment resident, and here's all the pictures from the security camera of what happened. I mean,
01:26:26.840And one of those things was, you know, as you read this idiot's account of it, and he's an idiot, he showed, here's a resident coming in, he walked by, and this is how they claimed that this was the convoyers, you know, this was while the convoy was going on, walked by this person sitting there setting a fire apparently in the middle of the apartment lobby.
01:26:44.080Yeah, right in the middle of the floor, not even very good arsonists apparently.
01:26:48.140And the guy said, yes, I'm with the convoy.