Western Standard - LIVE - Triggered： Will the Trans Mountain expansion ever be finished？

00:00:00.000 Thank you.

00:00:30.000 Thank you.

00:01:00.000 that way you can tell us what we're doing better oh okay it appears we should have sound soon and

00:01:05.760 i'll start this all over again so welcome to triggered i'm cory morgan it is uh march 23rd

00:01:13.040 2022 we're in a new studio and we're still setting up some of our sound things i've actually got a

00:01:18.160 nice new earpiece going on here as opposed to the uh uh airpod but uh again we're still just getting

00:01:24.560 some hookups together so thank you all for who have been joining so far and that reminder going

00:01:28.960 back into it we're live daily 11 30 a.m mountain standard time monday to friday lots of news and

00:01:35.680 issues to cover today thank you all for commenting and yes letting us know about the sound and let us

00:01:40.000 know about your thoughts on the show ideas for the guests things like that it's all welcome again

00:01:45.280 just trying to keep it civil while we can and uh we can have a good time here together so good to

00:01:52.000 see you maryland and bonnie and all you guys for reminding me of the sound uh today's guests i'm

00:01:56.720 going to have Mike Thomas coming in studio. He lives down in the Beltline. He's written a number

00:02:00.620 of columns for us on some things, including the protests that are going on down there. He's also

00:02:07.120 a real estate specialist and he's gone on about Jane Fonda. He's very versatile. That way we'll

00:02:11.300 have lots to chat about and looking forward to that. My second guest, we had a scheduling issue,

00:02:17.340 so that will unfortunately be deferred a little longer before we get to that. So there's lots to

00:02:23.820 talk about all the same. Let's start. I'm going to start on a good news thing. I had this sort of

00:02:29.480 written before, of course, everything broke with the UCP last night. And I want to talk about,

00:02:34.680 and it's a column that's up at the Western Standard right now, the Trans Mountain Pipeline

00:02:38.440 Expansion Project. Good news is it's still under construction. The bad news is it's moving

00:02:43.780 agonizingly slow and the costs are going through the roof. Now, since the federal government

00:02:48.920 purchased the line a few years ago, the projected cost of construction is nearly tripled from

00:02:53.540 7.4 billion to 21.4 billion. Of course, nothing shoots the costs of a project through the roof

00:02:58.560 more effectively than government management of a project. It's a little wonder that the original

00:03:03.220 owner, Kinder Morgan, fled the project as costs and delays continued to mount before they even

00:03:08.340 got a shovel into the ground. The Trudeau government was forced to take ownership of

00:03:11.840 the pipeline at that point, as we remember, because they'd managed to kill every other

00:03:15.900 new pipeline project in Canada. If Trans Mountain were to fail, they could be facing a revolution

00:03:20.700 in Alberta. Well, in February of this year, Finance Minister Christia Freeland announced

00:03:26.180 that the government would not put any more public money into the project. They claimed that private

00:03:30.300 investment is going to fill any new costs as they move forward. Now, I can't see what private

00:03:34.640 company in its right mind would sink a nickel into that project right now. I expressed doubt

00:03:39.500 on social media of the pipeline ever getting finished and was quickly chastened by others

00:03:43.580 though who did assure me that the work is progressing on that line. Due to strict non-disclosure

00:03:48.160 agreements placed on everybody working on that line it was tough to ascertain it i reached out

00:03:52.000 i can't get anybody to talk to me about that line edmonton journalist and photographer though tom

00:03:57.680 braid recently traveled the pipeline route and he shared a number of photos of the work in progress

00:04:02.080 and in different locations along the pipe so it's good to see the project still has a long way to go

00:04:07.120 in order to reach the finish line but it was reassuring to see people hard at work on it they

00:04:10.960 are moving on it in western alberta much of the pipes been buried while the work continues on the

00:04:15.600 the rest. As can be seen, the line is being taken seriously and there's a lot of work happening. I

00:04:20.080 mean, there have been some conspiracy theorists holding the view that Trudeau bought it just to

00:04:23.800 shelve it. And that doesn't seem to be the case. I mean, it is going into the ground. They're

00:04:27.220 working on it. I don't think Trudeau is terribly interested in finishing it. It's not his top

00:04:31.000 priority, but they do intend at this point of still getting it done. So it's heartening to see

00:04:35.400 activity going on and knowing that progress is being made, albeit slowly. I do remain skeptical

00:04:40.580 of the line ever being completed though. The process for this expansion began nearly a decade

00:04:45.640 ago and it's still only half completed. I'm at a stage now where I'll believe it when I see it. I

00:04:50.520 got to see oil coming up the other end of this thing. Pressure from environmental groups still

00:04:54.820 mounting against the line and as construction nears the terminus in Burnaby, Vancouver we can

00:05:00.280 look forward to a lot more protests and delays. One can hardly read a story about the expansion

00:05:04.140 we'll hear from one expert or another claiming that the line's financially non-viable and the

00:05:08.900 government should shut it down and cut their losses. How much longer is the federal government

00:05:13.060 willing to keep pressing ahead with a pipeline expansion that they really actually philosophically

00:05:17.080 oppose? All that said, if indeed the government does want to get this project done, the time to

00:05:21.680 step on the gas is right now. Energy prices are at record levels. The world's hungry for Canada's

00:05:27.580 energy products. National support for increasing domestic energy supply and expanding local

00:05:32.560 infrastructure is higher than we've seen in decades due to the Russia-Ukraine conflict.

00:05:37.460 While activists will always oppose any work on the line,

00:05:39.880 the majority of the Canadian public would be supportive of getting this thing moving.

00:05:43.700 It doesn't really have to take this long,

00:05:45.780 and it doesn't have to be tough to get the line in the ground. 0.99

00:05:48.840 The government just needs to get out of the damn way. 1.00

00:05:51.280 The Trans Mountain expansion, it isn't even a new pipe. 0.98

00:05:54.060 All it involves is laying a pipeline right next to an existing pipeline.

00:05:57.760 The right-of-way is already cut in that area,

00:05:59.660 and the line's been safely operating for more than 60 years.

00:06:02.900 We're not talking about going into a virgin area

00:06:04.680 and creating new ecological disruption.

00:06:07.900 It's just a matter of expanding a right-of-way in the trees a bit.

00:06:10.740 It should hardly be noticed by Mother Nature.

00:06:12.860 The problem, as always, is the government.

00:06:14.780 This line expansion involves literally thousands of permits and licenses.

00:06:19.120 The duplication in applications, studies, consultations, and paperwork in general

00:06:22.980 is insane and totally unnecessary.

00:06:25.960 It spawns a fantastic cottage industry of consultants and bureaucrats

00:06:30.540 who thrive on redundancy delays and red tape.

00:06:33.180 The bulk of that red tape could be cut and it wouldn't impact the environment in the slightest.

00:06:37.560 That would take some courage on the part of the government, though, and they'd have to take on those entrenched special interests.

00:06:43.380 And this administration tends to be lean on courage.

00:06:46.500 The federal government also has to put their foot down with the B.C. government.

00:06:49.660 The court challenges are done, the assessments are done, the consultations are done.

00:06:53.040 This thing needs to get moving.

00:06:54.400 Meanwhile, the B.C. government is still trying to add new conditions to hinder the project.

00:06:58.780 This is out of the province's jurisdiction and they need to be firmly reminded of it.

00:07:02.840 Again, though, I doubt the federal liberals are eager to upset lower mainland BC voters.

00:07:08.420 Reports on the progress and activity on the Trans Mountain expansion construction have been purposely muted.

00:07:13.500 Perhaps the government's hoping to get it done under the radar in order to avoid more critique from environmental activists.

00:07:18.780 This strategy appears to be failing, though, as the project progress continues to slow while the costs explode.

00:07:25.300 We can't assume it'll be done simply because some of the line is already in the ground.

00:07:29.000 Most of the Keystone XL was completed as well, and it was stopped in its tracks.

00:07:33.900 If the Trans Mountain Pipeline Expansion is ever to get finished,

00:07:36.280 the federal government is going to have to step up.

00:07:38.140 They bought it with our money.

00:07:39.900 The responsibility lands in their laps.

00:07:41.540 They can't continue with this half-hearted effort to build the line.

00:07:44.740 They need to unapologetically set out a plan and get it done and get on with it.

00:07:49.100 Otherwise, the Trans Mountain Pipeline Expansion is sure to die a slow and expensive death

00:07:53.720 without ever having moved a drop of oil, just as the Keystone XL line did.

00:07:57.620 that's where i am on that but now we're going to pivot to dave naylor our news editor with a news

00:08:04.740 update and discuss some of uh what's going on in the rest of the world there hey dave how's it

00:08:11.700 going yeah going well cory going well i got got a cute story for you to start the day uh i was at

00:08:18.700 a function last night and ran into a woman who found out i worked at the western standard and

00:08:24.540 she says oh yes i recognize your voice you're the guy that does the news updates all the time

00:08:29.520 turns out she she watches your show and uh every day she doesn't doesn't she just listens to it

00:08:35.820 she doesn't watch it uh while she's walking her dogs so uh i'd like to say a special hello to uh

00:08:41.640 to her this morning she made my night it's the first time uh my voice has uh ever been recognized

00:08:46.680 but uh you know considering i've got a face made for radio there you go uh also cory if you'll

00:08:52.480 permit me, I want to say a special happy 58th anniversary to my parents, Mike and Vili and

00:08:59.360 Naylor. They're celebrating out in BC, 58 years, an incredible achievement, especially when you've

00:09:06.000 had to deal with kids like me growing up. So good for them. Yeah, something to get Albertans blood

00:09:15.500 boiling this morning. Our top story on this site right now is the Quebec government is handing out

00:09:21.080 $500 to each and every citizen of Quebec, sort of to help them with all the rising costs and

00:09:29.260 inflation and stuff like that. So $500 for each Quebecer, well, guess what? Each Albertan sends

00:09:35.720 Quebec the equivalent of $650 a year through equalization payments. So, you know, every

00:09:42.960 Quebec family's cashing in and the government's still making a profit while Albertans collect

00:09:48.380 nothing. Speaking of the Feds, they are refusing to commit to a date when they will end federal

00:09:56.920 COVID vaccines mandates. Obviously, the rest of the world is bringing them down, but the

00:10:04.460 dear old Liberals keep hanging on. We've got a story from our Ottawa Bureau that the federal

00:10:12.060 government has paid social medias, social media influencers, $600,000 to say good things about

00:10:19.840 them. So they could certainly pay me a lot less, Corey, and I would start to say good things about

00:10:25.360 them. The UCP has flip-flopped on another idea. They came out recently and said they were going

00:10:33.320 to ban or eliminate traffic court, and that caused such a stink. Justice Minister Tyler

00:10:38.960 Shandro stood up in the legislature and admitted that that plan has been deep-sixed a big day for

00:10:46.000 our new Saskatchewan correspondent the third day on the job and he's got a budget coming down so

00:10:53.360 premier Scott Moe is delivering the budget there and our Christopher Oldcorn will will have

00:10:59.440 live coverage as the day goes on and we're starting to get some details of what that

00:11:04.560 the axis of weasels, as the Sun Media called it quite appropriately, between Jagmeet Singh and

00:11:13.160 Justin Trudeau. One of the deals they've cut is to bring in a dental care program.

00:11:20.260 Everybody under earning less than $70,000 a year will get free dental care for their kids,

00:11:26.160 and that's going to cost taxpayers $5 billion. And they've also eliminated replacement workers.

00:11:33.180 These are the so-called what union people would call scabs who cross picket lines during work stoppages because of the NDP alliance.

00:11:43.020 Now, those are going to be made illegal. Coca-Cola has won a labor victory.

00:11:48.320 They sent some unvaccinated workers home from one of their bottling plants.

00:11:54.480 The union agreed that and they were ruled that the company could do that.

00:11:59.480 So more bad news for unvaccinated in the country.

00:12:05.240 So that's all we've got up now.

00:12:07.240 Lots more stuff coming through the day.

00:12:09.060 I'm just about to publish a story on the latest shenanigans of the UCP

00:12:13.680 and their leadership vote on Jason Kenney.

00:12:18.380 It's a very strange twisted tale.

00:12:20.800 It gets weirder and weirder, Corey.

00:12:22.740 It certainly is.

00:12:23.960 Yes, I'm sure we'll be talking about this UCP debacle for a few days yet to come now.

00:12:29.480 I'm going to start ranting a little bit about it as soon as I let you go there, Dave,

00:12:34.060 because I'm pretty worked up with this one.

00:12:36.940 All right, Corey.

00:12:37.520 Stay calm, and we'll see you in a few minutes.

00:12:39.880 Great.

00:12:40.320 Thanks, Dave.

00:12:41.720 So that's that reminder to everybody.

00:12:43.920 Yeah, the stories are blowing up on the site.

00:12:45.940 It's been very busy, lots of traffic.

00:12:48.220 We've got reporters across the country coming up with content all the time,

00:12:52.000 and we're putting it up as fast as that news is breaking.

00:12:54.840 So if you haven't already got a subscription to the Western Standard,

00:12:58.880 hey what are you waiting for guys get on there take one out the subscribers are what allows us

00:13:03.820 to keep doing what we're doing keep expanding keep fixing up our gear and uh addressing those

00:13:08.760 sound issues that i keep getting myself into uh there's a deal on if you put in triggered

00:13:15.060 in the coupon code when you take out that subscription you'll get another 10 bucks off

00:13:19.820 and it's a free trial for two weeks you got nothing to lose sign up check our stuff out

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00:13:29.660 everything and risk-free. You can sign up for the $10 a month after that. You'll find it well worth

00:13:35.080 it. This is how we can stay independent. This is how we stay away from federal tax funding and

00:13:39.620 obligations towards them. Please take out a subscription. Buy one for someone else if you

00:13:44.800 like. There's lots of things you can do with those. And that's how we stay going where we are. So yeah,

00:13:49.200 talking about that UCP leadership review. Wow, what a gong show. I mean, it's just,

00:13:55.540 it's awful watching this. You know, with the shenanigans, as Dave put it, and the mess they're

00:14:00.780 making, the trust that's being shattered in that party right now. It's clear, let's face it, it's

00:14:07.440 clear they're trying to rig it. And I will use that term, rig it. When you change the rules of

00:14:13.180 something people are voting on, once cutoffs are already hitting, there's no excuse. The only

00:14:19.040 thing is you're fearing the outcome is not going to match what you wanted it to be. And people don't

00:14:25.480 even know what's going on with it. Now we're getting mixed reports. It sounds like they're

00:14:29.600 talking about refunding everybody who paid the $99 fee to come out and vote. Meanwhile, they're

00:14:36.260 going to allow everybody with an existing membership to vote and it'll be mail-in. This is a party that

00:14:42.000 still has lingering legal questions over their last leadership race. Nobody is going to trust

00:14:48.280 the results of this bloody review, especially if it's mail-in. I mean, if they really wanted,

00:14:55.140 if they had to change things, some fart catchers for the party brass have been saying online

00:15:01.000 already, well, you've got to understand the logistics. We had 15,000 people were going to

00:15:05.400 descend on Red Deer and we'd have no options. I mean, it would have been too crowded. It would

00:15:09.600 have been a mess. What are we going to do? That's true. What do you do? You keep the rules the same

00:15:15.380 and you give them more places to vote.

00:15:17.900 You can set them up, give voting stations,

00:15:21.920 as some people were talking about, in Edmonton

00:15:23.800 and in Red Deer, Calgary, spread it out.

00:15:27.120 Grand Prairie, maybe, Fort Mac.

00:15:28.480 Hey, you've sold 15,000 fees for this for $100 each.

00:15:33.360 That's $1.5 million.

00:15:35.200 You can do a whole lot of things with that kind of money

00:15:38.720 in order to get a proper vote going on.

00:15:42.120 And now you've got this mail-in debacle.

00:15:44.560 And I tell you what,

00:15:45.380 But when I was with the Wild Rose Party in the past, when we had our leadership race, it's the one with Danielle Smith when she ended up winning it.

00:15:52.820 And we'd sold, I think it was about 13,000 or 14,000 memberships that qualified in that race.

00:15:57.940 And it was a mail-in ballot system with that.

00:16:00.860 And the hoops we had to jump through, the work we had to do, I mean, those are boxes and boxes and boxes of ballots that have to be sealed, that had to be picked up in secure spots.

00:16:11.180 And we had months to work on it.

00:16:13.100 And it still was an incredible workout.

00:16:15.380 And now the UCP thinks they can scramble something like this together in two weeks?

00:16:19.660 Come on.

00:16:20.740 This is brutal.

00:16:22.500 And there's going to be a revolution within the party, essentially, as this goes on.

00:16:29.620 I'm just gobsmacked with what they're pulling off.

00:16:32.720 But either way, we've got our guest in studio here in the new studio with a lot more room.

00:16:38.040 So we'll get on to that.

00:16:39.340 I'm going to talk more about the UCP races a little later in the show here.

00:16:43.640 So this is columnist Mike Thomas in studio. Now we're not knee to knee and, you know.

00:16:50.700 Big time, huh? Big time stuff.

00:16:52.540 Look at all this space.

00:16:53.660 Huh? Party central.

00:16:54.820 Yeah. We're expanding like that. And I was thanking our subscribers earlier for it. That's why we can do it and keep doing these things.

00:17:02.420 So you've been prolific lately on the Western Standard.

00:17:04.940 Prolific.

00:17:05.580 Yes. Many columns. And as I was saying, you're covering a lot of ground. I mean, you write on real estate.

00:17:10.820 You've been writing as a Beltline resident on some of the protests and things you've seen there.

00:17:15.460 And you even shot at old Hanoi Jane Fonda there.

00:17:20.380 Sometimes people just, you know, paint a big target on them.

00:17:23.540 Yes, yes.

00:17:24.700 So where to start?

00:17:26.040 I mean, I guess in your most recent column, what was about real estate?

00:17:29.080 We'll kind of begin there with the easy stuff, I guess.

00:17:31.200 Yeah, I put up a report yesterday, a company called Zolo out of Eastern Canada.

00:17:37.000 They go around and collect MLS statistics for home sales and stuff like that.

00:17:44.020 So the market generally, it's cooled down just a little tiny bit nationally,

00:17:50.760 but not as much as I think the powers that be, whoever they may be, want it to.

00:17:57.400 If you go through the numbers a little more deeper than I did in the article,

00:18:04.040 Calgary is without a doubt the hottest market in the country.

00:18:07.000 um i was looking at some figures this morning from the calgary real estate board they're the

00:18:14.600 only board actually across the country that uh posts daily updates for numbers and the sales are

00:18:22.120 are up i think last march to date to yesterday's date um from the first of march to yesterday's

00:18:30.040 date last year it sold just over 1900 homes this year 2900 so that's that's a huge increase and the

00:18:39.800 uh the other number that people should look at is the days on the market so from the time a home

00:18:45.240 gets listed to the time it's sold um calgary i think is about 12 days now so uh they're just

00:18:54.200 people snap snapping up like crazy so some of that must have to do with the energy booming people are

00:18:58.440 moving back in i mean to a degree but i mean it's it's it's a big decision to make on a volatile

00:19:04.840 market i guess well i asked that question myself this morning thinking that you would ask that but

00:19:09.400 um talking to the people who are actually selling the houses the and i wrote this a number of weeks

00:19:15.640 ago the people from vancouver and toronto who are coming in here as investors uh are a big part of

00:19:24.200 the market which is a good thing i mean it's from just selling homes but a bad thing down the road

00:19:30.120 because um unless if if they're buying those houses with the intent of renting them out or

00:19:37.480 sitting on them until they make 50 grand or whatever on them they're sitting empty

00:19:42.840 that on that case but if they're going to rent them out um

00:19:49.560 i don't know what the rental situation is like here right now there's a lot of room right now

00:19:53.480 i think so i really do um the the condo market in calgary is still saturated there's way too many

00:20:01.880 of them but if if all the homes are being bought from people in toronto in and vancouver at that

00:20:08.040 rate that they're buying them it pushes prices up uh because of the supply demand thing uh so if

00:20:15.080 that continues i can't i just can't think it's a good thing at all well it's just kind of bizarre

00:20:20.360 I guess counter-intuitive if they're looking on spec. And then some numbers that came out recently

00:20:24.600 with Alberta for the first time, I think it was in decades, we've had our 30 and under age demographic

00:20:30.600 has actually been dropping. Younger people are leaving the province, at least over the last

00:20:34.040 six years. And those would be the people just getting to the point, usually in your late 20s,

00:20:38.760 might be considering getting into the real estate market, buying your first home and they're leaving.

00:20:42.760 So, I mean, just things are kind of not jiving, I guess you could say.

00:20:46.600 Yeah. And there's no, I mean, every once in a while you get information from StatsCan about

00:20:51.620 saying how many people came here from Ontario and how many people left here for wherever they were

00:20:56.400 going. And I haven't looked at that recently, but from what I can understand, a lot of that

00:21:02.600 younger demographic that's leaving are finding jobs somewhere else because the job situation

00:21:08.960 here is not as good as it could be. So they're finding better paid jobs. And I think probably

00:21:15.200 the more highly educated end of that demographic yeah so it just makes things very unpredictable

00:21:21.840 i mean the trends you know things that your instincts would say one way but then they just

00:21:25.120 go another kind of so uh you think it's a dangerous time for people to get involved in real estate

00:21:30.240 right now or i mean part of it too people worry about inflation they worry about interest rates

00:21:33.840 and maybe now is the time to lock in on it well you want to talk interest rates a bank of canada

00:21:38.720 bumps it up 0.25% their overnight rate, which is the rate that the banks borrow money from

00:21:46.040 each other. And then they add on what they're going to charge you. The next rate increases

00:21:52.140 April 13th. And I watched the US Fed raised their rate down south for the first time in years. I

00:22:02.640 can't remember the last time they did it. They went up a quarter of a percent. So I don't know

00:22:07.700 that that might encourage the bank of canada to go up half a percent next next time um they have

00:22:15.780 i think they have six more announcements to make on the rate before the end of the year and

00:22:21.540 everybody's thinking that by the end of the year that bank rate will be two percent

00:22:25.460 which is huge that is huge that'll that'll just slow everything down that dramatically changes

00:22:30.660 a lot of things people underestimate i mean part of why we've been as charged economically as we

00:22:35.060 have for the last while has been unusually low interest rates for for decades really yeah yeah

00:22:41.300 so yeah that's you know and that's a deliberate attempt to to slow down the price increase and

00:22:47.620 you know i guess mathematically and financially it works but it's not the solution to the housing

00:22:53.140 problem the problem is is supply yeah and that's we got a lot of battles going on with that i mean

00:22:58.820 again a lot of municipalities that ideological battle that anti as they like to say sprawl

00:23:04.020 thing they choke off development growth that should naturally be going out and it screws

00:23:08.740 at the market well you know and i was talking to a couple of local home buyers here or builders um

00:23:15.700 and there's just no way the industry nationally can can start and finish the number of homes

00:23:22.660 that are needed um it's just impossible they're talking about a requirement of two and a half

00:23:28.020 million more homes in this country over the next 10 years i think they said that's and that's

00:23:33.620 difficult to do you know um the the builders are not going to just start building uh homes on

00:23:41.220 speculation yeah in that volume they just don't do it um that's not what they do and everybody's

00:23:48.100 talking about getting the government involved in the supply chain which i'm totally against um if

00:23:54.340 they if the government comes up with a hundred million dollars just to pick a number to build

00:23:58.900 a housing project here or winnipeg or wherever 80 of that is going to go into the bureaucracy

00:24:05.540 um but so if they're going to do that if you've got a hundred million dollars if you get

00:24:10.980 a billion dollars give it to the builders and just get out of their way and they'll do it

00:24:16.180 and they'll compete i mean if people say oh they'll just pocket it no they won't because

00:24:19.380 they've got to compete they'll say well we can knock 10 off that house price and get more people

00:24:23.940 in and they'll target it to where people want to move as opposed to that's the whole thing you

00:24:29.620 nailed it the the builders know what kind of homes to build they know where people want to live they

00:24:35.380 know how much people can pay not what they want to pay but what they can pay um whereas the

00:24:42.420 government would have to build this big bureaucracy to to police the whole thing because that's all 0.91

00:24:48.420 the bureaucracy does is police stuff so it doesn't work doing it that way no and i mean the government's

00:24:53.620 talking that's one of their big announcements with their unholy alliance as we've put it you know is

00:24:57.780 uh boy there could be a number of things it's an ndp government now it basically marriage of

00:25:02.020 convenience yeah and uh one of them was talking about addressing the housing but we know the way

00:25:06.340 they do that yeah they'll get in they'll meddle with things and they'll make them worse uh since

00:25:10.340 i was just mentioning earlier with the trans mountain pipeline i mean it was seven and a half

00:25:13.620 billion uh projected what the government bought it it's ballooned uh past 21 billion now and this

00:25:19.060 This thing is only half done.

00:25:20.720 Only government can manage to blast a budget out of the atmosphere like that.

00:25:25.600 They're going to mess the housing up.

00:25:27.300 Oh, totally.

00:25:27.740 Well, anything they touch gets messed up.

00:25:31.400 I mean, I know we're going to get this, so let's go there now.

00:25:33.640 And we're talking about the Beltline and the rally last week.

00:25:37.240 That whole thing, the arrest, the police presence, the violence.

00:25:43.240 violence. I mean, the young fellow that Mel interviewed, who was arrested and tasered,

00:25:51.300 I didn't know that happened. It's like, that's on Courtney Walcott. That's on Giancarlo Carra.

00:25:58.160 That's on Gondek. It's on city council. It's their fault, unequivocally. Did I think the

00:26:05.880 police overreacted? Yeah, but I don't know what their marching orders are. I know some police

00:26:10.140 guys and they're just regular people they get in a situation like that and they're afraid afraid

00:26:15.100 they're just afraid that something's going to happen especially in a situation like that i

00:26:19.180 didn't like seeing the violence at all but had they done the right thing it wouldn't had need

00:26:25.340 to be done you know i i watched those marches go by my place every day for or every saturday for

00:26:31.660 two years now and and they're great to watch i mean you got little kids you got grandparents

00:26:36.940 And they're happy, they're smiling, they're waving, and then that, it's on city council, and especially Walcott.

00:26:48.880 He was flaming for weeks, and I've ripped into him on this show a number of times.

00:26:53.700 I mean, the insults, the belittling, and again, the usual calling everybody racist.

00:27:01.400 I mean, it doesn't matter how much evidence was there, you don't have to agree with the protests,

00:27:05.500 you don't have to like them but go down just go down that's your responsibility you're an elected

00:27:09.100 person you're paid a lot and just look around and if you'll notice that okay there's a number of

00:27:12.780 people who are not white then clearly it's not a white supremacist thing you can still oppose

00:27:17.740 everything else but when you're going to lie that's what i'll call it a lie and keep smearing

00:27:21.820 them as that that inflames them that gets them worked up it gets the people who believe you

00:27:26.300 worked up so people who really do think it's a new incarnation of the clan marching through

00:27:30.460 their neighborhood are gonna get upset and there was no need for this no and a part of that some

00:27:37.500 of the blame should be put on on the marches as well i think uh they they had to know that they

00:27:45.260 were causing a little disruption on 17th avenue there they had to know that they had to know that

00:27:50.620 the people running businesses there weren't real happy about it and all they had to do is go down

00:27:56.460 there on a tuesday sit down with them and go okay how do we make this work for for both of us let's

00:28:03.500 be friends let's talk about how we do this and the people on 17th avenue could say well why don't you

00:28:09.340 go up to royal avenue and march around the other side of western canada come back to each street

00:28:13.820 and then down that would be such an easy thing to do yeah you can find compromise and things such

00:28:19.820 as that. Yeah, I mean, just using common sense. And as I said, a compromise. And that's been

00:28:28.240 lacking in the Ottawa sense, though. It's been lacking in the local one, again, for political

00:28:33.000 leadership, playing games and flaming things. There was never any respect directed at the

00:28:38.480 protesters. You know, again, you don't have to agree with them to respect them, but just to at

00:28:43.440 least treat them with, and there was none of that. There was never that in Ottawa. That's part of why

00:28:48.240 that got inflamed as out of control as it did.

00:28:50.860 You know, we don't expect the prime minister to come down and kneel among them as he did

00:28:53.540 with BLM protesters.

00:28:55.320 You don't expect him to sit down and have a, you know, smoking ceremony with Chief Spence's

00:28:59.980 fake hunger strike from many years ago.

00:29:02.820 But, you know, Trudeau has a long history of pandering to protesters and he wouldn't

00:29:06.020 even talk with these guys.

00:29:08.440 No, no, no.

00:29:10.820 And, you know, the whole situation blowing up in Ottawa is on Trudeau.

00:29:16.060 It's his fault.

00:29:16.720 You know, if Mayor Gondek had gone down to Central Memorial Park last Saturday and set up a loudspeaker system and said, look, here's where we're coming from.

00:29:27.840 But where was she? Nowhere.

00:29:30.220 I think somebody told me Joe Cece was there, masked up and disguised, which I thought was pretty funny.

00:29:38.020 Well, if you cover his mouth, he's harder to recognize.

00:29:39.980 But all the same, you know, these guys, whatever, he's an elected official.

00:29:45.220 So it's provincial, but he's got, I guess, the right to be there.

00:29:49.520 That was interesting stuff we saw too, though, as it's been framed that the counter protesters

00:29:53.680 were always concerned local residents, upset local residents.

00:29:57.740 And I'm sure there's some.

00:29:58.640 Sure there are.

00:29:59.280 You know, there's some people annoyed with it or whatnot.

00:30:01.420 But we saw that when Melanie was trying to interview people and we saw as they chased

00:30:05.460 them, essentially, all the way to City Hall, these are anarchists.

00:30:08.520 These are people looking to make trouble.

00:30:11.060 And the City Hall wasn't calling them out.

00:30:13.580 No, and I agree with that.

00:30:14.860 I mean, I think there were, what, 20, 25, 30 of them all on that southwest corner of the park, all looking very smug and looking like it's a big victory for them.

00:30:27.420 But I don't think they were local residents or business people at all.

00:30:31.600 They were agitated by Walcott on his Twitter feed, and it was kind of like, let's go to war, and they showed up.

00:30:38.980 Yeah, well, and you live down there. You don't want to see weekly tear gassings and congestion and riots and sirens going off. These things were, I think, starting to calm down anyways. I mean, a lot of the restrictions were coming down. A lot of people were saying that's enough. A lot were saying there's lots we still want to protest, but it was fading.

00:30:59.840 You know, they're already talking about going to Princess Island now and protesting there.

00:31:03.340 But who could have reasoned to that compromise rather than wait until there was a police conflict and people being tackled and arrested?

00:31:10.260 Yeah. And it was it's just like that whole police presence.

00:31:14.040 You know, it's like I don't know what to compare it to.

00:31:18.160 You know, major riots in other places, maybe not like the states where they're burning things down.

00:31:22.960 But I just looked at that and I shuddered.

00:31:26.280 My God, what's what's going on?

00:31:28.380 Well, yeah, and there were so many. I went down there last weekend, too, for a walk around. I just like to see firsthand what's happening. And again, everybody was peaceful at the point I was at. The police presence was massive. And it can't be discounted on how much it's costing us.

00:31:44.020 Well, you know, I was having a conversation with my dad about that.

00:31:48.560 I had a lunch with him Monday talking about the cost of the police and what that –

00:31:54.740 and I said, well, you know, the police have escorted that march for two years.

00:31:58.880 He did not know that.

00:32:00.320 He did not know that.

00:32:03.040 So there's a cost to that, obviously.

00:32:06.500 So, I mean, just having them march, protect or manage the march, let's say, you know, closing streets and getting people through and waving traffic through, that's a better way to spend money than having them beat people up in the park.

00:32:20.760 Yeah, and some people, I saw some of the usual, you know, misconstruing the police have taken a beating from the usual suspects, you know, publicly and online as well on this.

00:32:29.900 Some were saying, look at this, they're endorsing them, they're facilitating.

00:32:32.600 Well, no, I mean, they're keeping things safe.

00:32:34.440 That's their job.

00:32:35.200 I mean, they're not leading the parade when the officer's in front in the car.

00:32:39.260 They're just making sure it's safe and they're moving people aside.

00:32:41.620 This thing's coming whether they like it or not.

00:32:43.540 So let's keep it under control and safe, at least.

00:32:45.980 And they have been doing that.

00:32:47.960 People could say it's a frustrating expense.

00:32:49.920 You know, maybe somehow there should be a fee to the marchers if they're going to.

00:32:53.240 I don't know how you would do that.

00:32:55.080 Well, you can't do that.

00:32:58.340 You can't have a march like that every Saturday or any day of the week without getting a permit from the city.

00:33:05.060 You have to have a permit.

00:33:06.420 And that's another thing my dad brought up the other day is, well, how can they walk around the city like that without a permit?

00:33:11.700 I said, well, no, they have a permit.

00:33:13.360 They have to have a permit.

00:33:14.380 The police don't just go, let's see if they're there.

00:33:17.180 We'll help them through.

00:33:18.200 There's been communications.

00:33:19.700 Gondek.

00:33:20.400 Mayor Gondek did that when she said, well, they don't have permits.

00:33:23.840 And they didn't have a permit for selling baked goods and T-shirts and stuff like that in the park.

00:33:29.500 But that's on the city.

00:33:31.940 They have inspectors who are supposed to go around and prevent that from happening.

00:33:35.640 Where were they?

00:33:36.800 And they went and got their injunction, which did change some things at that point.

00:33:40.640 Now we've got some new rules they could apply based on the injunction.

00:33:43.060 Yeah.

00:33:43.320 Which, okay, was prior to Gondek's time.

00:33:46.140 But during the Occupy thing, when a bunch of squatters sat in Olympic Plaza for three months,

00:33:50.540 it took them months before they went out and got an injunction.

00:33:54.240 And that was only after my stunt where I got a little bit arrested that time.

00:33:59.040 I forgot about that.

00:34:00.080 To blow that up, you know, and show how absurd it was with them facilitating that and everything.

00:34:05.100 And it went well.

00:34:07.000 But the city, you know, seems to, again, when it's protesters they like,

00:34:10.360 they'll let them settle in for months without a peep.

00:34:12.520 But when it's something that they have a problem with,

00:34:15.540 suddenly they see conjunctions and enforcement.

00:34:18.460 Well, I got an idea on how to get rid of protesters.

00:34:22.120 And that is make them sit through a city council meeting.

00:34:24.860 Oh, God.

00:34:25.520 That's cruel and unusual.

00:34:27.840 I mean, how dare you?

00:34:30.080 You see what that did to poor Rick Bell?

00:34:31.920 Yeah, look what's happening to Rick.

00:34:34.740 Hi, Rick, how are you doing?

00:34:37.300 I've always, you know, again, I love reading his stuff. 0.88

00:34:39.660 I'm thinking, how does he survive in that place, watching those clowns? 0.85

00:34:42.500 And, you know, it's not just this council. 0.97

00:34:43.960 It always has been.

00:34:45.220 There's just something else in that place.

00:34:47.320 Well, when I was at the Calgary Sun, I sat through a lot of council meetings

00:34:51.300 because they talk about land development and approving new communities

00:34:54.400 and stuff like that, and I had to be on top of that.

00:34:56.240 But talk about painful, just awful, awful stuff.

00:35:00.080 no it's just amazing they managed to get anything done it's true i could just envision it you know

00:35:06.200 the council toilets got plugged by somebody uh then they got to start a committee and figure

00:35:10.820 out who's going to be assigned to unplug it and so on and everything and uh meanwhile you know

00:35:15.160 hodges has filled his pants because he couldn't wait any longer uh on the committee to figure

00:35:18.940 out what to do about it all you had to do was pick up a plunger but uh welcome to government right

00:35:24.800 and yeah and this is still ongoing i hope this weekend anyways it sounds like they're going to

00:35:30.100 go to princess island park they can go there and if some lunatic you know i don't think the police

00:35:34.960 will smile upon agitators following them and trying to start it over there they'll say look

00:35:39.060 they moved they're out of the way you guys leave these guys alone i would i would think

00:35:44.260 they would leave them alone now i think last saturday was a show of force and it was kind of

00:35:48.840 like this is what we can do yeah so let's not have any shenanigans here yeah most often from

00:35:54.640 I've seen police actions they really they want to avoid the big conflict that's their goal like when

00:35:58.640 I was there I'd set up over by that church I think it's a united church it's a nice one over in the

00:36:03.440 corner and I was on the steps because that's where the police had the road all blocked up

00:36:06.320 because that's where the march typically went I was ready to take pictures to see you know again

00:36:09.760 I'm there to what happens when the march comes up to this police line because they had it solidly

00:36:13.920 blocked with vehicles and a line of police officers and of course all of a sudden they

00:36:17.120 changed the march and went to city hall so the the police had to scramble and tear it all down

00:36:22.420 But they were trying to be preventative.

00:36:24.080 They were, you know, just trying to block things and then stop it from going further.

00:36:29.240 Because, of course, six blocks up was the collective group of counter-protesters, and they just don't want them to come together.

00:36:33.640 Well, no.

00:36:33.880 Now we've got a bigger problem.

00:36:36.560 And they get it all the time. 1.00

00:36:38.180 They get the crap. 0.98

00:36:38.980 You know, the week before when there were problems with the counter-protesters, and they were moving them, and people were saying the police are taking sides. 0.99

00:36:43.300 Well, it's just not taking sides.

00:36:45.760 It's common sense.

00:36:46.420 You've got 100 people here.

00:36:48.020 You've got 2,000 people here.

00:36:49.980 If they come together, we might have some very serious problems.

00:36:52.580 It's going to be a lot easier to move the 100 over here to the side so the ones can pass than to push back.

00:36:57.080 But the other thing is, it's my understanding that when they were blocking 17th Avenue, and I think that's the picture there, it's up now.

00:37:07.360 I don't believe that those people had a permit that allowed them to block 17th Avenue.

00:37:13.240 You need a permit to do that.

00:37:15.040 I think they just walked out there and did it.

00:37:16.800 So in terms of who do you clear out, the people with a permit or the people without a permit?

00:37:22.520 The answer is easy.

00:37:23.440 Yeah, and there's an irony in the counter-protesters actually turned what would have been a 15-minute disruption

00:37:27.660 into over an hour because they were standing in the middle of the road.

00:37:30.640 Well, that's what I wrote.

00:37:31.440 I wonder if they understand the irony of that whole thing.

00:37:35.140 Yeah.

00:37:35.520 Let's have a march so the people will stop marching. 0.99

00:37:38.680 Well, let's hope this chapter of city idiocy is kind of coming to them. 0.99

00:37:42.200 Oh, no. 0.99

00:37:42.740 Come on.

00:37:43.080 They're not even six months old yet.

00:37:44.620 Well, I'm not talking about them in general.

00:37:46.920 I just meant the protest.

00:37:47.740 Oh, I thought you should see the council. 0.99

00:37:48.840 No, no, we got three and a half years of those clowns to deal with yet. 0.99

00:37:52.380 I don't see signs of life in there. 0.80

00:37:54.880 You know, another side thing, I know Walmart's opening another giant center out in Rocky View.

00:37:59.180 That's going to employ a bunch of people, bring in a bunch more tech. 0.97

00:38:01.440 Rocky View, Ninchy and Gondek are the best friends for satellite areas for drawing commerce.

00:38:07.640 You know, they just won't face that.

00:38:08.840 They just, if we could just pour enough money into Calgary Economic Development, somehow we'll draw commerce here and it's failing.

00:38:14.180 Well, yeah, there's irony in that, too, because they talk about the downtown core here.

00:38:20.220 The amount of taxes that they collect out of here now is minuscule compared to what they did.

00:38:26.000 But that money would have been made up if they'd allowed all those big commercial developments,

00:38:31.000 and you're talking about Rocky View taking them, but if they'd allowed those within city limits,

00:38:36.360 the tax base would be strengthened and they'd be collecting a lot more money.

00:38:40.620 Oh, yeah.

00:38:41.100 No, it's failing badly.

00:38:43.440 And we've talked about that donut we've got downtown and things like that.

00:38:46.820 The city has got to face some reality.

00:38:48.860 You've got to draw these businesses in, not through public art,

00:38:51.320 not through subsidy programs and Calgary economic development.

00:38:54.560 Just cut the taxes, show a welcome business environment, and they'll come in.

00:38:58.100 They seem incapable of thinking that way.

00:39:00.100 Yeah, I have a very radical idea for downtown, and I doubt it will ever happen,

00:39:04.960 but I think it would be pretty cool if they did.

00:39:07.260 And that is just level all the skyscrapers.

00:39:09.640 Boom, take them down, build a park. 0.54

00:39:11.480 um there's there's a guy back in the early 1900s came to calgary from england with this really

00:39:18.180 cool plan for downtown really big boulevards and parks and stuff like that uh that they didn't do

00:39:26.120 because i think was at that time it was five million dollars so that's a lot of money back

00:39:30.100 then but it would have it would have if if they had gone ahead with that plan we wouldn't have

00:39:35.180 that problem right now yeah it's kind of a glass undesirable sort of uh type downtown and we have

00:39:41.320 We can't change it at this point, especially since we just invested in the studio.

00:39:44.340 Well, no, we'll keep this one.

00:39:47.020 But, I mean, they've also got a giant parking lot sitting over by the Saddle Dome now that they've got to figure out how to deal with in the event center.

00:39:54.780 And now they've brought a third party in to try and see if they can iron something out over there.

00:40:00.620 Yeah.

00:40:01.140 Well, they have to do something.

00:40:02.920 Yeah.

00:40:03.540 It's ugly.

00:40:04.300 Well, we'll get a little more before we wrap up towards Hanoi Jane.

00:40:07.780 Oh, Jane. 1.00

00:40:08.660 You didn't mention her in a column recently.

00:40:10.260 Hanoi Jane.

00:40:11.320 Yes, Jane Fonda, you know, there's somebody who just won't go away.

00:40:16.060 No.

00:40:16.940 Of course, maybe she died a while ago, but all that silicone is still moving.

00:40:19.680 Possible, possible.

00:40:21.240 And just remember, he said that, not me.

00:40:23.240 I'm not here to be nice.

00:40:26.280 I don't know what she's thinking.

00:40:28.860 I mean, a political action committee, you know this, but maybe some other people don't.

00:40:33.660 It's an independent organization that raises money to get rid of politicians or to bring in new ones.

00:40:39.740 And that's her whole thing.

00:40:41.320 is she wants people to send her money to her pack so then they'll go around and label uh the 0.96

00:40:48.760 the non-woke politicians and she claims it'll be republicans and democrats she's not going to uh

00:40:55.480 yeah yeah right so it'll all be republicans um and they are they will run campaigns in leading

00:41:01.880 up to the midterms uh to don't vote for this guy don't vote for this guy don't vote for this guy 0.97

00:41:07.560 because he's anti uh getting rid of fossil fuels and that's what i call it is a fossil fool 0.89

00:41:15.240 yes um but that i mean and that's a whole another story oh yeah well then i and she got delayed

00:41:21.880 unfortunately i was going to talk to melissa embarki today as well and she's with the mcdonald

00:41:25.160 laurier institute she wrote a column on that she's an indigenous uh uh policy analyst and she also

00:41:31.480 works in the the energy sector yeah boy she is not happy with people like jane fonda and dicaprio

00:41:37.400 and ben stiller and all these guys all coming up together against and speaking on her behalf i mean

00:41:42.520 they're always said they're talking for the indigenous people of canada they're saving

00:41:45.960 from themselves and how insulting you know and patronizing uh but they need to be called out on 0.96

00:41:51.320 that crap yeah well i thought it's it's it's frightening you know the covid fear is is just 0.97

00:41:59.160 about dissipated i think for the most part they have to come up with another thing to scare us 0.98

00:42:04.280 and so it's going to be the climate emergency it's and they'll they'll be talking about

00:42:08.520 lockdowns i know the iea in in france yesterday sent out a list of things that they want people

00:42:14.200 to do to save energy but and so i mean it's coming it's coming it's going to be big they're

00:42:19.560 gonna they're gonna reap their uh their media slaves will be jumping on this thing like crazy 1.00

00:42:25.880 that it's the end of the world yeah well and and some ugly precedents have been set like the

00:42:31.080 one that kind of scares me with some language that came out of biden a little while ago

00:42:34.520 because now they've realized the world has realized that if we can make it a health issue

00:42:38.200 and convince enough people we can supersede individual rights we can do it we can set them

00:42:42.920 aside we can stop you from traveling we can put you out of your job we can do all sorts of things

00:42:48.280 under the name of public health and then biden talked about firearm crime being a public health

00:42:53.080 issue. So that's where I can see them already coming along to figure out how they can get past

00:42:57.400 their second amendment because they can say, well, now it's a health issue. And we're going to see

00:43:01.320 more and more of the climate change crowd using the health emergency issue. We're going to see

00:43:06.180 that. And then they say, well, you know, hey, it's for your own good. We're superseding these

00:43:11.100 rights for your health. And that's very disturbing. Well, and unfortunately, there's a lot of people

00:43:14.980 will buy into that. We've seen them. We're watching them walking downtown alone, masked

00:43:19.160 100 feet from people right now that they and they're scared i i make fun of them but these

00:43:23.800 are people think about it who are genuinely that terrified and i i appreciate that and i respect

00:43:28.360 that but it's a it's a matter of educating yourself instead of just blindly listening to

00:43:33.960 to cbc for example and just and that's your your media diet you're not going to know what's going

00:43:39.640 on no cbc has exposed itself as it really isn't i know it used to chafe uh carolyn dunn i think

00:43:46.280 was the one I'd get on Twitter and call him a state broadcaster and say,

00:43:49.800 we are not a state broadcaster.

00:43:51.800 Because, okay, technically a state broadcaster is fully owned

00:43:55.000 and beholden to the government and party and power.

00:43:57.600 But with the behavior of the CBC this last six months,

00:44:00.760 I don't see how somebody could claim anything otherwise anymore.

00:44:05.040 I mean, they had some degree of distance, I admit, in the past.

00:44:07.720 You know, they did some great investigative stuff.

00:44:09.540 They would poke at the government.

00:44:11.540 But nowadays they are just a parrot for the truth.

00:44:13.620 Oh, terrible, terrible.

00:44:14.620 it should be abolished it should be just abolished and there's there's a

00:44:18.640 billion dollars you can put into housing and then not to mention you know all

00:44:23.380 that stolen advertising I always call it that stolen it is revenue from the

00:44:26.680 market could go into independent news outlets like ours and we can get some

00:44:29.800 more ad space because I mean when you get a government subsidized monster like

00:44:33.340 that in a market it screws up a market well yeah if the government's gonna pay

00:44:38.200 them to operate they should not be running advertising they shouldn't be

00:44:43.780 out in the street competing with the private people. That's just wrong.

00:44:47.320 We can't sell ad space at their rates.

00:44:49.120 We don't get a billion and a half. We all refuse to government subsidies here.

00:44:52.400 Yes, I know. I thought that was a very clever trick on Derek's part.

00:44:55.240 It was, you know, we, there's no better way to show it.

00:44:57.680 It's not just virtually saying we're showing we qualify. We could take it.

00:45:00.620 You know, they're holding the money out.

00:45:04.600 Just wanted to see, we just wanted to see if we could. And now we know.

00:45:09.180 And then it just makes the other ones who do draw that,

00:45:11.440 that funding look all the worst.

00:45:13.780 All right. Well, that was a good chat. You noticed I covered some stuff. I appreciate you coming in.

00:45:17.220 I don't have a short notice, but you're down the road at the Beltline.

00:45:19.760 I'm not far away.

00:45:20.500 It's good to get an update from you on all these.

00:45:22.660 And as I said, you're writing a lot online at the Standard, always columns, as we see, on a number of issues, which is fun.

00:45:29.800 So it's not just the real estate stuff.

00:45:31.940 No, and it's fun writing for the Standard. It really is.

00:45:34.780 It really is because, like you said, there's so many different things I can write about.

00:45:39.560 I'm not pigeonholed into anything.

00:45:41.820 Yeah.

00:45:42.360 Well, we appreciate it, Mike.

00:45:44.080 So good to see you.

00:45:44.740 Welcome to the new studio.

00:45:46.020 Yeah.

00:45:46.400 And we'll have you back in again soon.

00:45:49.000 Okay, Corey, thank you.

00:45:50.000 All right, Mike.

00:45:50.900 Back to you soon.

00:45:51.560 Thanks.

00:45:53.160 So, yes, that was Mike Thomas of the Western Standard,

00:45:56.780 our columnist at large on, as we said,

00:46:00.200 a number of issues coming in to talk about a few of those columns

00:46:04.540 he has put out recently.

00:46:06.060 So we're going to move on to a few more things pretty quickly here

00:46:09.320 as Mike pops out in a second, and I'm going to talk about Bitcoin, actually.

00:46:13.900 Bitcoin Well, that's where you do have to speak to our advertisers.

00:46:16.760 Those are the other ones who pay our bills along with all of you fantastic subscribers out there.

00:46:23.280 So Bitcoin Well, we've talked about before, you want to get your money free from government reach.

00:46:27.960 You want to protect your hard-earned wealth.

00:46:30.680 Digital currencies are one of those options to get you there, and it's a whole new world.

00:46:34.920 And being new, though, not all of us really understand what it's about and what's going on with it.

00:46:39.320 Bitcoin well is there to help lead you into that world, you know, show you what they can do.

00:46:43.900 And it's safe. They call it non-custodial, which means the money always stays in your hands.

00:46:49.380 These are the things people worry about ripoffs. They worry about untoward companies. And of course

00:46:54.600 they should. Unfortunately, it just seems like everywhere you turn around online, somebody's

00:46:57.540 trying to take more of your money. These guys, your money is always in your control. It's always

00:47:02.940 in your wallet. They never handle it. They just facilitate the transaction, getting you into it

00:47:06.700 help educate you with it. They have Bitcoin Academy, as we can see on the screen there,

00:47:11.520 where you can get online, basically take courses and learn what the digital currencies are about.

00:47:16.180 I mean, find out if it's worth it for you. Find out how to set up your wallet, all that good stuff

00:47:20.440 and get involved in the digital currency world. So that's bitcoinwell.com, guys. Get out there,

00:47:26.660 check them out. Look at the website. They're a good Western Canadian company and see if digital

00:47:31.940 currencies are for you with Bitcoin. All right. So let's, before we're going to check in with

00:47:37.000 Melanie Rizdin in a short bit with a bit more updates on the, what's going on with the UCP

00:47:42.520 leadership debacle. But until she's available, we'll talk about some of the other news stories

00:47:47.180 going on. And that was mentioned by Dave earlier, federal departments and agencies. Yeah, they spent

00:47:51.600 more than $600,000 to pay people to, who are on Twitter and blogging and then social media

00:47:57.020 influencers and such to talk nice about their programs. Like, this is insane. But this is,

00:48:02.600 again, the government trying to control information. They do not like independent

00:48:05.500 information. And if they can't ban it, they're going to try and buy it. And they're going to do

00:48:09.420 it with your money. And it's just ridiculous. You know, it's funny when people, you see that 0.96

00:48:15.060 on Twitter with some of our disputes, you know, who's paying you to say this or paying you to say

00:48:18.020 that? Honest, nobody's paying me for my opinions at this. Well, I guess the Western Standard

00:48:22.380 technically is, but that's out in the open. No, I tweet whatever I want to and whatever I think.

00:48:27.020 And no, unfortunately, nobody's giving me a bunch of money to throw those things out.

00:48:33.700 I mean, we had who we got here.

00:48:36.760 So I'm just trying to see the Dragon's Den personality, Michelle Romano.

00:48:41.200 I don't watch that show anymore.

00:48:42.600 And a partner, Nicholas DuVernay, paid $120,000 to promote Export Development Canada on a Facebook post.

00:48:50.780 Nice work if you can get it.

00:48:52.180 Hey, I talk about the Dragon's Den.

00:48:53.620 I mean, they talk about investment ideas and how to get in on the money.

00:48:56.640 wow, yeah, if you can make six figures for Facebook posts, these dragons really do know

00:49:00.920 how to make some money. Unfortunately, it's our money. It's tax dollars. And they keep doing that.

00:49:05.840 Look at how many levels the government is going into and out there to control the information

00:49:11.160 coming to you right now. They're putting out huge subsidies to, as we were saying with Mike,

00:49:15.800 the CBC, of course, multi hundreds of millions of dollars going towards other publications and media.

00:49:21.780 As we found at the Western Standard, there's a myriad of subsidy programs you can dip into as

00:49:26.520 a media outlet. They're more than happy because, of course, once you're dependent on them,

00:49:30.800 they own you. You will put out the messaging they tell you to put out. And it has broken down

00:49:37.240 all the way down into the point of social media posts. Wow, they're paying people to tweet nice

00:49:43.800 stuff about the government. This is where your tax dollars are going. Of course, I guess with

00:49:47.640 the government being as dysfunctional, expensive, and wretched as it is, you can see why they have

00:49:54.000 to try and buy good reviews because anybody independently and in their right mind is not

00:49:59.200 going to speak favorably about what they're doing these days. So it looks like we've got Melanie

00:50:05.320 Rizdin on deck getting set there and we've got an update coming in because yeah, that's been

00:50:09.600 breaking from the UCP's executive committee on what they're doing with these leadership rules

00:50:13.940 and maybe we've got a little more clarity now that's come in the last half hour or so. So let's

00:50:18.820 bring Melanie in and see what, uh, what's going on out there. 1.00

00:50:23.540 So, uh, so you're looking for a bit of an update on the, uh, the situation with the, um, with the,

00:50:32.500 uh, SGM, the special general meeting that was going to be coming up, uh, in, in April, April 9th.

00:50:41.220 Sorry. I'm just having a tough time hearing. Um, can you hear me?

00:50:46.300 Oh, I'm hearing you just fine. Carry on.

00:50:48.820 you can hear me okay great sorry i can't i can't hear you very well uh okay so it looks like uh

00:50:57.140 looks like they have switched they have switched now they're going to be moving to a mail-in ballot

00:51:01.940 system so sgm is actually going to change now it's not going to be an in-person system

00:51:06.980 or an in-person meeting anymore it's going to be a virtual meeting at this point and it looks like

00:51:14.020 the UCP board president basically put out a letter saying that to all members and registrants for the

00:51:21.140 special general meeting that the board has made the decision to make this switch because

00:51:28.260 thousands were requesting to do so to make it easier for grassroots members to sort of eliminate

00:51:34.980 the need for paying that registration fee, eliminate the need for people to travel and

00:51:41.220 have to be in person in Red Deer because membership has grown actually it's more than doubled heading

00:51:47.940 up to this SGM. They have 15,000 registered to participate in the leadership review and vote

00:51:56.340 and so by the sounds of it it was just going to be easier and that's the basis behind the decision

00:52:05.140 to switch to this mail-in ballot. So I saw something that, as you said,

00:52:10.900 with the registration fees, I saw it's been breaking so fast, it was hard to confirm,

00:52:15.860 but they were going to offer to refund the $99 that everybody else had paid already to date

00:52:21.700 for a registration to get on to the review. Well, I would have to assume by seeing some

00:52:29.940 of the statements that I'm seeing that that will be the case, especially considering sort of the

00:52:35.780 verbiage around this decision is to eliminate people having to pay that registration fee.

00:52:41.380 So my guess is that anyone who has paid it is going to be refunded. I don't have that specific

00:52:48.100 statement in front of me, but with the wording of the reasoning behind this, that would make

00:52:54.260 sense that that is what the plan to do is, especially considering the meeting is now not

00:52:57.700 going to be held uh in the form that it was going to be with people traveling and and needing to

00:53:04.420 to you know reserve that space uh and i was understanding that uh and that was the explanation

00:53:10.500 for the registration fee was to handle some of the hard costs so i think moving this to an online

00:53:18.420 sgm and then of course moving it to a mail-in ballot system that would likely do away with

00:53:25.540 with the majority of those hard costs. Yeah, well, and as I was saying just before the show

00:53:31.900 started, I've dealt with a mail-in ballot sort of a system before for a leadership race, and there's

00:53:38.060 going to be a massive amount of hard costs coming with that anyways. The logistics of it is huge,

00:53:43.680 especially with only now a couple of weeks to pull it off. Has there been any discussion of

00:53:48.460 changing the timeline then? I haven't seen anything yet. Wait a minute. Yeah, looks like

00:53:54.460 they have updated the current membership deadline to no let's see here sorry no i don't have

00:54:01.420 information to answer that quite yet um uh one of the things i will mention though is that uh

00:54:07.900 quite a few members were insistent and in fact demanding that it remain this in-person um uh

00:54:17.420 gathering to do the vote and hold the vote. So it sounds like the UCP board has sort of ignored

00:54:25.620 many of those requests and demands by members to do this. So they've decided to go to this

00:54:33.340 voting system so that it says here so that all current members can participate. They don't have

00:54:41.300 to do the travel. And, you know, it also says here that they are going to hire a national

00:54:49.580 auditing firm that's going to be brought in and retained to oversee the mail-in vote.

00:54:56.560 So I don't know anything about that firm or whether that's going to be an issue for

00:55:01.920 many of these members. You know, like you said, it is still sort of this ongoing information

00:55:09.420 coming in all right well thank you for the update as this breaks and unfolds because it's really

00:55:15.520 this is a big big deal and i don't think enough people quite realize what's going on debacle is

00:55:21.820 the best word i can give it and i just wow this is something else well and i think too uh when i

00:55:28.700 was reading some of the information on the website for the uh special general meeting they were

00:55:33.920 talking about how it looked like, you know, constituency members were going to be overseeing

00:55:41.880 the counting of ballots, you know, members, presidents of the members associations and

00:55:48.100 whatnot. So now it being sort of handed off again to this separate auditing firm, again, I think is

00:55:56.780 going to raise concern for, you know, the people that really wanted to oversee and have

00:56:05.540 an invested interest in participating in that process of counting the votes. So we'll see

00:56:12.380 how they maybe look to line up that auditing firm and allow for others to participate and

00:56:24.160 overseas. So we'll have to, you know, obviously have some updates coming once we get more

00:56:29.020 information. Great. Well, thanks for the updates, Melanie. And I know you'll, you'll keep on it and

00:56:34.880 we'll post anything new on the Western Standard online, of course, as soon as it comes up.

00:56:39.820 You bet. All right. I'll see you after the show.

00:56:43.300 So yeah, this is still breaking, unfolding questions. You know, I mean, you can tell

00:56:47.180 it's scrambled. Like this is a government, this is a party, I should say, not even so much the

00:56:52.300 government. That's in complete disarray. They are in disarray. This release came out suddenly this

00:56:59.860 morning. We've been waiting on results from this board meeting for two days already. It's not

00:57:05.040 terribly detailed. There's a lot of questions in the air about it. And let's not beat around the

00:57:10.200 bush. The bottom line is they're trying to save Kenny's ass. I mean, I've been trying to be somewhat 1.00

00:57:17.180 balanced with this thing. And I've been trying to get pro-Kenny MPs to come on, or MLAs, I should

00:57:22.620 say. And I've had difficulty getting them to come on the show because I wanted to show some things.

00:57:26.460 But there's no other reason for this manipulation and pissing around. You know, ironically,

00:57:32.000 originally, when the constituency associations who were demanding this review, the ones who

00:57:36.940 signed on, I believe it was 23 or 24 of them, they wanted to have some sort of mail-in so everybody

00:57:43.400 could participate. And it was through the wrangling of the party executive on behalf of

00:57:48.780 the premier that they said, no, we're going to hold it at a special meeting in Red Deer where

00:57:53.160 people have to pay a big fee and go in person. Because they figured, the reason they did that

00:57:57.900 was because they figured that will keep the numbers low enough that we can manage to make

00:58:02.000 sure we can stack a good enough turnout and win this thing decisively. They didn't count on 15,000

00:58:07.740 people registering. No, absolutely not. But now to turn around and change it at this point

00:58:13.800 to a mail-in system is a recipe for catastrophe. As I said earlier, hey, they raised one and a half

00:58:23.480 million bucks then. That means they got one and a half million bucks in the bank from those

00:58:27.320 registrations. You can book hotels all over the province to get people to come out and vote in

00:58:34.200 person, because I can understand, yeah, you can't get 15,000 people in and out of a Red Deer location

00:58:39.500 in six hours, not in a hotel like that, but you've got the money now and the resources and the time

00:58:46.420 to set it up in a number of places so those members who registered can come out and cast

00:58:50.540 their ballot in those multiple locations. The problem they have is that they know, they do

00:58:55.200 internals, governments pull, pull, pull, parties pull, pull, pull. They've checked, and they know

00:59:00.520 that if it's those 15,000, Kenny's going to lose. They've got to change the numbers. They've got to

00:59:05.920 bring a new pool of available voters to be able to come in and vote in this race. And by doing that,

00:59:11.920 by getting anybody who now just has a $10 membership able to vote, totally changes the

00:59:18.520 entire dynamic on who is going to come out and vote in this race. Now, the cutoff, I saw Don

00:59:25.100 mentioning that earlier, I believe the cutoff is still going to be the same membership cutoff that

00:59:32.640 it was. So like last weekend at the end of the week. So you won't be able to spend 10 bucks next

00:59:37.400 week or even today and vote in this thing. You already have to have a membership, but who knows

00:59:41.140 they're changing the rules as they go at this point. So it wouldn't shock me if they change

00:59:45.240 that there, but this is a real problem. As Melanie was saying, there's going to be an independent

00:59:49.320 firm auditing it. When I was talking before, when we did this with the Wildrose Party,

00:59:55.180 with the leadership race, we used Myers-Norris Penny, I believe. You get an outside firm,

01:00:00.440 and they were very diligent. Some people say we'd have to audit them as well. With these

01:00:04.580 large firms, they have a reputation to protect. They will make sure it's okay. As Melanie was

01:00:10.580 talking about too, the old system would have had scrutineers there in person to watch the vote

01:00:14.620 counting, and you'll still have to. And I don't know how they're going to do this in two weeks.

01:00:19.320 I don't, the logistics, when we did it with, as I said, I think it was 13,000 votes and it was

01:00:24.920 bins and bins and bins of sealed envelopes that were coming in that we had to keep in a secure

01:00:29.480 location. They all had to have individual numbering on, of course, each ballot so we could

01:00:34.280 track and make sure. And we still had issues. One of the campaigns had bought a bunch of

01:00:39.720 memberships on behalf of other people and were trying to vote on their behalf and things like

01:00:44.040 that is when you have mail-in, you can't assure the person on the other end of that envelope

01:00:47.960 really is the person who's supposed to vote. It's difficult to say the least and nobody trusts

01:00:54.040 anybody. It's not like you can demand identification. Look what happened in the leadership race when

01:00:57.960 they went through all that crap before too with the UCP. This is a mess. This is a real mess and 0.99

01:01:05.240 it's only going to get worse. So now not only we're looking at 15,000 people were ready to

01:01:10.880 commit a hundred dollars to vote into this thing. I don't know how many members the party has with

01:01:15.540 that $10 a head rate now, but you've got a much larger number now. So what are we going to look

01:01:20.980 at? 20,000 ballots getting mailed in and nobody's going to trust it. Let's face it. Nobody is going

01:01:28.420 to trust it. So it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. If Kenny comes in with 90% support,

01:01:35.300 people won't believe it. If he comes in with 51% support, he better bloody resign because the party

01:01:41.320 is going to rip in half. And I think it's going to anyway now. If Kenny maintains the leadership 0.65

01:01:45.820 of this party, UCP, after this mess, there's going to be a mass floor crossing. There's my

01:01:52.880 big prediction right now. I'm not going to try to make predictions on what number it's going to be,

01:01:58.600 whether it's going to be 55% or 51% or 80%. What I am going to say is a number of MLAs are going

01:02:07.060 to leave that party. They are going to cross the floor. They are going to say, we cannot take part

01:02:11.760 in this any longer. And you know what? You only need four members to be sitting in that legislature

01:02:15.780 and you have a registered party. And we will now have, again, as we saw some years ago,

01:02:22.300 two conservative parties with sizable caucuses sitting within the legislature. And guess what

01:02:27.340 happened the last time that happened? We got four years of Notley, Premier Notley, for our troubles.

01:02:33.660 This political game playing at the expense of Albertans has to stop.

01:02:40.460 It sounds like Melanie might have another update or just came in for a message there

01:02:44.200 just to say, confirm the members are going to get a refund

01:02:46.680 where they can opt to make their registration fee a donation.

01:02:50.500 Okay, thanks for that update, Melanie.

01:02:52.360 And so, yes, you've got to think of the logistics of that

01:02:56.040 because I think especially the people who put the $100 in to be delegates in this thing

01:03:02.660 Don't want to donate to the party right now.

01:03:04.220 They aren't bloody happy.

01:03:05.660 So they're going to be asking for a refund.

01:03:08.400 And that's a whole other nightmare for the party to deal with now.

01:03:13.120 Think of the accounting.

01:03:14.160 You've got to find the money in.

01:03:15.160 You've got to get it back to people.

01:03:16.460 Was it online transfers?

01:03:17.660 Was it checks?

01:03:18.240 Was it credit cards? 0.98

01:03:19.680 What a frigging mess. 0.94

01:03:22.140 And again, you want transparency? 0.98

01:03:25.720 You can see right through what they're doing.

01:03:29.400 They're trying to save Kenny's hide.

01:03:32.500 You know, I'm just tired of the political game playing.

01:03:37.980 I mean, this is why I'm actually as grumpy as I am

01:03:40.700 and I'm triggered all the time and everything.

01:03:42.320 I'm happy at the Western Standard

01:03:43.720 because I can write on these things.

01:03:45.180 I can look into these things.

01:03:46.260 I can discuss these things.

01:03:48.040 I'm an opinion person.

01:03:49.160 I can put my opinion out on it.

01:03:51.000 I'm not inside the parties anymore

01:03:52.780 and I don't want to be.

01:03:54.220 I can't stand, I mean,

01:03:55.560 most of the people in political parties,

01:03:57.100 I'll say with decades of experience

01:03:59.000 and working within them,

01:04:00.920 are good principled people.

01:04:02.040 They really are trying to make things better.

01:04:04.520 They want to.

01:04:05.220 That's their goal.

01:04:06.700 But there's always a pack of weasels within them.

01:04:09.840 Always.

01:04:10.600 And there's always, they feel that every rule needs to be bent and they feel that it doesn't

01:04:14.400 matter.

01:04:15.120 Winning is everything.

01:04:16.260 Principle doesn't matter.

01:04:18.380 Public support doesn't matter.

01:04:20.440 Just as long as you win, win, win at all costs.

01:04:23.720 We're seeing that kind of play going on right now.

01:04:26.820 We're seeing it with a stacked party executive.

01:04:28.800 we're seeing it with a review that was forced like pulling teeth and they still managed to

01:04:33.520 make their own rules to benefit their own butts with the review. And when it looked like the

01:04:37.000 review was going to turn against them, they changed the bloody rules. It stinks and it's 0.98

01:04:41.780 an embarrassment. It really is. You know, I was so optimistic when Jason Kenney came in, 0.97

01:04:47.160 I was supportive and I was happy to see the merger of the UCP, you know, or the creation of

01:04:53.680 the UCP is I was terrified of four more years in Notley. And I had enjoyed, I thought Kenny was a

01:05:00.260 fantastic member of parliament. I thought his organization was incredible as he brought those

01:05:04.300 parties together and all the way up until they won the election. You know, it wasn't, I was

01:05:09.980 pretty supportive and happy until about a year after they got in and realized that nothing's

01:05:14.640 getting done. You know, realizing that the fair deal panel was a bait and switch plan and realizing

01:05:21.620 that regional MLAs really weren't taken seriously because you had a strong central core of

01:05:26.980 leadership that wasn't listening to them. And all we'd ended up with was a government less bad

01:05:34.060 than the NDP, but it wasn't a good one. And my optimism was it was fading. And now I'm watching

01:05:40.540 these shenanigans going on, these death throes of a small group of people with a lot of control

01:05:48.920 trying to maintain power in a party.

01:05:51.940 I'm sorry.

01:05:52.800 I do not see how this party is going to stay together after this review

01:05:58.020 unless the leader is gone.

01:05:59.620 I just don't see it.

01:06:02.000 Maybe, you know, I've been wrong before.

01:06:03.680 I can be proven wrong.

01:06:05.220 But this is just a travesty.

01:06:08.180 You can't change the rules on something like this.

01:06:10.400 This close.

01:06:11.020 I mean, we're not talking months in advance, guys.

01:06:12.520 This is just a couple weeks away.

01:06:16.020 It's desperation.

01:06:17.280 I don't know if this will save them.

01:06:18.920 I mean, one of Premier Kennedy's stronger areas.

01:06:21.980 And again, it was because of his good, hard work.

01:06:24.100 As an immigration minister, he was very popular with new Canadian communities.

01:06:28.380 He did great outreach.

01:06:29.840 He was on the ground with them.

01:06:30.960 He spoke to their concerns.

01:06:33.080 And that means he's got very strong support in high immigration communities such as northeast Calgary and areas like that.

01:06:39.000 And I know some of the talk was that they want to even set up a balloting centre to allow people up there to vote.

01:06:45.620 You knew that was just, of course, them wanting to make sure to have it as convenient as possible for the more likely Kenny supporters to get out and vote.

01:06:53.880 Now, though, with mail-in ballots, boy, who are they going to be reaching out to?

01:06:58.400 How are they going to be targeting it?

01:06:59.980 How do we believe every person who's mailing in that ballot really is the right person on the other end of the ballot?

01:07:05.840 I've talked about this before, too, when people talk about having, like, online voting and, you know, all these different ways.

01:07:13.000 mail in. Again, I'm very sour on just having endured it once with the Wildrose Party leadership

01:07:18.000 in the past. You can't. You can't beat on an important election, whether it's a general

01:07:23.720 election, whether it's a leadership vote or a review like this, you can't beat making a person

01:07:27.980 come in person, show a piece of identification, and cast a paper ballot which would be a record

01:07:34.280 of how they voted. Old-fashioned, but it's the way it works best. It's foolproof. You have

01:07:41.560 scrutineers. You count those ballots. It takes a while. That's the way it goes. It can be a bit

01:07:46.400 expensive, but that's the safest way. Online voting? Absolutely not. There's just no way to

01:07:51.920 trust that crap anymore. There is not. We know bloody well there's not. And mail-in ballots, 1.00

01:07:58.020 even if, you know, and again, I trust these auditors. I trust the count. I think the count

01:08:02.280 will be fine. But boy, you better watch those boxes and make sure none disappear or anything

01:08:06.340 like that. We'll see how they set all that up. But they can't tell who was on the other end of

01:08:12.880 that letter. And again, how are you going to get those ballots in? This is two weeks away.

01:08:17.440 Have you guys even got time to print these and get them out to members who qualify to vote?

01:08:23.260 So you've got to get all these ballots out to people and they've got to get them all back in

01:08:27.720 by April 9th? Right. Right. That isn't going to happen. And I think also, though, maybe they're

01:08:37.160 hoping they'll catch people flat-footed who were organizing on the, you know, side to try and

01:08:42.560 replace the Premier. I'm just, I can't help but show that I'm very, very concerned and upset with

01:08:50.760 this. I think that's pretty clear at this point. Let's speak to a sponsor quickly again while we're

01:08:56.200 at it then. And I've got to cover them. Of course, they're helping pay our bills. These are good

01:08:59.700 principal people. And that's the Canadian Shooting Sports Association. These guys, speaking of right,

01:09:05.760 speaking of keeping things on the up and up, these guys work on your behalf as a firearm owner or

01:09:10.480 somebody considering being a firearm owner. I'm talking about things like even with, you know,

01:09:13.700 the other sponsor, Bitcoin. Well, it's a resource. Go to the Canadian Shooting Sports Association

01:09:18.620 webpage if you look them up. And they've got all sorts of things from videos on safe gun use to,

01:09:24.580 uh, as you can see from this, uh, fundraisers, they've got a ladies day at the range. And of 0.86

01:09:31.380 course, most importantly, they've got multiple legal challenges going against the government

01:09:36.620 against, you know, as they've been trying to take away your firearms, take away your right to

01:09:40.840 legally safely enjoy firearms. It's important. Uh, they will take these away if we allow them.

01:09:47.320 And the only way you can stop them is by standing up for yourself. And you can't just do it as one

01:09:51.060 person. You've got to do it together. And that's what the association's about. It brings you

01:09:54.240 together so you can push back, stand up for your rights. But they need you to get on board. You've

01:09:59.060 got to join them. You've got to take out a membership. So check them out. It's cssa-cila.org.

01:10:06.100 Or again, if you just search it out, Canadian Shooting Sports Association, you'll get there.

01:10:09.680 Lots of good resources beyond the legal challenges, of course, which are very important.

01:10:14.740 But also they have those challenges going on and they need you. So check them out and get on board.

01:10:23.960 So, let's see.

01:10:25.360 Let's look at a little more federal things.

01:10:26.920 You know, we've got the Unholy Alliance going.

01:10:28.360 We're going to be doing the pipeline.

01:10:29.540 That's going to come out tonight, by the way.

01:10:30.820 Dave and Derek and I are all going to talk.

01:10:32.380 We're going to talk about this UCP leadership some more, of course.

01:10:35.240 And we are going to talk about the, as it has been put, Unholy Alliance between Jagmeet Singh and Justin Trudeau,

01:10:41.420 where they feel that they can hold power for the next three years in Ottawa through their alliance.

01:10:47.440 We'll see if that actually works.

01:10:48.580 But for the time being, they got that on the go.

01:10:51.580 Now, we've got other reports that are coming up.

01:10:54.000 So these are the people that want to make a universal basic income scheme.

01:10:56.980 You know, there's a Senate bill that'll probably die.

01:10:59.420 There's been private members bills.

01:11:00.680 It's not right around the corner yet, but they're definitely stabbing around that,

01:11:04.220 and they want to do it.

01:11:05.400 The Canadian Revenue Agency paid millions in wage subsidies.

01:11:08.280 Talk about, again, the subsidies going up.

01:11:10.100 Millions in subsidies to insolvent companies.

01:11:12.240 This shows how competent and good our government is with our money.

01:11:16.420 Revenue Minister Diane LeBoutilier.

01:11:19.340 a bit about Hillier. That's part of why I'm a Western independent supporter too. I won't have

01:11:23.260 to learn how to pronounce all those French names if we move aside. There'll still be some domestic

01:11:26.240 ones. Either way, in a report, wouldn't disclose the total costs of the subsidies paid to insolvent

01:11:32.460 firms. They're insolvent. Why are you giving them money? That's our government, isn't it?

01:11:38.700 And they won't give the answers. She said there was confidentiality provisions in the Income Tax

01:11:43.460 Act. Well, you know what? When you're taking our money, I think the confidentiality can be set

01:11:47.680 aside. It's our money. And, uh, yeah, so this is a conservative member of parliament, Earl Drieschen

01:11:54.400 was, uh, requesting data on those, uh, payments, you know, uh, on how many of them were, all we

01:11:59.280 know is millions. Uh, the, the average payment, let's see, let's see, we've got, uh, payments

01:12:07.640 under the a hundred billion dollar program, average 218,000 per company. And again, that's

01:12:12.720 not all the ones that were insolvent. We don't know. We know 787 of those were insolvent. So I

01:12:19.720 mean, just doing the math on that, it's well into the millions and millions of dollars that have

01:12:26.320 gone into these insolvent companies. I mean, I guess they were solvent enough to make an

01:12:30.240 application for free money, but not more to carry on. So just a handout, I guess, to a company owner

01:12:37.180 going broke. Welcome to our government mandated things. And that's one of the things with their

01:12:43.700 agreement. You know, they're talking about this dental care program. This is another thing with

01:12:47.860 the alliance coming together. They're saying it's going to cost $4.6 billion. Come on.

01:12:52.300 Again, we know, as I said, with the Trans Mountain, that tripled. This is going to cost

01:12:57.420 probably, I mean, I don't know. It's going to be tens of billions, probably. We can't

01:13:02.140 pay for the teeth of everybody without a massive, massive new spending program. And I know they're

01:13:07.060 talk about easing it in, it'll start with low-income people and children and things like

01:13:11.180 that. Guys, we can do some healthcare reform. We can do a lot of things into where it can pull in

01:13:16.160 dental and pharmacare, but just bringing in yet another program and tossing a pile of money at

01:13:21.720 it isn't going to help any of us at all. We need to reform the entire system and perhaps including

01:13:27.500 some dental coverage within it is an alternative. But this idea out of them, no, this is just money

01:13:33.080 being tossed into what will turn into a black hole. And again, punishing us who pay, pay our

01:13:40.700 taxes, work hard. I talked a bit about that before. In January, Jane and I went all the way down to

01:13:46.300 Arizona, went to Algodone's and got some dental work done, actually. And it cost $3,000 to get

01:13:54.080 that done. It was $12,000 we were quoted up here. Bottom line is, we're paying our own bills. That's

01:13:59.620 the way it goes. And we chopped around because Canada, we've got some brutally high costs for

01:14:05.980 health or for dental care up here going on. And we've voted with our wall. But the responsibility

01:14:12.100 is ours. It's ours. We pay for our own teeth. So again, you got to remember, we make enough

01:14:17.220 probably that initially on this program, we wouldn't qualify for the dental care. So it just

01:14:20.540 means we have to pay more taxes to fix somebody else's teeth. You know, we're willing to travel

01:14:24.660 to Mexico to get ours done in a cost effective manner and pay out of pocket. And at the same

01:14:28.580 time, we have to pay more out of pocket for somebody else who isn't making enough money on

01:14:31.540 their own. That's not my problem. This welfare state is getting really big and out of control.

01:14:38.440 And we don't owe everybody everything, guys. I mean, we've got a baseline. We don't want people

01:14:44.820 to starve to death. We don't want people thrown out on the streets. But we also don't have to

01:14:48.980 give them prime dental care when we can't afford it ourselves working our butts off.

01:14:53.000 But this is where we're going with the socialism that is going to come out of the deal between

01:14:57.660 Justin Trudeau and Jagmeet Singh. You know that this alliance wasn't going to come without some

01:15:02.660 big conditions. The other thing, of course, as Dave mentioned in the update as well, the government's

01:15:08.000 going to ban replacement workers for federally regulated private sector companies. That's just 0.98

01:15:16.360 giving away these companies in the private sector to unions. They will be owned by unions. Look,

01:15:22.920 unions are a right and the ability to strike is a right. But you've got to allow the push and pull

01:15:31.140 and the balance. If you take away the company's ability to bring in replacement workers, you've

01:15:36.440 given the company away to the union. We've made Canada that much less appealing as a place to

01:15:40.940 invest when we really can't afford it right now. But again, this is the deal that Trudeau has signed

01:15:46.720 with the socialist devil. And this is what we're getting into, you know, um, we are in some serious,

01:15:55.020 serious trouble. Uh, another thing, uh, we got a bunch of coverage. We had some video and things

01:15:59.020 like that. Uh, uh, Oh, let's wait. Wildrose, a dick statement. Oh, mine was a dick statement

01:16:05.780 because fewer and fewer people can afford to fly to Mexico. Oh, I'm sorry. Wildrose. I know it's

01:16:11.000 funny. You talk conservative all the time, but we've seen that stuff before in there and you

01:16:13.940 get all upset when we talk about privatizing health care. Are you a socialist or not? We need

01:16:18.580 reform. And I couldn't afford to just fly to Mexico. We actually drove there on a low budget

01:16:22.720 because otherwise we'd have to pay $12,000 here. We did that to save money. Hey, if you want to be

01:16:29.200 lazy and piss away your money, let your teeth rot out. That's up to you. You want to get them 0.98

01:16:33.660 repaired, save your dollars and nickels and go get them done. That's called personal responsibility.

01:16:37.800 I don't owe you teeth. Now, debt clock tour, speaking to taxpayers and the Taxpayers Federation,

01:16:44.720 explaining where the feds are throwing money out the window. But this was a neat one.

01:16:48.240 They're even paying for European sex toy shows and government employee expenses. 0.68

01:16:54.560 This is where our money's going. We're buying dildos in Europe and not even domestic ones.

01:17:00.800 I mean, I don't get where the government gets their money. I mean, if we're going to have a

01:17:03.860 special on butt plugs for people that are tax funded, shouldn't those stands for it be in

01:17:07.380 Canada, at least. We have to pay full price over here for those things. Well, most people who get

01:17:11.280 those kind of things. This is problematic. We know, and unfortunately, it's comical, but it's

01:17:15.800 dark comedy. This is what our leaders, this is what the people who take the money by force out

01:17:22.000 of your wallet want to do with your money. And dash, riproxing, dental health is important. I

01:17:27.960 agree. Absolutely, I agree. That's why I pay to have it done. But how far do we go? How universal

01:17:36.340 household do we go? How much do we punish the working people to pay the others to get their 0.89

01:17:39.940 stuff done? Emergency dental work is already covered. You know, if it's a medical emergency,

01:17:45.140 you're covered. And there's a lot already for people on the lower end of the income scale to

01:17:50.180 get, again, basic dental coverage. These programs are getting further and further, and it's not

01:17:54.620 going to get better and better. And it's going to get more and more expensive. When you get

01:17:57.200 government-provided services, the price goes up. We will all lose. Do you want dental service to be

01:18:02.060 as good as our health care service? How long do you want to wait on a waiting line for universal

01:18:09.660 dental service? Dash, what's the difference between paying a doctor and a dentist? Well,

01:18:13.580 a dentist is a doctor. What is the difference? I mean, it's illegal to pay a doctor in Canada.

01:18:20.460 That's why people leave the country to get preferred health care. It is legal for us to

01:18:25.260 pay a dentist. So that's why we leave the country to get preferred dental care.

01:18:27.980 we need to reform the whole system that's what i'm talking about the whole thing

01:18:31.980 and that dental is part of your health care but if we're just going to set aside another giant

01:18:37.860 bloated program to give quote unquote free dental care to canadians it's only going to make it worse

01:18:43.940 again it's going to be similar to the current health care now you're going to be waiting for

01:18:47.500 months to get dental treatment and you're going to get lackluster treatment perhaps because people

01:18:52.460 won't be able to shop around as appropriately i mean i'm sure there's some fantastic uh

01:18:57.300 dental. Well, we know there's great dentists up here. There's great doctors. There's great nurses.

01:19:01.720 Our healthcare providers are typically top-notch in Canada, but our system is sick and all the way

01:19:09.180 through. And if we want to bundle dental into healthcare, sure, but we've got to do it carefully,

01:19:14.820 not just getting another bloated socialist program, because we are all going to fail for it.

01:19:19.280 King Doop saying, yeah, if you think the waiting time for dental is bad now, wait till it's free.

01:19:22.840 and that's what we're getting to. So at least the Canadian Taxpayers Federation is out and

01:19:28.400 you know exposing some of the spending on things like that and where those money go and I know

01:19:34.540 dental care is expensive. That's why we had to travel to get it done but it doesn't mean that

01:19:39.160 it's the government's obligation to suddenly come up with a way to make it affordable for everybody.

01:19:42.860 Guys, we can't afford to make everything quote-unquote free. It doesn't work that way.

01:19:47.620 Check the Soviet Union. They tried it. Venezuela tried it too. It doesn't work. You've got to find

01:19:52.120 to balance. It doesn't mean leaving everybody uncovered. It means we need to change the whole

01:19:59.500 system. That's all. I'm not looking to have people suffering without coverage, but to just bring in

01:20:03.880 another program isn't the way to go. BC, we got unions who are fighting to keep children masked

01:20:11.200 in schools because the science doesn't matter. It really doesn't anymore. That's hardly an update.

01:20:17.000 Unfortunately, these battles just won't stop. It was kind of like talking with Thomas in here

01:20:23.960 when he was on before. And we've got fear. They want to keep us afraid. They want to keep us

01:20:31.520 afraid all the time. So it doesn't matter what the actual science says anymore. It doesn't matter

01:20:37.220 whether it actually saves people or makes them healthy. They just want to keep scared because

01:20:40.540 scared people are easy to control. And that's what's going on in BC. Either way, I'm going to

01:20:45.620 go. I've ranted out. There's a lot to cover tomorrow. I'm going to have actually Senator

01:20:49.620 elect Erica Baroudi's on. I've been talking to leadership candidates with the Conservative

01:20:53.580 Party of Canada. I've been pinning them all down on that to say, hey, are you going to appoint

01:20:57.700 our elected senators or not? And so far, well, Sheree kind of talked around it.

01:21:05.300 Polly Eve said, told me he would most definitely do so. And as I get all of those candidates on,

01:21:10.720 And I'm going to keep asking him on that question.

01:21:13.060 And we'll talk to Ms. Barutis,

01:21:15.880 Ms. Barutis, I think I called her Baruts, 1.00

01:21:18.180 about how that's going as a senator and waiting,

01:21:21.760 you know, in Alberta.

01:21:23.620 And I believe I might have Jaime Rubenstein

01:21:27.020 back on tomorrow to catch up with that

01:21:29.240 because I had a scheduling mess up on my behalf.

01:21:31.100 So thank you all for tuning in with me today, guys.

01:21:33.940 Make sure to watch for the pipeline tonight.

01:21:35.360 We're going to be talking about a lot more of that.

01:21:37.420 And watch for those specials, subscribe and all those things.

01:21:39.620 You know, Melanie did some great interviews this last few days, some exclusive stuff.

01:21:43.780 Subscribe on YouTube, Facebook, Rumble, all those things so you can see these news items

01:21:47.800 as they break, get those exclusive interviews.

01:21:50.320 Thank you for the interaction, guys.

01:21:52.140 Even when I rip back at you, I do appreciate it.

01:21:55.400 And I will see you all tomorrow at 1130.

01:22:09.620 We'll be right back.

Western Standard - March 24, 2022

LIVE - Triggered： Will the Trans Mountain expansion ever be finished？

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