Western Standard - April 01, 2021


March 31, 2021


Episode Stats


Length

39 minutes

Words per minute

164.4424

Word count

6,432

Sentence count

358


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

In this episode of The Pipeline, we're joined by our brand new BC Political Columnist, Nathan Guida, to talk about the latest lockdown in British Columbia, and whether or not it's worse than the ones in the Soviet Union.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
00:00:00.000 .
00:00:30.000 .
00:01:00.000 .
00:01:30.000 Thank you.
00:02:00.000 Thank you.
00:02:30.000 G'day, I'm Derek Fildebrandt. Welcome to The Pipeline. Today is March 31st, 2012. Pleased to be with you. Today I'm joined by Dave Naylor, news editor of the Western Standard. G'day, Dave.
00:02:57.640 Hey, Dirk.
00:02:59.180 And Corey Morgan, Alberta political columnist and host of the Corey Morgan Show.
00:03:06.660 Good day, Corey.
00:03:07.300 Good afternoon.
00:03:08.480 And a very special guest on the show today, Nathan Guida, who is our brand new BC political
00:03:17.560 columnist and will soon be launching as host of the Mountain Standard Time, another show
00:03:26.480 that'll be playing tuesday wednesday and thursday how you doing nathan i'm doing very well thanks
00:03:31.440 for having me on pleasure to have you he's coming to us from beautiful city of prince george i drove
00:03:37.360 the deck clock through it once but i really just picked it up from the airport uh so i haven't i
00:03:42.000 can't really say i've spent much time so i'm assuming it's beautiful i'm taking your word for
00:03:46.000 it i'm hometown others might not as much right on okay well uh today we're gonna be getting into
00:03:57.200 we've got a great show uh british columbia is under a full lockdown again um we've had one
00:04:04.800 lockdown yes what about second lockdown actually isn't this third lockdown we're gonna come to that
00:04:09.680 especially with Nathan. We've got a group of very prominent Albertans, some doctors,
00:04:20.160 former high-ranking military and emergency management officials have challenged
00:04:25.520 Jason Kenney and Dina Hinshaw to a debate. We're going to find out if they have any intention of
00:04:30.720 taking it up. Spoiler, they don't. And Pastor James Coates is free from jail. That's right,
00:04:37.760 We're no longer jailing people for preaching, at least in Alberta. So at least we're somewhat
00:04:44.720 more free than the Soviet Union now. We're going to get into all three topics, but first we want
00:04:49.680 to thank our Western Standard members. If you're not yet a member of the Western Standard, please
00:04:54.480 check it out. You can try the Western Standard for 15 days free. See if you like it. You're
00:05:00.640 supporting bailout free Western owned and Western operated media. Check it out at
00:05:05.360 to westernstandardonline.com membership. And today, of course, our show is sponsored by
00:05:11.820 Kyren's Way. Kyren's Way provides natural, non-pharmaceutical treatments for stress relief,
00:05:18.680 for anxiety, the kind of things that plague a lot of people a lot of the time, but especially
00:05:24.200 plague most of the people most of the time right now. Check out kyrensway.com for more information
00:05:30.560 for very affordable treatments for your stress and anxiety that kind of thing well let's um
00:05:36.960 let's jump into it uh british columbia under a full lockdown again uh dave why don't you set the
00:05:44.080 table for us the government announced this week derek that uh full lockdown again there'll be no
00:05:51.280 more indoor dining allowed so you can't go into a restaurant you can stay outside if you like
00:05:58.480 and hope your weather is nice and and it's not raining but only restaurants can open for
00:06:06.080 takeout and delivery that no nobody can actually go in it so it's just a return to return to the
00:06:13.360 old methods british columbia like all of the provinces across canada seen an increase recently
00:06:19.520 in the number of covet cases and the number of variant cases so they are doing a sharp three week
00:06:27.840 circuit breaker. I know Ontario is also going into a lockdown as of tomorrow. So those two
00:06:36.940 provinces, full lockdowns there. Nathan, I obviously really want to hear from you here.
00:06:45.420 How many lockdowns is this now? Is this second? Is this third? Is this fourth?
00:06:52.300 um how many lockdowns has this been now and what is the reaction in british columbia to it
00:06:58.540 i think we're essentially at lockdown 2.5 uh the original lockdown that started about this time
00:07:05.580 last year uh got us into well into may i believe originally and then some restrictions were
00:07:13.700 relaxed uh through the summer and into the fall and then right after the election uh where of
00:07:19.620 course, the BC NDP won a majority. They brought back in the lockdown about a month later in
00:07:26.340 November. We've been in that lockdown ever since. That lockdown originally consisted
00:07:31.860 of really essentially the churches being closed. There wasn't really much else that changed. It
00:07:37.740 was worship services that were mostly the most affected. And of course, there was still indoor
00:07:42.940 dining. Of course, you could still go into Costco and Walmart. You just couldn't go into places that
00:07:47.280 were places of worship. And then it appeared that we might have an Easter miracle. Obviously,
00:07:53.060 we're right before the Easter weekend here, Holy Thursday, Good Friday, and of course,
00:07:58.180 Easter Vigil and Resurrection Sunday are coming. Of course, in other faiths, there are very big
00:08:02.500 days ahead as well. And what happened was it appeared that Dr. Bonnie Henry would give us
00:08:08.860 the chance to go back to church at a very reduced capacity, and then out of nowhere,
00:08:13.900 that was ripped away from us simultaneously indoor dining was also suspended well and that lovely
00:08:23.680 glad you could lead the way Corey do you think premier Jason Kenny you think premier Scott Moe
00:08:34.360 how closely do you think they're watching this and how likely do you think they are to follow
00:08:39.700 in the footsteps of Horgan and Ford well then the worst part is they're
00:08:44.080 probably watching the polls and communicating for internals not the
00:08:47.180 actual health aspect and the maddening and almost insulting thing with this is
00:08:52.600 when they bring in these lockdowns they keep saying it's because you guys
00:08:55.120 misbehaved if you guys would just behave yourselves we wouldn't have to keep
00:08:59.080 doing this and you know what this is a government is supposed to be supporting
00:09:01.900 me not my nagging parent if only I didn't go to Hawaii or Mexico yeah no
00:09:06.920 doubt you know and there's a lot of questions on the efficacy of these lockdowns i mean it's
00:09:11.560 inconsistent you know we're really looking on the state side texas mississippi south dakota their
00:09:16.520 numbers are still dropping and they opened right up california has had some of the strongest
00:09:20.440 restrictions in north america and their numbers are through the roof there's factors there's
00:09:24.920 something going on but it seems that these government restrictions really don't necessarily
00:09:28.760 they have a negligible impact on it but it's the go-to for government every time they get scared
00:09:32.920 and it's crushing businesses.
00:09:35.400 They really keep setting aside what the cost of these lockdowns are.
00:09:39.400 I mean, in Alberta, we're having one to two people a day dying now.
00:09:42.100 I mean, it's terrible for those one or two senior citizens,
00:09:44.720 but how many people are committing suicide?
00:09:46.680 How many people are going bankrupt?
00:09:48.360 How much domestic abuse is going on, substance abuse, overdoses?
00:09:52.500 We've really got to start getting real,
00:09:54.060 and this seesaw lockdown thing is terrible,
00:09:56.580 and there seems to be no end to it.
00:09:57.740 I'll bet you, Corey, dollars to donuts.
00:10:00.440 Premier Kenney's just waiting to get through the Easter holiday period and then he will shut the
00:10:06.580 province down again. We've exceeded the 300 mark in hospitalizations. That's back up. We're getting
00:10:12.840 more than 300 variants a day. I'm sure he's getting Dr. Hinshaw whispering in his ear,
00:10:19.880 lockdown, lockdown, lockdown. So does he have the political capital left? You were telling us
00:10:26.060 earlier talking to a restaurant owner who told you that she'll have to close
00:10:30.620 their doors if they are if another lockdown comes yeah they can't take
00:10:34.460 anymore they're hanging by a thread they've taken out the loans they've
00:10:37.400 taken out the subsidies they've taken up but they're all just barely hanging in
00:10:40.760 there one more slap to them and a lot of them are just saying you know what I
00:10:43.640 might as well just pull the pin go bankrupt and see what happens in a few
00:10:47.420 years the greatest tragedy of this all is that I've already lost my favorite bar
00:10:51.260 in Alberta, a worst.
00:10:53.580 There's no more German beer hall left in Calgary.
00:10:56.760 I mean, either someone's got to open it up
00:10:58.860 or I'm going to sell the standard
00:11:00.500 and I'm going to open a bar.
00:11:02.560 You don't know what you're getting.
00:11:03.880 Yeah, I probably shouldn't do it.
00:11:06.320 You can call it the pipeline.
00:11:09.760 There we go.
00:11:11.860 Nathan, I mean, I unfortunately fear
00:11:16.100 that we're going to be following in your footsteps soon.
00:11:19.180 But, you know, what's really the reaction on the ground here? Are British Columbians, I know here the government loves the, Jason Kenney is kind of envious of Doug Ford. The more he cracks down in Ontario, the more his popularity goes up. We seem to have quite the opposite phenomenon here. The government seems to think its popularity is vital, or that lockdowns are vital to maintaining public support, but the more they do it, the more it goes down.
00:11:45.940 um what's what's the politics to this on the ground in british columbia if uh you're you're
00:11:52.440 now in another lockdown lockdown 2.5 as you said uh is this going to have any effect on the
00:12:00.040 popularity of the government i know they were re-elected with a big majority um but also how
00:12:04.140 are the bc liberals handling this are they um are they at all different uh than how the bc uh ndp
00:12:10.160 is handling it i think something that's interesting about what happened last year
00:12:14.560 is that the B.C. Liberals, for the most part, played the lapdog to the B.C. NDP.
00:12:20.240 They didn't resist any of their projects or policies around the pandemic
00:12:24.780 or maybe question them or bring up some kind of oppositional sort of ideas,
00:12:29.480 alternatives to the way that things were going.
00:12:31.540 For that, they were rewarded with an absolutely crushing defeat at the polls.
00:12:37.340 And so I think without contrast, without providing an opposition,
00:12:40.740 any party, and that goes for any party, left wing or right wing,
00:12:43.420 is always in deep danger of losing its supporters because what's the alternative? They could vote
00:12:48.120 for you, but they'll get it with the other guy. I think coming back to what's going on in British
00:12:52.040 Columbia on the ground, there seems to be essentially, as there always is, at least
00:12:56.240 kind of four camps. You have your extremities both for and against the lockdown, and then you
00:13:00.720 have people who are kind of in the fair to Midland. Where it goes for us in the northern interior is
00:13:06.320 that for the most part, it doesn't really seem to affect us that much. Of course, it affects us when
00:13:10.160 We try to get into a church door, and now the restaurants are closed.
00:13:14.320 And, of course, that's a deep tragedy, and these people need to be compensated.
00:13:17.820 And, honestly, they just need their businesses reopened.
00:13:19.920 It's absolutely ridiculous, and they were given no warning.
00:13:22.340 But the fact of the matter remains is that it just feels like it's all above our heads.
00:13:26.960 The average person, I don't think, really tunes in anymore to when Dr. Henry speaks.
00:13:30.960 No offense, Dr. Henry.
00:13:32.860 And the fact of the matter is it just seems like so much hoopla.
00:13:36.160 We've been a year into this.
00:13:37.720 Things have gone up.
00:13:38.700 Things have gone down.
00:13:39.460 what does any of it mean i don't know if anyone really has a clue anymore and nobody really
00:13:43.300 cares they want to just move on with their lives well that's uh certainly depressing but probably
00:13:51.320 unfortunately correct uh nathan i know you got to run you're here for a good time not a long time
00:13:56.300 but we appreciate the time you gave us uh just a reminder for everyone nathan guida
00:14:01.600 is going to be uh starting mountain standard time a show that's going to run
00:14:06.040 10 to 12
00:14:08.460 Mountain Standard Time
00:14:09.920 every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday
00:14:11.700 and 9 to 11
00:14:14.660 Pacific Standard Time
00:14:16.220 where you are. It's going to be a great
00:14:18.580 show. We look forward to having you on
00:14:20.320 starting next week.
00:14:23.320 Thank you so much.
00:14:25.240 Very good. Okay, you take care, Nathan.
00:14:27.640 Absolutely.
00:14:30.840 Well, that's
00:14:31.960 just wonderful, but it sounds
00:14:34.360 like there's probably a bit more of a debate
00:14:35.920 about lockdowns, about mask restrictions. You know, the war on fun, I think, has now gone nuclear,
00:14:44.240 it's fair to say. There's a bit more of a debate on that, I think, here in Alberta, where I think
00:14:50.240 opposition is, you know, there is opposition in every province, but I think I'm very proud that
00:14:55.040 the opposition is the largest here in Alberta. We had a very interesting debate challenge,
00:15:02.000 I think yesterday come out that, Dave, you had the scoop on. Why don't you tell us what happened?
00:15:09.380 Yeah, Dirk, this involves a group of very respected medical people, former military,
00:15:16.120 high-ranking people, and they've got together and sort of formed their own emergency response
00:15:23.060 unit, and they've issued a formal challenge to Premier Kenney to come out and publicly debate
00:15:29.560 them. I think he gave them a list of six questions that they were willing to debate. They had a
00:15:35.480 moderator all picked out. And they're basically against all of the Alberta COVID lockdown
00:15:41.880 regulations saying they're doing more harm than more good. So the challenge was issued.
00:15:48.760 One of the people interestingly involved is Dr. Dennis Modry, who we've all dealt with before.
00:15:55.320 He's a world-famous heart surgeon in Alberta, performed the first heart transplant at the
00:16:01.160 University of Alberta in 1985. He's got an absolute alphabet of initials past his name that
00:16:09.000 I don't even understand, but he's very well respected. He wrote a letter to the Premier
00:16:15.000 last year that got literally hundreds of thousands of views worldwide. Kenny finally responded a
00:16:20.920 a couple weeks ago. And Dr. Modray has actually responded today. I've got a hold of a letter
00:16:26.040 he has sent to the Premier this morning. I'll be publishing that as soon as we're done the show
00:16:32.220 here. And again, he doubles down and challenges Kenny to a public debate. Western Standard reached
00:16:41.740 out to Premier Kenny's office for comment. And we've heard not a peep back. But I think there's
00:16:48.840 Two chances of a debate. One is slim and the other is none. I don't think it's going to happen, Derek.
00:16:56.480 Thanks, Dave. Corey, Dr. Modry originally penned some private letters to Jason Kenney.
00:17:05.520 Both Kenney and Redman, Colonel Redman, they both wrote, I think this was this in November or was this December?
00:17:15.320 I think the private letters were in November.
00:17:16.600 Private letters were in November. Nothing happened. Both of these gentlemen came to us. We published Dr. Dennis Modry's open letter in the Western Center in December. Up until that time, at least, it was our most read story ever, this open letter. It was very fascinating stuff.
00:17:34.400 uh kenny has only just now responded to to dennis modry um after this has now gotten a lot of a lot
00:17:42.160 of play finally and uh is this modry's reply to the reply on our site now or no not yet uh still
00:17:48.920 it'll be coming up uh he it's a very detailed response uh paragraph by paragraph uh he cuts
00:17:55.600 apart the premier's arguments uh very interesting lots of links in there uh so yeah make sure you
00:18:02.300 check back at westernstandardonline.com and we'll put all three letters up and you can you can judge
00:18:08.500 for yourself we should do a poll which one people like more absolutely although i i might predict
00:18:13.640 the results from our yeah yeah you don't need to be a top pollster to figure out i i i think i know
00:18:18.280 our readership well enough to know how uh people would vote on that um cory how how damaging do
00:18:24.720 you think this is of the government um this back you know there is dr motory's letter but now
00:18:29.240 others that the debate challenged Kenny and Hinshaw. When I first saw this come across my
00:18:34.000 desk, I think my reaction was, yeah, I don't think they're taking it up. I won't even ask you if you
00:18:40.180 think they're going to take it up because there's no chance they're taking it up. But do you think
00:18:44.800 this is going to have much effect on things? Because these are not, it's not you and me
00:18:48.420 challenging them to a debate. We have opinions on these matters, but we're not experts. These people
00:18:53.320 are incredible experts though. This is Dr. Dennis Modry, one of the most respected and renowned
00:18:58.240 doctors still alive in Alberta today. Redmond was in the letter, right? Yes. Redmond, a retired
00:19:06.160 Lieutenant Colonel David Redmond, who was also the head of Alberta's emergency response
00:19:11.680 agency for the province here. These are not casual people. These are not angry people
00:19:19.620 commenting on a Twitter thread. These are about as credible and high ranking as you can get.
00:19:25.140 Do you think this is going to have any kind of effect?
00:19:27.280 I think over time.
00:19:28.420 I mean, this debate's happening whether the government likes it or not.
00:19:30.800 So they would be well served to start participating in it and quit hiding behind their bureaucrat
00:19:36.480 health experts because we're seeing that across the country.
00:19:39.180 And just these are doctors.
00:19:40.880 They do care for the people, the head health experts for governments.
00:19:45.480 But they're basement bureaucrats and they've been stuck in this role for a year.
00:19:49.560 And I think they've lost touch with reality outside of their bubbles, to be honest.
00:19:52.780 the old vapid case people would make in the early part of the pandemic is you're not a doctor you
00:19:57.700 can't speak to it you're not a doctor you can't speak to it well we've had a number of doctors
00:20:00.820 on and if you haven't seen Danielle Smith's specials with the western standard go to our
00:20:04.620 youtube channel look back she has sat two hour interviews with doctors medical doctors speaking
00:20:10.740 on this there's a lot of questions there's a lot of debate the great Barrington declaration
00:20:14.640 that was a story that recently recently came up on the standard it is this is signatories
00:20:20.180 There's thousands of doctors, medical experts that have questions, they're concerned, they're
00:20:25.280 looking at, you know, how effective lockdowns are, how this virus moves.
00:20:29.300 It's not, you know, there's not just one solid opinion.
00:20:32.060 It seems the governments are all stuck in one solid opinion, but more and more are coming
00:20:36.080 out of the woodworks.
00:20:37.080 This discourse is happening, whether they like it or not, and they would be well served
00:20:40.380 to take part.
00:20:41.380 But no, I don't think they will.
00:20:42.380 I mean, we saw with the last announcement, Jason Kenney was hiding.
00:20:44.480 He left it to Dr. Henshaw and to the health minister to come out.
00:20:48.380 got to come out and show some leadership. Yeah, I don't think anything's happening,
00:20:53.260 but I think this probably increased the pain a little bit more when we enter our third lockdown.
00:21:00.460 We're still under a semi-lockdown right now, but I think if we start falling backwards here,
00:21:07.260 I don't know. I think the government's got no moral authority to do this. We had the Snowbird
00:21:10.540 scandal. We had them throwing pastors in jail. We had them trying to find businesses for reopening.
00:21:19.900 I mean, the only reason we got to any partial reopening whatsoever was the restaurant revolution
00:21:24.140 we had with Whistle Stop and other small independent restaurants opening. Then we got
00:21:28.940 this phased reopening because the government knew they couldn't stop it. I know you've written very
00:21:31.900 well on this in the past. You've covered it in detail on the news side. If they lock us down
00:21:37.900 again i i've got a feeling that a lot of these restaurants are going to say no we we know what
00:21:43.820 happened the last two times we closed the only reason we got the real one again is because we
00:21:48.220 said we denied the authority of the government yet the authority of the state to destroy our
00:21:53.100 businesses anymore um i i like to hear from maybe both of you but do you think there's a significant
00:22:01.020 chance that a lot of businesses just refuse to close again if they try this well it's a good
00:22:07.260 question during does the government have the political capital to go to lockdown three uh i
00:22:12.700 think the increase in civil discontent will be would be huge uh pastor coates who will get to
00:22:19.340 in a few minutes has urged people to continue to peacefully publicly demonstrate uh the
00:22:25.180 demonstrations on every saturday in downtown calgary are seem to be growing by leaps and bounds
00:22:31.260 certainly the the comments and notes that we get here at the western standard
00:22:35.900 or overwhelmingly people people have just had enough uh i think the other thing is that uh
00:22:42.940 when people are taken to court after being charged all the charges are seemingly being dropped
00:22:49.980 so they seem to have lost that that threat that hammer over people that if you don't follow the
00:22:55.980 law you're going to get charged because apparently the crowns don't think uh charges are going to
00:23:00.300 stick i know we had one reader uh from uh clint upton uh upham who uh says that he thinks youtube
00:23:07.760 took down uh the interview with daniel smith and the three doctors i think it's there you might
00:23:11.980 have to click and look under live broadcasts past live broadcasts it makes it a little harder to
00:23:15.780 find but if you click on that you'll find all the live ones it gives it a different category
00:23:18.620 but i'm pretty confident it's still there clint although i'm certainly going to check as soon as
00:23:22.340 we're done because that was an important interview i just made a note now yeah that was and that was
00:23:26.420 record viewership there's a ton of people have watched that on youtube and facebook combined
00:23:30.520 and podcast downloads and we actually should start reminding people to subscribe to the podcast if
00:23:34.840 they're not a lot of you are watching this on um on facebook live or on youtube live uh but make
00:23:42.120 sure you subscribe to the podcast you can catch it after the fact very easily uh we're replacing
00:23:46.500 talk radio at least we're gonna try um but yeah we're gonna i've been worried about that particular
00:23:52.060 video getting pulled down because we had three doctors that in the d platform doc show um and
00:23:58.300 we they were certainly contradicting the who contradicting fauci in the states or theresa
00:24:02.940 tam here uh so we've been worried about getting it pulled down best i know it hasn't been pulled
00:24:07.660 down yet um so we've uploaded it to some alternative areas in case they do pull it down but
00:24:13.340 uh yeah we'll check and make sure uh okay well let's let's move on uh i guess this is
00:24:19.500 Because these things just segue very nicely and easily sometimes.
00:24:23.700 Pastor James Coates, Danielle has interviewed both Pastor Coates' wife, Aaron Coates,
00:24:34.200 and just last night interviewed Pastor James Coates himself.
00:24:40.380 He is now free from jail.
00:24:43.920 Dave, why don't you tell us about his release, the conditions of the release?
00:24:48.640 I know they had Sunday service just this last Sunday.
00:24:53.700 Why don't you tell us about his release so far and how Sunday service went?
00:24:58.620 He's been released with no conditions attached.
00:25:01.740 You remember he's jailed for more than a month for refusing to abide by a condition to stop preaching.
00:25:06.720 But he's now out.
00:25:07.800 He can do what he wants.
00:25:09.260 And he showed up on Sunday back at his packed Grace Life Church and actually did preach.
00:25:17.500 Stunningly, the RCMP and Alberta Health Services attempted to enter the church minutes before he took the pulpit and were blocked by church elders.
00:25:28.580 So it was a great interview last night with Danielle Smith and Pastor James.
00:25:33.380 And he talked about that. I mean, just how stunning it was to see the RCMP show up, you know, after just being getting released from jail. Imagine the nerves that that would cause.
00:25:46.420 He told Danielle about his time in jail, two weeks in solitary COVID confinement, only allowed out of his cell a couple times a day for 15 minutes at a time.
00:25:58.460 He said the food wasn't good.
00:26:00.580 He woke up one morning dizzy, couldn't get out of bed because of lack of nutrients.
00:26:06.920 When he was released into the general population, things improved on the food-wise because he could access the canteen.
00:26:15.080 He quickly learned the prison code.
00:26:18.260 You don't call other inmates certain names.
00:26:21.980 Other inmates came to him for actual pastoring, and they read Bible passages and sang songs.
00:26:29.500 And now he's out.
00:26:31.160 He was still in contact with his cellmate.
00:26:33.800 So he spent more than a month in there.
00:26:35.680 He was out, took to the pulpit on Sunday.
00:26:38.180 Told Danielle last night he still feels like public enemy number one.
00:26:42.340 He says he's like a marked man with provincial health authorities, but he vowed to continue doing what he does.
00:26:49.640 A big religious weekend, as you know, coming up.
00:26:53.520 He'll likely hold a Good Friday service and a Sunday service.
00:26:57.600 And I'm sure the RCMP will be in attendance again.
00:27:01.240 And he did say in terms of the next lockdown, he's pleased with the number of Albertans demonstrating.
00:27:07.840 He stressed specifically that it needs to be peaceful demonstrations, but he said that's
00:27:13.920 the only way that Alberta government's going to change.
00:27:16.160 And he had some very harsh words for the Premier Kenney.
00:27:19.340 He said he voted for him last election, says he won't make that mistake again this election,
00:27:25.780 and says unless Kenney, quote unquote, repents, the UCP will be wiped out in the next election.
00:27:31.840 Derek.
00:27:32.840 Wow.
00:27:33.840 You left out the best part of the interview where you told us about his tattoo and he
00:27:36.840 He was trading Bibles for smokes.
00:27:40.240 Yeah, you know, and he had to hide his shank in his Bible.
00:27:43.680 It was all pretty dramatic stuff.
00:27:45.960 Yeah, yeah.
00:27:46.600 I mean, he learned the code pretty quick.
00:27:52.280 Corey, yeah, we're obviously coming up to Good Friday and Easter here,
00:27:57.700 probably the second most important round of holidays on the Christian calendar.
00:28:06.840 how do you
00:28:09.400 especially if you think we're going into
00:28:11.440 I guess the consensus I guess
00:28:13.520 around this table is they'll probably wait until Easter
00:28:15.360 itself is over before locking us down
00:28:17.200 they're probably just trying
00:28:19.600 to stir up trouble if they lock us down
00:28:21.300 before Easter and Good Friday
00:28:22.660 but I mean
00:28:25.200 the previous, the government
00:28:27.220 would tell
00:28:29.600 Pastor Coates, okay we're going to pay this bail
00:28:31.380 and you're going to abide by these conditions for release
00:28:33.200 and he told them in a very polite and Christian
00:28:35.560 way to piss off
00:28:37.460 I'm sure using much more pastorly language than you or I or Dave would,
00:28:41.620 but he held out and was now released without conditions.
00:28:47.580 But we're going now into very possibly another lockdown.
00:28:54.000 How much of a defeat for the government is this?
00:28:57.420 It looked very bad to be locking up a preacher who at least,
00:29:02.860 I'd say probably about at least half of Albertans think should not have been locked up, certainly
00:29:08.680 more than half of people who voted or intend to still vote UCP. How much of a problem was
00:29:13.680 Pastor Coates for the government? Well, he was and remains one. And, you know, locking somebody up,
00:29:18.920 I mean, it can't be understated. I mean, for a month, a person that's not, you know, a criminal
00:29:23.700 bent. I mean, I enjoyed the hospitality of the Calgary drunk tank for one night back at the start
00:29:28.260 the 90s. And that shook me up. I'll never forget that smell. I couldn't imagine 30 days as really
00:29:33.540 a law-abiding type of citizen in remand with that sort of a crowd. It's a terrible thing for just
00:29:41.220 pursuing your faith. I mean, it's unimaginable. And we did that here and it made international news
00:29:46.580 and it embarrassed the government. And as you said, we're coming up on a huge holiday. I mean,
00:29:51.140 it means little to myself except for that discount chocolate I can buy next week.
00:29:55.380 But for a lot of people, it's very, very important.
00:29:57.500 I mean, you talk to a lot of people, I guess, who are not hardcore Christians,
00:30:00.540 but they'll go to services twice a year.
00:30:02.240 They'll go to Easter and Christmas, and they've skipped Christmas.
00:30:05.000 They skipped last year's Easter.
00:30:06.120 They're going to be coming out.
00:30:07.700 I believe the police were present at the Faith Church.
00:30:11.740 Sheila Gunn-Reed was covering that live.
00:30:13.340 They were trying to intimidate, and they're trying to push.
00:30:15.680 Like, this is scary.
00:30:16.360 This is a police state.
00:30:17.320 You are bullying religious people from going to a very important service.
00:30:21.400 I think we're going to see a lot of them coming out this weekend.
00:30:23.580 You know, we need to, as Pastor Coates said, though, and then we need more Albertans to get up, whether it's restaurants, whether it's individuals and push back.
00:30:31.520 I've said it before, and I know it'll upset people now, but we've got to get, we've got to overpower the crazies.
00:30:38.360 I'm sorry, but I've gone to these demonstrations and there are some very out there people.
00:30:42.720 There may be well-meaning, but it puts people off.
00:30:45.280 They show up and they say, I'm not coming back to this crowd again.
00:30:47.780 We need your common Albertans to come out.
00:30:49.460 I'm going to come out this Saturday to the next one.
00:30:51.000 I'll have a look around.
00:30:52.300 But if I get more people talking to me about the lizard people and Jewish conspiracies,
00:30:55.380 I'm not coming back again.
00:30:57.000 So please, Albertans do have to get up.
00:30:59.040 We have power.
00:30:59.880 We can push this government back.
00:31:02.000 But until it's dominated by common Albertans, unfortunately, these public protests backfire.
00:31:08.700 I mean, that's part of where Pastor Coates and the interview last night was clear, though.
00:31:12.620 He's a reasonable man.
00:31:13.580 He's a thinking man.
00:31:14.360 He's a peaceful man.
00:31:16.000 And this was a man that was locked up in jail for a month.
00:31:18.360 I mean, we've got rural criminals.
00:31:20.180 really unreasonable by then but uh so more people like that and more other individuals getting out
00:31:26.100 there and we can push the governments back we really can't we've got that power we've got to do
00:31:29.820 it you know uh you're bang on like i'm the kind of person who would like to attend these protests
00:31:38.160 i think the vast majority of people at them are reasonable but yeah you're you're gonna have the
00:31:42.200 odd person who's uh taken in by conspiracy theories it's microchips in our brains to
00:31:48.040 control us i mean come on guys the pandemic is real the reaction to it is not that is that's
00:31:54.900 where i draw the line and uh you know i i my own view i'd like to see more people out of these
00:32:01.380 things i think a lot more people would come out i think you'd see wicked numbers uh if we maybe
00:32:08.700 just do a better job of keeping people the lizard the lizard people signs uh in the back and hey
00:32:14.980 They have the right to come out and have their voice too.
00:32:17.080 And they're maddeningly vocal.
00:32:18.760 They're usually at the front of the line.
00:32:21.080 And everybody has a right to come out to these things.
00:32:24.420 But it's got to be dominated by rational voices.
00:32:26.100 Just please hold your own protest.
00:32:27.000 That tipping point of common Albertans coming out who are concerned has to happen.
00:32:31.620 And it might take a little while.
00:32:33.280 I'm really going to hold high hopes for this weekend.
00:32:35.160 The weather is going to be nice.
00:32:36.180 Let's see some folks come out and speak up for themselves.
00:32:39.880 Dave, before we wrap up here, what does it really look like, at least the government in Alberta and in Saskatchewan, is looking at doing, as we were discussing at the top of the show, British Columbia, Ontario, already under lockdown 2.5 or 3, depending on how you're slicing it.
00:32:58.620 What's it looking like we're going to see?
00:33:02.180 What's the feeling, what signals is the government sending about what they're going to do when we're past Easter?
00:33:07.320 Well, it's a difficult question, Derek. They're holding the cards to the chest. As you've said,
00:33:15.320 Premier Kenney is not making himself available. They're leaving it to Dr. Dina Hinshaw.
00:33:22.120 NBP leader Rachel Notley has been looking for more, I think. She was tweeting on the weekend
00:33:29.240 about Grace Life Church and how the RCMP and Jason Kenney should be doing more
00:33:33.800 to shut the Grace Life Church down.
00:33:39.020 I guess Jason Kenney's probably sitting around the cabinet right now,
00:33:43.100 just as Scott Moe is, wondering,
00:33:45.560 do we have the political capital to move into lockdown again?
00:33:51.040 I would think Scott Moe's in a better position
00:33:53.240 because of the absolute majority he's got in the province.
00:33:59.200 But Kenney's popularity right now is low.
00:34:02.860 It's Alison Redford low.
00:34:06.840 And, you know, the next election is coming closer and closer every day.
00:34:11.180 And how low does he want to take it?
00:34:13.560 At some point, Corey is not going to be able to come back up.
00:34:17.220 No, it's, you know, recently actually Rick Bell wrote about that too.
00:34:22.380 He thinks that Jason Kenney is actually quite opposed to locking down further,
00:34:27.180 but he's just going to try and keep on the lowdown and then avoid being pushed into it.
00:34:31.080 But I'm not sure if that's the way to do it.
00:34:33.020 You know, dig your head in and hope that it just passes over.
00:34:35.620 You've got to stand up and lead.
00:34:39.160 Well, that's what happened when we got pushed in the second lockdown.
00:34:42.160 Kenny said, no, I want to try more individual responsibility stuff.
00:34:47.200 And Notley was screaming that she wanted things shut down.
00:34:51.820 Speaking of which, I know some people mentioned in the comments.
00:34:53.820 Dave, you've done stories.
00:34:55.180 Rachel Notley has been demanding that not just Pastor Coates be thrown back in jail,
00:34:58.960 but she's demanding that Grace Life Church be shut down.
00:35:01.820 And that just shows how vulgar the NDP is.
00:35:04.420 So, Jason, please don't blow it.
00:35:05.740 We can't take four more years of those bloody borderline communists running this province.
00:35:09.460 I mean, they're screaming to lock up people for holding services.
00:35:12.140 But at the end of the day, Jason Kenney, just one week later,
00:35:15.280 did exactly what Rachel Notley wanted him to do last time.
00:35:19.480 So, I mean, I don't have a lot of faith that,
00:35:22.740 because to not lock us down again requires an admission
00:35:25.740 that the first two lockdowns were a mistake.
00:35:27.900 And you know, I can forgive the first lockdown. We all, we did not properly understand this virus was coming out of China and China was jailing reporters, jailing doctors who were speaking up on it. We just didn't know how bad it was going to be. The initial reports showed that this was going to be more serious than it turned out to be. I can forgive the first lockdown. I know some of you watching or listening cannot. I can forgive the first lockdown.
00:35:52.340 I cannot forgive the second lockdown because that was political.
00:35:55.440 It was pure political pressure.
00:35:57.180 They knew in their heart it was the wrong thing to do.
00:35:58.900 They said it was wrong, and then they just gave it to political pressure.
00:36:01.480 They do it a third time.
00:36:03.460 Honestly, I don't think any of us are obliged to listen to what these people have to say.
00:36:07.540 They lost their moral authority to govern us when they broke their own lockdown and took a vacation in Hawaii.
00:36:14.460 So let's see if they have the going answer to do it.
00:36:17.660 I hope to God that they have learned something that while it's important for a government to
00:36:23.520 stay popular and get reelected, polls are not everything. You should try just doing what you
00:36:29.600 think is right sometimes and have some faith, just a little bit of faith, that the voters will judge
00:36:36.440 you fairly at the end of the day. Okay, well, before we go, yeah, let's, we're gonna make it
00:36:41.740 a regular reminder. If you're not already subscribed to the podcast, subscribe, find
00:36:45.960 Western Standard on your favorite podcast app. That'll get you the pipeline. That'll get you
00:36:51.000 the Cory Morgan Show, Mountain Standard Time with Nathan Gita, and of course, Danielle Smith
00:36:56.680 Uncensored when we have her for those special shows. If you're not yet a member of the Western
00:37:01.800 Standard, go to westernstandardonline.com slash membership. Try it free for 15 days.
00:37:07.160 If you subscribe to an entire year-long membership, you'll save 21 bucks and you're
00:37:12.780 supporting bailout-free media. It'll feel good. Try it on for size. And of course, today's show
00:37:19.000 was sponsored by Kyren's Way. As we mentioned at the beginning of the show, Kyren's Way is a natural
00:37:24.700 and non-pharmaceutical treatment program that's affordable in the Calgary area to help you deal
00:37:31.100 with stress and anxiety during times like this. Check out kyrensway.com. I just want to throw one
00:37:38.180 plug in for this Friday if I may? Yes. Okay, because I will be on with the Corey Morgan
00:37:42.260 show Friday from 10 till noon. I've got Marcel Latouche who's going to be on for 45 minutes to
00:37:47.360 talk about municipal politics. People remember him from Danielle Smith's radio show. He gives
00:37:51.640 some great common sense and we're going to talk about the municipal guidebook and some provincial
00:37:56.000 governance of issues and things and such. After that, I'm going to have Colleen Craig from
00:38:00.160 secondstreet.org coming on. They've done some polling and some other things to speak on there
00:38:04.840 and how it relates to Canadian news and democracy.
00:38:08.140 Carl Craig's an old colleague of mine
00:38:09.420 from the Canadian Taxpayers Federation.
00:38:10.740 He ran it in Saskatchewan and Manitoba
00:38:12.260 while I ran the show in Alberta.
00:38:15.820 Very smart guy to have on.
00:38:17.440 Yeah, so make sure you check out
00:38:18.380 the Corey Morgan Show on Friday,
00:38:21.060 10 o'clock Mountain Time,
00:38:22.240 9 o'clock Pacific.
00:38:24.520 If you're in the East,
00:38:25.940 you're allowed to watch.
00:38:27.260 Yeah.
00:38:27.520 We'll let you watch.
00:38:28.340 We can't really stop you.
00:38:30.620 And remember, next week,
00:38:32.660 Mountain Standard Time with Nathan Gita starts.
00:38:34.840 uh 10 same times 10 o'clock mountain uh nine o'clock pacific dave derek give me an hour and
00:38:41.360 we'll have that dr modry letter uh up on our site sounds good you heard it here thank you very much
00:38:47.280 everyone god bless have a great good friday have a good good friday and a great easter thank you
00:38:53.040 very much
00:39:04.840 You