00:01:08.120He's been putting a lot of great stuff out from that eastern perspective.
00:01:11.700So be sure to use that comment, scroll, discuss things with each other.
00:01:14.800I don't necessarily read all the comments out, but I do read them all and just keeps things flowing along.
00:01:19.860So getting to what I entitled this about.
00:01:23.420I mean, this is one of the problems, actually, a shortcoming of Alberta.
00:01:26.060I don't like talking about those often, but Alberta's political Achilles heel federally is our electoral predictability.
00:01:32.680While provincially the situation has been volatile, leading from progressive Conservatives to NDP to UCP in the span of a decade,
00:01:40.480the province has always given a strong majority of its seats to whatever the Conservative Party of the day is federally.
00:01:47.000And that tendency has led to Alberta being taken for granted by federal parties.
00:01:51.080The Liberals don't pay much attention to Alberta because the likelihood of gaining seats here is pretty slim.
00:01:55.760The Conservative parties don't pay much attention to Alberta because the likelihood of losing seats here is pretty slim.
00:02:02.100But Albertans tend to punch above their weight within the Conservative Party of Canada
00:02:05.580because the province has always served as a fundraising hub for the federal party
00:02:09.380and an incubator for conservative politicos from candidates to strategists.
00:02:14.200When the federal campaign comes, though, Alberta is quickly forgotten
00:02:17.160as the federal entity starts to try to win the electoral love in Laurentian Canada.
00:02:22.160You know what? It isn't even personal. It's just math.
00:02:23.980No federal party can win government without strong showings in Quebec and Ontario.
00:02:28.640To win those central provinces, though, the wishes of western provinces have to be sidelined.
00:02:33.000We aren't in the middle of a federal campaign right now,
00:02:35.760but we're seeing a great example of the federal dynamic in conservative politics
00:02:39.580as the CPC has kicked off its Conservatives for Canada campaign.
00:02:43.720This campaign ostensibly is to reach out to Albertans and tell them why the Federation is just spiffy,
00:02:49.360and they should set aside notions of independence.
00:02:51.380If online reactions to the campaign kick off are any indication, the response from conservative Albertans to Polyev's overture is flat at best.
00:02:59.620Albertans are sick of federal politicians telling them what they're supposed to think, and that includes politicians from the conservative side of the aisle.
00:03:06.840The CPC knows their campaign won't make much difference in the voting intentions in Alberta in the referendum.
00:03:15.420It's Polyev's way of trying to distance his party from the Sovereignists, who, like it or not, are dominating the Conservative membership in Alberta federally, just as they dominate the United Conservative Party provincially.
00:03:26.600He's trying to assure Eastern voters that if he were ever to become Prime Minister, he wouldn't act to change the federal status quo on behalf of his Western support base.
00:03:35.640Polyev said earlier this summer that all Conservatives will be campaigning for Canadian unity in Alberta.
00:03:41.140Many members of Polyev's caucus have kept their campaigning rather silent, actually, through the summer, if they did so at all,
00:03:47.740while orders from above may be pressuring them to wrap themselves in the Canadian flag,
00:03:52.240orders from the membership are telling them Albertans have had enough.
00:03:55.160The CPC Unity campaign began with some CPC MPs posting canned statements about their indivisible federalism on X and other social media spots,
00:09:01.080He was posting about Indigenous affairs and how it's ludicrous that national parks are being shut down and areas being shut down just for Indigenous use.
00:09:12.040Well, the B.C. Realtors Association clamped down on him and gave him a nasty letter calling his actions polarizing and inflammatory.
00:09:20.240So now the Canadian Constitution Foundation has got involved, and their lawyers have given the B.C. guys 30 days to get rid of that nasty letter they're going to sue.
00:09:36.000We talked yesterday about the sanctions, and he urged everybody to vacation in Canada, see the glorious sights that Canada has to offer, making no mention about the fact that he summered in Tuscany in Italy.
00:09:49.260So I guess what's good for the goose is not good for the younger.
00:09:51.700We're to have the staycation, I guess, taking those local wonders.
00:12:12.920So, yeah, as you can see, as always, loads and loads of stories coming out there on all sorts of things, national, international, and across the country.
00:12:21.860The reason we can do it, this is where I've got to nag, guys.
00:12:32.480And it keeps us independent, keeps those reporters across the country so we can get unique content, and it gets you past that pesky paywall.
00:13:52.560Well, I mean, I'd want it as a regionalist I am,
00:13:55.400but I never would expect the Conservatives to come out
00:13:57.500and support the independent side in the upcoming referendum.
00:14:01.820It's not their role, and as a federal party, they shouldn't.
00:14:04.100but I don't think they're being terribly wise by jumping in feet first and taking a side on the
00:14:10.880federalist side, actively campaigning on the ground, starting an advertising group for it.
00:14:15.640Guys, 60, you know, we've seen some of those pollings when you're talking membership bases
00:14:20.200and so on, 60 to 70% support within your membership base are independence friendly,
00:14:26.240and you're pissing them off. And I don't know, you know, I'm a student of history to a degree.
00:14:32.040I started, you know, when I had my long hair and no grays, but as a young reformer in the reform party, Albertans will change and turn their attention elsewhere.
00:14:42.060I don't know if Mr. Polyev has been enough time in Alberta to see the activism and the galvanizing of conservatives that's been happening in this last couple of years here.
00:14:53.740You don't want that activated crowd to turn their guns on you after this referendum's over.
00:14:59.220having a hard enough time winning things as it is all right let's bring in our guest jeff knight
00:15:05.040from ontario he's been writing on the situation in queens park and all the great stuff happening
00:15:10.860out there it's about time we got you on thanks for joining us today jeff yeah cory thanks for
00:15:15.840having me so uh if you heard it uh what dave was mentioning we should get into that story you
00:15:23.900posted uh the other day on uh the mother of an isis terrorist running for school trustee
00:15:30.540what would uh inspire somebody so controversial to make a more public run
00:15:36.220uh yeah dr diga met wally yes oh i mean it was uh pretty interesting to see her kind of popping
00:15:42.380up like that i expect you know she's trying to get uh you know more sympathy for her son in a
00:15:48.300lot of ways and roundabout way uh in her correspondence with me she you know she
00:15:52.940referenced the the bring abdul home website that she set up for him and stuff like that but i mean
00:15:57.300you know the guy uh even while he was incarcerated like he stabbed an officer in the eye and the
00:16:02.140officer lost his eyes like i i don't think there's a very good chance of him gaining too much sympathy
00:16:07.280uh regardless of how successful she is in her campaign uh now you know this is this is canada
00:16:14.560so she might actually have a decent chance of of winning but uh uh yeah it was interesting
00:16:21.220interesting correspondence i had with her uh on email i was trying to get her to answer a few
00:16:25.280questions like for example uh when this first all happened she said that uh it was all canada's
00:16:31.000fault that it had happened and that he had been manipulated by the rcmp so i was trying to get
00:16:35.800her to see if she still stood by that and she responded with uh you know basically oh i can't
00:16:41.900say anything until i've spoken with a lawyer and you know i'm very concerned that the framing is
00:16:46.820going to create a misleading and damaging impression about my personal character and
00:16:51.120stuff like that so you know she seemed to kind of be leaning towards getting a little litigious
00:16:54.980uh there so you know i didn't pursue it too much further um but yeah she seems pretty defensive
00:17:01.560about the whole thing i guess understandably so well did she at least explain like what does she
00:17:07.620think she can offer them as a school trustee i mean her her kids are presumably uh grown beyond
00:17:13.480the school point he's he's in the you know he's he's been well educated in stabbing prison guards
00:17:17.960uh what what motivation would there be because it's not like it's a you know a big paying job
00:17:24.280or something like that it just seems a strange path to go um i i expect that you know her
00:17:31.020motivation is going to be around kind of controlling those types of narratives and
00:17:35.340being on the forefront of uh you know being able to have a say as to who's coming and going
00:17:41.300from the school system but she really you know the the responses that she gave me were pretty
00:17:47.260much just like you know I need to talk to a lawyer and you need to give me very specific
00:17:52.200you need to get back to me in a very specific way otherwise I'm not answering any questions so she
00:17:58.520really you know I pressed her a couple times but she didn't really go beyond that she seems very
00:18:02.600concerned with the legality of what she's going to be saying well it'll be an interesting race to
00:18:08.180watch, I guess, if nothing else. Maybe I'll pivot back to something, you know, more recently you
00:18:12.940wrote, and of course, it's the dominant story has been for, it's just, it already seems like forever,
00:18:17.420but this ongoing trade war, President Trump has banned outright a number of items coming from
00:18:24.280Canada into the United States now. That's quite a development. I mean, that's not just a tariff,
00:18:27.740that's a blockade. Yeah, the outright ban on, what is it? It's dairy, booze, and motorcycles now.
00:18:35.440You know, I think the U.S. took something like $700 million in alcohol sales from Canada last year.
00:18:42.620So, you know, it's a substantial part of the market for us.
00:18:46.460But I'm pretty sure we actually hurt them even more when we blocked American alcohol.
00:18:52.160So it's a bit of a it's kind of a bit of a tug of war with Trump and Ford here on kind of, you know,
00:18:58.500And they've gotten really down into the mudslinging with Ford telling him to kiss his ass and Trump changing Lake Ontario to Lake America and stuff like that.
00:19:06.940And it seems to, you know, I've been saying it's one of the best gifts Ford's got in a while because, you know, he's kind of like a bit of like a sailor, right?
00:19:16.840He'll kind of point himself whichever way the wind's blowing.
00:19:19.320And it seems like Canadians are really on board with sticking it to Trump any way that they can.
00:19:24.520So for Ford to now be leading the Liberals in the polls where he was kind of behind them a little bit, it seems like this is a great gift for him politically to kind of move his career forward in what I expect is the direction is aiming for Pierre Paulietta's position.
00:19:42.300Yeah, there's a lot of discussion on that.
00:19:44.640yeah so obviously Ontario got hurt the worst because of the the motorcycles and and you know
00:19:51.040we have all the the auto factories and stuff here so that's the biggest concern for us so since you
00:19:57.260kind of went there and I you know I wasn't really thinking of that but I mean there has been sort of
00:20:01.200that sub campaign at least positioning himself uh you know Corey's out there uh working on things
00:20:08.160BC's conservative leadership race sort of turned into a proxy race between uh Eastern staff
00:20:14.620going on uh if if it looks like ford is kind of eyeing the federal direction what's happening
00:20:22.780within the provincial conservatives though are the people up and coming under ford i mean it
00:20:27.020causes more than just uh you know uh it causes quite a ripple effect if a leader moves on
00:20:33.740uh yeah absolutely and and i don't know if he's even thought that far ahead i know that they've
00:20:38.860We've got the annual policy priorities setting session coming up tomorrow, actually.
00:20:47.080And I think that's part of the reason he's been pretty quiet this week, despite all of the U.S. banning of Canadian products and stuff like that, is he's probably saving a little bit of his response for then.
00:20:58.620And also, he's probably like, you know, he's probably spending a lot of time online and seeing what people have to say so that he can, like I said, plan his response according to what's popular right now.
00:21:08.860Um, so I'm not exactly, uh, sure who'd kind of follow him up if he did jump ship, but, uh, I think it's, it's not a secret that he's, he's got big aspirations on his mind.
00:21:22.980Yeah, well, he's got, uh, ambition. There's no doubt about that. It's kind of ironic that, that him and Trump are locking horns the way they are.
00:21:29.840I mean, if there was a comparable type of political style coming from Canada, comparing to Trump, I would put Ford actually kind of at the top of the list for that shoot from the hip.
00:21:38.600uh maybe speak first and think later sort of approach to things i guess you can't have two
00:21:43.440people in the same room who have that attitude yeah it's kind of our our big uh blonde loud
00:21:49.460mouth versus theirs well it keeps you with lots to uh watch and report on i mean uh politics has
00:21:57.020certainly never been dull in canada lately though i i think alex out in bc still has a crazier thing
00:22:01.400to watch than you do at this time but uh there hasn't been a max mass exodus uh another story
00:22:07.040It came up, Jean Cretchen surfaced, they pulled him out of the crypt and had him speaking on using Alberta's resources and Saskatchewan resources for leverage.
00:22:19.520What's the attitude in Ontario about that?
00:22:21.520I mean, that's a very hot button out here.
00:22:23.840Is it even coming up out there, though?
00:22:26.140Well, I mean, obviously, Ontario wants to leverage, you know, the energy out in Alberta and stuff like that.
00:22:32.980But Daniel Smith has already essentially just rejected it outright.
00:22:37.040And pulling Kretchen out, he looks better than I thought he would, but he said, you know, that what Trump's doing doesn't hurt Lake Ontario because it's just a lake and all that kind of stuff.
00:22:49.200And he's saying that they really do need our oil, electricity and potash and gas and everything really bad.
00:22:57.300and to kind of attack them that way i think you know the sheer size of the u.s means that
00:23:03.620really getting down and dirty with them ultimately is going to hurt us i think more than it hurts
00:23:08.380them so you know the the nastier we get um pushing these types of things forward uh it's only you
00:23:14.760know it's going to help uh the politicians who are championing it because you know canadians
00:23:19.320love to fight with americans but ultimately it's it's going to be terrible for us i believe so
00:23:35.220Yeah, well, and when we do have, you know, Venezuela lining up and things such as that, encouraging our biggest customer to start sourcing from other areas.
00:23:45.660I mean, there are other suitors out there could cause a lot of long-term difficulties for us, you know, versus the immediate problem.
00:23:52.280But, you know, it's understood. I mean, you know, they want something stronger than just liquor to go back and forth with, even if it has a good symbolic victory.
00:24:02.380It's just interesting how it's tied together. I mean, the timing of this referendum, probably I got a feeling if there wasn't a referendum coming in Alberta, they might have already made a move for Alberta, an export tariff or something of the sort.
00:24:13.220yeah no absolutely uh and the scary thing too is once we you know start to lose our auto
00:24:21.400relationship with the u.s then that just kind of opens us up directly to chinese markets and uh
00:24:27.120you know they don't have the best reputation for their auto automobile industry no or their
00:24:32.740corporate practices or pretty much much of anything but and that is an area that has been
00:24:38.100devastated you know is the auto sector and the parts manufacturing i mean this this trade war
00:24:42.020has hurt central canada far far more than than the west and i i guess it could lead to a bit of
00:24:47.960you know regional envy or things like ford said at one point kind of implying that well alberta
00:24:53.360and saskatchewan should be feeling some pain as well well the equal sharing of pain doesn't
00:24:57.760necessarily mean we're moving towards a productive end though yeah the whole like we're all in this
00:25:03.060together uh mantra that he's been promoting but you know it's it's really we're all we're all
00:25:07.720going to lose together in the end and so um i think you know trump trump's a tough guy to work
00:25:13.320with i think you kind of just have to you know butter his bread a little bit and not get down
00:25:17.980in the mud with him and he gets satisfied so i i feel like uh you know maybe the whole approach
00:25:23.420needs to be reworked here so so i guess i'll pivot a little more to something that's big that's going
00:25:30.280on out there i mean it's the the mayoral uh race is sort of heating up in toronto uh uh olivia chow
00:25:37.240is out um well out and hitting the hustings but the story you put up i guess she she skipped out
00:25:44.220on an anti-semitism debate uh not that surprising i guess in light of things though is it no i mean
00:25:51.340she's been pretty consistent with uh you know not being a huge fan of of uh i think israel in general
00:25:58.740And, you know, she's been a pretty big supporter of the Palestinian protests and stuff like that happening in the city.
00:26:04.920So I can see why she's like strategically avoiding these types of events.
00:26:09.760But, you know, Toronto has a pretty giant Jewish population and it's important for her to be a mayor for all her constituents.
00:26:18.440Right. And so to kind of be rejecting these these types of things is sounds a pretty loud message.
00:26:23.980So how secure does she look going into, you know, the next municipal election?
00:26:28.520I mean, she's been difficult to dislodge, as some people have said.
00:26:31.380It's because, of course, we tend to have a lot of people splitting that vote.
00:26:34.320But is she sitting comfortably going ahead or are Torontonians finally kind of tiring of her?
00:26:39.600Well, I don't think they're tiring of her.
00:26:40.780That's the thing is I think that her strategy is working.
00:26:44.840Like Toronto is a pretty left-leaning place.
00:26:48.140And, you know, I don't understand it as someone who lived in Toronto for a long time
00:26:52.540and has seen it, you know, in my opinion, decline over the years.
00:26:57.020But it seems like the strategy is working for her.
00:27:00.820I'm not sure what her exact numbers are that she's pulling by,
00:27:04.120but I think she's beating Bradford by a pretty solid amount right now.