Western Standard - Spencer Fernando on authoritarianism & liberal elites

00:00:00.000 authoritarian arrogance of the liberal elites. I mean, how could I not be drawn to a title like

00:00:05.980 that? And you only expanded further from there. Can you kind of start off in a nutshell what that

00:00:12.580 column was about, Spencer? Yeah, the idea was, you know, we're seeing how angry, you know,

00:00:17.760 the, as you could call it, the establishment media and many people in the government get

00:00:22.140 when, you know, Pierre Polyev says, oh, he's going to, you know, fire the Bank of Canada

00:00:27.360 governor, you know, anyone who even criticizes the Bank of Canada, even before he said that,

00:00:31.920 people were losing their minds over that. And, you know, it's kind of the attitude of, you know,

00:00:36.360 here's a group of people who have a lot of power, you know, the Bank of Canada has tremendous power

00:00:40.480 to influence, you know, our economy or way of life. They can devalue our currency, which means they

00:00:46.200 can make the money you earn worth less. So that's a massive impact. That's tremendous power, far more

00:00:51.140 than really anyone else in this country has. And so the idea that somehow they should be, you know,

00:00:55.840 protected from criticism or protected from accountability is really antithetical to

00:01:00.360 democracy. And I think it's, that's what I mean by the authoritarian attitude where it's, you know,

00:01:06.100 in authoritarian countries like China, no one would dare question the government because, oh, the

00:01:09.760 government is above you. The government's better than you. Now, the people in the Communist Party, 0.52

00:01:13.260 they're, they're the elites and they control, you know, how your life is going to be and you should

00:01:17.760 know your place and you shouldn't question them. Now, we're not supposed to be an authoritarian

00:01:21.440 country. We're supposed to be a place where people are allowed to question authority, where

00:01:25.280 we encourage people to question authority because we're supposed to believe that authority is

00:01:29.100 accountable to the people and can be influenced and controlled by the people. And so it's very

00:01:34.900 concerning to see a lot of people in the media and in the political establishment who seem to

00:01:39.880 somehow think that certain institutions should be just free from credit, from being accountable and

00:01:45.000 free from criticism.

00:01:45.780 Well, yeah, and that was something that was really quite something to see them line up.

00:01:50.780 And again, I'll get a, because you had another column on your own side, Spencer Fernando, about

00:01:54.160 the media, because I mean, that's part of the establishment as well. And they were horrified that

00:01:59.100 somebody dared criticize the head of the Bank of Canada. I mean, you could disagree with whether or

00:02:04.080 not the critique was accurate or founded, but it was the ability to even criticize that they were so

00:02:10.360 mortified about. And that's distressing. I mean, no position in this country is above critique.

00:02:15.360 It should be.

00:02:17.040 Yeah, I mean, you'd like to think it's that way, but it seems that a lot of people in the

00:02:21.220 establishment don't believe that. And that's quite concerning to see. And I think it's interesting

00:02:25.060 you're seeing it's not just the liberals and the media, but within the conservative leadership race

00:02:29.320 itself, you know, Jean Charest, Patrick Brown, they've echoed a lot of those criticisms of Pierre

00:02:34.360 Polly. So I think that's an attitude that some within the conservative party have as well, which should be

00:02:38.460 quite concerning to people. You know, we're not going to be a free and democratic country for long.

00:02:43.800 You know, for some people, obviously, we're not a free country. But, you know, we're not going to

00:02:46.980 maintain any freedom or democracy for long if we kind of accept that kind of attitude, that here's

00:02:51.320 the people who are in a higher class than you. They run the country, they get to control how things are,

00:02:55.880 and you don't get to criticize. And that's the opposite of what Canada's supposed to be.

00:03:00.660 Yeah, well, there shouldn't be any sacred cows. I mean, the people have pointed to some of these very

00:03:05.000 high positions within the country, and they're appointed. That's one of the areas where we have

00:03:09.480 difficulties with the democratic ability. We should at least then be able to openly critique them or

00:03:15.300 support them. But I mean, when you when you say it's beyond that, then we start to get worried,

00:03:19.160 you know, and how are we supposed to hold them to account if we can't even mention them?

00:03:24.000 Yeah, it's there's obviously a double standard. I mean, Justin Trudeau has been undermining confidence

00:03:28.240 in institutions for quite some time, obviously, with the SNC-Lavalin controversy. You know,

00:03:32.860 he's had no problem interfering with the justice system. We saw what he did to Jody Wilson-Raybould.

00:03:37.540 So, you know, much of the media was fine to give him mostly a free pass for that. But all of a

00:03:40.800 sudden, Pierre Polyev talks about the Bank of Canada, and people go crazy. I think part of it

00:03:44.900 might be that much of the media doesn't really understand how the monetary system works. They

00:03:48.720 don't understand how inflation and money printing are linked. So to them, it's just all incomprehensible.

00:03:53.820 And they hear Polyev talking about this. Well, I don't understand this. So I guess it must be

00:03:57.200 something dangerous and terrible. So they kind of go crazy in that way. So, you know, I think

00:04:02.820 I think we need to always maintain the spirit of questioning institutions, criticizing those in

00:04:07.580 power, and not not putting people on a pedestal just because they have a temporary position in

00:04:12.800 government.

00:04:14.000 Yeah, so I'll kind of pivot to your own piece, you know, on your own site there that you've written,

00:04:19.800 and that's where the media holds the opposition accountable. And politicians are blaming the public

00:04:24.460 for anger and division. You know, one of the roles, even if you didn't have an effective,

00:04:28.400 necessarily of elected opposition, or if there's problems, the media used to always be there to at

00:04:33.660 least, you know, dig in on stories, look into things. But they do seem to spend more time going

00:04:38.640 after the frontrunners in the Conservative Party race than they're looking at the government or the

00:04:43.800 agreement between them and Jagmeet Singh right now.

00:04:47.600 Yeah, I think much of that was really inevitable when it got to the point where the government

00:04:52.320 subsidizes much of the media. I mean, you're going to have you're going to be influenced by whoever pays

00:04:56.100 your bills, there's no real way around that. So if the government's paying your bills as a media

00:05:00.600 institution, well, you're probably going to, you know, want to keep that government in power.

00:05:04.940 And it's not just government versus, you know, critics of the government. It's the fact that the

00:05:08.560 Conservative Party is much less likely in government to give that kind of money to the media, the media

00:05:13.200 knows that, so they have a financial interest in keeping the Conservatives out of power and keeping

00:05:17.340 the Liberal, you know, NDP coalition or PAC, whatever you want to call it, in power. And then, of course,

00:05:23.100 the way, you know, there was the response to, you know, people yelling at Jagmeet Singh. I don't think

00:05:27.020 that was appropriate behavior. I don't think, you know, acting towards someone like that is

00:05:30.720 acceptable. I'm not a fan of Jagmeet Singh, but it's still important to remember if you're talking

00:05:34.620 about a human being, you know, a husband and a father. So, you know, trying to say some of the

00:05:39.120 things people said about it. Screaming at somebody, you're not going to influence anybody by screaming

00:05:42.400 at them. But the way the media coverage is, is they act as if none of that has any underlying cause

00:05:48.420 a reason, right? The politicians are allowed to say anything they want about unvaccinated people,

00:05:53.380 about people in the freedom convoy. They can, they can demonize people, you know, call them Nazis and

00:05:57.380 racists and bigots. But then when people get angry at politicians, it's, oh, that's that we have to draw

00:06:01.760 the line there. That's unacceptable. So I think we need to have a more holistic view of things and

00:06:06.820 realize people don't just get angry at politicians for no reason. Someone doesn't just wake up and say,

00:06:11.680 I'm going to, I'm angry at politicians today, just randomly, right? If people are struggling

00:06:15.940 financially, that's a big reason. If people have been demonized by politicians in the government,

00:06:20.180 that's a big reason. So I think it's disingenuous to just act as if it's just the only issue is the

00:06:25.160 anger of politicians without asking where a lot of that anger comes from, and the responsibility

00:06:29.160 politicians have in generating the conditions that led to that anger. Yeah, they've been doing a lot of,

00:06:35.320 I mean, you know, if you want to look for the source of division, you should be looking at the top

00:06:38.520 rather than the bottom. But we've got it backwards. Another piece I see you called out our public

00:06:44.140 safety minister, which was great, because as you pointed out, I mean, these are things that media

00:06:48.820 needs to be looking at. I mean, you've got to record this. Your average citizen doesn't necessarily

00:06:52.620 watch all these committee meetings or these things that they're saying. But this fellow, as you said,

00:06:56.740 he keeps spreading misinformation and purposely and blatantly and repeatedly. But he's not getting

00:07:02.820 held accountable for this. I mean, where do you stop these guys from spreading BS like this?

00:07:08.660 Yeah, I think it's a good reason, you know, why people are so concerned about the government trying to

00:07:13.380 control social media and the internet, because they're not going to use that to objectively,

00:07:17.100 you know, censor disinformation. They're just going to use it to censor their critics. Because

00:07:20.860 Marco Menegino, he goes to the committee and says, oh, well, we had Freedom Convoy supporters and

00:07:25.680 members who were, you know, setting fire to buildings. Well, no, the police have said twice now that those

00:07:30.920 incidents had nothing to do with Freedom Convoy supporters. Even some of the media, the government

00:07:35.720 likes it. CBC even had to report and kind of edit one of their reports and say, oh, you know,

00:07:40.440 we were wrong and had nothing to do with the Freedom Convoy whatsoever. And then Marco

00:07:44.700 Menegino, obviously knowing that, he knows that it's been, it's been, you know, debunked,

00:07:49.780 you could say. He goes there and says it anyway, I guess, because he thought it would get him a good

00:07:53.540 soundbiter because he thought it would be politically beneficial. And that's spreading

00:07:57.260 disinformation. That's misinformation, you know. So where's his ban? Where's his censorship? Of

00:08:02.320 course, it's not going to be used against him because he's in the government, not a critic of the

00:08:06.160 government. So I think it also shows why independent media is so important, why what we're doing is so

00:08:10.980 important, because much of the media, they don't want to call the government to liars. They don't

00:08:15.200 want to point out that Mendocino is spreading disinformation. And so they'll just, you know,

00:08:19.060 they'll just give it a pass. They'll either not cover it or kind of, you know, give it a nice spin.

00:08:22.620 So we need people doing what we're doing, which is actually exposing the truth.

00:08:26.840 Yeah, well, and that's it. I mean, if any conservative politician had misrepresented the tragedy of the

00:08:32.960 Mark Lapine slaughter of women, you know, for political points, that conservative politician 1.00

00:08:39.200 rightly would be just, you know, pilloried by the media and other politicians. Yet the public safety

00:08:45.000 minister used that completely off base and wrong. And again, aside from, you know, Andrew Lawton and

00:08:51.520 yourself and some other alternative media, he got away with it.

00:08:56.060 Yeah. And again, that's the double standard that I think a lot of people are upset about. And, you know,

00:09:00.400 to go back to the conservative leadership race, you know, you're seeing in response to, you know,

00:09:05.400 the horrific event that happened in the United States and Buffalo, you're seeing people trying

00:09:09.080 to score political points against Pierre Polyev now, you know, people tweeting things out about,

00:09:14.020 you know, oh, well, Pat King expressed a similar view as to the gunman in the United States.

00:09:20.420 And Pat King had a link to the Freedom Convoy. And didn't Pierre Polyev say he supported the Freedom

00:09:24.780 Convoy? Ergo, you know, Pierre Polyev is the same as the Buffalo shooter or some insanity like that,

00:09:29.540 right? Maybe not going that far, but that's the link they're trying to make in people's minds,

00:09:32.900 right? They're trying to take a very tragic and terrible event to the United States and attack

00:09:38.060 the front runner of the conservative leadership race. So I think we all really need to be aware

00:09:43.040 of the damage that does. And of course, they're going to keep calling Polyev the divisive candidate,

00:09:47.580 even though he's not the one accusing his opponents of being linked to mass murders.

00:09:53.540 So, you know, I think that double standard, it never gets applied to, say, you know,

00:09:57.420 someone who does something and may have more of a liberal ideology, right? It never gets linked to,

00:10:02.240 you know, the rhetoric of Justin Trudeau or anybody. It's only one side. It's only

00:10:06.020 conservatives who get linked to these things when something happens. So I think that's another

00:10:10.480 reason a lot of people have lost trust in the establishment media, because the narrative is so

00:10:14.240 obvious. Some terrible event happens, there's a shooting somewhere. How can we use this terrible

00:10:18.720 event to attack conservatives? And it just gets done over and over and over again.

00:10:22.220 And it just, it divides us even more. And it's, it's the opposite of what people who claim to be

00:10:27.080 in support of unity should be doing. Yeah. So I'm going to pivot a little bit,

00:10:31.200 just a little farther back to one of the things you wrote on as well. And speaking of divistic,

00:10:34.640 at least in a regional sense, was that the Alberta challenge against Bill C-69, the No More Pipelines

00:10:40.580 bill, it was successful. It got quashed. But then the challenge in Alberta against the carbon tax

00:10:45.780 was successful too. Now it's going to go to the federal Supreme Court. And I mean, it's a very

00:10:51.180 hot item out here in Alberta. Do you think that there's going to be any success on the federal

00:10:56.100 front though, when that challenge goes forward to there against the No More Pipelines bill?

00:11:00.700 Yeah. I mean, you know, past history would show there's not too much of a chance. What was

00:11:04.880 interesting about the ruling was it did talk about the division of powers between different levels of

00:11:09.800 government, provincial and federal. So that's something where it may not be much of an ideological issue.

00:11:15.700 You know, because people say the Supreme Court's not motivated by ideology. Everybody is. Everybody

00:11:20.740 has an ideology and it influences them. So the only institution is fully free from that. But if it

00:11:25.880 becomes more of a, you know, a procedural or division of powers argument, then there is possibly a chance.

00:11:31.900 But, you know, even if that happened, I expect the liberals would just reintroduce slightly tweaked

00:11:35.940 version of the legislation and impose it again, because they're interacting in a very ideological way.

00:11:40.620 I mean, we saw when many countries in Europe were saying, hey, you know, we would prefer not to be

00:11:45.100 getting our oil and gas from Russia. You know, maybe Canada could be a country that could help us

00:11:50.140 out. And Trudeau basically straight up said, yeah, you know, we'll do a little bit, but we're not

00:11:54.140 going to, you know, alter our climate goals to, you know, produce more oil and gas. So it's a very deep

00:12:00.140 ideology that he and his government have. And the only way I think to change that is to get them out of

00:12:05.020 office because, you know, whatever ruling, even if it goes against them, they'll just introduce similar

00:12:09.020 legislation again.

00:12:10.900 Yeah. I mean, the courts are, you know, slow enough that if even if you took that to court

00:12:15.020 again, they could have years of imposed legislation. But boy, we're a long ways, it seems, from

00:12:20.440 replacing them. I mean, the Conservatives seem to be gaining a little bit of ground, I guess,

00:12:23.640 in the sense right now. But I think some people seem to prefer the Conservatives without a leader

00:12:27.860 than as opposed to the past leader they had. But a lot will depend on who wins, I guess, and

00:12:32.480 how things go in the next year. So with the minority government, we just never know when we're going to go into

00:12:37.180 the election now. Yeah, you know, it has been interesting, though, because the media keeps

00:12:42.860 saying, oh, the Conservatives committed political suicide by, you know, having prominent members

00:12:47.200 support the Freedom Convoy. Oh, they're really in trouble now, you know, talking about inflation

00:12:51.160 and the Bank of Canada. Well, they're in big trouble. And they continue to lead in the polls,

00:12:55.560 you know, amid that situation. And so it shows, again, a lot of immediate disconnect from the general

00:13:00.620 public. And I think the underlying anger and discontent in the country, I mean, inflation everywhere

00:13:05.680 in the world produces, you know, a lot of angry. Look at countries where it's really gotten out of

00:13:10.560 control. Sri Lanka, for example, having food shortages, it's descending into chaos in large

00:13:15.100 parts of that country. So I don't think we'll get to the same point here in Canada, obviously. But

00:13:19.060 inflation makes people angry, and it discredits the people in power. You know, Justin Trudeau,

00:13:22.900 it's easy to forget, but he came to power largely on the idea that he was going to make life more

00:13:27.980 affordable. He did the escalator ad, you know, in the 2015 campaign, where he's walking up an

00:13:33.700 escalator going down saying, oh, a lot of Canadians feel like it's tough to get ahead.

00:13:38.060 And that was an effective campaign for him. You know, you don't hear him talking too much about

00:13:42.080 affordability now, because that wouldn't really bode well for him. And so I think that's one reason

00:13:46.680 Paul Yev is talking about the Bank of Canada and talking about inflation and money, the monetary

00:13:50.940 system, money printing. He's linking that together in people's minds. And so if the election does come

00:13:56.760 down to affordability, then that's not good for the Liberals. And strangely enough, the NDP,

00:14:00.920 the NDP used to be very much the party of working class people, you know, making life more 1.00

00:14:05.360 affordable. Jake made things where they jumped on to the Trudeau bandwagon. He's linked himself to

00:14:10.020 Trudeau, and Trudeau was the one in power during massive inflation. So that's not going to help

00:14:14.180 the NDP either. So I think that's going to be the issue, you know, whether things are a lot different

00:14:19.480 in three years' time. That remains to be seen. But of course, future inflation, even if it goes down,

00:14:26.300 is still based on already inflated prices. So it's not like it's going back to where it wasn't.

00:14:30.460 People are going to find life super affordable all of a sudden. And so I think, you know, if it's

00:14:35.760 Paul Yev who leads the Conservative Party, he's been out there, you know, for quite some time

00:14:39.620 sharing a message that's very opposite from what the Liberals and NDP are pushing. So if people are

00:14:45.200 looking to really move in a different direction, then I think that benefits Paul Yev and the

00:14:48.840 Conservative Party. That's it. I mean, ideals only sell so well when people can't pay their bills.

00:14:53.400 You know, the reality when your mortgage starts coming first or putting food on the shelves and

00:14:58.620 things like that. So the Liberals are going to have to respond to that pretty soon. So I mean,

00:15:02.840 or not. I mean, at least we see some light at the end of the governing tunnel anyways.

00:15:08.980 Thank you very much for checking in with us today. Where can we find more information on where

00:15:13.580 you're writing and what you're doing, Spencer?

00:15:14.640 Yeah, you can follow me on Twitter at Spencer Fernando. My website, SpencerFernando.com. And I do a lot of

00:15:21.820 writing at NationalCitizens.ca as well. So those are the three places to look.

00:15:26.520 Great. Yeah. And if you search Spencer Fernando, I know you put columns out in a lot of number of

00:15:30.960 other areas around as well, and even occasionally here. So lots of good stuff that you're always

00:15:36.260 writing. I always appreciate it when we get a chance to talk to you and see what you're putting

00:15:40.160 out there, Spencer. So I'll let you get back to it. Thanks for joining us today.

00:15:43.740 Alrighty. Have a good day.

Western Standard - May 16, 2022

Spencer Fernando on authoritarianism & liberal elites

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