Western Standard - June 22, 2021


The Cory Morgan Show. June 21 2021


Episode Stats

Length

1 hour and 54 minutes

Words per Minute

180.12016

Word Count

20,537

Sentence Count

1,005

Misogynist Sentences

6

Hate Speech Sentences

12


Summary

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

In this episode of the Cory Mendoza Show, I sit down with Independent MLA for Medicine Hat, Saskatchewan, Drew Barnes, to talk about the end of the Alberta session, the upcoming fall election, and what to look forward to in the summer.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Misogyny classifications generated with MilaNLProc/bert-base-uncased-ear-misogyny .
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
00:00:00.000 .
00:00:30.000 .
00:01:00.000 Thank you.
00:01:30.000 Thank you.
00:02:00.000 morning welcome to the cory morgan show it's the
00:02:25.960 summer solstice, June 21st. We have the longest day of the year. It's going to feel even longer
00:02:32.300 because we're still under mask mandates, but maybe, maybe in 10 days, those are going to be
00:02:37.280 gone. We'll see there's some politicians working their very hardest to fight, allowing us those
00:02:42.000 freedoms, but that might pass. So I've got a good guest coming on in a little while here. Drew
00:02:48.440 Barnes, independent MLA for Cypress Medicine Hat is going to come on. We'll talk about how the
00:02:53.860 session finished up in the provincial government, what they've got to look forward to this fall,
00:02:58.440 what he's going to do through the summer. Jason Kenney, I'm sure, has issued quite a sigh of
00:03:04.260 relief at the end of the session. It's been a long, agonizing six months for him and his party
00:03:09.620 as well, along with everybody. Just people are miserable for different reasons. I'll get started
00:03:17.000 though in mentioning our sponsors, you know, because we are an independent news outlet and
00:03:22.280 And we rely on sponsors and subscribers like you to keep rolling.
00:03:26.400 We don't take any government dollars.
00:03:28.420 And as I like to say before, the government's not offering us any.
00:03:31.100 We're not really much of a friend of the state.
00:03:33.600 But a lot of sponsors do step up and help us along and keep us broadcasting and giving news that other mainstream outlets won't cover for you.
00:03:44.560 So the CCFR, they've been sponsoring these shows.
00:03:46.900 That's the Canadian Coalition for Firearms Rights.
00:03:49.760 and nobody works as hard as a ccfr to fight for your ability to own and use firearms you know that
00:03:54.800 that use portion is important i mean some of them say oh you can own it but we just want to have it
00:03:59.120 disabled and hanging on your wall and then welded to a piece of metal or something no you want to be
00:04:03.680 able to use it you know target shooting hunting whatever it's up to you as long as you're safely
00:04:07.360 using it not violating other people's rights that's lost on a lot of progressive-minded
00:04:12.400 souls hey if it's not harming you leave it alone and don't worry a gun itself will not harm you
00:04:16.560 but the CCFR is fighting for your ability to do that and to carry on doing that it is your right
00:04:21.920 so their site is firearmsrights.ca so go there firearmsrights.ca and click why join us and
00:04:29.120 they'll give all the reasons on why to join them and what they're doing to stand up for your rights
00:04:32.880 because again we've got to stand up for ourselves plus we've got groups like this that are helping
00:04:36.880 us stand up for ourselves this is their job their role get out there support them so they can
00:04:42.400 support you it's important getting on to other groups i i love these guys the resistance coffee
00:04:48.480 company i mean this is where we can use the private market and capitalism to make a political
00:04:54.400 point while supporting small local businesses while providing good coffee to people i just see
00:04:59.600 win everywhere you go these guys were kind of formed in in response uh to the woke political
00:05:06.000 correctness is being rammed down your throat everywhere you turn you know i mean you go to a
00:05:09.440 a place you buy towels or you buy soaps and you find out that that business took some of your
00:05:14.860 money and gave it to Greenpeace or gave it to PETA or some other goofy group that you really
00:05:19.860 wanted no part of supporting, yet you indirectly supported them. You know, I mean, you buy soap
00:05:24.320 and then you feel dirty afterwards. It kind of defeats the purpose. Well, Resistance Coffee
00:05:28.140 Company, they only support causes that stand up for your rights, not the ones that are trying to
00:05:32.100 take away from them. So 10% of every purchase you get from them goes towards causes that are
00:05:37.860 fighting for constitutional freedoms in Canada. For example, they give money to the Justice Center
00:05:42.060 for Constitutional Freedoms, you know, with John Carpe and some of the others that have been
00:05:45.540 fighting so hard for people's rights under the charter and in the courts. So the Resistance
00:05:49.960 Coffee Company, counter to the woke narrative, will give a portion of your money to causes that
00:05:55.980 you will appreciate, causes that help you, not that shut you down or put you out of work or
00:06:01.780 restrict your freedoms. So get out there and they've got some real catchy names. I mentioned
00:06:06.140 on the show before one of them is like defund the cbc which is of course a name that's near and dear
00:06:10.380 to my heart uh liberal tears uh lots of neat names for the coffees and it's just good coffee so if
00:06:16.220 you go to resistancecoffee.com that's where i'll repeat it resistancecoffee.com and when you buy
00:06:22.540 you put in a promo code western standard all one word and you'll get 10 off your first order so
00:06:28.460 head on down there put in western standard get that first order you get that 10 off and another
00:06:32.460 10% is going to go towards a good cause. And you end up with a bunch of coffee. I mean, this is
00:06:36.780 just winning all around. So please, you know, support our sponsors so they can keep supporting
00:06:41.580 us. And it's the great alternative media cycle of life here. Hi, I'm Andy. Thanks for coming on
00:06:49.560 and good to see you. What's this? I'm sorry. I just like to watch the comments. It is a live
00:06:55.600 show and comments are welcome. I know I do pause as we go. So Damien's saying something about
00:07:00.600 Fauci partnering with Moderna. I'm not sure. I'm not familiar with that one.
00:07:06.020 Starting with some COVID news, though, something is happening today
00:07:08.520 in Calgary and a number of city councils around Alberta is they're discussing whether or not to
00:07:16.500 get rid of their bylaws for mask mandates. And Jason Kenney's made it clear the UCP numbers are
00:07:22.520 dramatically dropping. Every number is dropping. Deaths are dropping. ICU admissions are dropping.
00:07:28.740 r values all the numbers they love using to lock you down they're all going down into the toilet
00:07:34.180 which is fantastic you know the infections are going down there's no more reason to maintain
00:07:39.540 these restrictions on us and those restrictions are all coming off on july 1st we're all looking
00:07:44.020 forward to it unfortunately many crazed control freak municipal politicians do not want to let
00:07:51.940 these controls go at all they made their own even if it's outside of their jurisdiction actually you
00:07:57.620 You know, health is supposed to be a provincial mandate anyways, but still, you know, you get people like Nenshi and Iverson and others.
00:08:04.000 I guess Lethbridge has been pretty bad and Innisfail.
00:08:06.620 They want to jump in and get control, whether it's their jurisdiction or not.
00:08:09.620 So they put in their own mask bylaws and not to be outdone by the federal government or provincial government.
00:08:14.500 They put their mask bylaws all the way to the end of 2021.
00:08:17.640 These things don't expire until after Christmas.
00:08:20.700 So if they had their initial way, you would be masked all the way through summer.
00:08:27.200 Now, they are getting some pressure, finally, because the rest of the province is going to
00:08:32.900 be unmasked. There'll be no more provincial mandate for it. So there really is no good
00:08:37.540 excuse or reason to maintain those bylaws. All the same, they are going, I believe Calgary City
00:08:43.340 Council is discussing it today. It's actually going before them. City administration, and who,
00:08:49.100 why do we give a shit what city administration says? You know, we're supposed to be telling them
00:08:52.420 what to do. They're not a health authority, but their recommendation, and I tell you,
00:08:56.580 Nenshi and his little gang bows to those city administration bureaucrats, and they want the
00:09:02.360 mask by law in Calgary to stay all the way till the end of July, at least. The other option they
00:09:07.660 have is to get rid of the mask mandate when the province drops theirs, which would make sense.
00:09:12.520 We'll see if common sense prevails in City Hall, and it's a rare thing when it does. Maybe some of
00:09:19.280 them are going to realize though that keeping people masked up all summer when it's no longer
00:09:24.220 part of the law and the infections are a thing in the past might be stupid. And some of these guys
00:09:29.820 are facing elections this fall. Ninchy, I got a feeling he's facing one, but it'll probably be
00:09:33.400 federal. He really seems to be positioning himself. You know, he's in the news. No matter
00:09:37.940 where you turn, you see Ninchy's face, bug eyes looking at you and he's going on about something
00:09:43.880 that's way outside of certain city's jurisdiction. I mean, that's not too terribly new, but I mean,
00:09:47.460 he's going anywhere and everywhere. I mean, he's just surfacing all over. It reeks of campaigning
00:09:51.980 is what it does. We know he's not running for mayor because he knew he probably wouldn't win
00:09:56.160 it. So he's moved on to a federal campaign. Some people think he might be going to the Senate.
00:10:02.520 That could be possible. I mean, I'll give my theory. I think the Senate's his final backstop.
00:10:06.560 He'll run. He's cut a deal for the liberals. He's going to run for MP this fall. If he loses,
00:10:11.960 yeah, Trudeau will put him in the Senate. If he wins, he'll be an MP and he'll be in cabinet
00:10:15.480 because, yeah, unfortunately, Trudeau is probably going to win a majority this fall.
00:10:20.700 So either way, Nenshi's got nothing to lose.
00:10:22.920 Well, he does have stuff to lose, but he's not so concerned about city issues.
00:10:26.640 So he'll push his mask mandate, if only to give the middle finger to Premier Jason Kenney
00:10:30.960 because Kenney has put a lot of political capital into the reopening.
00:10:36.300 You know, he said this is the best summer ever.
00:10:37.760 He's hoping that Albertans will breathe such a sigh of relief with the mandates
00:10:42.100 and the restrictions ending that they'll finally start warming to the provincial government again
00:10:47.940 and the UCP might get a bit of bounce in the polls and they can move on with other things
00:10:51.300 in this next two years and hope to get re-elected. Now progressives like Minchin and Iverson do not
00:10:57.060 want Kennedy to recover whatsoever so they are looking at this mask mandate I think as a way
00:11:01.620 to keep Albertans miserable they don't want us to have the best summer ever they want Albertans to
00:11:05.620 remember it and be miserable another lost summer a second lost summer and one way to do it is to
00:11:10.900 to keep these mask mandates running.
00:11:12.300 And I tell you, masks are miserable.
00:11:14.300 You know, some people say, so what?
00:11:15.180 It's no big deal.
00:11:15.920 Well, then go ahead, wear it.
00:11:17.100 Wear it until you die of old age.
00:11:18.520 I don't care, but I don't want to wear it.
00:11:20.560 It's dehumanizing.
00:11:22.340 I don't hear very well.
00:11:23.680 Here's a side issue.
00:11:25.080 When I'm actually talking to people,
00:11:28.040 long story as to why my hearing is not that good.
00:11:30.220 I'm too stubborn for hearing aids,
00:11:31.680 but I find reading lips helps a little bit
00:11:34.040 while I'm at it to catch what they're saying.
00:11:35.760 Well, masks really hinder that.
00:11:38.180 Other aspects, we've all been living through it.
00:11:40.200 We know it.
00:11:40.900 can't see somebody smiling you can't tell if they're being a little jovial or sarcastic or
00:11:45.860 if they're angry with you there's only so much you can read in the eyes you need to see their face
00:11:50.660 you know having these masks on is not a minor inconvenience as i said it's dehumanizing it's
00:11:56.180 it's a control thing if it really was and that's debatable and so on saving lives fine but now
00:12:00.900 that it's done it's done let the masks come off if you want to wear one knock yourself out fill
00:12:06.740 your boots, but I'm sick of wearing one. Now, if those idiots in City Hall, and they are idiots,
00:12:11.020 there's a lot of them. If they keep that mask mandate right to the end of July,
00:12:15.960 well, for one, businesses in Okotoks, Cochrane, Chestermere, Crossiron Mills, Airdrie, they are
00:12:24.140 going to be thrilled because they're going to get the people who are sick to death of wearing the
00:12:28.240 masks. And as Rose was pointing out, yeah, your glasses fog up when you wear a mask. Again,
00:12:31.440 it's not a minor thing. It's really annoying and troublesome. So for one, you know, and then they
00:12:39.620 beat on Calgary businesses badly enough with high parking rates, high taxes, just general
00:12:44.960 disrespect for Calgary businesses from the city council and the mayor. One other area where
00:12:50.200 they're going to mess with Calgary businesses, small and large, is if they keep this mask mandate
00:12:54.140 because maybe they don't believe it, but it's true. People will leave the city to do their
00:12:59.160 shopping. They will go to the Sutina Costco. They'll go to the Canadian Tire in Cochrane.
00:13:04.400 That's an awesome Canadian Tire, by the way. It's huge. You know, they'll go to restaurants and bars
00:13:08.880 down in, say, Prittis, for example. There's a great one down there I know of called The Water's
00:13:12.820 Edge. You know, Okotoks, lots of others. And I don't own that anymore, by the way. It wasn't
00:13:17.180 self-serving in that sense. And, you know, you can sit on a patio. You can have a drink. You don't
00:13:22.700 have to look at a server with a mask covering their face. You don't have to go through the
00:13:26.100 stupid motions of, oh, I finished my drink. I have to go to the washroom. Okay. I'll stand up,
00:13:32.000 put on my mask. No, maybe I got to put the mask on before I stand up, you know, walk across the
00:13:35.780 room, go to the washroom, come back, take your mask off again, consume your beverages, your food.
00:13:41.800 Come on guys. It's arbitrary. It's ridiculous. It's not protecting anybody. And everybody,
00:13:47.340 well, most everybody knows this. So again, if the boobs in city hall decide to keep that mask
00:13:53.960 mandate all the way till the end of July, well, then people are going to be going outside of the
00:13:58.860 city with their businesses. And those service industry businesses that are already crippled,
00:14:03.020 that are already in terrible condition, that are already hurting, are going to hurt all that much
00:14:07.100 more. It's hard enough for these Calgary restaurants and bars or even retailers to get
00:14:13.460 business as it is to try and get through. I mean, the wage subsidies are going to come to an end
00:14:17.320 eventually. The rent subsidies are going to come to an end. And they got to deal with the fact that
00:14:21.200 they'll be the only cities in Alberta that make all their customers and staff mask themselves
00:14:26.320 while everybody else doesn't have to. Great. Just one more thing. You know that you wonder why the
00:14:32.160 downtown is hollow. You wonder why there's a boom in suburban and even farther outside bedroom
00:14:37.120 community purchases. It's not just businesses fleeing Nenshi and the controls lunatics on
00:14:42.960 city councils. It's citizens. They don't want to live under that. So either way, I wanted to get
00:14:49.440 on about that because these discussions are today in city hall in calgary i don't know when it is in
00:14:53.360 edmonton i don't know when it is in lethbridge but you got to speak up and you got to tell these
00:14:56.880 imbeciles that's enough back off the laws are coming down don't you guys be holdouts it's not
00:15:02.480 within your jurisdiction and if they don't do that please show up at this falls election and
00:15:08.640 fire these guys part of the reason they do what they do is because we let them get away with it
00:15:13.120 we got the worst amount of apathy in the world it seems when it comes to municipal elections
00:15:17.040 You know, 20, 30% turnouts have been known in Calgary elections in the past and around the province.
00:15:23.320 I mean, this is government that's closest to you.
00:15:25.640 These guys have a great deal of influence and impact on you.
00:15:28.840 And they take a lot of your taxes.
00:15:30.620 They impact businesses in a heavy way.
00:15:33.320 Yet you don't bother yourself to get out and fire them when they're being idiots.
00:15:36.380 So no wonder they sit in there for 20 years at a time.
00:15:39.200 Diane Colley Urquhart, I mean, God, I think she was just getting in there after I got out of school.
00:15:44.200 She's still there.
00:15:45.000 Ray Jones finally left for health reasons I hope he's okay but he was there for decades uh Dale
00:15:51.640 Hodges you know these names you don't hear because the ones in City Hall by the way who learned how
00:15:55.740 to stay there for decades nobody moves nobody gets hurt you know most of the city Ray Jones
00:16:00.160 was there for decades no most of the city didn't know who Ray Jones was why because he didn't do
00:16:03.620 anything he stayed away from the camera and you know what people just apathetically put them back
00:16:07.940 in again over and over and over again Dale Hodges same thing get up this time yeah Drew Farrell
00:16:14.220 Paul, what, six terms, I think, in Ward 7, though I can't compare Drew with some of the others in
00:16:23.140 some senses. It's only in a tiny little way. I don't agree with pretty much anything Drew does,
00:16:28.560 but I can respect one aspect. She didn't sit there like a mushroom doing nothing for decades
00:16:33.260 to try and stay in there. She did actually stand up for things and speak up, almost always the
00:16:37.340 wrong things, but at least she had some principles to push with them. She didn't sit there like a
00:16:41.540 mushroom like some of them just turn it into a job. You know, watch Ward Sutherland. He wants
00:16:45.180 to die in there of old age. Get up, fire these guys this fall. We have to. Drew Farrell is finally
00:16:51.540 stepping aside. Yeah, only because she wanted to. She's a crazed socialist, but she was unfireable.
00:16:58.780 People wouldn't get up and do anything about it. So that's what we got. We got a big one coming
00:17:02.640 this fall. You know, there's going to be a new mayor no matter what. There's going to be at least
00:17:06.800 five new city council members. That's enough to change these guys around. And part of it too,
00:17:11.540 is watching votes like today. They like it to slide under the radar. They want you not to know
00:17:15.980 what they're up to. That's why there's no Hansard in City Hall, you know, no gazettes. You can't see
00:17:20.780 what they've actually done. And they rely on that. They rely on your apathy. So watch the votes of
00:17:26.840 your city councils this month, everybody. Keep an eye on them. Make a check mark next to your
00:17:31.960 councillor if they voted to get rid of the ridiculous mass bylaw, or if they voted to keep
00:17:36.860 it or on a number of the other issues they talk about because you keep giving them a pass. We keep
00:17:41.520 giving them a pass. These guys get elected and re-elected and re-elected because we aren't paying
00:17:46.500 enough attention to them. They would behave so much better if we would just get up and fire them
00:17:51.000 every now and then. You know, you want to keep them accountable? Make them fear for their jobs
00:17:56.760 a little bit. City hall appointments or elections shouldn't be lifetime appointments to office to a
00:18:02.120 cushy job, yet that's what it turns into for a lot of them. So we've got an opportunity to change
00:18:06.800 that year, this year. Okay, so getting on to accountability and outspoken politicians, I'll
00:18:12.820 get on to our guest for today. And that would be independent MLA for Cypress Medicine Hat. Drew
00:18:18.340 Barnes is coming on here. There we go. How are you doing today, Drew? Oh, Corey, I'm great. Good
00:18:23.980 morning. How are you? Oh, good. I got a nice head of steam on yelling at municipal politicians for
00:18:28.740 a little while. So I'm all ready to speak with you now, though I'm not worked up with you at this
00:18:33.240 point. So it keeps me motivated though. Hey, down here in Medicine Hat, there's 10 new people
00:18:40.080 I've already put their names in. So people are looking for change once again. Hopefully we'll
00:18:46.020 get some. Well, that's good. And you know, I mean, I might as well segue into kind of a political
00:18:51.740 notion that's been a problem and it's a problem in partisan systems. It's a problem in municipal
00:18:55.520 systems without parties and it's group think, you know, where everybody's got to think the same way
00:18:59.460 or we will ostracize the outliers,
00:19:02.140 the ones who raise their hands and ask questions
00:19:04.240 or the ones who don't march in step with the rest.
00:19:06.560 And that's an issue you're quite familiar with these days,
00:19:10.260 I could safely say.
00:19:12.380 Yeah, I sure am.
00:19:13.960 When I was ejected from the UCP caucus about a month ago,
00:19:19.060 of course, Premier Kenney had said publicly many times,
00:19:22.600 he welcomed public debate and public disagreement
00:19:25.120 and public discourse.
00:19:26.560 There was times when I agreed with him,
00:19:28.780 especially when we had a regional approach to COVID and mask wearing and that kind of thing.
00:19:34.100 But anyway, it is what it is now.
00:19:36.300 And I have the opportunity to speak more direct for my constituents,
00:19:39.700 for Albertans that believe in freedom and prosperity, families and communities.
00:19:44.960 And I'm relishing the opportunity.
00:19:47.160 We just finished in the legislature late, late Wednesday night.
00:19:51.800 Fellow independent Todd Lowen and I have a great relationship.
00:19:55.700 We've hired some great staff people.
00:19:57.500 uh we're you know we're very much ready to uh work for albertans and listen lead and learn
00:20:03.920 yeah well you know some of i mean you've mentioned that before in a sense it's empowering in a way
00:20:09.400 when you're an independent i mean you truly can just speak for your constituents in your local
00:20:13.500 area but it is harder to get the voice out when you you've lost that that party platform to stand
00:20:18.820 upon so what have you been doing to kind of try and bypass that that handicap well a few things
00:20:23.440 first of all, social media. So whether it's Twitter, Facebook or Instagram or LinkedIn,
00:20:28.800 anybody that wants to reach out to me with an idea or concern, please do. Secondly, iPods or
00:20:35.440 podcasts rather like this, as much media as possible. And just walking around Medicine Hat
00:20:43.300 and even Edmonton talking to people, hearing what their thoughts are. This summer is going to be a
00:20:49.240 busy time out and about I'm going to with equalization referendum coming up I believe
00:20:54.200 it's critically important that Albertans send a strong message to Ottawa that we have to end this
00:20:59.720 unfair game uh this this game where resources are being stripped out of here in spite of the
00:21:05.980 risks we take how environmentally good we are and all we do to the rest of Canada and um you know
00:21:12.440 I'm part of the reason I'm going to be doing a big you know around Alberta and a lot of
00:21:17.840 communications, is I'm concerned that right now Premier Kenney's unpopularity, the lack of trust
00:21:24.420 for Premier Kenney has made it so, you know, Albertans, he's not on the ballot this fall,
00:21:31.180 but we need to focus on the fact, like Quebec, we need some changes in the Constitution. We need
00:21:36.900 some changes in our relationship with Ottawa. You know, we've seen just in the last two weeks,
00:21:42.220 Quebec has asked for nationhood within a nation on the Quebec part of the Constitution. They've
00:21:47.540 Ask for French only.
00:21:49.020 I see on the weekend they're only going to allow Quebec artists in music
00:21:53.420 in Quebec government buildings.
00:21:55.740 They're not scared to push for what's best for Quebec families and communities.
00:22:01.300 Albertans are there now, and it's time to organize that,
00:22:04.540 and it's time to make Ottawa and make the rest of Canada aware that,
00:22:09.340 in spite of Premier Kenny's unpopularity, that we want more prosperity
00:22:14.740 for our companies, our communities, and our families.
00:22:18.160 Yeah, and I really appreciate that. And that's why I wanted to bring you on today, because, I mean, there's clearly been some sparks and so on, and you're in a different seat in the House with the legislature, but you're not taking it on as a role of blind opposition.
00:22:30.680 You're going to impose every initiative that comes out of the UCP or from Jason Kenney. And something that's very important, you see the value of the equalization referendum this fall and that hazard that people might use it as a de facto way to show discontent with Premier Kenney.
00:22:46.680 And we've got to ask Albertans to differentiate between the two.
00:22:50.140 I mean, even if it was a UCP initiative, it's still a worthwhile one, and we can express our discontent with the government in other ways.
00:22:57.080 Yeah, exactly, Corey.
00:22:58.100 Hopefully, this is the start of more Albertans realizing that nothing moves unless it's pushed.
00:23:05.680 It is time for us to, like Quebec does, to push our existing arrangement with Ottawa.
00:23:11.160 you know it's going to be hard when 25 billion a year leaves leaves Alberta for the rest of Canada
00:23:18.360 the number 670 billion since 1960 you know there the changes will at first be hard I believe but
00:23:26.920 secondly part of this is is just to do it we haven't pushed for a long time I think of the
00:23:32.760 Alberta agenda items from over 20 years ago our own pension plan our own police force our own tax
00:23:39.700 collection, even greater control over our immigration so we can pinpoint better where
00:23:44.500 workers are needed and that kind of thing. Hasn't been worked on for over 20 years since
00:23:50.180 Stephen Harper and others made it higher profile. And yeah, so yeah, let's take what's good,
00:23:59.320 what the UCP puts forward and let's go from there. But of course, you know, the three or four things
00:24:05.920 that I'm most interested in is more limited government, so spending can be less and taxes
00:24:10.960 can be less, so individuals, families, and communities can be stronger, you know, especially
00:24:15.720 with some local decision-making, you know, and those are things that I'll be watching for.
00:24:22.140 Oh, well, yeah, good to have somebody watching for that. I mean, part of an imbalance I think
00:24:26.760 we've had in the legislature, and it's one of the problems with a two-party system is, I mean,
00:24:31.540 it's naturally built a polarization. I mean, there's going to be this side and there's that
00:24:36.080 side. So anytime somebody is getting up a question period to question the government in power,
00:24:41.280 it's always coming or had been always coming from the left end of the spectrum, which is their role.
00:24:45.440 And that's what they're there to do. But if the government's always only going to get pressure
00:24:48.900 from one side, then if they're going to have any movement, they're only going to move in one
00:24:51.740 direction and get people come up and question for a small government, for reduced government,
00:24:56.760 for smaller taxes. We need those voices. And you and Todd are providing them right now.
00:25:01.220 and that's appreciated. Getting back to, yeah, the Fair Deal panel, I was on with Franco
00:25:07.200 Teresano last Friday. It was the one year anniversary of the release of it. And aside
00:25:11.860 from the equalization referendum, unfortunately, nothing, everything else within it seems to be
00:25:16.080 stalled right now. Is there movement on anything like the pension plan, the police force or
00:25:20.620 any of those initiatives yet? Just in the typical Premier Kenny way, you know,
00:25:27.600 studies you know two or three million here to study this to study that rather than than taking
00:25:35.420 the bull by the horns and getting the job done um you know collecting our own taxes is is is a good
00:25:42.720 place to start quebec is the only province in canada right now that collects uh the personal
00:25:48.820 share of the provincial income tax uh both alberta and quebec collect the provincial share of the
00:25:55.560 corporate tax and uh quebec uh jesus two years ago now um was pushing to collect ottawa share
00:26:03.460 and and amazingly enough andrew sheer agreed and uh justin trudeau didn't uh so we have an ally in
00:26:11.260 quebec when it comes to that and and i haven't seen any of of the work with with other provinces
00:26:17.160 to make that start happen uh the police force um by any march 31st we we have to give two years
00:26:25.060 notice so we can set up our own provincial police force and replace the RCMP which of course will
00:26:30.440 make little difference in the metros which have their own police forces but make a huge difference
00:26:34.880 in the quality of service in rural Alberta where police policing and victims and all those things
00:26:41.820 are terrible and they're a problem. Something has to be done. You know things like even more
00:26:47.400 control over immigration and where we need workers and those kind of things. You know we as we come
00:26:52.880 out of the COVID lockdown and restrictions,
00:26:56.340 it's going to be essential to get the economy
00:26:58.380 going in the right way.
00:26:59.740 But no, in our pension plan too,
00:27:03.580 it's clear that if Alberta had its own pension plan,
00:27:07.400 CPP or Alberta pension plan in this case, of course,
00:27:10.700 like Quebec does, the benefits to Albertans
00:27:13.520 would be over 3 billion a year.
00:27:15.860 So we could have employees and employers pay
00:27:18.240 a little bit less, or we could have our retirees,
00:27:21.660 our seniors have substantially more and more pensions,
00:27:25.300 even if it was the second pension,
00:27:26.880 an Alberta one and a Canada one,
00:27:28.780 if you have some past work with Canada.
00:27:31.720 And Corey, as you know,
00:27:33.560 with this bout of inflation in the last three months,
00:27:36.720 it's made it even that much tougher
00:27:39.360 for people on fixed incomes.
00:27:41.000 It always was tough anyway.
00:27:42.720 And for me, this is a risk worth looking at
00:27:46.220 when seniors can't afford to retire
00:27:47.860 on what they have now anyway.
00:27:49.680 Let's let's look at making Alberta better for for everybody, particularly the youth and the seniors on fixed incomes.
00:27:55.820 But yeah, I was one of the one of the last questions I had in question period on Wednesday was OK.
00:28:01.900 You know, Premier Kenney, you fair deal panel had all these other things out for our own police force.
00:28:08.220 I think we also have to look at our own constitution so so we can enhance resource movement.
00:28:14.040 You know, we can enhance the government needs to stay a certain size and taxes a certain limit.
00:28:19.680 And, and all that's been pushed to the wayside. So, so like I say, the Alberta agenda items
00:28:25.560 commonly called the firewall letter over 20 years ago, and none of that's been done.
00:28:31.460 Let's not do that again. Yeah. Well, it's something I've said more and more lately is
00:28:35.560 rather than getting mad at Quebec, we should start learning from them. I mean, they have
00:28:39.420 unapologetically stood up for themselves for decades and it's worked, you know, I mean,
00:28:44.360 the world revolves around Quebec as far as Ottawa is concerned. And it's time to stop that one
00:28:50.840 Canadian trade. I think that is kind of a handicap of ours is our trade to constantly apologize.
00:28:55.400 I mean, all of the things we asked for back with the original firewall letter,
00:28:59.560 none of them were unprecedented. Every one of them, some other province was already doing.
00:29:03.080 I mean, there already was the Ontario police force. There's already Quebec pension plan.
00:29:06.680 There was already Quebec collecting their own taxes. Yet when we asked for it, we're suddenly
00:29:11.320 jerks and we go and cower away and apologize for having asked in the first place. It's time to dig
00:29:15.500 our heels in. Yeah, exactly. Again, nothing moves unless it's pushed. It's, you know, more and more
00:29:21.480 Albertans are asking for it. I think because of, first of all, the lack of resource movement when
00:29:27.360 we didn't get the pipelines and now corporate welfare government involved in every aspect of
00:29:34.660 pipelines and oil business, it's ridiculous and it's not efficient. And, you know, Corey, I think
00:29:40.340 back to 2012 Wild Rose when we elected 17 people. I had the opportunity in 2011 and 2012 to knock on
00:29:48.420 thousands of doors and there was a real outcry for Cyprus Medicine Hatters and all Albertans then
00:29:54.480 for democratic reform like citizens initiated referendums like recall and especially things
00:30:01.020 like more of a fair deal Alberta agenda items. We seem to you know maybe have gotten
00:30:08.360 distracted in the last six or seven years on that. But I believe that the desire from
00:30:14.120 Albertans is there strongly again. You know, when I'm grateful to have been on the fair deal panel,
00:30:20.040 and when we heard from thousands of Albertans, and up to 80% said that they are insisting and
00:30:27.160 wanting a fair deal with Ottawa. And Corey, a lot of it was taking some real risk and some real
00:30:32.780 effort opening the constitution so we can actually have a senate that works um you know uh opening
00:30:38.720 the constitution so we can have reform in the number of seats that we have uh on the supreme
00:30:44.140 court you know right now uh we just have one and we share that with saskatchewan and uh and
00:30:49.760 manitoba on an alternative basis where ontario and quebec are always guaranteed three each so
00:30:55.340 political things that go to the courts end up being being swayed uh that way of course and uh
00:31:01.860 Same with the number of seats we have.
00:31:03.300 The number of times that hardworking Albertans
00:31:05.820 went to the mic and said, this is ridiculous.
00:31:08.160 The results of an election are over
00:31:09.680 before we, you know, we even vote.
00:31:12.960 It was so unfair.
00:31:14.100 And of course, I think now we're seeing that
00:31:15.940 with some of the policies coming out of Erin O'Toole
00:31:18.180 and the Conservative Party of Canada.
00:31:20.160 It looks like they're prepared to write off
00:31:21.880 the 34 Alberta seats for 47
00:31:25.160 or something they may get in the Toronto area.
00:31:29.160 It's mind boggling.
00:31:31.040 But again, Corey, I'm so grateful that everywhere I go now, Albertans are telling me that, yeah, you know, enough's enough.
00:31:37.600 They've seen their families, their friends and their communities hurt in so many ways and not be able to prosper.
00:31:44.260 You know, from smaller communities and smaller rural communities not being able to get the linear taxation that oil companies paid for years and years.
00:31:54.420 But, of course, they've had some trouble to the number of young people that have had long periods of layoffs.
00:32:02.840 Or, you know, the one I like to talk about because it's accurate is, you know, a guy with a welding truck used to put himself out for $85 an hour.
00:32:11.800 You know, now he's lucky if he's getting $45 or $50.
00:32:14.480 And, you know, it's been a lot of changes in our local economy that people are saying is enough, enough.
00:32:23.820 And, of course, we've also seen that in spite of the fact that the Alberta economy has been hurting, the fact that this year Travis Taves and Jason Kenney are running a $20-plus billion deficit, we're still probably a net contributor to Ottawa paying into it.
00:32:38.740 And when we went back to Ottawa, cap at hand, asking for a cap on the fiscal stabilization, that was turned down again, of course, or a small win.
00:32:48.400 It wasn't near the win that we wanted.
00:32:50.600 And so, yeah, Albertans are ready to push back and it's political and I know we'll get the job done.
00:32:57.840 Yeah, well, I hope enough people are saying enough is enough.
00:33:00.740 And I just recently reread Preston Manning's book, The New Canada, from back in 92.
00:33:05.620 And what was frustrating at reading that is you could just change the dates and republish that book today and nothing has changed.
00:33:12.080 You know, this was when he was pushing the Reform Party.
00:33:14.760 Triple E was the big thing back then.
00:33:16.620 We thought that an equal elected and effective Senate could change the regional disparity.
00:33:22.000 I mean, Canada is one of the third biggest landmasses in the world, and we've got one
00:33:25.720 of the least decentralized governments of them all.
00:33:27.520 It's ridiculous that we don't account for regional differences, but we've been trying
00:33:31.640 for almost 30 years on this file and haven't gotten anywhere.
00:33:34.900 We do have Senate elections this fall, but unfortunately, they're only limited to federal
00:33:38.820 candidates, which is kind of odd.
00:33:42.780 I'm looking forward to hopefully voting for a senator candidate, but I'm not sure if we're
00:33:46.160 going to have many options this time around is that exercise you know still worthwhile or
00:33:51.480 well yeah thanks for that Corey yeah that that's a good way to to frame it because
00:33:57.020 it's only a small part of all all the changes we we need done but it is at least some control
00:34:04.580 for Albertans for Alberta voters as to who goes in there and what I think we've had four uh of
00:34:11.620 our elected people appointed over the years. It's something like that. So there's a good chance for
00:34:16.640 it. I saw in the media about a month ago that the Canadian Senate had just set a record over 25
00:34:24.460 years since it had overturned a law from the House of Commons. And that's the longest in the
00:34:31.340 Westminster system that an upper body had ever gone without changing the law. So if that doesn't
00:34:37.040 look like pure patronage and it makes you wonder. So I would encourage everybody to get out and
00:34:46.780 vote against equalization continuing. It's time for Alberta to get a fair deal. It's time for
00:34:51.840 Alberta to help the rest of Canada prosper. And that's what will happen. And again, it's ridiculous
00:34:58.600 that hydroelectricity revenues don't count, but oil and gas ones do. There's so much that needs
00:35:03.300 to be changed and and and there's there's many many reasons but you know what i would say when
00:35:09.080 it comes to to voting for your senator senator elect with every party they're with um i'm going
00:35:15.680 to drill down and find out who's interested in reform who once they get there will work towards
00:35:20.400 those triple e's uh equal effective um and elected and uh if i can get strong commitments uh you know
00:35:28.000 out of the people running for that. Yeah, that's, that's where my support will go. And, you know,
00:35:33.620 and again, more of a independent, more of an autonomous Canadian confederation where,
00:35:40.720 where Alberta can be free and prosperous with our people here, the great risk takers we have,
00:35:46.180 the great hard workers, and as good as we are in so many ways, Alberta should be the freest,
00:35:51.100 most prosperous place in North America. Yeah. So getting farther along, I mean,
00:35:56.820 Now, let's say we have some great Senate elections and a strong turnout and we've definitely determined, you know, who we want to represent us in the Senate and say we have a very strong turnout also saying we want to see equalization taken out of the Constitution.
00:36:12.200 If and when, say, a Trudeau majority tells us to take our notions and stuff them somewhere, where do our options land then?
00:36:20.340 Well, yeah, thanks, Corey.
00:36:22.060 Well, you know, I hopefully won't even get to that.
00:36:26.300 Hopefully, we will continue and always push for a stronger Alberta.
00:36:30.960 But the next provincial election is between March 1st and May 31st, 2023.
00:36:36.540 That's less than two years away.
00:36:40.320 You know, there's a lot of political parties and people storming out there.
00:36:46.080 And storming is a word.
00:36:47.300 They're organizing.
00:36:48.640 They're talking to people.
00:36:50.180 So let's look for politicians and people that are going to stand up for Alberta
00:36:55.180 being the freest and most prosperous place.
00:36:59.140 You know, the Fair Deal panel
00:37:01.340 and the thousands of Albertans that spoke at it
00:37:04.420 and emailed me otherwise showed that
00:37:05.980 the vast, vast majority of us
00:37:07.940 are insisting on a better deal with Ottawa.
00:37:12.020 And so let's put provincial
00:37:14.360 and Alberta members of parliament in place
00:37:17.440 that will stand up for that.
00:37:20.000 And so let's keep watching
00:37:22.900 and helping out, of course,
00:37:24.580 to see what ideas develop and what party develops.
00:37:28.600 Let's see what, you know, where the UCP goes in terms of, you know,
00:37:34.360 one of the big concerns, of course, now is the vast majority of Albertans I talk to
00:37:41.320 feel that Jason Kenney and the UCP have not met expectations in so many things,
00:37:45.740 but particularly when it comes to standing up for Alberta versus Ottawa or Alberta
00:37:51.620 and trying to get us a fair deal.
00:37:53.780 So we'll have to see what develops.
00:37:57.120 But hopefully, you know, one of the things that I said in the fair deal panel that I still believe in is Ottawa has to have a date knowing there's consequences for not giving us a fair deal.
00:38:08.940 And the consequences, I think, should be an independence referendum.
00:38:12.980 And let's pick a date.
00:38:14.940 At times, I thought it should be the same date as the provincial election between March and May of 2023.
00:38:21.940 in 2023, Albertans can go and say, yeah, Ottawa has tried to give us a fair deal, done this,
00:38:26.660 this, and this, and is in the right way. So let's see what happens. Or no, they haven't. It's time
00:38:31.940 for Alberta to pursue its independence. There has to be consequences. Nothing's changed in
00:38:38.200 over a hundred years. Nothing's changed in 20 years. Let's make it happen.
00:38:44.480 Yeah. And just along those lines, outside of the party aspect, I guess you and Todd Lohan,
00:38:48.260 One amendment, I believe you tried to get through when it came to the, whether it was recall or the referenda, perhaps both, was getting the bar lowered to enable, you know, for citizens to be able to initiate those actions.
00:39:01.640 Those amendments didn't pass, though, I believe, did they?
00:39:04.100 No, they didn't pass at all.
00:39:06.300 We did, on one of them, we did have a couple of UCP MLA supporters.
00:39:10.700 I believe it was on citizen initiative referendum.
00:39:13.080 them. But to me, it's again, Albertans are crying out for more involvement. Albertans are crying out
00:39:20.600 for more accountability. And Premier Kenney came along and set the bar. You know, first of all,
00:39:27.200 with recall, it's exactly the same as British Columbia. In over 20 years in British Columbia,
00:39:32.280 it's never been used. It's never gone as full process because the bar is so high. And he also
00:39:38.100 put in a confirmation election there's there's like three big steps for recall in alberta
00:39:44.820 first of all uh people not a certain percentage of um electoral people have to have to sign
00:39:52.300 that's 40 percent of electoral voters um so uh somewhere in my case 16 000 people in cypress
00:39:59.800 medicine hat would have to sign saying that they want a recall election then six months later
00:40:05.160 there's a vote to confirm that they want to recall and if that happens and six months after that
00:40:11.560 there's a by-election. BC doesn't have that middle step of the confirmation or the vote to have a
00:40:17.240 vote and and so we tried to take that out we tried to reduce the 40 percent lower the NDP tried that
00:40:25.580 as well but it but it was turned down and in citizen initiative referendums in Switzerland
00:40:31.760 8.5 million people, 50,000 people can put on a policy or legislative change.
00:40:38.820 If you get 50,000 signatures out of 8.5 million people, it has to happen.
00:40:43.820 Here at the number that the UCP and Premier Kenney came up with was for legislative and policy changes, 10% of the election list.
00:40:53.980 So if that's 3 million Albertans, that's 300,000.
00:40:56.980 And of course, there's about 4.4 million Albertans.
00:40:59.320 If it's a constitutional change, it's double that. It's 600,000.
00:41:05.220 Jurisdictions that have those two thresholds never meet it.
00:41:10.100 And I think it has to be done in 60 days as well.
00:41:12.760 I tried to extend that to 120 days, but that was turned down.
00:41:17.100 I tried to make it so it's more workable.
00:41:21.020 You know, the interesting argument that a lot of the UCP MLAs that didn't support it had
00:41:25.480 is they wanted a continuous process.
00:41:28.580 They wanted the law to be put in, even though it's basically unachievable, and be worked at over time.
00:41:36.480 Well, the way I look at it, Corey, we're taught when we're young and we're helping dad or we're helping a friend, you measure twice and you cut once.
00:41:44.260 This seems to be a law of measuring once and cutting several times until it's done.
00:41:50.180 And it also depends on whose government.
00:41:52.000 As you said, to open up our talk this morning, in our Westminster system, who's ever in power, has tremendous power.
00:42:00.280 They, you know, with the majority, they do what they want.
00:42:03.660 And so that will make Albertans subject to the whims of that.
00:42:08.840 But, Corey, that's one more reason for Albertans to get involved.
00:42:12.900 When a politician knocks on your door, when it's time to send an email,
00:42:18.080 Now, put in there that you want citizen initiative and recall that it's got a lower threshold, a more achievable threshold in terms of the length of time to gather the signatures and the number of signatures needed.
00:42:30.560 It's, again, one of my concerns that when Albertans tell me they want to be more involved and they want to hold me and all the politicians more accountable, let's give them the chance to.
00:42:40.480 Great. Well, I appreciate that. And, you know, just sticking to those core principles while you first got into politics with, you know, sometimes being stubborn, hopefully it'll pay off in the long run. I know you've been asked before, and then we'll see before I let you go. I mean, you're going into the summer as an independent. You still got a couple of years ahead of you. I know you haven't pointed any party directions yet, and you may not even by election time, but are you taking any considerations on a party front at this time?
00:43:10.480 Well, thanks for that. I'm certainly listening. I'm certainly talking to Albertans. And,
00:43:17.600 you know, it's interesting. Up until four or five months ago, and of course, I was
00:43:24.400 ejected from the UCP caucus a month ago, probably 70% of my constituents were saying,
00:43:30.880 try to stay within the UCP, try to work within the UCP. Now, wherever I go, people are saying they
00:43:38.720 I think less and less, they are saying they believe the UCP is not the answer.
00:43:44.400 Certainly, the desire for Premier Kenney to resign and change there is huge.
00:43:50.320 So less and less are saying that.
00:43:53.120 You know, I'm grateful that parties like the Wild Rose Independence Party, even the Alberta Advantage Party,
00:44:00.340 Saskatchewan had a party called the Buffalo Party in last election that just started about six months before the election
00:44:06.320 and finished second in five constituencies.
00:44:10.860 So there's, you know, you said it earlier.
00:44:14.120 It's important, I think, to have a voice on the conservative right.
00:44:18.940 You know, the libertarian voice that a lot of us share,
00:44:22.160 but also that very, very strong fiscal conservative voice.
00:44:25.440 The fact that, you know, Tax Freedom Day,
00:44:28.880 I think the Fraser Institute now has it at July 24th.
00:44:32.220 There's, you know, something, you know, I'm sorry, June 24th.
00:44:35.380 like so you work half the time for the government
00:44:38.640 and then half the time for your family
00:44:41.180 and the desire for more choice, more opportunity
00:44:45.520 for more free enterprise.
00:44:48.140 And so these voices are out there
00:44:51.820 and I'm gonna spend the summer in Cypress Medicine Hat
00:44:55.040 and going around Alberta as much as I can.
00:44:57.460 And I very, very much like to hear from all Albertans
00:45:00.180 and the direction and how we make Alberta free and prosperous.
00:45:05.380 Well, great. Well, thanks for joining me today. Maybe I'll run across you on one of those summer
00:45:09.160 events. It's been heating up to a nice one. Hopefully we're all healthy and unmasked and we
00:45:14.200 can socialize and plot and plan and improve our political lot in life this year. Absolutely.
00:45:21.300 I look forward to seeing you in person sometime soon or having you on again. It's always good
00:45:25.900 just to get somebody straight shooting and speaking from our legislature for us.
00:45:31.300 Corey Morgan, thank you very much. All the best. Have a good day.
00:45:34.440 All right. Thanks, Drew.
00:45:35.380 Talk to you later.
00:45:37.480 So, yeah, it's always good to get Drew on.
00:45:39.180 Like I said, he doesn't beat around the bush with things.
00:45:42.020 And, yeah, there's a few questions, you know, out there.
00:45:45.520 So, I mean, back to where I was ranting before Drew got on with Jenny saying,
00:45:49.540 Albertans need to want and insist we be and do better.
00:45:55.420 And that's it.
00:45:55.920 It's up to us.
00:45:56.720 I mean, we've got flaws in our democracy, but it is a democratic system.
00:46:00.700 If we really get off our butts and do something about it, we can.
00:46:04.540 I mean, we think of true authoritarian states. You can't. You can't do anything shy of a revolution. We do have peaceful tools at our disposal. We're just too lazy to utilize. And one of which is firing politicians or demanding better.
00:46:19.080 One of the things Drew was pushing for, again, was with the legislation, which really ticked me off out of the UCP, unfortunately, was that, yeah, they gave us recall and referendum legislation, but they set the bar so high, it is completely impossible.
00:46:31.700 It's just totally impossible to get those signatures in time in order to invoke a referendum or a recall.
00:46:42.060 and I mean some people don't understand like these when you've done official petitioning I
00:46:47.040 see Craig Chandler watching there boy he's done a whole heck of a lot of a lot of campaigning
00:46:50.680 even going out say for a provincial election I think you need 30 or 40 signatures on your
00:46:56.200 nomination papers to run that is a day's work quite often I mean petitioning on an official
00:47:02.260 forum means you go in person to that person you've got to get their physical signature there's not
00:47:07.540 internet signatures you got to get their address you got to get their phone number it's got to be
00:47:11.260 matched up against the voters list later. And not everybody wants to sign and you've got to get them
00:47:16.580 in person. Like it is a whole lot of work. So some people say, Oh, just getting a couple hundred
00:47:20.420 thousand signatures is easy. No, not even close. It's a massive endeavor. And the Kennedy government
00:47:26.660 darn well knows that they've campaigned before too. So when they set that bar there, that was
00:47:30.620 their way of saying, we're going to give them the legislation, but we're going to make sure they
00:47:33.040 never, never, ever actually use it. And that I found to be insulting. I would have felt better
00:47:38.000 if they had not even given us the legislation and just be honest about it and just say we don't want
00:47:43.860 to empower you with the ability to bring issues out in a referendum or the power to fire us
00:47:52.200 midterm. That's what the reality is. So yeah, and Craig there had asked Drew if Kenny was gone,
00:47:58.840 if he'd come back to caucus. It's a good question, but I got this the last time Drew was on kind of
00:48:04.240 as well in that. It's just that I don't want to corner Drew on those things because he said over
00:48:08.960 and over he's kind of keeping all doors open at this time. I mean, it's only been a month since
00:48:14.000 he's been ejected. He's been able to speak openly as an independent, but he also understands there's
00:48:19.840 a lot of handicaps in being an independent. You don't get as much voice, you don't get as much
00:48:24.160 budget in the legislature and things like that with not being with a party. Others are wondering
00:48:27.780 whether he'll join the Wildo's Independence Party. As Drew had kind of said there, though,
00:48:31.900 he's he's not uh ruling anything out either so i'm gonna let him do his job and then hit the
00:48:36.620 ground running this summer and see what he comes up with a great one from elaine i like seeing
00:48:40.700 that somebody's uh elaine mcneil saying i'm enjoying my resistance coffee right now and
00:48:44.860 it's yummy that's good again thank you for supporting our sponsors it's really important
00:48:48.780 to us it's important to those small businesses uh that are doing a great job out there for for
00:48:53.820 everybody. And then we got Patricia Lineker, probably mispronouncing there, but putting it
00:49:01.720 again, an election should be based on a resume. When us little people lie on our resume, we don't
00:49:06.300 live up to it. We get fired. It's called accountability, hired on skill and honesty.
00:49:12.220 So, I mean, yeah, when a campaign is coming as a first time person coming in, they really have to
00:49:16.660 get out to the people and tell them what they're going to do, why they should be chosen, why they
00:49:21.800 should be entrusted to get into those positions. And then they get in and they turn around and
00:49:26.240 they don't do what they promised. But the problem is we don't fire them. What are we teaching them
00:49:32.840 if we put them back in every time they lie to us? And we got to fire them. People say,
00:49:37.660 well, the next guy will be just the same. Okay, fire that one too. Fire a third one if you have
00:49:42.020 to. Eventually, some of them are going to figure it out and think, you know what, if I want to be
00:49:46.680 in my job for more than four years, maybe I should actually do it. But it's up to us.
00:49:52.660 And the same goes for the Senate and the equalization referendums coming up this fall.
00:50:01.280 I've talked about this and ranted about it.
00:50:03.640 I really feel it's important for us to get out and take part in these things.
00:50:08.860 You know, get out and strongly register our votes one way or another on those.
00:50:13.060 Make a showing.
00:50:14.760 I know some people feel that it's running against a brick wall.
00:50:17.700 Some people feel that we've got to go straight to independence.
00:50:19.740 Hey, I'm there, okay?
00:50:20.940 I was pushing for independence, you know, 20 years ago, but the voters aren't there yet.
00:50:26.420 And the best way I'd put it with Albertans were reluctant separatists.
00:50:29.720 There's just so many who want to do every possible other measure first.
00:50:36.020 It's fine.
00:50:37.180 Okay, let's do it then, though.
00:50:38.780 Let's quit messing around.
00:50:39.660 Let's try it.
00:50:40.680 Let's really put Fobor on the Senate reform.
00:50:44.120 Really hit equalization hard.
00:50:46.400 really start putting those changes in place that get our foot one foot out the door,
00:50:51.520 provincial police force, things like that. And if the central government and central Canada
00:50:57.200 responds negatively to us, well, then we will start getting those people who really want,
00:51:02.540 you know what? They'll say, that's it. Let's go. Let's pull the pin. We're done.
00:51:06.800 We got to get out of confederation. Maybe we can rewrite a deal after that. Because I think
00:51:10.420 that's where we're going to go. I think that's where we have to go. The only question is how
00:51:14.240 long is it going to take and how many times have we got to fail before we get there? But we can't
00:51:18.020 find out that without getting out there and trying on those fronts. And as Jenny also said,
00:51:24.140 yeah, on every level of government. And that's why I was hitting it at the municipal. I'd actually
00:51:28.080 gotten a private message while Drew was talking from a council member in Calgary. They're discussing
00:51:31.920 the mass bylaw as we speak right now. I won't distract myself by going and looking and seeing
00:51:36.700 how it's going, but maybe they'll actually vote and just join the province. If they're showing
00:51:40.720 some wisdom, they'll do so. And the political class no longer has any fear of the electorate
00:51:47.820 from the Albertan politicians should wake up every morning hoping they don't anger the people
00:51:50.920 they represent. Absolutely. And we need decent mechanisms, realistic ones, in order to hold
00:51:58.400 them accountable. And we don't have them. And we got a bait and switch from the UCP when it came
00:52:02.120 to recall a referenda. And like I said, that really ticked me off. And Drew and Todd tried
00:52:07.940 tried to fix it and bring that that bar you see what it was it's pretty subtle most of these uh
00:52:13.380 things like if you want to register a political party i can't remember what the number is but
00:52:15.940 you need a certain percentage of the amount of people who voted in the last election on a petition
00:52:22.660 over a period of i believe it's 90 days and it's thousands of signatures and that's why we only
00:52:26.820 still really have only a handful of parties because it's a lot of work it's tough to get
00:52:30.100 that many in that time period and what kenny set the laws for recall and referenda on though
00:52:36.260 were based on the amount of people registered to vote not who came out to vote so that sets
00:52:42.020 the bar to a huge level now think about it if you live in a constituency that say had a 40
00:52:46.580 voter turnout and you're supposed to get you know 40 of them on a petition
00:52:54.740 of the registered electors i mean you need basically everybody who voted to actually sign
00:52:58.020 the petition it's not going to happen and again the kidney government knew that so that was kind
00:53:02.660 kind of insulting um it takes away our measures so what do we do we got to start firing some of
00:53:07.860 them there's no other way to deal with this and eventually we got to move towards independence
00:53:13.560 getting on to the federal front we're moving on to the end of the parliamentary session
00:53:16.800 you want to rant a bit about that c10 i don't know what you know that that's the uh free speech
00:53:23.880 infringing internet controlling bill from the minister of heritage it's just been a gong show
00:53:29.680 I would have thought the liberals had enough sense of self-preservation to just get rid of
00:53:34.680 this dog by now. They've just stumbled on every step. Their own speaker, I mean, it was nice and
00:53:40.860 refreshing to see one parliamentary check and balance kind of work. A liberal speaker looked
00:53:46.960 at a whole pile of amendments that the liberals had shoved onto that bill as they mashed it
00:53:50.620 through committee and into parliament and said, no, that's not going to happen and got rid of
00:53:55.460 all of those amendments. Now, the bill is still there. It's still odious. It just doesn't quite
00:54:02.060 have those amendments, but the liberals just will not give up. So now they've shoved it on the Senate
00:54:05.520 and some senators are digging in their heels. Hopefully that, you know, I mean, the Senate has
00:54:11.100 loads of theoretical power. They just rarely use it and they can be stacked, but I'm just hoping
00:54:18.700 that rotten bill dies before the end of the session. And this session will probably be the
00:54:24.120 last federal session we're going to see in this parliament, this government, in a sense,
00:54:29.940 something that happened in the last week, MPs who have already declared that they're not going to
00:54:34.860 run again in the next election, got up during this session and made their farewell speeches.
00:54:39.440 So they don't anticipate that they're going to be sitting in the parliament again.
00:54:43.180 There's going to be a fall election. And I tell you, from the looks of O'Toole,
00:54:47.260 it's not going to be very good for us. We'll see. I mean, well, O'Toole's going to give us a carbon
00:54:52.480 Texas like the Liberals. So as an Albertan, I'm going to have to think really long and hard about
00:54:57.000 how I'm going to vote this fall. But as it is either way, with his capitulation and throwing
00:55:02.620 Alberta under the bus, it doesn't matter because his support numbers are crap in central Canada
00:55:05.780 where he needs to win anyway. So all he did was take us off and won no points. So I mean, I fear
00:55:10.420 we're going to get a Trudeau majority, but I don't know. I'm mixed with the fear. Maybe that'll be
00:55:13.700 the catalyst to finally get Westerners to get up and stand up for themselves. We can't change
00:55:17.920 playing within this ballpark. So let's change the park. Let's change the venue. Let's change the
00:55:21.920 rules. We've got a lot to look forward to as that goes. So they've given their goodbye speeches.
00:55:27.760 They're ramming through a couple of other things here. It looks like, you know, they're trying for
00:55:31.040 that net zero commitment in emissions by 2050. That will severely damage us, of course. It's
00:55:39.160 gross political virtue signaling at the highest of levels at terrible expense. And of course,
00:55:44.720 as always, Central Canada wants to do it at Western Canada's expense and will pay the price.
00:55:50.100 that one will probably go through. Looks like a conversion therapy ban. They're all fighting over
00:55:54.680 in there. That's another hot button virtue signaling issue. The reality is conversion
00:55:59.860 therapy is disgusting. It's people thinking that you can pray the gay away. If I can just
00:56:05.680 go to the right shrink and embrace the right religion, do you think, I mean, if you're straight
00:56:10.220 and you're listening or whatever your orientation is, do you really think that any amount of therapy
00:56:16.340 is going to change your preferences. I mean, you can really screw yourself up trying. I guarantee
00:56:21.680 you that. You can add to a lot of confusion and stress. Either way, leave parliament out of it.
00:56:26.840 There's very few places offering that. If it's a grown person who really wants to go to some
00:56:30.920 organization and try and take on such therapy, whatever, you know, screw yourself up. Unfortunately,
00:56:36.140 we'll have to pay to try and fix you later. But it's an odious concept, but is it somewhere that
00:56:42.820 we need our federal parliament tying themselves in knots over either. I don't know. I think it's
00:56:46.940 more of a political trap because it brings people into anybody who looks like they're opposing the
00:56:52.740 liberal ban on it is supporting the conversion therapy itself. And then they can play some
00:56:57.180 political gotcha with it. It's a stink bomb. Hopefully it gets through and we just get on
00:57:02.120 to some more reasonable things. There's word that Saskatchewan's looking to get out of their
00:57:06.220 restrictions getting back to provincial stuff in July. It looks like Scott Moe is ready to move on
00:57:11.540 that. Their infections are down. Let's leave on, I guess, some optimistic notes. Canada Day is
00:57:18.720 coming up. That's the day. That's the day we get back to normal in Alberta outside of any of the
00:57:24.880 municipalities that are maintaining controls on us. Here's something like, again, I'm somebody
00:57:32.200 who's sour in confederation. I want to see a new deal. I want to see a referendum. I want to see
00:57:36.420 the West split off as Ted Byfield used to refer to it in the past. If we're looking at the long
00:57:41.080 game. I'd like to see reconfederation. That was his term. You know, we can sign back into another
00:57:45.480 deal, whether it's EU style or whatever. I mean, confederation is just a bunch of agreements. It's
00:57:49.980 just a contract. And that contract is the constitution and it stinks. It's dated. It
00:57:54.880 doesn't account for the regional differences. It doesn't account for the regional changes or the
00:57:59.380 growth. And nobody's willing to change that constitution. So you know what? Let's tear this
00:58:03.920 engine down to its roots and rebuild it. And the only way to do that is to have a constitutional
00:58:10.160 crisis and that's where the province either voting to go or at least varying on the very
00:58:13.340 brink of it because charlottetown beach lake didn't make it through you need something big
00:58:17.060 to give the catalyst to make that real true systemic change either way along those lines
00:58:23.360 canada today canada today canada today coming july 1st you know the celebration of the beginning
00:58:29.500 of confederation i i'm fine with that you know even as an albertan first now as a person who
00:58:35.760 wants to see confederation torn down a change, I still respect the history. I still respect the
00:58:40.360 fact that this nation was formed and became one of the most prosperous, free nations in the entire
00:58:45.260 world. And I'm sick of the self-loathing assholes who think we should be apologizing for attitudes
00:58:50.520 from 150 years ago. Those guys built what we are enjoying today. Sure, they were intolerant. That's
00:58:57.820 what was happening 150 years ago. Sure, they had some views that are unacceptable today. Well,
00:59:03.600 let's celebrate that we grew out of those views. But to try and cancel Canada Day is pure idiocy.
00:59:09.320 It's junk, it's crap, it's revisionism, and we've got virtue signaling politicians, again,
00:59:14.420 usually on the municipal front because we keep re-electing these extremist ding-dongs into
00:59:18.300 those positions. So St. Albert's canceling their fireworks. Victoria, of course, land of the loopy
00:59:23.840 left, got rid of their Canada Day celebrations. Penticton has followed suit. Has it changed
00:59:28.560 anything? Did it undo the damage of the residential schools? Did it stop the internment of the
00:59:34.600 Chinese or the deportations of the Chinese in the 20s or the internment of the Japanese in
00:59:39.260 the 40s? No. And I'm not ashamed of the nation. I don't like our system. I think it's broken. I
00:59:47.260 think we need to work to fix it. But I'm not ashamed of what got us here. It was still better
00:59:52.940 than a lot of the blood, gore, and misery that a lot of other nations had to do to get into the
00:59:57.260 modern world. They all look at any nation's history from 150 years ago. It wasn't pretty.
01:00:03.080 So, I mean, when it's not to look and say we celebrate Canada today or to look at a statue
01:00:07.980 of John A. MacDonald doesn't mean we embrace everything they did and love everything they
01:00:12.440 did. It's just that we recognize how historically significant those people were and how it led to
01:00:17.160 where we are today. And I still, if we were in a truly independent Alberta 10 years from now,
01:00:22.020 completely gone from confederation, I still wouldn't be offended by a John A. MacDonald
01:00:26.120 old statue that was somewhere that would still be a part of Alberta's history even then.
01:00:31.080 But we've gone into this world of madness thinking somehow
01:00:34.160 we're all responsible for the sins of our fathers. What an ugly concept. We're getting better.
01:00:41.260 There's always room to improve. But this ridiculousness and this pushback against our
01:00:47.500 own history is counterproductive. It's identity politics, you know, gone to the extreme and gone
01:00:53.820 wild and again i'll say it i've said it before and i'll say it again that's another reason i want
01:00:57.660 independence if you really want to get rid of racism in canada if you really do and i tell
01:01:02.060 you what the virtue signaling left really doesn't because if they really did they would oppose the
01:01:06.700 indian act they would want it repealed and they would want the reserve system to come to an end
01:01:11.100 so you know what whenever you listen to one of those jackasses talking about systemic racism
01:01:14.700 in canada tell them they have no place to speak until they call for the complete repeat repealing
01:01:21.100 of the indian act get rid of it because it's a purely racial document it's pure race-based
01:01:25.900 policy it's ugly as wrong and get rid of the reserve system which is racial apartheid that's
01:01:30.300 exactly what it is it's racial apartheid by definition so unless you're going to actually
01:01:34.620 oppose those two things then you're full of crap when you're claiming you oppose racism you're
01:01:38.220 lying you're selective you can't be selective if you oppose racism you can't say i oppose this
01:01:42.780 racism but not that racism we've got to oppose it all if we're going to get rid of it not
01:01:47.820 entrenching and actually dividing further with this ridiculousness you know there's identity
01:01:52.460 politics i'm this i'm that i'm this i'm that well i'm here and i'm now and i'm going to deal with
01:01:58.220 tomorrow and today i'll learn from yesterday i'm not going to apologize for it either way
01:02:04.460 that's enough ranting for today uh the weather looks great it's going to be nice and hot out
01:02:09.340 tomorrow let's hope when i get back online we'll have had some mass band-aids uh ripped out by
01:02:16.620 by municipal governments. If not, maybe on Friday, I'll start listing all the businesses around
01:02:20.400 Calgary, perhaps around Edmonton. They'll be happy to offer a mask-free service so customers can
01:02:25.620 enjoy themselves in comfort and smile at each other or scowl at each other or whatever their
01:02:29.260 preferences may be. Happy Monday to you too, Jenny, and thanks for tuning in. Thank all the
01:02:35.220 rest of you for tuning in. You know, it was a good show. Thank you for letting me get that off my
01:02:40.240 chest. And of course, one other bunch that I do have to thank again is our sponsors. And by the
01:02:47.340 way, I should thank the people who subscribe to the Western Standard. You know, we need
01:02:50.220 those subscriptions. They are critical. Get on there, sign up. You get some great content,
01:02:55.320 some great articles, great columns. You know, sign up, subscribe. It gives us that stability
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01:03:24.040 give you more reasoning as to why, you know, they need your help, why you should join them
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01:03:35.340 ordered a whole bunch of it. I'm looking forward to it. I'll be sure to drink some
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01:03:43.920 it's great. But you know, again, these guys aren't doing that woke political correctness. They're
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01:03:51.640 purchase to good causes that are fighting for the constitutional freedoms of Canadians. 10%
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01:04:24.580 us. Plus, you're going to get good coffee. It's just a perfect win. So, be sure to support them,
01:04:29.280 guys. Thank you all for tuning in this week. Nathan's going to be on, Nathan Guida with
01:04:35.160 Mountain Standard tomorrow at 10 o'clock.
01:04:37.540 On Wednesday, I'll be back with the pipeline
01:04:39.740 with probably with Dave and Derek and then
01:04:41.520 Friday for another episode of this show.
01:04:43.540 And I'll be talking to Linda
01:04:45.140 Slobodian on that one. So
01:04:47.060 thanks again and we will see you then.