THE PIPELINE： Alberta independence gets messy
Episode Stats
Harmful content
Misogyny
8
sentences flagged
Toxicity
3
sentences flagged
Hate speech
17
sentences flagged
Summary
The Western Standard's senior columnist Cory Morgan is joined by news editor Dave Naylor and former editor Nigel Hannaford to discuss the latest in the Scottish independence movement, including the latest on the case against former Scottish Prime Minister, Jeffrey Ramsay.
Transcript
00:00:00.000
good evening it's july 15th my name is cory morgan i'm a senior columnist of the western
00:00:29.440
standard and you're watching the pipeline you can see the host this week is less bearded and
00:00:34.960
prettier than the one you're used to looking at mr phil de brant is on a vacation for the time
00:00:39.520
being so we've got me hosting it today and talking to a couple of our usual suspects on this uh
00:00:47.040
broadcast i'll start on the end there with our news editor dave naylor good to see you good to
00:00:51.200
see you and i'm stealing you from an important match oh yeah come on let's talk and let's get
00:00:55.520
let's get this going doesn't make that clock go any faster no i know i know going we will cover
00:00:59.840
those subjects and i hope you are not too distracted no and our former opinion editor
00:01:04.720
and still constant contributor of great content uh nigel hannaford i would be opinion editor
00:01:10.480
emeritus yes yes that sounds so much more elegant it gives it a means forever doesn't it no it means
00:01:17.040
once he was a has-been oh yeah it's a nicer way to say it does sound a little better and it likes
00:01:23.120
One of the best things I've heard before when people say that is better a has-been than a never was.
00:01:31.880
Issues, a couple in my wheelhouse, I guess you could say.
00:01:41.700
A person who's been a leading figure and voice in the independence debate for some time is now dominating the news, but not in a good way.
00:01:49.540
uh no we're talking about uh jeff wrath he was a still is a leader i guess of the independence
00:01:56.100
party on on on one front he has been sued and had his assets frozen by the tall creek first nations
00:02:04.340
and it's all over a settlement that uh that i guess wrath negotiated uh that was to provide
00:02:10.580
money for for youngsters uh in the in the first nation and apparently there's some discussions
00:02:16.740
about what money was withheld and how it was withheld and all sorts of stuff like that.
00:02:22.740
So a judge has granted an account freezing, so they're actually doing further debate on it
00:02:32.500
as we speak in an Edmonton courtroom. So it's exactly the news the independence groups don't
00:02:38.660
really need. Well, that's why I sort of flagged it this morning. I thought, would this be happening
00:02:43.460
if he was not so prominently involved with the independence movement?
00:02:48.680
And I can't answer that, but it certainly was the first thing I thought of.
00:02:52.880
Well, some people have spoken on things such as that,
00:02:55.580
but it should be remembered, this is part of a combination.
00:02:58.320
These guys have been fighting this legal battle for a few years now.
00:03:01.680
So, I mean, perhaps there's questioning on the timing
00:03:04.300
when the courts decided now is the time to pounce and act.
00:03:06.940
I don't know if that had anything to do with it,
00:03:10.820
but it's not solely because of any independence involvement because i think this whole thing
00:03:15.460
began before the all right yeah it's like it's it's pretty likely that it's only because it
00:03:21.460
involves jeff wrath that is it is uh uh getting so much uh so much news coverage i mean he's
00:03:27.860
he's certainly a volatile volatile subject that uh has ranted and raved a lot on uh on social
00:03:34.980
media. And, uh, yeah, I guess this is his enemies, uh, come up against him.
00:03:41.480
Nigel, you know, I guess from a strategic perspective, even if you know, you're not
00:03:45.800
necessarily part of the independence movement, but it's been an unusual campaign.
00:03:52.000
You know, when you've got a number of different groups, a number, there's no
00:03:54.440
particular centralized leader, uh, that's kind of saves you from being taken down
00:04:00.240
by one scandal, but it also means everybody kind of wears the actions of
00:04:03.600
everybody else how does the movement address this i mean part of it too is this is still to be proved
00:04:09.320
out in court i mean jeff rath may have done absolutely nothing wrong we'll see over time
00:04:13.840
but it's making the news and it still is a distraction and looks poorly how does the
00:04:19.020
movement cope with this well i think the movement is going to have to figure that out because there's
00:04:22.460
going to be a lot more dirty stuff uh coming at you you know like just this morning a national
00:04:29.220
Post carried a story about a fellow in Eastern Canada who was part of the healthcare lobby,
00:04:39.060
the people who represent the doctors and nurses and just don't want any change because they want
00:04:42.740
the money to keep coming. Friends of Medicare as well. At any rate, whatever. And he said,
00:04:49.060
Carney ought to just cut Alberta off from healthcare. That was your story. It's not going
00:04:57.140
to go anywhere because first of all i don't think mr carney would would do that uh it's not a it's
00:05:04.260
not a statesman like thing to do uh and secondly you can't change the law just like that either
00:05:09.700
if they do it they do it and they keep the health transfers coming but that's just one of the
00:05:14.900
mentality that i see taking root another one was uh judge leonard when she bumped the original
00:05:22.580
uh referendum if that ever goes to appeal we won't know the result for months but meanwhile
00:05:32.900
that couldn't that question couldn't be put so premier came up with a clever workaround and
00:05:38.820
we're doing that instead but you know there are people out there who are taking the federalist
00:05:45.060
side who are now going to see what they can do to derail the independence movement.
00:05:52.260
Because of the 250-year events of the last few weeks, I've been a little more aware of
00:05:59.620
what was going on in the 13 colonies 250 years ago. I can't tell you, that's the same kind of
0.80
00:06:06.260
thing that was going on, except people were getting tarred and feathers. You might want to watch out.
00:06:34.020
makes it okay well if they stop healthcare payments
00:06:38.100
Yeah. We'll see who wins that. I think procedurally it's easier for them to stop the health care payments than for us to.
1.00
00:06:45.100
It's not like we write a check or anything. But anyway, good for Chris.
00:06:49.100
But that's not unprecedented too. I mean, for those who remember the first Bill 11 with Ralph Klein and prior to that,
00:06:56.100
when he tried having some doctor's fees imposed on people to visit doctors, they cut our transfer payments at that time too.
00:07:04.100
too. And Chrétien threatened to do so, and that's part of why, do so more, and that's part of why
00:07:08.740
Klein backed off. So they could use that as a threat, and we could see something, if they follow
00:07:14.420
the same rule book that Chrétien successfully used. Yeah, and sorry, Chris says it also helps
00:07:19.860
the independence movement, because they can see how petty the little Wrenchians are, who are going
0.99
00:07:24.740
to take their health care. Yeah, that would, no, the way I remember that 25 years ago was with
0.99
00:07:30.420
Rolf Klein was that he recognized that the problem was that a lot of people would show up at emergency
00:07:39.300
when they actually had plenty of time to take care of it during all business hours at their
00:07:43.780
own doctor. How do you start people doing that? Well, I think he had $10 in mind for a fee,
00:07:49.300
which was not exorbitant at all. Anyway, the Liberals wanted to make a point that they were
00:07:57.300
there for the average canadian and oh no you can't do that we'll cut your cut your transfer payments
00:08:03.940
off now why he then went further and brought in bill 11 to absolutely bar anybody having a private
00:08:10.900
hospital in alberta always struck me as a bridge too far you know he would have been much better
00:08:16.740
to have everybody get as many private hospitals as you can and put the job out to bed you know
00:08:23.060
whatever the job is but anyway he didn't do that unfortunately now we're stuck with it well that's
00:08:28.100
it that's the federal hammer over our heads i looked at it recently just because it was it's
00:08:31.620
a recent story and then the amount that chretchen clawed back was almost token it was like 3.6
00:08:35.380
million dollars but it really still was part of what we were entitled to and he took it away
00:08:40.660
incline's first incarnation of bill 11 was actually to expand some private options but he
00:08:45.620
backed down on that one that's one of the things he said is a policy regret later but there was
00:08:50.100
that threat of having those transfers if people studied a bit of that too as chris said too this
00:08:54.340
might increase the independence movement they understand we we're stuck with providing the
00:08:59.540
care provincially but they tell us how we must do it and they'll punish us with our our holding our
00:09:04.900
own money back if we don't well you know corey if you let me just promote my own show for tomorrow
00:09:09.700
night here for a moment i had a really interesting guest he's um a utilities economist and he was
00:09:17.060
commenting on a paper that the federal government had put out as an intention to proceed. What it
00:09:23.060
called for was a new way of handling power transmission within Canada. They started with
00:09:30.740
the premise that there was too much north-south and not enough east-west. Therefore, we need to
00:09:36.900
do things differently. Well, I tell you, right now, what emerged from that interview was just how
00:09:42.660
independent alberta was in the matter of generation and of power and moving it forward if this was
00:09:50.420
not already in place this is what the independence movement would be recommending so i have to wonder
00:09:56.820
whether mr mr carney had that in the back of his mind when uh he authorized the release of this
00:10:02.900
paper or whether it's just genuinely uh you know the the the specialists in the back rooms having
00:10:09.140
their way anyway tomorrow at seven o'clock tune in yeah i mean it's it's you know healthcare in
00:10:16.100
general everybody knows it's not working everybody knows you know you've seen the the wait with
00:10:21.460
doctors waiting lists the lineups at the er you know a year and a half to get a get a surgery
00:10:27.460
healthcare is not working so at least the smith government is trying something which is bill 11
00:10:31.940
and you know allowing doctors to to bill in both the public and private sectors and you know the
00:10:37.860
the left wing just loses their collective minds over it.
00:10:45.320
Well, you see, you're speaking like a customer,
00:10:52.960
you want the ability to get treatment when you want it,
00:11:03.620
so they're the ones that you'll never convince them otherwise so frankly the if anything is
00:11:10.900
going to change it's going to have to be because people like premier smith think it needs to change
00:11:15.700
and get it done that's good that's uh there's a kind of a i have friends who are doctors and
00:11:22.980
nurses and so on so i have to be a bit careful how i phrase this otherwise i'll hear about it later
00:11:27.940
but you know the the system certainly works well for the people who are paid by the hour yeah and
00:11:35.860
it's not it's not the doctors and the nurses and the physiotherapists it's the executives
00:11:41.700
the bureaucracy that's from there's some of the other end too though i mean i can't remember the
00:11:45.700
name of the group it was canadians for democratic health care something like that they're the ones
00:11:49.780
really making the noise pressuring carney saying he's got to cut and stop premier smith in her
00:11:53.220
tracks and i looked into who all the funders of it are public service union public service union
00:11:58.180
public service it's the unions and that they've got a stranglehold on the care well so much you
00:12:04.100
know so many of those contracts are loaded with things that don't sound like much when you write
00:12:08.980
them out but they actually add up to a lot of money so so you book off shift and they call you
00:12:13.460
you know mr smith is having convulsions what did you give him you know uh if they take that phone
00:12:19.140
call it may take two minutes but they get to charge a lot of time for it and those kinds of
00:12:24.900
restrictive practices really boost the um boost the wage bill in the public clearance sector
00:12:31.060
well there's been some other things they don't like discussed if we tried to reform some things
00:12:34.580
if we had a private hospital for example i bet you private managers wouldn't put up with a nurse
00:12:38.900
pulling in 500 000 a year by gaming the overtime system as they do when they choose shift swapping
0.96
00:12:44.900
and a whole number of other things that are built into those union contracts where suddenly they're
00:12:48.580
making six, eight times regular salary and they still qualify as part time. There's a lot of
00:12:57.700
stuff that gets exposed and then of course the unions freak out and then the government backs
00:13:00.980
off and they're too afraid to talk about it. But a private institution would look at that at the
00:13:05.300
dollars and cents and say, well, no, we're just going to hire another nurse. We're not going to
0.95
00:13:09.940
let you do that. But they would say good luck finding one. That's the other problem. That's
00:13:17.360
With competition, actually, it's surprising what can happen, but we'll see.
00:13:22.020
I mean, so it's another flashpoint potentially in the independence thing.
00:13:24.900
As I said, we've got these distractions and it's going to get uglier.
00:13:28.320
I mean, yeah, you know, Jeff Rath has this, Dennis Moldry has been in some legal soup,
00:13:32.380
unfortunately with his own family thing that went out, which typically these things,
00:13:36.280
we wouldn't hear a lot of news of it, except that they're involved in the independence
00:13:39.400
movement, I think the pathways for independence guy blew up a public washroom
1.00
00:13:42.860
unapologetically in 1991 after a bender on draft at the spotlight club in calgary just preemptively
1.00
00:13:48.620
getting that out there in case it gets released now um sorry say that again what's that you remember
00:13:53.320
the spotlight club i remember the spotlight that was a vile place that was yes cheap draft though
00:13:57.960
oh i don't know some guy who's leading the pathway to independence group these days so
00:14:01.820
it was a tragic thing but you know just these scandals might emerge from somebody's
00:14:05.700
past as this campaign gets going further so they're digging up you right now who knows that's
00:14:10.880
the only one I can think of that might, you know, might show some, some bad principle on my part.
00:14:15.560
I probably should have cleaned up after myself or something, but I was, you know, give me a break.
00:14:19.680
I was 20 years old and it had a lot of draft. If I remember correctly, the spotlight draft
00:14:25.460
wasn't very good. No, it was warm and flat, but it was only four bucks a jug or something like that.
00:14:30.220
But, you know, I mean, it took more to get the effect. You couldn't pass up on a scene with
00:14:33.980
Mitzi Dupuis and some of the talented folks who used to tour back. No, but we're going to.
00:14:39.160
Kong at its finest. Oh, yes. An ugly sidetrack. Yes. Derek's out of the house and he's put the
00:14:45.860
tasteless man in charge of the microphone. So these things are going to come up. All right.
00:14:49.740
Well, we'll see what unfolds with all of that anyways, with Mr. Rath and see what happens. I
00:14:54.520
mean, I guess just to follow a bit, I mean, Keith Wilson's really kind of emerging though, as
00:14:58.380
the voice of this at this point, uh, and increasingly so I think maybe the movement's
00:15:04.000
going to coalesce a little more around him as well. Even if some people still think highly of
00:15:07.900
Mr. Rath, they just understand that if we can't focus on independence when all this other stuff's
00:15:12.860
going on. No, and you don't have time to really have a convention to get a leader. But after the
00:15:19.480
referendum, you do have time. Do you think that's something the independence groups will take on and
00:15:25.060
have a convention and select a leader? I don't know. I mean, I don't know how you do it because
00:15:30.140
we're in an unprecedented spot. With a party, it gives you a natural mechanism and a role and a
00:15:34.640
place. But with a bunch of disparate groups, how do you still crown a king, even if it's a
00:15:40.960
democratic means? We haven't been down this road before. You have to go back to the constitutional
00:15:51.760
textbooks and just look at who else. I mean, how did they do it in 1776? They had their revolution
00:15:58.880
first in the Constitutional Convention second, as I seem to recall.
00:16:03.920
Yeah. Well, if we were going down that road, presumably to an actual Clarity Act compliant
00:16:09.120
referendum, and there was a yes vote, you know, we still a good few steps away from there, then
00:16:14.400
theoretically, yes, some sort of constitutional convention would have to be held and somebody
00:16:18.000
would be picked. But how does this movement deal with this right now? You know, even if they get,
00:16:23.600
say, 60% on that word salad of a question that's coming, it's not binding for anything.
00:16:28.400
it will move the gears for and obviously this issue won't be going away we'll have more happening but
00:16:33.600
how will they centralize their messaging frankly there you know you do actually have to go back to
00:16:38.720
the books that chart the progress of revolutions i'm thinking of crane's book it was written before
00:16:46.480
the war but he analyzed how movements like the french revolution like the like the american
00:16:54.480
revolution like the civil wars in england how the russian revolution came about and unfortunately
00:17:03.840
what always seemed to happen would there would be a strong group and there would be a more moderate
00:17:08.560
group and they would join together and then there would be a purge of the weaker groups afterwards
00:17:17.200
it would be i'm not recommending this i'm just saying that historically that's what tends to
00:17:22.960
happen yeah and but you won't even get a chance to form a government and do any purging unless you
00:17:30.320
first seize the initiative and get yourself elected that's what it'll take somebody's going
00:17:37.920
to have to shake hands and say well until we get through the the next election we're going to work
00:17:42.640
together sort it out later well we'll see what happens yes well so another uh story popping up uh
00:17:56.800
I think most Albertans realize that and feel that way.
00:18:01.340
So Alberta created eight out of ten of the new jobs across Canada in the past year.
00:18:08.560
And that's even so, I mean, Ottawa has that ability to keep creating those civil service jobs.
00:18:12.820
That's part of how Trudeau managed to always pad the numbers.
00:18:15.500
Even despite that sort of thing, though Carney, I think,
00:18:18.140
hasn't been as aggressive in hiring civil service.
00:18:23.120
But 8 in 10 in a province that only makes up 12% of the country.
00:18:32.840
So we only have 12% of the country, but we make 80% of the jobs.
00:18:44.720
And 55,000 of them were in the healthcare sector.
00:18:48.140
Wow. So that's the hiring of the nurses and all that sort of good stuff. So compared, Ontario only created 65,000 jobs. And all the people are saying, you know, it's basically everybody's flocking to Alberta because they can get jobs with good pay and the cost of living here, buying a house, all that sort of good stuff is way cheaper than in Vancouver or Toronto.
00:19:13.360
So it certainly puts yet another damper on the chicken littles in the sky that said this referendum question would force investment away from Alberta.
00:19:28.660
We have the $13 billion data center from Zuckerberg that Corey is getting all this hate mail from.
00:19:39.560
Yeah. Yeah. And it's actually been booming for a very long time. It's just that we never got the credit for it. But now, of course, with the Eastern manufacturing, it's too bad. They're getting walled by the American attitude to bringing production back into the United States.
00:19:59.620
so the auto industry is reeling and the steel industry is reeling and all these projects are
00:20:06.660
going into the major projects office but none of them are coming out so there's not much hope to
00:20:12.420
be had in eastern canada at the moment i think people hear that song about albert abandon they
00:20:18.660
decide there's better things to available out here and sure enough especially if you've got a
00:20:24.580
degree in nursing, your doors are open for you. That's the only thing that discourages me a little
00:20:30.980
about those numbers. I mean, great, we need the healthcare professionals. We're just talking
00:20:35.700
about that. But I would personally be happier if it was people who were in the energy sector or
00:20:46.820
perhaps doing something with AI. Value-added industries.
00:20:50.020
We all need nurses, but at the end, it's a cost, not a cost.
00:20:56.500
It's very good news, I think, for the Smith government, too, though, particularly the healthcare ones, though, in that sense that the doomsayers, as she's brought in policies, and she's been fighting with the unions, the teachers' union, you know, putting them back to work, and there's always, you know, crabbiness with the nurses' union, and they've always said the NDP, all these professionals are going to flee Alberta, you're not going to be able to get any nurses, you're not going to be able to get any teachers, you're not.
00:21:20.580
You know, just in passing, Corey, I am absolutely flabbergasted by the relentless propaganda
00:21:26.900
paid for by the health and education uniforms that's blasting out of the radio every day.
00:21:35.380
And yet, they're coming here in droves to take well-paid work in Alberta.
00:21:42.040
Do they not get the memos from the union office?
00:21:45.880
You can sell your house in Toronto and buy us something similar here and bank half your
00:21:54.020
Well, it says something about those unions too, though, and that, I mean, it's true.
00:21:57.500
You can't turn on the radio without hearing another one of those healthcare or education
00:22:01.500
union guys going, but the teachers union with their short lived strike, didn't have any
00:22:07.500
strike pay because it turns out all the money they'd been paying into their union for decades,
00:22:11.360
the union has been pissing it away and never actually set it aside for a time like that
00:22:15.200
when they need it that's where it's going they're blowing it out on these ads that are failing yes
00:22:21.760
i can give you guys some advice podcasts you don't have to listen to commercial radio oh
00:22:28.240
i'm familiar with those yeah you've done one or two yourself yeah nobody will buy ads online so
00:22:33.680
you don't have to get it is that because you blew up the strippers bathroom it wasn't the strippers
00:22:38.240
bathroom it was just a public washroom it was terrible either way uh thank you less said about
00:22:43.680
that it was the days before having everybody having a camera so it was i i do blame that i
00:22:48.400
think there was some sort of poison in that jug of draft came other than ping pong ball
00:22:56.720
nurses had to treat my gastric issues later bless them all anyway all the rocks rocks
00:23:03.520
walking and roll do we have room for all these people in the schools or bulging you know housing
00:23:10.320
starts i believe i'm just going off of memory i think they've been shooting up very well
00:23:16.880
so does this now i mean tying it into the prior discussion though does this undercut the
00:23:22.800
independence uh case a little bit i mean it's kind of saying well you know what alberta can still
00:23:28.880
manage to keep its industries going i mean it's like i said at the start i feel alberta's
00:23:32.480
prospering despite ottawa but maybe some people are satisfied even if it's despite auto as long
00:23:38.080
as the prospering is happening well there would be room for some uh you know to do a good streeter
00:23:44.800
with uh going around asking people are you new to alberta how do you feel about because i have
00:23:52.480
a feeling hopefully i have not done the street or i have not asked the question but i have a
00:23:58.000
sense that people who just moved in from toronto probably don't have that sense of alberta pride
00:24:05.280
that people who have lived here for generations and feel aggrieved at the attitude of the federal
00:24:13.120
government often bear with them. I mean, there's a reason why we think the way we do, but if you've
00:24:19.200
just moved in from out of town, you probably haven't had time to pick up on that vibe.
00:24:23.120
No, and I think you're probably going to vote to stay, because you're not going to
00:24:27.200
give everything up in Toronto, move here, and then, what, we're going to be a separate country?
00:24:31.520
i mean that was a difficult one too you never know i mean a lot of people moved here to escape
00:24:35.840
though what they felt was going on government wise and they don't want to see it creeping in
00:24:39.040
here i i have met i mean it's anecdotal so i don't know how much it means in the numbers in general
00:24:44.000
but a fair number actually people have moved here for that express purpose just said well
00:24:47.360
it's the last bastion of conservatism uh i want to move here and save what little i can from what
00:24:53.760
seems to be creeping in everywhere else and i'm going to support it some of the worst i've seen
00:24:57.920
have been long established Albertans professors others you know well I got my mortgage paid off
00:25:03.600
I've got my pension I don't want to rock the boat right now but the young ambitious ones who are
00:25:07.760
moving and traveling they're a little more I think flexible anyways maybe but I mean I'm just guessing
00:25:14.560
from who I meet I mean only select people though yes your audiences are a bit biased yes the rooms
00:25:22.720
could be a little slanted well I mean I do meet people on the other side they come out but usually
00:25:26.240
they're hollering at me until we get security to have them removed so it's a polarizing time
00:25:31.760
how's the book sales coming very good yeah i've sold out again are you really how many copies
00:25:36.320
is that now i don't know what the you know what the updated sovereignty sandbook if you give me
00:25:41.600
an opportunity for a plug i don't manage the online sales of it so i don't see those stats
00:25:48.240
quite yet but uh the the sales in person as i go to events and selling them i've sold a couple
00:25:53.920
hundred already just you know the sorentist's handbook yes the updated one apparently apparently
00:26:00.240
he still hasn't earned enough to wear a tie oh i forgot that jeez i i it's sort of the aftermath
00:26:06.960
of stampede well this was part of the hurry too i mean this was a this was a no huddle uh uh you
00:26:12.560
know take off here right from my show to this show because you have an important event i have an
00:26:17.280
important event i'm trying to get there and you know derek's not derek's in germany so yeah we
00:26:21.920
we know he won't watch a show. Well he never watches the show when he's here. Well this will
00:26:26.780
be the time that he does. Oh well. One time because he's jet lagged and awake in Munich.
00:26:33.800
Well interesting. Let's look into the federal front again. This is a beauty.
00:26:39.200
You put that in there. Carney's choice of a chief operating officer. I mean that's a new office in
00:26:43.220
the prime minister's office. Yeah it is. And so much for elbows up apparently I guess he couldn't
00:26:49.580
find anybody within Canada who qualified for the role.
00:26:51.980
I know. This is a really weird story. For the benefit of listeners who might not be aware,
00:26:59.020
I did have six years in Ottawa working in the prime minister's office. I'm fairly aware of
00:27:04.620
the way the office is structured. This is a complete outlier in terms of it. I've been
00:27:11.980
checking around with some of my old colleagues to see if they've heard of anything like it.
00:27:27.520
It is a position that Carney obviously wants for his purposes that he's figured out.
00:27:35.540
You have the prime minister, you have the cabinet, you have the prime minister's office.
00:27:39.940
uh political appointees who who try to give the try to give instruction to the rest of the federal
00:27:47.460
government the civil service chosen for their point of view so you have a chief of staff
00:27:52.740
the chief of staff does all the unpleasant work that the prime minister shouldn't have to do like
00:27:59.700
fire people and hire people and then you've got the there's a whole policy as a side of it as well
00:28:07.300
that gets shared out between the deputy chief of staff and the the principal secretary so everything
00:28:14.820
to do with executive action and policy development is already figured out in those three people now
00:28:20.580
we have a fourth one courtesy of uh of mr carney he described the appointment is described as being
00:28:28.740
the chief operating officer well you know the all of those functions that are wrapped up in the
00:28:36.580
in a chief operating officer's job in a private company are actually taken care of by the three
00:28:42.340
individuals you mentioned before the chief of staff the deputy chief of staff the principal
00:28:45.860
secretary so quite what this person's unique uh lane to run in is going to be i i've not figured
00:28:53.540
that out yet and none of the people that i spoke to have figured it out either they're all scratching
00:28:59.140
their heads. The only thing that I can think of that makes any sense is that this woman is a
0.99
00:29:07.580
Democrat. She knows a lot of the people in Washington who would be valuable for Mr. Carney
00:29:16.380
to know. And if she is a Democrat and served under Mr. Biden, she'd have a pretty good idea
00:29:22.560
of what the ways that particular part of the United States thinks
00:29:30.360
So perhaps it is, they had to call her something.
00:29:34.640
I can't see her interfering with the mechanics of government,
0.98
00:29:39.300
but she will provide intelligence from the Washington swamp
00:29:48.320
But this, Corey, Dave, is me in my nice mode trying to put the most positive spin on something that is completely outrageous.
00:29:59.940
But you did say intelligence and Ottawa in the same sentence.
00:30:07.100
This new CAO has a democratic history, as you know, worked for Hillary Clinton in her election campaign in 2016.
00:30:18.020
and has also been involved with the Democratic Mayor,
00:30:22.940
former Democratic Mayor of New York, Michael Bloomberg.
00:30:32.060
And she's apparently already been fined by the Ethics Commissioner,
00:30:37.260
$250 fine for not giving up the details of her portfolio quick enough.
00:30:44.040
So already she's tired and she really has to start at the job.
0.99
00:30:47.620
I mean, give her a little slack. They don't have ethics commissioners in Washington. They
0.99
00:30:53.540
may have Senate committees to investigate, but this is like, who is an ethics commissioner?
00:30:59.620
Who is this? Well, $250 later, now you know. Well, you think somebody might have told her
00:31:06.740
that she had to fill out the form? I don't know. Remember you said intelligence in Ottawa
00:31:13.300
in the same sentence. They could have asked Gerald Butts to come back. Oh no, I don't even think
00:31:20.260
Mark Carney would touch that. You know, I just don't see the value and the tactics of this. I
00:31:26.580
mean, you laid out part of the value this person could provide, fair enough. You know, you need
00:31:30.180
somebody who knows some of the names and faces and people to talk to, but he should also be
00:31:34.660
keenly aware that he's dealing with an orange tinted, hypersensitive madman and trying to make
00:31:40.580
make trade deals with and to take a prominent Democrat operative and stick it into his office,
0.72
00:31:47.100
no less, is not going to make his job any easier in dealing with President Trump, who really
00:31:53.160
doesn't take anything lightly or well. You know, you could get the value of this person
00:31:58.700
in many, many positions. It's easy enough for the prime minister's office. You make a budget,
00:32:02.740
you create a role and you can put them there without it being so prominent as being one of
00:32:06.620
or full out inner circle people, I mean, was this a purposeful signal in doing this or
00:32:15.980
You look, last week we had to back down on the Gordie Howe bridge stuff.
00:32:23.500
We built that bridge and now Carney's capitulated and Trump's going to get another, Trump's
00:32:32.860
I think it's the state of Michigan that gets half the tolls, isn't it?
00:32:40.700
And, you know, it was blocked by Trump people and Trump says he's now happy with the deal.
00:32:51.620
I mean, the other part too, of course, it undercuts the entire basis of how Carney
00:32:58.000
This whole campaign was elbows up, all Canada, all the time, higher from within, don't feed
0.99
00:33:05.180
Apparently out of 40 million Canadians, she was the only one qualified for that position
1.00
00:33:12.580
As I say, the astonishment of my erstwhile colleagues and what this person was supposed
00:33:18.520
to do was the signal that this is something a bit different.
00:33:21.940
and it's not the first time that the liberals have actually employed American expertise.
00:33:28.400
I think they had Frank Luntz up, this must be 10 years ago now,
00:33:32.180
but, you know, a mercenary, an advisor for hire.
00:33:37.500
He would have been just as happy to advise the conservatives,
00:33:40.500
but the liberals got to him first and had more money, so he worked for them.
00:33:45.580
So the idea of bringing in the people on the American left
00:33:49.860
to advise the Liberal Party. It's not a new one. This is not the first time it's happened.
00:33:56.340
But I am surprised that Mr. Carney, in the circumstances, would have chosen that person
00:34:04.220
at this time. Maybe she knows something about somebody down there that's going to be helpful.
00:34:15.360
Well, it will be interesting, but it probably wasn't the clincher deal for her.
00:34:21.280
Everybody thinks that senior politicos make a lot of money, but not compared to what they're
00:34:26.860
capable of making elsewhere if they're capable of doing that job at all.
00:34:30.460
So I would be pitching her salary in the $200,000 to $250,000 range.
00:34:34.740
Well, Carney's appointment of the defense procurement guy, he's making $700,000.
00:34:42.040
But he's not within the prime minister's office.
00:34:44.480
He's working for a hands-off organization, so if she is a staffer and covered by the
00:34:53.420
civil service grade system, then it only takes you so far up the ladder.
00:35:13.240
also hit on anyways of federal policy, go off script, make you work impulsively.
00:35:19.000
The assembly of first nations is one of Canada's favorite lobby groups that we
00:35:24.100
Uh, they're having their big annual shindig this week.
00:35:27.100
Uh, you know, so just a complaint fast as usual.
00:35:29.620
They've, I don't think they've ever actually liked anything when they've
00:35:32.020
gotten together, but I guess they have just today unanimously resolved to
00:35:37.360
oppose Kearney's proposed reforms and streamlining major project approvals.
00:35:43.860
So they're basically saying we're going to oppose anything and everything you
00:35:47.880
put forward in this major project notion that you've got, what are you going to
00:35:54.460
Is Kearney's going to have to take a stance with these guys?
00:35:57.440
But once my understanding is once it's passed the major project's office
00:36:01.620
and gotten approval, what the natives say doesn't matter.
0.78
00:36:05.620
But they're still going to blockade and block trains and disrupt highway travel.
00:36:13.300
But yeah, as you said, somebody's got to put their foot down.
00:36:19.700
You know, this is something I wrote a column on, I dug deeply into before a while back.
00:36:24.660
I mean, this is Supreme Court affirmed, but you never hear it out of Kearney.
00:36:29.060
We need leadership out of that man to point this out.
00:36:34.260
The consultation thing they've won on a number of times in court, and every ruling also makes it clear, though, that they do not have veto authority.
00:36:43.880
And Carney's been giving them de facto veto authority.
00:36:46.360
So what does he expect when they get together and say, we're not going to approve anything?
00:36:50.460
Because he already said with the pipeline from Alberta a while back, he said that will only happen with First Nations consent, not consultation.
00:36:59.800
I've often wondered whether he regretted saying that.
00:37:04.360
It probably rolled off the lips fairly easily at the time, but having consultation and giving
00:37:11.560
consent is not the same thing. Of course, the indigenous people have got a right to be consulted.
00:37:20.360
That much we have conceded in several significant court decisions over the last 30 years. It's not
1.00
00:37:25.800
a matter of you know we're dealing with moralities here this is the this is the law they have won the
00:37:30.680
right to be consulted however nobody has in court in the court system has conceded the right uh that
00:37:39.160
even with undrip the united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous people even when that
00:37:44.680
was brought in even when bc brought it in itself so that just in case nobody else in canada got
00:37:51.560
it bc was pure of heart in in this in its approach to indigenous people even that didn't give that
00:37:58.360
right to only the right to be consulted so it is a fair it ought to be an easy thing for mr
00:38:08.360
carney to say look we listened to you for long enough now stand back because the bulldozers are
0.93
00:38:13.240
coming through uh that he also has this advantage that of all the indigenous groups
00:38:23.320
that you could be up against the assembly of first nations is the one you would pick because the afn
00:38:34.200
how can i say this delicately because i don't want to be
00:38:39.560
sued like some of my colleagues get sued when they you know mns trial dates at the end of august
00:38:45.880
you know here's the deal if they if they're getting some money and they just drop the check
00:38:51.320
off of the afn office you can rely on the afn to see that it's close to the right place it's it's
00:39:03.260
So I don't get the impression that the average indigenous person on the reserve boiling his
00:39:11.760
water thinks too highly of the AFN because they are not living on the reserve.
00:39:21.140
It's like when we were talking about the proposed west-east pipeline that has to go
00:39:26.220
through manitoba and they've got a uh indigenous premier who doesn't like the idea and and you know
0.96
00:39:33.900
will oppose it and he's got the whatever first nations they are they're a little poser all you
00:39:39.900
need to do is back up a garbage truck full of money tip it in there and they'll be happening
00:39:44.060
on board well you know something else you could do and i know they won't you stop the money
00:39:48.940
you know what when they get a little hungry it's amazing how much more receptive
00:39:52.220
people come. I just, you know, said it online on X, not as a matter of, I know people, of course,
00:39:59.340
start with starving natives now, now, whatever. The Alberta Association of Assembly of First
00:40:06.380
Nations. People don't understand as well. I mean, media treats it as if it's some sort of established
00:40:10.940
level of government or something. It's just a lobby group, nothing else. That's all it is.
00:40:15.980
And it's fully funded by us taxpayers. There's no treaty anywhere that says we are obligated
00:40:22.140
to fund this gang of extortionists, and I'll say it that way.
00:40:27.520
You're starting to sound like that health care guy who said that Alberta's health care payments should be cut off.
00:40:38.620
But, I mean, you know, if they were to be a lobby group that represents Indigenous people on the ground,
00:40:42.760
they should be going to the reserves and rattling a cup and getting the funding from the people they purport to represent.
00:40:51.300
And I'm giving money to these people to put me out of business.
00:40:56.040
And I think some people are getting tired of it.
00:41:00.200
But unfortunately, as you said, the way it does work is, yes, there'll be some deals negotiated and some more money will land in the right pockets and then things will get done.
00:41:12.600
I don't know if we'll ever see the political courage to actually deal with this, as I think we must.
00:41:19.740
Well, I hate to give credit to anybody with the name of Trudeau,
00:41:22.440
but Pierre Trudeau at least had the foresight to recommend ending the reserve system.
00:41:36.560
Canada would be a completely different country today if they didn't have stood their ground on that.
00:41:40.400
And then his son took away the fact that First Nations had to report their expenses.
00:41:49.100
yeah yeah well there's a difference anyways you know trudeau senior was a terrible socialist of
00:41:55.100
a man and authoritarian at least he was bright his offspring bouncing around like a pogo stick at
00:42:01.580
pop concerts now is man i just would have hoped he'd just vanish after leaving but we still have
0.74
00:42:06.940
to see him in our scroll and he probably needs a haircut if he's going to go flopping around like
00:42:11.580
that oh he needs a cut all right but whatever yes he's just have to deal with that in our history
00:42:18.220
okay he's getting their time i guess for the parting shots i'll start on the end and work my
00:42:21.820
way in dave what do you got today i just want to say it's uh the last month has been a great world
00:42:26.380
cup there's been stadiums full in uh in three countries in in america hasn't been any riding
00:42:33.660
no incidents uh and uh it's gone the only the only problem was donald trump interfering with
00:42:41.740
the build with the usa red card utterly despicable utterly uh it shows you the the depth of the
00:42:49.100
corruption of uh of uh fifa but uh you know well played to them for for the last month and uh
00:42:55.980
hopefully we'll have a good final on sunday between uh spain and england
00:43:02.460
streets of the spanish armada okay yes we sank them we we won the last round yes you're right
00:43:08.940
Look, the intriguing story there that we had about who pays taxes, and it turned out, according to the Fraser Institute, and one thing about the Fraser Institute, everybody understands they're a conservatively minded organization, but nobody has tripped them up on their numbers and on their research.
00:43:26.600
So I take this more or less as the literal truth that 20% of the people pay 60% of the taxes, which means that 80% of the people pay 40% of the taxes, which makes the whole system quite a lot more egalitarian.
00:43:43.380
That put me in mind of another statistic that I found years ago.
00:43:49.880
I went and looked it up, and it's still the same.
00:43:53.520
People at the lower end of the socioeconomic scale actually come out functionally without paying taxes at all.
00:44:02.080
about 40 percent of canadians who when you balance out what they receive from the government
00:44:10.240
in various subsidies against what they pay in taxes either in income tax or sales tax
00:44:17.200
they're even steven they actually don't contribute and they don't cost and so it's that 60 percent of
00:44:26.480
of everybody else who pays the freight for government it's a ugly are you one of the 40
00:44:33.520
or one of the 60. i don't pay a lot i'm not in the high end of the scale so i guess i can say i benefit
00:44:40.880
ah well okay well and i'll end on some of the people who do do quite well uh a toronto story
00:44:46.560
they'll win the standard with the ontario tourism culture and gaming minister stan cho
00:44:50.560
Cho, who has now agreed to reimburse taxpayers for more than $16,000 for hotels, stays in downtown Toronto over just the last three years.
00:44:59.720
He only lives six kilometers from the assembly, and he has access to a limousine or a tax-funded vehicle and driver if he wanted it.
00:45:11.300
I think it's Mrs. Cho who's got more questions than the taxpayers do on what he's been doing in that hotel all this time.
00:45:20.560
as bad as a personal ethical thing that is with Mr. Cho as well,
00:45:26.340
but it just shows, again, where these politicians,
00:45:29.160
so many of them just lose all grasp of respect for the money of the people
00:45:35.920
Remember that phrase, I'm entitled to my entitlement?
00:45:41.680
He had billed for a 25-cent piece of chewing gum.
00:45:53.920
Well, hotel rooms are pretty expensive now, I guess.
00:45:56.640
Yeah, but you don't really need one if you live six.
00:46:00.940
Well, yeah, unless you needed some privacy for a moment.
00:46:04.880
You know, I guess he didn't like those ones that charge by the hour.
00:46:20.660
I'll let you get to the game. I won't see anything
00:46:30.480
just a reminder, the way we pay those bills, it's
00:46:54.700
or no, westernstandard.news slash subscription.