Western Standard - March 14, 2026


THE PIPELINEļ¼š CBC Meltdown


Episode Stats

Length

46 minutes

Words per Minute

173.05733

Word Count

7,984

Sentence Count

331

Misogynist Sentences

9

Hate Speech Sentences

22


Summary

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

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 Good day and welcome. Today is March 11th, 2026. I'm Derek Fuldebrand, publisher of
00:00:29.380 the Western Standard and you're watching the pipeline I've got our usual crew
00:00:34.380 rounded up here I got Western Standard former opinion editor Nigel Hannaford
00:00:38.860 still has opinions senior Alberta columnist Cory Morgan always a pleasure
00:00:43.300 and news editor Dave Naylor great to be here okay we're gonna talk about meltdown
00:00:50.140 at the cbc uh former uh cbc host and journalist uh travis donraj uh was testifying before parliament
00:01:02.940 yesterday and he had a few choice words and exposed uh a lot of the dirty inside workings
00:01:09.740 of the cbc i hope none of you get to go with parliamentary immunity and spill your guts about
00:01:14.620 the western standard uh yeah i don't know what's worst saving it for a book ah you're telling i
00:01:21.260 retire yeah uh you can spill the beans on friday beers a beer o'clock drink at your desk friday
00:01:28.940 things like that uh our notable lack of a dei policy it shows it's working
00:01:35.900 only white anglo-saxon elderly males i get a tan in the summer so i get a little diversity
00:01:45.100 points you know um so we're all off the order of canada by the way yeah all right um we're
00:01:55.420 gonna talk about uh there was a floor crossing uh last night uh an ndp mp i think it was none
00:02:02.060 of it. She crosses the floor to the Liberals. And then we've got three by-elections coming,
00:02:07.660 two of which the Liberals are virtually guaranteed to take, a third of which they got a really good
00:02:11.660 shot at. That looks like a Liberal majority effectively in the works here. We're going to
00:02:17.740 talk about how likely is it, I say extremely likely, and what it's going to mean. And does
00:02:22.860 that mean we're not going to have an early election? I don't know. But first we're going
00:02:27.260 going to start with, what is Mark Carney's position on the Israel-Iran war today?
00:02:35.800 Corey, when this first came up, Mark Carney says, Canada supports this. We're in. And then
00:02:44.660 he supports it with regrets. And you've got a tattoo, I think it said, no regrets. So
00:02:52.560 Canada supports it, then Canada supports it with
00:02:54.740 regrets. Canada
00:02:56.740 supports it if it
00:02:58.480 but it really should have
00:03:00.880 UN authorization, but then Canada
00:03:02.760 supports it with regrets. Should have UN
00:03:04.840 authorization, but we're still okay with it without it.
00:03:07.160 Then it's Canada might
00:03:08.720 send troops. We might go die
00:03:10.680 for this war. And then it is now
00:03:12.920 Canada will definitely not
00:03:14.800 under any circumstance send troops.
00:03:18.800 It's Wednesday
00:03:20.840 Wednesday evening. What do you think the position's going to be by the time we go to bed?
00:03:25.860 I don't know. I mean, he's unpredictable, nothing else. Maybe he's trying to mimic the
00:03:30.980 southern leader we have on the other side of the border. We don't ever quite know where
00:03:33.860 Mr. Trump's coming from. To be fair, yeah, Trump's had even more positions on this war
00:03:36.980 than Carney. The thing that gets me with Mark Carney is he's been actually kind of a bit of a
00:03:43.480 dither or a flip-flopper since he began as prime minister, but it seems to work for him. It's not
00:03:47.860 sticking with him. He's taking all sides and taking no sides and his support numbers just
00:03:52.180 continue to grow. You know, most people, you would say that looks like weak leadership and
00:03:56.860 disorganization and lack of control, but it seems to slide off of him. I mean, there's people who've
00:04:03.480 written, they've talked about it. You can certainly see how and why the Liberal Caucus
00:04:07.220 would be divided on this, you know, with the extent of any involvement or no involvement or
00:04:12.220 even outright opposition but he seems to be trying to play to all of them and well again so far it's
00:04:19.360 working and the irony of it all is to be honest Canada's stance on it's pretty close to absolutely
00:04:25.120 irrelevant to the whole scene of things anyway so we don't have a military force that would have a
00:04:29.740 serious impact within that and I don't think Canada's viewed after the damage that Trudeau
00:04:34.260 did to our international reputation as a diplomatic force that really would have an impact with
00:04:39.220 whatever side we took anyhow so carney's only concerns i think are domestic views of him and
00:04:44.740 he seems to be playing it right somehow well you know maybe i don't know whether i would go with
00:04:49.380 that he's uh he's he's playing it according to form some people can get away with that and some
00:04:54.980 people can't polyeth could not get away with that but mr carney has for so long been uh saying well
00:05:01.220 we've got we've got we've got an agreement well actually we've got a memorandum of understanding
00:05:06.660 actually we sort of shook hands on it and well what what exactly are you committed to nothing
00:05:13.860 you know and so then you can go and say well we support it we don't support it we're gonna get
00:05:18.820 involved people just don't care anymore so well stick to him i think nigel corey is right that
00:05:27.380 you know canada has no material for like even if can canada was yeah we want to be involved
00:05:33.780 like we might get like latrine digging security version maybe we get to defend a rear forward
00:05:41.700 position in bahrain like at best uh we're i guess maybe we could send a frigate or two maybe but
00:05:49.540 there's nothing really material canada could do uh but similar to iraq you know george w bush did not
00:05:55.540 necessarily need canadian boots on the ground besides he wanted a symbolic canadian presence
00:06:00.100 you know for the coalition of the willing um they're not even really looking for that from
00:06:04.720 anyone besides though israel wants it from the states but they're not looking really for anyone
00:06:08.560 else at least at this time um so canada's material involvement doesn't really matter
00:06:13.840 although i do have to worry when we saw the new canadian armed forces recruitment commercial a
00:06:18.480 bunch of uh tough looking white guys in it for once uh that's the surest sign i've seen that
00:06:24.660 we actually are going to be going to a big war soon now that they want our types again but um
00:06:29.680 I'm a bit sympathetic-ish to Carney's stance here. I hate saying this, but you know what I
00:06:39.160 think of the war. I think this is a bad, bad war. This is not in America's interest. It's not in
00:06:43.420 Canada's interests. This is not our war in the West or Canada or America, period. But from the
00:06:50.740 Canadian perspective, there is really only two objectives of Canadian foreign policy. One is
00:06:55.520 keep the Americans happy, to domestic. Always. Canadian foreign policy is always at least 75%
00:07:03.100 driven by domestic political concerns and 25% plus by keeping the Americans on side.
00:07:10.260 Carney's really only advantage in one way or another was generally not to antagonize Trump.
00:07:17.440 So even though I think the war is a bad idea, I think he probably took the smart stance in terms
00:07:23.720 a foreign policy for not unduly attracting Trump's ire. Condemning it wouldn't do really anything
00:07:31.100 because Canada has no political, no diplomatic weight anymore anyway, or at least anything if
00:07:35.620 no, or somewhere, we rank somewhere around Denmark probably. So condemning it wouldn't make it any
00:07:42.600 less likely to happen or bring peace any sooner. Sitting, putting boots on the ground wouldn't do
00:07:48.160 anything. We have nothing to contribute anyway. So this was actually probably diplomatically the
00:07:52.100 smartest position for him to take. Well, but you look at Donald Trump's reaction, yesterday he
00:07:57.360 tweets that Carney is the future governor of Canada, right? So he's obviously, Trump has
00:08:03.960 obviously taken notice of it and has, you know, stopped calling him prime minister and has said,
00:08:10.880 you know, just like he used to insult Trudeau. Yeah, the actual, to the degree that Canada has
00:08:16.820 a traditional stance on Iran, it is that we are very against this regime.
00:08:23.100 Back in the Harper days, we closed their embassy for them.
00:08:25.740 I'm not sure whether it ever did be opened or not.
00:08:28.700 But certainly we were highly objected to the murder of a woman who was born in Iran
00:08:34.560 but had become a Canadian citizen.
00:08:38.300 This happened 15 years ago.
00:08:41.400 But this is not a good regime.
00:08:44.020 So Mr. Carney was critical of it.
00:08:46.240 good for him he should be well everybody's critical of it even people opposed to the war
00:08:50.220 critical of it there is virtually no one besides crazy chmasnik types who are not critical of the
00:08:55.860 regime well and there is something we could do i mean credit where we concluded last week if we're
00:08:59.260 talking about the world that we could agree on domestically we could deal with something i mean
00:09:03.240 this canada has apparently identified 700 irgc members in the country how they know i don't know
00:09:09.140 with some sort of intelligence why don't we clean up around here we don't have to go overseas you
00:09:13.420 don't have to get but we all kind of agree we don't want those types here well if we've identified
00:09:17.840 them get them the hell out of here if an opponent to the war like me i'm all for that get rid of
00:09:22.180 these guys this is something we can do because there is a concern with uh uh despite what they
00:09:27.260 think they're asking for people saying they want to globalize the intifada these are the people
00:09:31.280 who are going to globalize it for you if you keep them hanging around here globalize it means bring
00:09:35.060 it at home here yeah sadly all flights to iran have been canceled at the moment well we don't
00:09:40.240 have to we could charter something you know the museum and just wind it up conservatives today
00:09:45.380 melissa lanceman and michelle rumple garner uh sort of said this is ridiculous we got 700 of
00:09:50.800 these guys running around uh we want the liberals to come back with a policy what they're going to
00:09:55.560 do with them within one week it's too urgent to delay any more we can pair we can pair drop them
00:10:00.940 over or on yeah or one of those frigates i mean you know we could make room it's not like they're
00:10:04.920 of modern armaments so just put them in steerage and send them on over steerage nobody's sent that
00:10:11.720 since the titanic my word um so i mean the war is you know approaching approaching two weeks
00:10:21.160 old now oh it's not a war what it was trump called it an excursion today
00:10:27.080 america has not officially been on war since 1940. i mean it's it's pretty ridiculous and
00:10:32.600 And that's a conspiracy of both the Democrats and the Republicans.
00:10:36.080 They want to just have Congress vacate its power for declaring more.
00:10:40.260 And both parties are in on it.
00:10:42.100 It's a conspiracy of silence.
00:10:44.020 But this is not gone.
00:10:48.280 I can't say it hasn't gone according to the plan because we never really knew what the plan was.
00:10:51.440 It was weapons of destruction in the first 24 hours.
00:10:54.280 Then it was regime change.
00:10:56.960 Then it's a decapitation strike.
00:10:59.400 But maybe a new guy from within the regime takes power the way it was in Venezuela, who's just a bit more pliable and compliant.
00:11:05.580 That's obviously not happened.
00:11:06.920 You have Khomeini's son, and he is, by some reports, even crazier.
00:11:11.800 So, okay, that's not working.
00:11:13.300 But impotent.
00:11:14.420 He's impotent.
00:11:15.180 He's got a softie there.
00:11:16.700 Oh, is that a real?
00:11:17.520 Oh, yeah.
00:11:18.400 He had trouble getting a wife.
00:11:19.840 Well, missile strike should be less of a problem.
00:11:21.280 Well, again, if they would just embrace the LGBTQ community, I suspect he's not impotent.
00:11:25.860 They've just presented him with the wrong target.
00:11:28.240 Maybe.
00:11:29.400 So anyway, we don't know what the goal is really here from, at least from the United States' perspective.
00:11:38.080 I think I know Israel's idea, which is generally just to weaken Iran for regional power reasons.
00:11:43.160 The United States, we can't really tell.
00:11:45.300 You know, one day it's, hey, we're done, almost, we're done more or less, kind of maybe.
00:11:50.580 Like, it can wind down.
00:11:52.300 And then literally onwards later, Trump says, unconditional surrender.
00:11:55.280 and if they don't open the Straits of Hormuz, we will destroy the nation, not the regime,
00:12:00.440 the nation, so that it can never be rebuilt again.
00:12:03.860 All this is done.
00:12:05.920 Again, it's only two weeks in.
00:12:08.020 Who knows how much longer it goes?
00:12:09.800 But the idea that this is going to lead to a quick uprising of the people overthrow the regime
00:12:13.680 that does not appear to be happening, what this has done, both the military strikes and
00:12:18.280 the way Trump's talk about destroying the nation, this has rallied people behind their
00:12:23.400 government, behind the regime.
00:12:24.800 So this could go into a long, dirty war. Iran knows now. If they weren't building a bomb before, I guarantee you they are building a bomb now. They've realized what happens if a country has a bomb, you don't get attacked. It's North Korea how well that works. They're even crazier in some ways than Iran. They don't get attacked.
00:12:45.540 um so uh this could go on and on and on potentially is there a potential political
00:12:53.660 liability now that carney even though we don't have troops there carney's going to have to wear
00:12:57.900 this if this becomes because it's not popular even in america let alone canada if this goes on
00:13:03.820 and turns into another big iraq style quagmire is there a political liability for carney here
00:13:09.160 having at least on paper supported it with some regrets well he will simply say the situation was
00:13:16.360 what it was when i've made those comments since then it's changed and uh well i stand against it
00:13:24.840 and he will say something else the week following if it is suitable a man does not have
00:13:30.360 consistent positions to be fair it makes it easier for him to back trap when that fluid
00:13:35.480 situation changes i mean in reality this is all in trump's weird little orange hands i i mean
00:13:40.440 whatever he determines to do it's i i don't forget what you said these crazy things he's not
00:13:48.520 necessarily uh trying to inform us he's trying to confuse the enemy trying to extricate themselves
00:13:54.040 i would hope i don't know i mean it's tough to get in their minds but i mean what more goal
00:13:58.040 you've blown the main things out of there you're already now losing popular support
00:14:01.720 If you want to look at just the cold-hearted way, the dollars are massive that you're pumping into there.
00:14:06.660 It's not helping your own economy when you've got energy.
00:14:09.380 It's good for Alberta.
00:14:10.460 Yeah, it's good for Alberta.
00:14:11.660 Alberta's going to do okay for this.
00:14:12.940 So, I mean, I suspect the pressure's coming on pretty hard and fast for him to make his, say, well, we've made our point now and we'll back out and let Israel keep pecking that.
00:14:21.600 But the Iranians have to agree to peace.
00:14:23.960 And they had the 12-day war before.
00:14:26.400 We're at, what, 12 days today, practically?
00:14:28.800 These guys have, I think, gotten the message that it's not going to stop.
00:14:36.480 They're just going to get weaker every war.
00:14:38.520 They're going to get weaker and weaker and degraded.
00:14:40.460 They were not as weak, it seems, as the Americans and Israelis were saying or thought.
00:14:45.540 But the Iranians are going to look at this and say, well, why would we agree to peace now?
00:14:49.460 We're going to need something.
00:14:50.600 Because they were attacked both times in the middle of negotiations.
00:14:53.440 Generally, it's polite to break off negotiations before you send a carrier group to attack.
00:14:58.720 They didn't do that.
00:14:59.920 So I'm not sure the Iranians necessarily just agreed to a ceasefire.
00:15:03.840 Maybe they do.
00:15:04.520 You look, before the excursions started, tens of thousands of Iraqis took to the streets demanding an overthrow.
00:15:13.540 The regime slaughtered 35,000 of them, according to reports.
00:15:18.500 It even wasn't to do a BBC report.
00:15:20.240 It's funny how the tone had changed.
00:15:21.280 From back then, we would talk to a person from, there was a documentary piece on our radio, but with a woman who in her city, they had gone out and protested and they were wiped out with birdshot.
00:15:32.720 A whole lot of nasty things and stuff.
00:15:35.660 There really was something coming up.
00:15:37.800 But I mean, if it becomes, it looks like your liberators are worse than what you're dealt with, then that can change.
00:15:42.380 Yeah, just yesterday, more than a million Tehranians, if that's the right word, gathered in a square for some of the funerals of the killed military.
00:15:53.680 A million people all in support of the regime.
00:15:57.040 Whether they were all there willingly or not, I don't know.
00:15:59.520 It's kind of a million people at gunpoint, though.
00:16:02.520 You have to have some genuine support.
00:16:05.360 We've seen through whispered regimes, too, though.
00:16:07.100 I mean, if you don't show your face, the knock on the door comes later.
00:16:10.300 Well, it might be good for your career to show up.
00:16:11.800 I'm going to kill you if you don't go to a rally.
00:16:15.360 Look at the Australian women's soccer team.
00:16:19.700 Not Australian.
00:16:20.700 The Iranian women's soccer team in Australia.
00:16:23.900 They all had a chance to defect, and only five of them did
00:16:26.760 because the regime was threatening their families at home.
00:16:30.700 If you defect, go to the back of the head for grandpa and granddad.
00:16:37.280 They're dirty.
00:16:38.140 There's no doubt about that.
00:16:39.500 There was plenty of opposition.
00:16:40.840 i'm sure there still is plenty of opposition to the regime in iran but when trump says we if you
00:16:46.360 don't open the strait of hormuz we will destroy the nation so they can never be rebuilt again
00:16:51.640 that's not going to help unconditional surrender unconditional surrender means we invade and
00:16:57.080 occupy and dismember your country vis-a-vis germany 45 or nuke you vis-a-vis japan 45.
00:17:05.240 No one likes that, even if you don't oppose the regime.
00:17:10.660 You know, arguably the Second World War requirements for unconditional surrender made a speedy end of the war, even still victorious, impossible.
00:17:19.500 People will then, who oppose, say, the Japanese regime or the German regime, they were like, well, I guess we're in it to the end.
00:17:25.820 Because unconditional surrender means I'm being ethnically cleansed and destroyed and subjugated.
00:17:30.880 people that will rally behind regimes they don't like if a foreign power that requires
00:17:37.820 unconditional surrender. Thankfully, I don't think Trump understands what unconditional
00:17:43.180 surrender actually means. I think he means that just means we win big. I think that's what he
00:17:47.380 think it means. But it doesn't matter. The Iranians can now use that for propaganda. I can say, do you
00:17:53.340 want to be like Germany or Japan in 1945? And the answer from even the most liberal dissident of the
00:17:58.980 regime will be no the other part of that too that we haven't mentioned much of though is even if
00:18:04.760 trump goes out israel's not going to rest until that threat's gone they've had enough that's kind
00:18:10.580 of the culmination of october 7th the nuclear threat was destroyed in the 12 days before yeah
00:18:14.580 we're talking about the money that goes to hezbollah hamas the houthis you name it said they
00:18:19.060 go after the nukes again this time i understand but uh they are determined to make sure that iran's
00:18:25.560 not in a position to start and it's gonna start again it's a cycle it seems but to knock that
00:18:30.760 ability down as much as they humanly can because it is a threat that's just sitting there and it
00:18:35.000 was a country we can't forget that it the leader said over and over and over again we're going to
00:18:39.800 eliminate israel it's a very it's not an imagined threat to israel or perceived threat it was a very
00:18:45.160 direct threat that was made i mean you can question whether or not the united states was
00:18:49.240 justified in slapping at iran but israel any country when asked if they were provoked into
00:18:55.320 fighting back they were quite well provoked yes 50 if the u.s stops their incursion today israel
00:19:01.240 will continue it tomorrow though the u.s probably fund israel a lot to do that yeah welcome to
00:19:07.480 geopolitical uh i don't know uh maybe this all this ends tomorrow you know that'd be that'd be
00:19:13.000 nice that'd be good i'm not convinced it does because only last time uh i'm not sure iran
00:19:18.200 necessarily at least agrees to a ceasefire and cries uncle well this will not end until they
00:19:23.960 open up the straits of hormuz again you've got a lot of countries china among them who are
00:19:29.880 very concerned about their ships stuck up the north end this is the card that iran has to play
00:19:35.320 they seem to be able to keep the straits closed even with even with their navy at the bottom of
00:19:40.600 the sea they seem to be able to keep those straits closed uh the the best case scenario
00:19:46.040 is the war ends but the straits remain closed so alberta makes money that's win-win people that's
00:19:52.520 How much do you want to pay for your gas, Derek? You've got a big truck.
00:19:56.280 I will make that sacrifice for Alberta because we'll be swimming in money.
00:20:02.680 Expanding it.
00:20:05.320 We'll be able to fund our expansion into Interior BC.
00:20:07.800 We're a retired gentleman and have to be careful about that sort of thing.
00:20:10.920 Yes.
00:20:11.480 Okay, so speaking of Carney, last night, I don't remember her name. Nobody knows.
00:20:20.440 She's some backbencher, but an NDP, one of the last NDP,
00:20:24.560 at least one of the last seven.
00:20:28.300 Then there were six.
00:20:29.560 Yeah.
00:20:30.400 She's the MP for Nunavut.
00:20:33.040 And, you know, we've always predicted it was likely they're going to get
00:20:36.500 floor crossers from both sides.
00:20:39.360 I mean, how conservative can Matt Jenneru and what else is his name?
00:20:43.840 Oh, Mark Carney is a real conservative.
00:20:46.020 I could go work with him.
00:20:47.200 Oh, he's attracting socialists too.
00:20:49.020 so maybe rethink that but uh government of national unity government yeah there you go um
00:20:55.820 so uh she comes across last night and there's three by-elections coming up this looks like
00:21:02.380 majority to you it does um for those who don't take care of the details there are 343 seats in
00:21:11.340 the house of commons therefore to get a majority you need 172 but really you need 173 because
00:21:20.060 your 172nd will become the speaker the other thing of course is nobody needs to get sick
00:21:27.660 so this this defection from the ndp gives them 170 and they have three by-elections coming up
00:21:36.700 two of them are pretty safe liberal seats so there's your 172.
00:21:41.980 They kind of need one more really to have what they would call an operating majority,
00:21:45.580 but it's a majority if it's 172. This woman from Nunavut actually won her seat by 100 votes
00:21:57.660 from the Liberals. But there's so few voters in Nunavut that's not as close as you think.
00:22:01.660 Well, true, but nevertheless, there is a fair amount of support for her locally going to the Liberal Party.
00:22:13.980 So the thought that strikes me is that this is probably to the benefit of both the Liberals and the Conservatives.
00:22:26.580 poll suggests conservatives wouldn't do very well if there was an election this spring
00:22:33.660 but there are so many NDP voters just ready to come back to the NDP but it would cost the
00:22:44.100 Liberal Party something they shouldn't assume that everything they have now they would have
00:22:47.940 after an election.
00:22:51.100 There are three ridings in which the NDP
00:22:58.020 and the Liberals are with 1,000 of each other,
00:23:01.360 which is considered to be a swing seat.
00:23:07.260 And the NDP lost 1.2 million votes over their 2021 vote score.
00:23:15.580 $3 million in 2021 and $1.2 million in 2025, if a lot of those voters decided that, okay, we've made our point, we don't like what the liberals have been doing in sacking civil servants, we choose to believe Mr. Carney really likes the war in Iran, you know what, we're going back to the NDP.
00:23:37.260 There's room there for the Liberals to lose on this too
00:23:41.220 So Mr. Carney, I say, will do everything he can to avoid the election
00:23:45.320 And things seem to be breaking his way
00:23:47.380 I think a lot of it's going to depend on who the new leader of the NDP is
00:23:51.180 You may see some of those current NDPs thinking
00:23:56.100 Oh, I can't work with this guy or gal
00:23:58.420 Then they defect to the Liberals
00:24:00.740 Who are you rooting for there?
00:24:03.800 um they're all not cases abby lewis there's only two guys yeah those are the two likely front
00:24:12.980 runners abby lewis does not have a seat and he's seen as more radical so who knows um but dave uh
00:24:18.740 so there's three by-elections i think two of them are in toronto in very safe liberal seats i would
00:24:23.400 put those pretty solidly in the liberal bag scarborough and uh university rosedale yeah
00:24:29.620 The other one is in Quebec.
00:24:31.340 It's something called Toblerone or something.
00:24:34.440 That's Switzerland, I think.
00:24:36.060 I don't know.
00:24:36.580 I'm calling it Toblerone.
00:24:37.600 That's the closest I can get to it.
00:24:41.080 But this seat was won by exactly one vote, technically, during the last election over the Bloc-Ibac-Op.
00:24:50.400 but there was some small errors from Elections Canada
00:24:58.060 that in a normal election not decided by one vote
00:25:01.600 you could say I wouldn't have impacted the ultimate result either way
00:25:06.260 you know maybe a few votes move here and there
00:25:08.140 but not enough to make any material difference
00:25:10.020 when you're at one vote it is enough
00:25:11.940 so a court, I don't know if this ever happened before
00:25:14.860 but a court ruled that election invalid
00:25:17.580 through the MP out of Parliament.
00:25:20.360 They're having a by-election.
00:25:22.900 So on paper, I guess you could say that
00:25:25.040 that by-election could be 50-50
00:25:26.720 between the Liberals and the Bloc.
00:25:29.580 But both of them, you know,
00:25:30.780 the Liberals could bring a lot of pork barrel spending to bear
00:25:32.760 to get over the hump there.
00:25:35.040 Alternatively, the Bloc can say,
00:25:36.200 hey, this seat decides the balance of power in Parliament.
00:25:39.860 This MP will have incredible leverage.
00:25:42.620 but if
00:25:44.980 I think that's the only
00:25:47.020 by-election really worth watching
00:25:48.420 that one seat, if you don't want the Liberals
00:25:50.900 to have a majority, you've got to root for the
00:25:52.820 bloc in that riding, in Toblerone
00:25:54.980 Terrible
00:25:56.220 I like Toblerone
00:25:59.280 Toblerone
00:25:59.840 Yeah, it's going to be
00:26:02.800 interesting to watch, I mean, will Mark Carney
00:26:04.700 stay in the country long enough to go
00:26:06.840 you know, glad-handing
00:26:08.720 in Main Street, and will he
00:26:10.740 show up there, will
00:26:11.660 Will the blind shot show up there?
00:26:14.300 I'm sure he will.
00:26:15.540 But yeah, that could go either way.
00:26:18.680 Well, we've got some weird polling happening.
00:26:20.720 It's funny with Quebec and Alberta and looking at the federal and the provincials
00:26:24.560 because the PQ is surging in Quebec, but actually the bloc is sagging.
00:26:29.360 And Alberta is looking similar, whereas at least UCP and independence-leaning support,
00:26:34.880 I mean, we've seen that with standard polling.
00:26:37.640 And at the same time, we've seen the liberals are surging here.
00:26:39.660 The conservatives aren't federally doing well in Alberta.
00:26:42.900 And we've seen that with multiple polls.
00:26:44.680 It's not an own liar, it seems.
00:26:46.680 So the block in that by-election might not be as strong as would have thought with a one-vote difference a year.
00:26:53.280 And that's another thing to think about.
00:26:54.900 I mean, at some point, I mean, the polls are looking great for Kearney right now.
00:26:59.200 If they go up another point or two, the urge to call an election may become overwhelming for them.
00:27:05.300 and just you know grab that majority it's gonna be hard super majority yeah it's gonna be hard
00:27:10.800 to justify calling an election so soon after the last one when you have a majority but it will be
00:27:17.100 the barest you can always majority find a way yeah it's nice i was pointing out i mean a
00:27:21.240 functional majority even if all the stars line up looking that way but 173 i mean you're one
00:27:27.380 bad case of the trots away from losing an ill-timed confidence vote uh you want to feel
00:27:32.960 better to have a 10 or 15 vote buffer if you have a majority that's agreed but i mean uh even if you
00:27:38.700 wanted to engineer his own defeat other parties could get cold feet the ndp sure does not want an
00:27:44.060 election yet the conservatives do not they can't all skip the vote but a couple of them could skip
00:27:50.320 the vote elizabeth may ah she's just happy to be there getting a paycheck at this point like we
00:27:56.300 don't have that games played though i mean you don't have to engineer a defeat the confidence
00:27:59.580 You can come up with a big bill of something so big and radical that suddenly you rethink, you know what, this is so important, we must take it to the electorate rather than the House of Commons.
00:28:09.940 It's our duty to do so.
00:28:12.440 Big, beautiful mill.
00:28:13.560 Yes.
00:28:14.540 Jim Prentice did it.
00:28:15.400 He's like, we need a mandate from the people for this budget.
00:28:17.880 I remember dreading him.
00:28:18.960 I was like, oh, no, we're going to get crushed by the PCs in this election.
00:28:21.440 And then I was in the lock.
00:28:22.240 I saw the budget.
00:28:22.940 I was like, oh, my God, I hope they can't not call the election now.
00:28:27.340 I want to run against this budget.
00:28:28.660 This is amazing.
00:28:29.580 Yeah, I don't know.
00:28:31.760 Even if he gets his majority, I think it delays an election from this spring.
00:28:36.260 Maybe until fall.
00:28:36.980 Probably.
00:28:37.700 But, yeah, it's got to be tempting for Carney to pull it right now.
00:28:43.740 And that would be the end of Polyev.
00:28:45.820 He's going to get a second kick at the can here.
00:28:48.140 I don't think he gets ousted before another election.
00:28:51.300 But if he doesn't take the ring this time, that's it for Polyev.
00:28:55.120 Yeah, that'll be two kicks.
00:28:56.180 That calf, he's only got one more electoral shot.
00:28:58.620 Yeah.
00:28:59.240 I mean, the only one who ever got two kicks in the can before, Paulie, was Harper.
00:29:03.080 Scheer did not get it.
00:29:04.000 O'Toole did not get it.
00:29:06.720 You know, two's considered pretty generous by our standards now for a non-NDB leader.
00:29:13.720 Okay.
00:29:15.440 Let's talk about our friends at the CBC.
00:29:20.340 Dave, I know you in the newsroom were covering this yesterday.
00:29:23.780 uh travis donraj we um he issued a call for the cbc to broadcast his hearing uh at a parliamentary
00:29:31.620 committee uh they did not do that right no no they did not but we did yeah we did and uh some
00:29:38.400 other independent uh media outlets did and it was it was certainly must watch tv uh mr donraj as
00:29:45.820 you may know got uh fired or let go from he resigned no and then they tried to not let him
00:29:53.200 Yeah, they just don't decide to find him.
00:29:55.600 Anyways, he resigned because he'd lost editorial control over his show.
00:30:00.720 He was told he couldn't hire, he couldn't bring on certain guests.
00:30:04.080 And then that's what he talked about.
00:30:05.500 He talked about an absolute toxic culture at the CBC where conservative voices are blacklisted.
00:30:14.480 And he said there's a list of 46 people, I'm sure Corey's on it,
00:30:18.960 that the CBC hosts are not allowed to interview.
00:30:24.260 And apparently this came up through Rosie Barton, our favourite host,
00:30:29.020 and David Cochran, our second favourite host.
00:30:32.080 Those two came off looking absolutely terrible.
00:30:35.960 David Cochran came off as a vile little man who called Tamara Leach trailer trash.
00:30:42.800 And he just went on for hours.
00:30:44.120 He's conveniently on medical leave right now.
00:30:45.720 Yes, he went on medical leave yesterday.
00:30:47.560 At least he doesn't have a hot mic.
00:30:50.220 No, no.
00:30:51.580 But it was...
00:30:52.060 Rosemary Barton, you better explain all that.
00:30:54.480 Oh, yeah.
00:30:55.360 Just make this stuff up.
00:30:56.740 Yeah.
00:30:58.180 Rosemary is the Trudeau-loving host of Power, not Power and Politics, but she's the CBC
00:31:04.900 main political correspondent.
00:31:07.080 And it just exposed, he went on for a couple of hours, just exposed the absolute dire culture
00:31:12.140 and the need for an absolute, either cutting the funding off or reforming it.
00:31:17.560 or doing something with it because right now it's a 1.4 billion dollar black hole it's got no
00:31:23.400 no viewership whatsoever and uh advertising rates continue to decline and they've got this
00:31:30.040 this government subsidy to fight against other media you know for advertising it's absolutely
00:31:34.520 stunning in his testimony he was he said that they had a list of 45 people in public life
00:31:40.280 who they were not allowed to bring on the show but whoever's show it was he says i've got the list
00:31:46.520 i want that list real bad i really want to be on that list no he said that he was going to give it
00:31:53.320 to the committee yeah uh i know reporters asked cbc for that list yesterday and they refused to uh
00:31:59.960 to give it up but they did but they didn't deny it exists our list yeah yeah i don't have a show
00:32:08.280 so i don't have a list if we're ever going to be as tough and big as you know we need a blacklist
00:32:12.680 we should have one damn it i mean we've got people we like and don't like but we don't have a list
00:32:18.920 yeah not a formal list i mean it'd depend on the mood you know i mean if ratings were low and we
00:32:23.500 wanted some insanity we could bring rachel gilmore on but would it be i i we've invited
00:32:27.980 viewers i mean we've invited rachel you'll be productive yeah yeah you might have to add her
00:32:33.300 to a list after see that that's what has been kind of the opposite of the cbc is i like having
00:32:38.000 people i really hate the views of might even personally detest i love having them it makes
00:32:45.600 for a way better show it's it's it's we're not look the four of us sit here most agreeing about
00:32:50.720 most things other than more wars well media bias is nothing new i mean since the first
00:32:56.720 newspaper was ever printed the editor had some control on where that was going to do
00:33:01.120 the cbc of all outlets at all because it's a public broadcaster should be striving and
00:33:10.720 everybody's always known it's had a left lean but i mean that lean from the 70s has turned into a
00:33:16.240 socialist tilt on that thing for decades now well and you know it should be obligated to at least
00:33:22.400 make an effort to show balance it hasn't for a long what's actually more insidious is the box
00:33:27.520 they draw around acceptable conservatism because they have token conservatives but they tend to be
00:33:32.480 and i don't uh i've got friends who appear on there so i don't mean to slay them but
00:33:36.400 when they go on they're pretty well behaved well they're the only ones who pay people to go on
00:33:39.840 their panel too yeah they pay you don't pay any guests ever yeah uh so you have a bigger incentive
00:33:45.440 to keep the cbc happy when you show up exactly and they have a box around like what kind of
00:33:51.600 i've never seen them actually have somebody maybe have had someone on but i've never actually seen
00:33:56.480 that they discuss like alberta independent stuff all the time i've actually never seen them have
00:33:59.840 an alberta independence supporter on like someone who actually knows who these people are what makes
00:34:06.160 them tick what animates it they don't know that's outside the box so they'll get an alberta
00:34:11.680 conservative on but they'll find someone i don't mean it's like anyone's gone on sorry guys but
00:34:16.240 like you know it'll be very politically correct for a conservative you know this is the bounds
00:34:24.960 of acceptable discussion for conservatives everything beyond that doesn't exist it doesn't
00:34:29.600 appear on the cbc unless it's uh about how hateful it is to date uh people who look like you oh
00:34:37.600 okay yeah no you know you got to go to england if you want to get uh get the latest on alberta
00:34:45.680 alberta separation independence jeff rath just did an extensive interview with a spectator
00:34:51.200 and uh there it is just came out today but uh what's the chances that he would get himself on
00:34:57.800 cbc well no comment that's different no comment yeah okay but yeah no really you know they go
00:35:04.560 they went to a guy in the states for his expert opinion about albert independence but they actually
00:35:08.840 don't talk to alberta independence people uh they won't talk uh they won't have on people who are
00:35:15.340 hardline opponents of mass migration they'll bring on a conservative who says well perhaps
00:35:20.820 we need to tighten up the numbers a little bit and make sure that everything is legal and okay
00:35:27.540 well that's the that's the hard take that's allowed that's the hardest boundary of discussion
00:35:32.180 on these topics so uh the conserve they do have conservatives on the cbc but it's a it's a it's a
00:35:38.580 cut there's a very narrow spectrum of conservatives that's allowed on the cbc sorry go ahead all right
00:35:44.500 i'll just take it quickly then they think that they are actually correct if they are representing
00:35:51.380 a good morally defensible fair examination of different ideas they can't conceive that somebody
00:35:58.740 could think differently than they do and be a decent person and you can't have non-decent
00:36:03.540 person on on the canada's semi-official news agency no you you've got the editor-in-chief
00:36:11.220 Brody Fenlon or something like that, and the CBC CEO were both testifying.
00:36:18.480 They're saying, you know, this is the most unbiased organization they've ever worked for.
00:36:22.920 You're right.
00:36:23.620 They do believe it.
00:36:24.280 But the voice of the CBC is the voice of Andrew Coyne and Chantelle Hebert and, you know, and David Cochran and Rosemary Barton.
00:36:35.300 They're all just socialists, right?
00:36:38.720 I mean, come on.
00:36:40.900 Unbiased, my ass.
00:36:44.480 I don't know.
00:36:45.100 I've never really believed there was necessarily a vast conspiracy within the CBC to be left,
00:36:49.560 but it was just more of a natural, organic way it just works out.
00:36:52.920 Like, most media is left, and of course it's left.
00:36:56.300 But if they do have an outright list, then perhaps it is actually a bit more of an organized thing than...
00:37:03.000 More formalized, biased.
00:37:04.680 Yeah, like, and I, like, I want it gone.
00:37:07.740 It should be, I don't even want to just defund it.
00:37:09.240 I want it shut down and its assets sold off.
00:37:12.560 Alternatively, you could turn it into like a right-wing media propaganda outlet.
00:37:15.840 Just the rub the left's nose in it.
00:37:17.800 You know, make Fox News look like pussies.
00:37:19.660 Pardon my French.
00:37:20.920 But like, you know, I want it gone.
00:37:24.520 But I've generally given it the benefit of the doubt that, you know, it's not a organized conspiracy against the right.
00:37:31.080 And that it is, you know, it is a planned thing to do this.
00:37:34.500 uh but if this list exists that um well it would be very interesting to see who's on it too i mean
00:37:42.700 are these then this list very people very far into the fringe i guess in thought in general
00:37:48.220 or are they moderate minded ones there there's the thing you gotta wonder are they moderate
00:37:52.920 minded ones who would have made a case they didn't like that's where the yeah i mean you
00:37:57.940 don't necessarily want the the head of some white nationalist group on your organization fair enough
00:38:03.820 Well, if he's in the news, if they're doing the news about them, they should.
00:38:06.240 Well, yeah, you know what I'm saying, where perhaps they could feel that they're justified
00:38:10.420 in making a list of such names, but if these are public names that are not really considered
00:38:15.220 that far out, then that'll be interesting to read it, just seeing where they're-
00:38:17.940 But you shouldn't need a list.
00:38:19.320 I know that's a subjective sort of thing, and the list shouldn't be-
00:38:21.860 And who-
00:38:22.860 If you need a list that shows you're not sure about the people, they could make a mistake
00:38:27.840 or maybe put a conservative picture on.
00:38:30.320 it might not be just also purely ideological also might be who are critics of the cbc you know i uh
00:38:36.800 you know previous life i was on the cpc all the time i had a regular segment but i was talking
00:38:41.680 about kind of normie conservative stuff taxes and spending and accountability stuff that's
00:38:47.200 you know motherhood apple pie conservatism um but you know in general you know when i was
00:38:53.600 at the community taxpayers federation at that time we didn't criticize we didn't call for
00:38:57.520 defunding or privatization of the CBC because we were on the CBC all the time. We just didn't want
00:39:02.640 to pick a fight with it. We were on all the time. The CTF has changed that. They openly call for it
00:39:07.120 now, so good for them. But I was never openly calling for getting rid of the CBC. I was talking
00:39:12.960 about normie conservative issues. Since then, you know, I talk about war, mass migration, national
00:39:20.160 identity independence and regularly beat the drum for getting rid of the cbc i have been invited to
00:39:27.600 the cbc for a very long time well even outside where you are though i mean but the the parallel
00:39:32.800 is franco i don't watch so i don't know he appears on a lot with the taxpayers federation just for
00:39:38.240 folks who don't know franco terzano i wonder if he appears on cbc i mean i've seen it on ctv at
00:39:43.120 least not that often i don't see him i'm not sure he's the sort of person i'm talking about who
00:39:47.840 perhaps would be on that subtle list i'm talking about he's a conservative it's it's he's just it's
00:39:51.760 taxes and spending you can't call that stuff far right you know okay rachel gilmore is of the world
00:39:56.560 bill but like you know regular people couldn't call that far right but you know okay he wants cbc
00:40:02.960 gone does that disqualify him i don't know that's that's why i'm just we're all celebrating to see
00:40:07.280 that list i want that list oh we should have that could be an interesting office pool who's on the
00:40:12.400 list i still have them being paid out for the iranian excursion no you didn't you didn't meet
00:40:19.920 it the war happened after the deadline it's like reading the fine there we have a date on there
00:40:25.760 february first it says that's the fine print there is the fine print i can see way from over
00:40:31.920 here way over i was i was right you guys were wrong and you just can't admit it you're right
00:40:37.200 No, I thought it was actually going to be a war, but the bet was before February 1st, you lose.
00:40:45.840 My sources in the White House told me it would be after.
00:40:49.400 I see.
00:40:50.600 Okay, well, let's go to one party of shots.
00:40:53.820 Start with Dave.
00:40:55.260 Sad day.
00:40:56.360 Sad day for Great Britain when they're going to replace Winston Churchill on the five-pound note.
00:41:04.820 We're going to take his portrait off.
00:41:06.200 one of the greatest Britons ever.
00:41:08.500 We'd all be talking in
00:41:10.000 German if it wasn't
00:41:12.340 for him. Instead of Arabic.
00:41:13.780 Instead of Arabic.
00:41:16.680 One of the
00:41:17.980 titans of history.
00:41:20.300 And they're taking it off and replacing him with a hedgehog.
00:41:24.300 And I'm serious about that. Hedgehog.
00:41:26.940 England is
00:41:28.380 getting close to being officially
00:41:30.180 fallen, if it hasn't already.
00:41:33.920 I will stay.
00:41:34.440 well they'll be doing land acknowledgements for your people one day yeah they will yes
00:41:39.860 uh cory i just want you know address a grand chief ninchi and his uh collection of assorted
00:41:46.900 uh indigenous leaders in alberta on the steps of the legislature the other day
00:41:50.880 holding a stunt and that's the only word for it where they called for a non-confidence vote which
00:41:56.440 doesn't exist uh against the legislature and upset that the legislature didn't recognize their false
00:42:01.820 non-confidence vote and then actually because he got called on it went out and
00:42:06.140 tweeted that it wasn't a stunt which only led to 1700 replies saying that's exactly
00:42:12.060 the definition of us holding on to some confidence vote outside the legislature but it really is
00:42:16.240 indicating speaking of a leader who can't seem to be getting his feet under him and moving carny
00:42:21.320 it just seems all things line up for him nitchy is not grabbing the interest of albertans and
00:42:26.980 showing i think with more desperation and stunts like this yeah uh nigel yeah well maybe we need
00:42:34.500 some stunts on the other side i'll tell you this is uh i've been really very caught this morning
00:42:40.260 by the exchange in one of the committees where they can't actually just say yes we should get
00:42:50.500 some proof that there are bodies in graves and some of these right they have to talk around it
00:42:56.900 and say well yes but we should we need to trust and so forth i think anybody if any fair-minded
00:43:03.460 person if shown proof that these claims are true will change their minds well no no no we we don't
00:43:11.460 want to we don't want to get because there will always be people who will be against you and
00:43:14.740 meanwhile in bc you've got a guy who says no i don't i don't see any more than two genders here
00:43:21.140 and they're slapping with a 750 000 dollar fine one of these two got together you are not allowed
00:43:28.900 it seems to just state what you see or what you think we are moving into dark times and this is
00:43:37.300 the beginning not the end if you want to know who your true enemy is look for the people who make
00:43:41.380 make it illegal to criticize them. You bet. That's exactly what it is. Sorry to end on a
00:43:46.760 sober note. Well, on a pleasant note, I'm going to give a tip of the hat to a relatively new
00:43:54.140 independent media organization without diminishment. That's mostly some younger folks,
00:43:58.520 I think clustered mostly on the West Coast. They're giving a really interesting and punchy
00:44:04.660 but thoughtful take on the issues of the day. It's not doing news. They don't have a newsroom
00:44:09.520 the way we do but it's commentary and analysis um from a younger a younger perspective on the
00:44:17.000 right it's not uh you know the kind of conservative i grew up within where we're you know kind of
00:44:21.760 worshiping at the altar of ronald greg and everything was supply side economics these
00:44:26.160 guys are talking about the more existential issues we face today of do we exist as people
00:44:31.360 what is canada who are canadians how does canada survive as a people as a country uh it's
00:44:38.740 and they do it in a tasteful and very thoughtful way.
00:44:41.440 I think they're adding a lot to the conversation,
00:44:42.840 so I wanted to give a tip of that to folks that,
00:44:46.240 without diminishment, they've got a good sub-stack going that I recommend.
00:44:48.980 Do they have a list?
00:44:52.020 I'm pretty sure we're not on it.
00:44:54.480 Your turn.
00:44:55.680 You have time.
00:44:56.440 All right, Dave, Corey, Nigel, thank you,
00:44:59.260 and John for running studio,
00:45:01.320 and all of you for joining us and sharing your time with us here today.
00:45:05.000 Remember, the Western Standard relies on support
00:45:08.120 from people like you, go to westernstandard.news, click on subscribe. It's only $10 a month or $100
00:45:13.020 a year for unlimited access to all Western Standard content and to support the work that
00:45:18.260 we do here. Thank you very much for joining us today and God bless.
00:45:38.120 We'll be right back.