Western Standard - The Pipeline： Chrystia Freeland's hair-of-the-dog economic update

00:00:00.000 good evening i'm corey morgan welcome to the pipeline this is the western standards weekly

00:00:18.560 news and opinion panel where we go into our top stories break them down analyze

00:00:24.480 them tell you what to think about them or at least suggest what to think about them and uh

00:00:30.000 Well, just get to the bottom of these issues. And there's so many going on all the time.

00:00:34.460 We're going to get to those right away. I'm just going to start with reminding you of our sponsor.

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00:01:14.200 Canadian Shooting Sports Association, their website's cssa-cila.org. Take out a membership.

00:01:20.120 It's well worth the investment in yourself and your rights. All right, but we got so much to

00:01:24.280 today i want to get right to it we got some stuff that's been breaking this may be a day later for

00:01:28.840 some of the viewers there but still this has been breaking all morning here dave we we have uh well

00:01:34.200 i should introduce you guys dave nailer our news editor nigel hannaford our opinion editor i'm just

00:01:39.720 so eager to get to things as they've been working up that uh i'd forgotten but everybody knows

00:01:46.280 it's as they say you need no introduction exactly so we don't get that's right yeah corey it looks

00:01:53.080 like we had a terrorist attack at the canadian border crossing at in buffalo the rainbow bridge

00:01:59.720 buffalo on one side niagara falls on the other we're still in the sort of fog of war trying to

00:02:06.440 figure out what exactly happened but it appears there was a a car on the u.s side that was driving

00:02:12.600 towards canada was flagged for further inspections and then drove head first into the customs building

00:02:22.280 exploding uh killing the two men inside and uh injuring minor injuries to a an american

00:02:30.040 border official uh u.s officials immediately went on high alert all the bridges were closed from

00:02:37.800 ontario into uh into new york state uh u.s joint task force officers took control of of the bridges

00:02:48.040 And now the investigation is well underway. Where did these people come from? Who are they? What were they trying to do? Were they trying to blow up the checkpoint or were they trying to smuggle these explosives into Canada and do something nasty there? But a very, very concerning development today, Corey.

00:03:09.880 Yeah, well, Nigel, I mean, it's so early right now, it's hard to speculate.

00:03:13.080 But the potential repercussions of something like this are massive.

00:03:16.300 I mean, a terrorist, if it was the case of something like that, even if it's an individual or a pair of individuals, crossing borders, potentially killing people.

00:03:25.120 I mean, this could lead to a lot of border issues and security for quite some time.

00:03:29.060 Well, unfortunately or fortunately, you know, production in the auto industry straddles the border.

00:03:37.840 And the same car body will go backwards and forwards between plants in Detroit and Windsor, which is at the western end of Lake Erie.

00:03:46.740 It's not here at the, we're not talking about, that's not where the incident happened.

00:03:51.200 But when something like this does happen, then everybody gets scared.

00:03:56.580 And all of a sudden, routine operations, like crossing the border with a truck full of car bodies, suddenly becomes more of an issue.

00:04:05.340 And when these factories are working on a just-in-time basis, it's going to affect things.

00:04:10.320 It's also going to affect hundreds of thousands of people who cross the border at the American Thanksgiving.

00:04:17.760 And it's going to – there are quite a few Canadians who actually work in the United States,

00:04:23.360 live on one side, work on the other.

00:04:26.480 They, too, will be – I believe it's very strong in the hospital profession down there.

00:04:30.960 So all of these things are affected.

00:04:34.180 Two people blow themselves up.

00:04:36.020 The damage, I mean, the damage looks considerable when you see that,

00:04:40.600 but they'll fix that.

00:04:41.500 It's one lane out of several that accommodate traffic.

00:04:47.040 The success of this operation, if you want to call it that,

00:04:51.500 is the fear and confusion that it sows into every other border crossing

00:04:58.120 in that part of the world.

00:05:01.100 and frankly, for all we know, in this part of the world as well.

00:05:05.100 Exactly.

00:05:06.100 And border security has been an issue for a while now.

00:05:09.960 The U.S. southern border is basically a free-for-all.

00:05:14.380 The Americans have increased their complaints about the northern border

00:05:17.820 with the number of nasty people that are crossing from Canada into the United States.

00:05:24.200 So whichever way it goes, it's going to increase border anxiety.

00:05:30.040 If these people were found to be illegal immigrants in the United States,

00:05:33.780 that's going to put the pressure up on President Biden to do something about it.

00:05:39.540 And, Corey, you may remember about a week or so ago,

00:05:42.500 there were reports that the government of Great Britain warned Canada

00:05:47.980 that they were due for a terrorist attack.

00:05:50.680 And our Canadian government kind of just sloughed it off.

00:05:53.580 And a week or so later, here we are.

00:05:56.020 Well, I guess we know.

00:05:57.120 Again, to remind everybody, go to westernstandard.news to keep on the updates.

00:06:00.980 We're putting them up as fast as they happen.

00:06:02.840 And every news story and things such as that, we'll continue to report on it as it unfolds.

00:06:06.820 I think in a case like this, the best we can hope for is just it happened to be two lunatics, independent of anything else.

00:06:13.540 And it's sort of taken care of itself.

00:06:16.080 And it's not something of a wider effort going on.

00:06:19.140 Yeah, hopefully they haven't taped a pro Hamas message before getting into their vehicle.

00:06:23.940 Yeah, to your last point about the terrorists coming from Canada, it does appear that this vehicle originated on the south, like on the American side of the border.

00:06:37.420 So I would, you know, yes, the Canadians were warned by the British, but maybe this isn't actually what they were being warned about.

00:06:48.000 because this, we don't know yet, but this may have an entirely domestic origin within the U.S.,

00:06:53.620 or it may be, as you say, somebody who stuck across the southern border and decided to have a go.

00:07:00.280 But what was it?

00:07:01.660 You also mentioned that, and I believe I overheard this earlier on the reports,

00:07:07.040 there's something like 500 nasties who entered the United States,

00:07:11.940 and 450 of them were classified as having come from Canada.

00:07:15.360 Yes.

00:07:15.600 We do not have a good reputation.

00:07:17.640 No, and this, even if it didn't come from Canada, this is going to increase calls from American law people and elected officials to increase it.

00:07:27.180 Because, yeah, governments in the United States have expressed high concerns about the number of people crossing illegally into the United States from Canada.

00:07:37.560 There'll be more scrutiny.

00:07:38.700 I used to have to cross that border when I'd drive down to work in northern Pennsylvania, and that you could kind of cross down through Bradford and north of Pittsburgh.

00:07:45.000 but that was a long crossing if you hit it at the wrong time and with increased scrutiny I can only

00:07:50.960 imagine as you said there's an economic cost that comes with these things and fear but well I guess

00:07:56.300 we'll watch and wait and hope for the best all right well let's get on to another disaster and

00:08:01.060 that's the federal economic update very nice segue yes Christia Freeland's hair of the dog

00:08:07.980 economic update and I guess we're going to pull our Sean Polzer in to lay out a little bit of

00:08:13.940 what's going on with our friends in Ottawa. Hi, Sean, how you doing?

00:08:17.140 Good, thanks. How are you guys?

00:08:19.380 All right. Doing all right. So have they balanced the budget yet?

00:08:24.740 Oh, I don't think they ever had. That's one thing that I have a perfect record on is

00:08:30.680 racking up deficits ever since they were elected in 2015. After inheriting a balanced budget,

00:08:36.680 Nigel probably knows more about that than I do.

00:08:39.940 You tried hard. We got one.

00:08:42.860 So what are some of the highlights, though, of that budget, Sean?

00:08:45.740 I mean, are there any successes they can point out?

00:08:47.440 I know they're going to try to, but, you know, what is it telling us from this latest, I guess, snapshot of where the finances are sitting right now?

00:08:55.540 Well, I had a hard time trying to find out any one success.

00:08:59.920 If you call kind of managing the deficit and holding the line on it at around $40 billion success.

00:09:06.880 But the one thing that struck me the most was the actual cost of servicing the accumulative

00:09:14.380 deficit, partly as a result of the policies from their own Bank of Canada, where interest

00:09:20.960 rates are basically quadrupled in about a year and a half.

00:09:23.960 So that's putting a lot of pressure on Minister Freeland to not only try to find these new

00:09:30.200 dollars for these priority areas like housing and their environmental causes that liberals like but

00:09:38.320 also to actually pay for it so one of the numbers that struck out at me is that it's going to cost

00:09:43.500 about 46.5 billion dollars this year alone just to service the debt so it becomes the largest

00:09:50.920 single line item in the budget and that number is going to rise up to over 60 billion dollars by

00:09:57.680 28-29 fiscal year. And to put that into perspective, Canada spends about $28.5 billion on the

00:10:06.320 military a year. So we're talking we could have triple the size of the army that we have

00:10:12.180 now, meet our NATO commitments, and do all these things that the Liberals have promised

00:10:16.960 to do if they had just managed to be a little more disciplined fiscally and show some fiscal

00:10:24.780 restraint.

00:10:25.780 Oh, absolutely. I mean, Dave, yeah. I mean, we know from our household budgets, there's nothing

00:10:30.960 galls me more, pains me than interest payments. It's just flushed money. I mean, we borrow money.

00:10:36.580 It's kind of a necessity of modern financing, but you want to minimize when you can. And when we're

00:10:42.620 sending more on interest payments out than our entire military budget, I mean, what a waste.

00:10:48.420 10 cents on every dollar now going to pay the interest. I think it's now time,

00:10:54.760 gentlemen that we three apologize to our children for screwing their future by running up such a

00:11:01.240 debt and these these debt repayments that are going to have to be made is going to be crippling for

00:11:06.840 many many years to come i think the canadian taxpayers federation has got a separate division

00:11:12.920 what are they called generation screwed is it yeah yeah well that's that's their message um

00:11:18.840 yeah we could apologize but you know wouldn't it be a hell of a lot better to just fix it

00:11:23.160 You know, the impetus, I mean, we would remember, though, the last time budgets got balanced within Canada and moved along, even Romano and NDP, you know, premier managed to balance the budget, though, was the interest payments were driving Canadians so bananas in the 90s.

00:11:37.040 I mean, the interest rates were higher than two, but all of these debts, I mean, people were seeing those numbers and they were floored.

00:11:42.480 Like, that does motivate, well, responsible politicians, but we've got Freeland.

00:11:46.520 Well, we saw Freeland lambasting Pierre Polyev saying all Conservatives talk about is austerity, austerity.

00:11:53.980 Canadians don't want austerity.

00:11:56.060 Well, I'm sorry, Madam, but I think maybe some of us do, and I think maybe it's time all of us did.

00:12:01.600 If that is the case, then it's something we've learned in the last eight years,

00:12:05.280 because let me remind you of one thing.

00:12:07.700 In the 2015 election, we had the balanced budget,

00:12:11.100 And we campaigned, we being the conservatives, on keeping it that way, maintaining a balanced budget, running a tight ship.

00:12:19.200 You know who else campaigned on that? The NDP.

00:12:23.020 OK, so the conservatives and the NDP were together on tight fiscal policy, good governance, not borrowing your way through life.

00:12:33.840 it was the liberals who actually promised that they would borrow money for three years and then

00:12:41.280 balance the budget in the fourth and people voted for that and it wasn't just our generation that

00:12:48.580 did so it was actually the younger generation that swept Mr. Trudeau into power so while I

00:12:55.220 I actually sort of get what you're saying about the generation screwed and we kind of owe them an apology and sort of thing.

00:13:05.940 Yes, but they actually have their own burden to bear in this.

00:13:10.740 They voted for this guy.

00:13:12.040 And the polls are now showing they've changed their mind.

00:13:15.160 Boy, how about that?

00:13:16.860 How about that, eh?

00:13:17.780 Yes.

00:13:18.100 They are.

00:13:18.640 Well, before I let Sean go then, I mean, business and energy is your beat, though.

00:13:22.160 did you see much within that update, you know, reflecting on how it might impact that or how

00:13:26.640 dependent they might be on energy revenues? What did you see in there? Well, it's funny because

00:13:33.640 unlike the present prime minister's father, he's not trying to steal our money. He's basically

00:13:39.840 trying to leave it in the ground. So no, there wasn't very much on energy specifically or any

00:13:46.060 kind of revenues or investment kind of things that they could potentially use to maybe offset

00:13:50.840 some of that deficit but there was some mention of carbon credit taxes for these carbon capture

00:14:01.080 projects these are big billion dollar projects and they've been promising some legislation to

00:14:07.560 put through these tax credits that they've identified in previous budgets but they haven't

00:14:12.680 done so yet and so that is apparently coming in the fall i would imagine there's only six weeks

00:14:20.040 left in the fall where they're going to promise some guidelines on these investment tax credits,

00:14:28.200 but I would kind of note that they were rolled in with a big larger suite of, you know, their pet

00:14:35.640 clean electricity policies and that somehow it looked to me that it was almost like a negotiating

00:14:42.680 ploy. As you know, the federal government and the provincial government, Alberta government,

00:14:47.400 are at the community roundtables where they're supposed to be negotiating some of these clean

00:14:52.600 energy regulations and emissions caps and whatnot. Jovo has taken a very hard line,

00:14:59.560 but Minister Wilkinson has said that these are only starting points. And it seems to me that

00:15:03.960 what we're seeing is the beginnings of a federal opening gambit, if you will, on some of these

00:15:11.960 energy issues that they've been having with Premier Smith.

00:15:15.840 Well, let's hope some economic pragmatism and reality squeaks in there from somewhere. I know

00:15:21.140 not every Liberal on the seats is economically inept, but they sure seem quiet these days.

00:15:27.960 Is there anything else you'd like to add before we let you go then, Sean?

00:15:30.900 Well, the other sneaker was the media bailout. They're adding another $130 million up to that.

00:15:37.220 I think it was $595 million pot to bail out the legacy media. And it was buried fairly deep in

00:15:44.160 the document. You had to kind of look for it. And there was about three little paragraphs

00:15:47.960 about not only expanding the program, but extending it, it seems to me, indefinitely.

00:15:54.740 And so that was a bit of an issue in the newsroom for us as well.

00:15:58.100 Wow, absolutely. And yeah, we'll talk a bit about that further. So I'll let you get back to your

00:16:04.580 your tasks there and keeping up with all that.

00:16:07.000 And I appreciate you checking in with us today, Sean.

00:16:08.900 Thanks a lot, guys.

00:16:10.120 Thanks.

00:16:10.720 So that was our Sean Pauls.

00:16:11.740 And yes, you go to the Western Standard.news

00:16:13.620 to see more of his stories out there.

00:16:15.280 He covers a lot of this, this beat quite well.

00:16:17.640 And these interest payments,

00:16:18.680 there's one thing that gets me to the left

00:16:19.980 where they feel that deficit financing is okay

00:16:22.320 and borrowing is okay.

00:16:23.900 Yet they always love to swipe at big business

00:16:26.420 and big corporations.

00:16:28.080 I don't think it's mom and pop corner store lenders

00:16:30.200 that are taking these interest payments.

00:16:33.480 I'm pretty sure it's big business.

00:16:34.360 isn't it? Oh, well, I mean, these, as I said, their budget updates, their snapshots, you know,

00:16:42.120 they don't pack too much in, but we read what we can into it. It looks, I mean, they got a bleak

00:16:45.880 picture to work with here. Yeah, but it's their fault they got a bleak picture to work with.

00:16:50.640 Absolutely. It's like watch, trying to watch an alcoholic solve their own problems, you know.

00:16:55.580 Yeah, drink your way through it. But boy, that's, this is like, we call it the hair of the dog

00:17:00.760 budget because that's got we got into this mess by borrowing too much money now she's borrowing 0.51

00:17:07.320 more to fix well that's the infuriating thing too i mean it shows the economic illiteracy or

00:17:11.880 deception one of the two probably a bit of both when she gets up there says we're going to battle

00:17:16.040 inflation we're going to keep your cost of living down and by doing that to do that we're going to

00:17:20.120 borrow and print a whole pile of money yeah either they're denying that that causes inflation or they

00:17:25.400 really actually don't know it and all their big money announcements for housing and there is a

00:17:30.680 housing crisis in this country don't start until 2025 26 so they're doing nothing at the moment

00:17:37.720 for it no well it's not a good on the day doesn't it yes and until you read the fine print it's not

00:17:44.040 a budget thing as well but i mean if they want to take pressure off housing we're starting seeing

00:17:47.400 reports saying as much as well they need to cut the immigration a little bit but they won't talk

00:17:51.720 actually you do a bit of airbnb don't you yes we do well what does this what does her update mean

00:17:58.200 for you i don't believe it's going to impact us because we are in a rural area and it's part of

00:18:03.000 the house we reside in what they're going after with it are people who have standalone properties

00:18:07.880 that they're uh letting out on airbnb and you know if you own four houses you use airbnb to

00:18:13.960 make more money out of things like that but i think i think jane might correct me on that

00:18:18.760 uh we that we don't fall under that but it's uh there they go after a small businessman again

00:18:24.200 yes it is and and it won't solve the housing problems and if anything uh when when you look

00:18:29.080 at that if somebody has one property they renter they say well fine you know what i'm out i'm just

00:18:33.080 going to sell it then and uh the high price now you have one you know with such a much larger

00:18:39.480 crisis in housing it's just a drop in the bucket they're just looking for villains to point at

00:18:43.960 so it must be those airbnb and we should know for the record the conservatives are going to vote

00:18:48.120 nay and the ndp lapdogs are going to vote aye so no quick election no no we can't expect that

00:18:57.320 all right well let's go uh closer to home get into alberta we've got an interesting

00:19:02.040 announcement dave you know it looks like we might have uh more options for health care

00:19:06.120 we do but do we want to talk about the media bailout of the uh the economic budget in the

00:19:11.240 order we got going things you're okay fair we've got to be able to move and go on the flow so i

00:19:15.960 I mean, I noticed the headline is more money for our competitors because it is a self-serving headline because we're ticked off, but rightly so.

00:19:23.420 I think most Canadians should be with this whole ongoing bailout of media.

00:19:27.820 Yeah, another $129 million to the failing legacy media.

00:19:32.140 I'll just read you a couple of tweets here from people who know what they're talking about.

00:19:35.800 The first being Michael Geist, the government now bailing out Canadian news outlets because of the disastrous Bill C-18.

00:19:44.240 It will now cover 35% of a reporter's wages from $55,000 to $85,000 a year.

00:19:51.720 And they made it retroactive to the beginning of the year.

00:19:55.220 In response, Peter Menzies, a former Calgary Sun sports editor, a former Calgary Herald publisher, a former CRTC vice chair, tweeted,

00:20:05.760 The government has essentially nationalized most of Canada's media.

00:20:14.100 This is a huge win for the hedge fund and a big blow to those who refuse the loot.

00:20:18.800 That would be us.

00:20:19.880 Most journals can now thank Justin Trudeau for their paychecks.

00:20:23.920 It's done.

00:20:26.420 I mean, does everybody understand about the hedge funds?

00:20:30.800 Not necessarily. Maybe expand on it.

00:20:32.520 Well, that's the major news companies are owned by hedge funds based in the United States,

00:20:39.320 so we think we're saving our democracy and we think we're keeping jobs for Canadian journalists.

00:20:43.320 Well, I guess we are, but the boys are actually whose investment is being protected here

00:20:50.920 are not even Canadians. No, it's not small local outlets we're talking about. These are big fund

00:20:56.200 owners who really are quite indifferent to the news content or any principles of journalism or

00:21:01.160 getting anything out it's just yeah they're the ones that have hemorrhaged staff from the uh from

00:21:06.280 the uh the newsrooms of the country over the years too they're they're now basically barely existing

00:21:12.200 well and just to tie it to another recent issue that's the way it works these subsidies too they

00:21:15.800 claim it's for domestic jobs that they always do and things like that but it rarely works that way

00:21:20.920 the layoffs are going to continue the the ostensible merger between the sun and the

00:21:26.120 herald as if it was going to make things better didn't make two entities it just made one ugly one

00:21:30.840 uh and like the battery plant we find out you know we're going to give billions for batteries 0.85

00:21:35.080 but we're going to bring in south korean staff to work there so this is one way of making the news

00:21:42.440 the newsrooms a little more culturally diverse is that what's your this is going to be a south

00:21:48.200 korean well we are taking the subsidy but somebody else different on the panel next week uh with a

00:21:53.560 kimchi report and uh i like kimchi but that's a side note we gotta get a food show on here

00:22:00.200 we do well we do have josh andrus our chief that's true he has covered a few things well

00:22:05.720 you've been on the road with them i yeah some of those panels i don't mind covering from out there

00:22:10.360 it needs to be in preparing it on camera shows where everybody gets a bite to eat then you got

00:22:15.960 to pretend you like it or not or not but i mean this is bad for me it is just bad well i mean it

00:22:22.520 it came out the same week i noticed cory that uh the uh trust in news media has hit an all-time low

00:22:29.080 And then bang, this comes out. And it's now, you know, as Peter says, the journalists can thank Trudeau for their paycheck every two weeks.

00:22:39.740 And they will do so by not reporting bad things on him.

00:22:45.200 Like when the most ridiculous headline I've seen this week was CBC talking about the South Koreans coming to Ontario to build the EV plant.

00:22:55.140 And he blamed Stephen Harper.

00:22:57.000 CBC blamed Stephen Harper because Stephen Harper signed a free trade deal with South Korea back in 2010.

00:23:04.240 I mean, that's just one of the more blatant examples of the Trudeau ass-kissing.

00:23:10.080 Well, you know, you want to talk about bad headlines.

00:23:12.620 There was that other one reporting on that unfortunate Winnipeg woman who died in Israel.

00:23:20.740 they reported that she died as if she had just sort of fallen asleep in her bed when in actual

00:23:26.340 fact she was a victim of terrorism cbc won't even call hamas terrorists so what exactly

00:23:35.540 ctv in fairness that blew the uh the poor lady headline yeah cbc won't call them uh terrorists as

00:23:42.660 well and something interesting of i was driving this morning i i was listening to a radio host

00:23:47.780 based out of Edmonton, and he referred to October 7th as being an activity carried out by Hamas

00:23:53.680 militants. The word terrorism is getting dropped from the other newsrooms too. I mean, we expect

00:23:59.780 it from the state broadcaster because we've never expected much out of the CBC, but this is chorus

00:24:04.540 entertainment. Like, why is this liberal language going into every outlet? Mark, my words, by 24

00:24:11.460 hours from this very moment, that incident in Buffalo will be put down to bad driving. Yes.

00:24:17.780 And it'll be because Harper changed some standards somewhere on the drivers.

00:24:22.820 And it goes right along with the, you know, the lessening of responsibility to Hamas goes right along with the increased anti-Semitism being felt across North America.

00:24:32.820 I mean, I think these are the kinds of reasons that are destroying the credibility of the mainstream media.

00:24:39.460 I have actually, I have to admit that I have seen some good investigative reporting coming out of all places, the CBC.

00:24:47.780 we have picked up on some of those stories we have credited their sources but they are so rare

00:24:55.840 that's the problem and when people it doesn't really matter how much the federal government

00:25:02.140 now subsidizes our industry people know it's subsidized so they think it's bought and paid for

00:25:08.280 the trust gets lost and there goes the trust and there are some good journalists in all of the

00:25:12.340 outlets and papers still out there i mean a lot but they're going to keep their heads down a lot

00:25:16.220 of them. The reason they're still there is they got bills to pay too. They got family to feed and

00:25:20.620 it's just, well, I don't know what else I can do. But the editor told me don't shake that tree

00:25:25.280 because, you know, we've gotten some veiled, you know, warnings from our bureaucrats in Ottawa for

00:25:31.620 our next subsidy dive that we might not cease. Because you know that's going to happen.

00:25:35.520 With Polyev soaring and Trudeau tanking in the polls, how worried do you think CBC staff are?

00:25:41.260 because they, you know, if they get monetized, he's been sticking quite outright to saying he's

00:25:46.960 going to defund the CBC. But it was part of what Menzies pointed out in his piece as well was

00:25:52.920 aside from the straight 1.4 billion given to the CBC every year out of the taxpayers' pockets,

00:25:58.800 they steal. And I say it that way, because if you're subsidized that much and you're selling

00:26:02.700 advertising on top of it, in my view, you're stealing advertising dollars from the private

00:26:07.200 market. If they would just even get out of the advertising business, that would open up 400

00:26:12.680 million a year in advertising for other outlets to pursue and try to get contracts for. But they

00:26:19.200 won't do that either. No, no. And we'd happily accept some of that money. Well, it's honestly

00:26:24.220 it's from advertising. We have to go to the advertiser and say, hey, this is what we're

00:26:28.140 offering. You know, the old form of an exchange of services for money. But now it's it's between

00:26:33.080 politicians and media. And I said the trust gets broken further. So even good stories,

00:26:36.980 people look at them with a jaded eye. They're not sure about this. And it's just a bad development

00:26:43.460 all around. And the timing too. I noticed that they make sure that this will be up for renewal

00:26:49.180 after the next election. No coincidence there. Okay. Well, what else can we cover? We can afford

00:26:59.320 to cover things around here still for now anyways let me get back to where i was going before you

00:27:04.420 were so rudely interrupted yes yes the nurse uh practitioners practitioners big uh big interesting

00:27:11.320 news in alberta this morning cory where premier smith and health minister lagrange announced that

00:27:16.200 licensed practical nurses will be able to open their own clinics and offer services now the way

00:27:22.260 i understand it nigel and you may know better than me you've got the register the registered

00:27:26.700 nurses at one level and then the licensed practical nurses are at another level and then

00:27:32.380 then you get doctors and apparently the licensed practical nurses can do 80 percent of what a doctor

00:27:40.220 can do well that's what daniel smith that's what daniel that's what daniel smith's news release

00:27:44.860 says so so if they the i know the the rural people are very happy with this because if they get some

00:27:49.820 nurse practitioners opening up in their in their communities that's going to take a lot of a lot of

00:27:54.540 pressure off. As usual, Corey and Nigel, there'll be, you know, the NDP is probably already screaming

00:28:01.780 about it. Some unions are probably already screaming about it, but to me it seems like a good

00:28:06.060 idea. Well, it sort of is and it isn't. On the principle that half a loaf is better than no

00:28:13.080 bread, if you're in a location or if you're in a situation where you do not have, if you're

00:28:19.040 not registered with a general practitioner and a nurse practitioner will put you on her books

00:28:26.760 or his are there male nurse practitioners i well i gotta do my politically correct part yeah well

00:28:34.160 that's that's so like you gory yes politically correct um at any rate i'm gonna i'm gonna go

00:28:40.000 out on a limb and i say that uh if 80 if they are 80 percent they are predominantly they are

00:28:45.360 If you can get one to take you, Corey, and you can't get on the list for a general practitioner

00:28:55.800 of either sex, you're going to do that because that's your best hope.

00:29:01.040 If something happens at short notice and you've got to get it and you've got to see somebody now. 0.71

00:29:05.600 I mean, the illustration we always think of is all of us who've had children is it's 11 o'clock

00:29:14.440 night, the baby won't go to sleep, seems like it's got colic, but just will not settle this

00:29:21.220 bawling and wailing, and your wife is just about ready to, you know, bawl and wail herself.

00:29:28.460 That's the time when you finally take the child down to emergency, and two things happen. They

00:29:34.960 give the child a pill, and they reassure you that they're not going to die. It's going to be okay.

00:29:44.440 And if you talk to doctors, you talk to medical practitioners, you talk to nurse practitioners

00:29:48.780 or anybody, so much time in medicine is taken up with managing patient anxiety.

00:29:59.840 There's no reason, to your point, why a nurse practitioner can't do that very well.

00:30:08.600 Well, my hesitation is that, first of all, I don't think the savings that the government is looking for is necessarily going to come from that.

00:30:17.700 But much more to the point is that the sort of the training regime of the nurse practitioner includes a lot of things that are, how can I put it, touchy-feely.

00:30:30.980 And you're there with something that is an unusual condition.

00:30:36.200 like who sees malaria these days present in a small town in southern Alberta with a case of

00:30:43.860 malaria that you picked up when you were overseas you don't even know you've got it you just know

00:30:48.500 you feel terrible are they going to know you've got malaria I don't know maybe they will but

00:30:52.840 a doctor might not either though I mean yeah doctors that's the thing that's the difference

00:30:57.200 in the training the doctors get that stuff because I'd rather for example the nurse

00:31:01.360 looks with the crying baby and gives the baby Tylenol and ensures the mother you're not a bad

00:31:06.620 person. You're not a bad person. You're going to be perfectly fine and sends them on their way.

00:31:11.920 In the meantime, the emergency doctor who would have been tied up can deal with setting that

00:31:16.140 broken arm from somebody who came in. And I'd like to think a lot of that. I mean,

00:31:19.720 there's competency levels of doctors and nurse practitioners that are all sorts of areas. But

00:31:23.700 if you've got guidelines, hopefully they would exercise judgment, you know, all that rash there.

00:31:28.000 Okay, we'll prescribe you a steroid cream, you know, or somebody drops their pants and

00:31:31.820 that's not supposed to be growing there.

00:31:33.700 Okay, you got to go see a doctor.

00:31:35.860 That's outside of my scope.

00:31:37.920 And it could be a referral.

00:31:39.480 I mean, look at it as a form of triage, even, you know, if people understand too, you're

00:31:43.540 not going to a full medical practitioner, you're going to somebody who can deal with

00:31:47.680 that first level of treatment.

00:31:49.700 I think you can really take pressure off, might not save money, but part of our issue

00:31:53.140 isn't so much the money necessarily.

00:31:54.660 It's the fact that we're waiting so long to get in to be seen.

00:31:58.000 Yeah. I don't know. When my kids had colic, I just gave them a soother dipped in scotch, and they were out like a hole.

00:32:04.500 One thing that we should talk about is the funding. You did mention it.

00:32:10.260 A question was asked today, you know, if they can do 80% of what a doctor does, are they going to get paid 80% of the doctor's wages?

00:32:17.120 And the funding is still in negotiation.

00:32:20.560 So, as you say, how much they're going to save or how much it's going to cost is still up to be determined.

00:32:26.500 Yeah, I'm just happy to see some thinking outside of the box, too.

00:32:29.520 We've been in a status quo with health care forever.

00:32:32.860 And, you know, we're spending more and more and more.

00:32:35.700 Nobody, despite what the howls of unions claims, nobody's been cutting health spending for years and years.

00:32:41.260 And the outcomes are getting worse.

00:32:42.480 The waiting lists are getting longer.

00:32:44.240 I mean, we need to try something.

00:32:46.320 And Premier Smith has shown the courage to say, here is a potential solution.

00:32:50.260 As you said, maybe it might not work out.

00:32:51.820 But I see a whole lot of good potential in here. 0.98

00:32:54.280 And she's willing to bring on the wrath of the nurses' unions and possibly the health lawyers and, you know, and say, let's give this a try.

00:33:03.820 I'm not sure that the, I mean, I'm sure the unions will make a fest just to, but deep down, this is something that nurses have been pushing for for a very, very long time.

00:33:15.920 Absolutely.

00:33:16.200 And it has to do with status and professional recognition, you know.

00:33:21.040 They're very well-trained professionals.

00:33:22.620 They can cover a lot of medical.

00:33:24.360 That's right.

00:33:25.000 They can cover 80%.

00:33:26.320 That's pretty good.

00:33:28.980 I think of other things.

00:33:30.480 For example, I pay out of pocket to get my driver's license renewed every two years.

00:33:33.580 I have to get a medical exam because I'm a class four.

00:33:36.680 Fine.

00:33:37.660 And I pay my dollars for that.

00:33:39.300 So it doesn't cost the system in dollars.

00:33:40.780 But it still takes up the time.

00:33:42.300 I have to have a physician take my blood pressure.

00:33:46.940 Actually, it's usually a nurse who does all that anyways.

00:33:48.940 it's a five minute quick thing with the physician and it's a nurse who takes care of all the rest 0.97

00:33:53.500 anyways. We can free up that five minutes even to the physician on what is pretty much just kind

00:33:58.540 of a routine checkup. And again, theoretically dedicate that physician to something that may be

00:34:05.660 more pressing. You need to go out to Springbank, get it done at the airport there. Then you're

00:34:09.940 right outside the system altogether. Go and see Brendan Adams. We'll talk about that later because

00:34:15.400 I hate doing that point. It's coming up this February.

00:34:17.900 As you say, something needs to be done.

00:34:21.520 It's nice to see something being done differently

00:34:23.580 because there's no point in spending the same amount of money doing the same stuff

00:34:27.120 because that's the definition of insanity, isn't it?

00:34:29.640 Yeah, we're spinning our wheels.

00:34:32.240 Are they qualified to recognize insanity?

00:34:36.500 I mean, I'd also like to see some degree.

00:34:38.620 I mean, somebody else I saw on Twitter said,

00:34:40.560 oh, the doctors' associations, everybody will be upset too.

00:34:43.120 I'm not sure about that.

00:34:43.960 But it's not like they're short.

00:34:45.580 They're not going to suddenly have a gap in spare time happening if this happens.

00:34:50.140 I mean, there's going to be plenty of demand for their services.

00:34:52.900 And maybe there'll be even a little bit of an element of competition.

00:34:55.920 One of the things I saw down in the States when I was working in Hobbs, New Mexico, awful

00:34:59.880 dusty spot on the Texas, New Mexico border.

00:35:02.440 But there was a billboard for a hospital.

00:35:04.460 It had a digital bottom and it gave the emergency wait time for the room at that hospital.

00:35:08.800 It was them saying, if you're driving into town, you need something.

00:35:11.420 hey, it's six minutes right now, or it's 18,

00:35:14.060 maybe go to the other one.

00:35:15.720 But they're trying to say, hey, we got good service,

00:35:18.200 come on in.

00:35:19.240 And now we're not gonna get to the point

00:35:22.440 of private hospitals advertising,

00:35:23.740 putting billboards up up here,

00:35:24.880 but seeing more alternatives for people to choose from,

00:35:28.360 I can only see that reducing some of the wait times

00:35:30.560 for more of the immediate acute care.

00:35:32.860 Agreed.

00:35:33.700 Yeah, no issue there.

00:35:35.780 So one of the things that is curious though,

00:35:39.140 I wonder why recent medical grads are not interested

00:35:42.900 in going into family medicine.

00:35:44.940 Do you have a theory?

00:35:45.780 You've got a theory on everything.

00:35:46.820 I do on lots of things.

00:35:47.660 That one I don't.

00:35:48.500 It's getting outside of my scope finally there, so.

00:35:51.660 Only maybe I could think of is that, you know,

00:35:53.820 specialties pay more.

00:35:55.600 Either that, or maybe they're just calling it

00:35:57.340 family medicine as opposed to general practice even.

00:35:59.860 There's, like, it sort of diminishes it.

00:36:02.340 People don't want to do family medicine.

00:36:04.560 I want to be a surgeon.

00:36:05.740 You know?

00:36:06.580 But is there any element of that to it?

00:36:08.880 It's a different appeal, I guess, yeah.

00:36:10.220 And the generalism.

00:36:11.160 It's kind of interchangeable with a nurse practitioner.

00:36:12.700 I don't know whether that's going to make people more anxious to participate or not.

00:36:18.960 I don't know.

00:36:20.080 I mean, again, if that covers some of that general practitioner with the nurse practitioners,

00:36:25.660 it does, because we're short of specialists.

00:36:27.300 We certainly are.

00:36:28.200 That's when you really get into those weights, you know, when you want to see a urologist

00:36:32.880 or a cardiologist or some of those specialized.

00:36:35.480 I mean, it could be six months, a year or more, depending on what you need.

00:36:39.520 Nurse practitioner will see you now, Corey.

00:36:42.000 Well, great. 0.95

00:36:42.860 And who knows, as you said, with that gender difference, maybe those prostate exams will be a little more... 0.92

00:36:46.800 Oh, no, no, no, they'll go there. 0.99

00:36:50.020 See, none of them are going to see me.

00:36:51.400 He's looking forward to this.

00:36:52.440 You were doing so well today in correcting Nigel and being politically correct.

00:36:58.020 Now you've just...

00:36:59.000 It's not my fault where the creator put that thing.

00:37:02.100 All right, let's move along then.

00:37:04.920 And that's as far as we need to go there.

00:37:07.300 On to something still in poor taste, and that's the Human Rights Commission and one of their gems, as usual.

00:37:13.060 It's kind of almost an annual tradition in a lot of ways to have this sort of controversy, Dave.

00:37:17.340 It is. It was written about by our Linda Slobodian yesterday, uncovered by Blacklock's reporters.

00:37:24.300 The Human Rights Commission says Christmas is discriminatory and colonialism because we're old white men and say Merry Christmas.

00:37:32.220 You know, it's subtly ridiculous. They're taking a run at Christmas. They're taking a run at Easter, obviously the two major religious holidays for Christians, because it's not inclusive enough and because it's discriminatory against other faiths and people.

00:37:53.160 So just before Nigel explodes here, I just want to read one thing from Polling Canada.

00:37:58.700 This was an interesting poll they did actually last year, December 11th, 2022.

00:38:04.340 And they asked people who grew up as non-Christians, are you offended when people greet you with Merry Christmas?

00:38:12.080 92% said no, they're not offended.

00:38:15.400 8% said they were offended.

00:38:17.620 So again, this is, it's not really an issue that the Human Rights Commission has seemed to jump on

00:38:22.780 and explode six weeks before Christmas.

00:38:26.240 I mean, it's, as you say, Corey, it's an annual mess.

00:38:28.880 It tends to drop upon us.

00:38:30.720 It's usually somewhere taking out a nativity scene or pulling out or saying we can't call it a Christmas tree in a place.

00:38:37.520 The absurdity.

00:38:38.460 But now we've got a government-funded agency that has delved into this.

00:38:43.400 I mean, what remedy are they proposing, too?

00:38:46.000 Well, they're not proposing anything at the moment.

00:38:48.200 It's a statement.

00:38:49.160 It's a policy paper.

00:38:50.240 So the danger of these things is that other government agencies take that as a signal

00:38:57.960 and then will move in a way that people who admire and like Christmas won't appreciate.

00:39:06.760 Christmas isn't going anywhere for two reasons.

00:39:09.740 One is that people who believe in the gospel story are not going to let it go anywhere.

00:39:15.460 and the other reason is that the entire economy depends upon you know starting black friday and

00:39:21.700 going through the new year sales that month of which of which christmas is the lynch point

00:39:30.580 is what makes the year if you are in small business and you're selling whatever retail

00:39:37.220 christmas is if you don't make it then you're not going to make it in the rest of the year so

00:39:41.780 there is going to be a period of celebration in the middle of December, and they can call it the

00:39:49.380 Saturnalia if they want to go back to basics, because some people say that the Christians just

00:39:55.400 appropriated that Roman holiday, called, changed the name, and nothing changed. So that could

00:40:02.360 happen, but Christmas is not going anywhere. I think these people are crazy. I also think they're

00:40:08.340 militias, but I am not anxious about the occasion. I mean, from a secular viewpoint, you know, it's

00:40:15.360 it's a part of the culture. It's gone beyond religion to a whole lot of people. It's just

00:40:19.680 part of something that's huge in North America and Europe as part of a season, a long, dark

00:40:24.760 winter, short days. We've got things to look forward to. We've got Christmas parties to look

00:40:28.120 forward to. We've got, you know, perhaps gifts exchanges if you want to take part in it, a meal

00:40:32.600 or even just a couple of days off. But it's a season. And again, people can set aside their

00:40:37.040 hang-ups, most people look forward to it

00:40:38.920 and enjoy it, whether they're people of faith or not.

00:40:41.100 All the women here are looking forward to doing a gift

00:40:42.980 exchange with you, Corey.

00:40:44.240 I don't know what your magic is, but

00:40:46.820 anyway.

00:40:48.460 They don't understand how cheap I really am.

00:40:49.840 They're all apparently talking about getting edible underwear.

00:40:54.360 All those things changed.

00:40:55.180 Don't you go where he's already gone.

00:40:56.760 Look, I think their point

00:40:59.140 was, just to be

00:41:00.980 serious for about five seconds,

00:41:02.880 that they said, well, look, Christmas

00:41:04.940 is a religious holiday,

00:41:06.460 and it's the only religious holiday that is recognized in the Canadian calendar.

00:41:11.720 Like, you don't get days off for Ramadan, you don't get days off for... 0.98

00:41:14.420 Well, you do for Easter.

00:41:15.120 For Easter, yeah.

00:41:16.120 Well, I'm reciting from what they say, but, you know, this is...

00:41:21.420 So, yeah, you're right. 0.91

00:41:22.200 But, again, I mean, this is just more evidence of how Christianity has hijacked the calendar in their eyes, 0.60

00:41:29.220 and that is discriminatory, and it's worse than discriminatory 0.82

00:41:33.000 because it's sort of white people as though black people and brown people and Chinese people

00:41:38.080 never go Christmas shopping and give each other gifts at Christmas and actually believe in Christmas.

00:41:44.700 As Corey said, even if you don't believe in Christmas, even if you're not a Christian,

00:41:49.320 you can still use the season to have a couple extra days off.

00:41:52.800 You can get your family together and celebrate whatever, you know.

00:41:57.540 So nobody, there's not anybody that doesn't benefit from the Christmas.

00:42:01.400 no and it's it's evolved to other practices like there's a jewish practice particularly in new york

00:42:06.600 of going for chinese food on christmas day for supper and the reason for it was was way back

00:42:11.720 when things were much more regulated you couldn't find anything open on christmas day we remember

00:42:15.560 that even up here but if you're jewish and you weren't observing the only other places that were

00:42:19.720 open were chinese restaurants because they weren't christian either so it just turned into we'll go 0.88

00:42:24.280 there the chinese now look forward to a large jewish uh uh turnoff it's just another tradition 0.84

00:42:29.960 that sure is tied to the Christian holiday originally, but nobody's offended, nobody's 0.98

00:42:34.040 having a bad time. It's always white, liberal, purple-haired busybodies that make these stupid

00:42:39.620 statements. It's nothing to do with the minorities or people of other faiths.

00:42:43.220 You're so right when you said that 90% of people are not offended. 92%, I think it was your number.

00:42:52.940 It's like you say, it's white, liberal atheists who actually turn you down and try to get you 0.55

00:42:59.520 canceled when you when you put up a christmas tree or yeah but you see there's white libertarian

00:43:06.080 atheists like me i have no problem with it i don't feel insecure so much that if somebody

00:43:10.160 wishes me merry christmas or happy ramadan or anything like that but it's it's offending my

00:43:15.920 how do you reply if i wish you a merry christmas merry christmas to you too or thank you i it's a

00:43:22.240 well wish i will take it i appreciate it it's you know wishing me to have a good time why why would

00:43:27.680 i'd be offended yeah the world needs to lighten up big time speak the word so i still have to get

00:43:34.240 you a present uh well just check the ticket maybe maybe you drew michelle

00:43:40.880 yeah that'd be easier for you secret santa we should remind everybody you know we've got a

00:43:46.640 couple of minutes left here i mean a great gift you can give people is the gift of independent

00:43:50.640 media and uh this is the time to remind people we aren't taking those bailouts guys we rely

00:43:58.080 on you subscribers so i'm going to kind of nag you and you know this isn't this is another idea

00:44:02.400 for something you can do there's nothing wrong with that buy a subscription for the standard 0.75

00:44:06.400 on behalf of somebody else they can have their login and their email how much is a subscription

00:44:10.960 well since you happen to be asking hey it's ten dollars a month or 99 for a year i mean

00:44:17.360 talk a great volume discount that's just the price of an old newspaper isn't it that's right you don't

00:44:22.080 have that pile of newspapers to get rid of later we are we are environmentally friendly it is a

00:44:28.480 digital product and if you've got a favorite uncle who loves the liberals and the left wing

00:44:33.680 get him a subscription that show them you know the error of his ways oh yeah i mean if you want

00:44:38.080 to set off the purple-haired person who hates christmas a card with the receipt showing i have

00:44:43.440 bought a subscription with the system standard on behalf of you. Merry Christmas. May you know,

00:44:49.920 my blessings. Come on, have fun with it, guys. And it helps us. I mean, I'm only being half

00:44:54.080 joking with this. You know, this is a good time. It's a potential gift. It's the digital world. I

00:44:58.800 mean, you should still go shopping or handcraft something for somebody or whatnot. But a standard

00:45:03.440 subscription won't hurt either. And hey, hey, you can't even go for you can't even go to the movies

00:45:09.200 for what you pay for 10 bucks.

00:45:12.100 I think movies pretty much $15.

00:45:14.900 Popcorn's more than that.

00:45:15.800 Crazy, I think they're money

00:45:16.840 out of the popcorn experience.

00:45:18.840 The theaters have really gotten great

00:45:20.020 with those lounge chairs

00:45:20.860 and things where you can make

00:45:21.640 a whole night of it now.

00:45:22.920 But it's expensive.

00:45:24.660 More than 20 bucks for one of those seats

00:45:26.680 and 10 bucks a beer

00:45:28.220 and 15 bucks for a popcorn.

00:45:31.640 It's nothing you can do often

00:45:32.860 on an independent media member budget.

00:45:34.480 So hey, we accept gifts too.

00:45:35.960 If you want to send movie passes our ways,

00:45:37.480 Yeah, really.

00:45:38.900 We could all use a night out now.

00:45:40.380 Attention, landmark cinemas, landmark cinemas, come in.

00:45:42.980 The Northwest is a great place.

00:45:45.880 Well, we know in this place,

00:45:46.820 nobody's gonna be shy from any of that sort of thing.

00:45:48.940 So we will wish people Merry Christmas. 0.98

00:45:50.760 And again, if it's Ramadan, anything else,

00:45:52.920 I'm more than happy to take the well wishes and greetings.

00:45:56.040 Well, don't forget Hanukkah, that's coming right up too.

00:45:59.040 You should do that.

00:46:00.560 I know it's coming.

00:46:01.400 I'm not good at practicing any religion, despite.

00:46:05.340 So you don't have the beanie?

00:46:07.480 I bought a Detroit Lions one for my oldest son because he's a Lions fan.

00:46:14.160 It seems to have worked.

00:46:14.860 They're doing well this year.

00:46:16.220 They are.

00:46:16.680 They're likely to make the playoffs.

00:46:19.160 We'll see if the Steelers aren't going anywhere.

00:46:21.060 Okay.

00:46:21.520 On that sad note, I think we're out of time.

00:46:25.220 So thank you very much, Nigel, Dave, and everybody else for tuning in.

00:46:31.260 Keep watching.

00:46:32.280 We appreciate it.

00:46:33.800 And Merry Christmas in advance.

00:46:36.080 I'll see you next week at this time.

00:46:37.480 Canadian Shooting Sports Association. Without the CSSA, our gun rights would have been taken

00:46:42.000 long, long ago. These guys are on the front lines helping to draft smart and intelligent

00:46:48.180 firearms regulations and legislation in Canada, and more importantly, educating the public about

00:46:54.240 how we keep guns out of the hands of the wrong people. We've become a member. It's absolutely

00:46:58.720 worth every penny. You can become a Western Standard member for just $10 a month or $99

Western Standard - November 23, 2023

The Pipeline： Chrystia Freeland's hair-of-the-dog economic update

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