Western Standard - The Pipeline： Conservative leadership race heats up.

00:00:00.000 Good evening, I'm Derek Fildebrandt, publisher of the Western Standard, and you're watching

00:00:23.480 the pipeline today is march 9th 2022 i'm joined as at least mostly normally we are by western

00:00:32.600 standard news editor dave nailer how are you feeling dave i'm feeling wonderful derek how

00:00:36.840 are you tonight i think there's too many british people in our office now taking on over i'm

00:00:42.360 hiring more germans good luck somebody with good food okay mr europe can you know okay mr gefilte

00:00:50.840 fish. Mr. Roadkill over here. Okay, I'm here to also with us is a Western Standard opinion editor

00:01:00.200 and rabbi, Cory Morgan. Food critic. Food critic. Western Standard food critic. Don't like our food.

00:01:08.200 What's wrong with fish and chips? And compared to some of the fine southern spiced Italian foods,

00:01:14.220 you get greasy wrapped up in newspaper. Oh, I thought you were making fun of the German food.

00:01:18.380 Yeah, no, the old sausages and such.

00:01:22.140 I'm going to go get some Manza balls.

00:01:24.800 It's Passover's approaching.

00:01:27.000 All right.

00:01:27.820 Well, we've got a great show today.

00:01:31.280 Lots happening for us to break down.

00:01:33.620 The Federal Conservative Party's leadership race is heating up.

00:01:37.140 We've already got some candidates in it.

00:01:39.120 It's no longer just Pierre Poliver swimming on his own and many more jumping in.

00:01:44.540 We're going to break down the early stages of the Federal Conservative leadership race here.

00:01:48.380 what it means for Westerners. Potential other leadership race happening here a month from

00:01:55.820 today, April 9th, United Conservative Party members who can afford the registration fee

00:02:00.660 are going to be headed to Red Deer in central Alberta, where they're going to vote on if Jason

00:02:05.680 Kenney should remain the leader and therefore leader of the United Conservative Party and

00:02:09.520 therefore the Premier of Alberta. Tons happening with that and a lot and it's actually dictating

00:02:15.380 a lot of the policy around the province. Jason Kenney has radically changed his tone. He is

00:02:19.540 radically changing policy. The cynic in me says that might have something to do with a certain

00:02:25.220 leadership vote coming up. You're so cynical. Maybe we should all have monthly leadership votes

00:02:29.940 and then conservative leaders would be conservative if they had to keep their jobs.

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00:04:13.760 doesn't belong to you anymore. All right. Also, before we go, we have to thank all of our Western

00:04:20.280 Standard members for your continued support. Wow. You guys have kicked a lot of ass. We've had

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00:04:36.760 uh next week we're going to be into our new headquarters just one floor below where we are

00:04:41.220 right now in our downtown calgary headquarters big new studio uh we might look a little mashed

00:04:46.760 up together right now next week we're not we're gonna i think we're gonna get lazy boys you said

00:04:51.420 dave we're gonna have a big new headquarters because we have so many new reporters we're

00:04:55.120 bringing on uh we've hired a bunch of reporters here in calgary on top of what we already had we

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00:05:27.580 for 15 days and cancel it if you don't like it if you don't like it well try out uh justin trudeau

00:05:34.540 bought some other journalists for you try them yeah i'll just be glad that i'm not touching

00:05:39.260 knees with you for half an hour every wednesday i'll admit it you like that come on all right

00:05:45.100 well let's let's get in the first one here uh the federal conservative party's leadership

00:05:49.500 heating up some candidates in others uh strongly expected to jump in tell us dave pierre pauliev

00:05:56.380 in john charay in well in tomorrow but he's in he's in uh lesaline lewis in and uh barber

00:06:09.340 it's the tower of babel mbp and uh in uh ontario they're all in four of them in a whole bunch of

00:06:16.620 different people now testing the water sticking their toes in just to see how they are uh people

00:06:22.140 like uh patrick brown he's pretty good you think he's in i think he's pretty he's pretty good how

00:06:27.900 many did we have in the erin motul leadership when he won that four it was only four no more

00:06:33.420 than no just four in the ballot uh but one or two were disqualified by the party for uh i don't know

00:06:39.020 the fact they might actually get some votes i don't know okay so we're gonna have uh probably

00:06:43.020 more than four uh this time around so september 10th is the uh uh the vote in in ottawa and it

00:06:50.700 It looks like the West is getting initial favored sun status.

00:06:55.740 Jean Charest announcing his candidacy tomorrow in a Calgary pub, a pub brewery.

00:07:01.080 Pierre Polyev has already been out West.

00:07:03.700 You know, I'm sure others will follow.

00:07:04.980 So promises to be months and months of good politics, Derek, months and months of campaigning.

00:07:12.300 You know, hopefully even get some, maybe we should sponsor a televised debate with all the...

00:07:17.980 Oh, we should do it, man.

00:07:18.120 You're going.

00:07:18.580 Yeah.

00:07:18.940 So, you know, I'm making a note here.

00:07:25.280 So, yeah, lots to talk about and lots of interesting days ahead.

00:07:31.200 Absolutely.

00:07:32.200 We're going to get into some of the at least some of the bigger candidates names that are going here.

00:07:35.800 But first, this looks like to be the second conservative leadership race without a Western candidate.

00:07:42.680 You know, there's always a favorite candidate in the West.

00:07:44.820 Someone's got to win it.

00:07:45.680 There's votes to be had.

00:07:47.140 But last time around, there was no Western candidate right now out of all of the names that are either in or expected to come in or even speculated to maybe come in.

00:07:56.040 No one from the West.

00:07:57.000 Corey, what's happening?

00:07:58.500 This is supposed to be a Western party.

00:08:00.840 I haven't really thought of it.

00:08:02.320 Of all things, I know I'm the regional guy.

00:08:04.140 But, yeah, we haven't had one.

00:08:05.920 I mean, there's always that underlying thing.

00:08:07.620 I mean, they've lost.

00:08:08.340 They've lost.

00:08:08.960 And I think there is a lot of people feel that you can't win with a Western leader.

00:08:12.460 I mean, it happened with Harper.

00:08:13.480 and we lost the tories lost with an eastern leader one too so yeah uh but none of the names

00:08:19.540 that were put forward you know people speculative whether it was rana or even michelle repel or

00:08:24.220 somebody else just said no i'm not i'm not in for it so yes we can claim polio i was going to come

00:08:30.080 to that calgary born he uh he was the he used to be a president of the university of calgary's

00:08:34.720 progressive conservative club back in the day where he fought with jean chariot and patrick

00:08:38.760 brown in student politics yeah there's actually some great news clippings some people have dug up

00:08:45.480 uh patrick brown was the national youth wing president uh jean charade was the leader of the

00:08:51.720 party and pure paulia was the leader of the president of the university of calgary conservative

00:08:57.160 club and uh you know at the time there's a united alternative movement to unite with the reform

00:09:02.280 party with preston manning and paulia wanted to do it and brown and charade didn't and there's

00:09:06.360 all sorts of little little his conservative uh uh feelings came as a calgarian yeah uh so i mean

00:09:14.920 yeah we um we might have a trojan horse westerner in the form of polyev but he's been out east

00:09:21.080 pretty long you know i think he's of there but yeah maybe he hasn't forgotten too much we'll see

00:09:26.360 okay well let's let's get into it uh polyev was uh just in saskatoon the other day had a boisterous

00:09:33.720 rally um uh where has he been so far what what's the poly of campaign done well he's already got

00:09:41.720 one uh one big endorsement he was in uh regina as you mentioned and uh he's got andrew sheer on board

00:09:47.560 uh the one who lost uh lost to uh his job to erin o'toole uh there's rumors of other uh other

00:09:55.000 conservatives uh coming on board i think that what people are salivating they want to see perry uh

00:10:00.840 Polyev going directly at Trudeau in leaders debates. He is such a great orator and he would

00:10:08.200 just make mincemeat of Trudeau. I think they like his youngish enthusiasm. They like his fiscal

00:10:21.480 policies. They just seem to like his common sense approach. And he's not, he's not as liberal,

00:10:30.300 obviously, as Aaron O'Toole was. He's not a liberal light. He's pure blue conservative.

00:10:36.820 And I think that's what, you know, that's what's the attraction at the moment.

00:10:41.440 I wrote a column on this yesterday, Corey. I actually wouldn't categorize him as a blue

00:10:46.540 conservative. I put him a bit more as a libertarian, which, you know, ideologically speaking might align

00:10:52.140 a bit more with traditional blue conservatives. But, you know, we've only had one major campaign

00:10:58.020 by a libertarian in Canadian history, at least modern Canadian history for high office. And that

00:11:02.300 was Maxine Bernier's 2017 run for the conservative leadership. And he lost out to kind of a generic

00:11:07.820 blue Tory in the form of Scheer. The two big candidates so far, and there's lots of time for

00:11:13.780 debate to shape up. Maybe someone will come from behind here, but if it's Polyev versus Shere for

00:11:19.140 the final round here, it's, I think it's maybe a bit more of a libertarian versus a super red Tory 0.57

00:11:25.940 in the form of Shere. Corey, do you think, how effective can Polyev be at bringing back PPCers 0.97

00:11:34.100 into the broader conservative fold and particularly in setting up as members in this race?

00:11:40.640 Yeah, well, he's reaching out for members, that's for sure.

00:11:42.640 I mean, we see the tactic.

00:11:44.160 He's always, you know, tweeting and sign this petition, sign that petition.

00:11:46.960 We know how that works.

00:11:47.940 You're getting the names.

00:11:48.660 You need to sell his memberships.

00:11:49.660 That's how you win leadership races, nominations, and definitely tweaking those issues, those

00:11:55.720 personal liberties issues, those freedom issues.

00:11:58.540 You know, he's been speaking to the West, too, making no bones about it.

00:12:01.240 You know, he knows that that earned O'Toole with the carbon tax.

00:12:03.620 He's saying it's gone if I'm in there.

00:12:05.500 It's not happening.

00:12:06.960 I'm more inclined to believe

00:12:08.300 Paulie I have at this point, even though, you know, we saw

00:12:10.560 it falsely promised to us before.

00:12:12.880 I mean, if you believed

00:12:14.520 O'Toole, I got a bridge to sell you.

00:12:16.340 I mean, like, honest to God,

00:12:18.600 like, I'm sorry, people. If you believed

00:12:20.260 O'Toole with his stuff,

00:12:22.220 it should have been easy to see people.

00:12:23.760 Yeah, so, I mean, courting that bunch,

00:12:25.500 because, I mean, Maxime brought the PPC

00:12:27.640 as far as it's going to get.

00:12:29.500 But he's also got a strong core

00:12:31.720 niche supporter. It might be

00:12:33.800 almost turned into a little bit of a cult of personality.

00:12:35.620 and you're not going to pull people from that.

00:12:38.120 They're just going to stick with him, but it's also got a hard ceiling.

00:12:41.460 So, I mean, they'll be over there, but I think Polyev holds a lot broader appeal.

00:12:45.760 We've definitely got some distinct ideologies lining up in this race, though.

00:12:48.880 As you said, you've got a red, red Tory on Charay,

00:12:51.700 and now with Leslie Lewis being in, I mean, she's an unapologetic classical social conservative.

00:12:56.200 So that's another factor in that.

00:12:59.000 You know, you've got those three distinct things.

00:13:00.440 Then you've got Polyev, who tends to be, yeah, more of a liberal conservative,

00:13:02.820 or Libertarian to Conservative and hasn't mired himself in those social issues.

00:13:06.680 So I think he'll be successful in getting moderate to Libertarian-minded Conservatives on board right now.

00:13:12.920 So you set me up for, I think, a good segue to Jean Charest.

00:13:16.340 The PPC may have gone as far.

00:13:18.640 I know some of you are going to be upset, PPC guys, but let's be honest.

00:13:21.740 Most Canadian Conservatives, they'll vote for the blue sign.

00:13:24.840 They're not really thinking these three things through.

00:13:26.500 The PPC may have gone as far as it can get unless Jean Charest is the federal conservative leader, because then it opens up a massive political space.

00:13:38.520 Jean Charest, at least, I don't know what he's going to run on this time, but based on his

00:13:43.560 previous politics, he'd easily fit in as a moderate liberal, very easily. And that would

00:13:49.920 shift the Conservative Party far to the left of even where Erin O'Toole was, which was pretty

00:13:55.500 far left for a Conservative. So let's go into that. I'll put it to either of you. Can Jean Charest,

00:14:05.520 I was talking to the CBC on this just yesterday.

00:14:09.660 Jean Charest is in Calgary tomorrow at the Wild Rose Brewery.

00:14:13.940 Ironically named place for this.

00:14:16.060 Wonderfully delicious.

00:14:17.860 Deliciously ironic.

00:14:20.000 Jean Charest is going to be in Calgary to launch his campaign.

00:14:22.320 Obviously, I think it's meant to be a bold move showing he's not afraid of the West.

00:14:26.720 How do you think he can do here?

00:14:27.960 I'll put it to either of you.

00:14:29.400 Well, I think you hit the nail on the head.

00:14:30.660 he's going to come at it head on and he's going to whatever answers he's got ready he's going to

00:14:36.580 be asked about his his former you know he seems to change parties more often than cory changes

00:14:41.300 his underwear he was the liberal premier of quebec you know tory uh federally uh where does

00:14:48.340 he fit in on on the political spectrum and these are all the questions that we're going to be

00:14:52.740 asking him. He's also got, don't forget, he was working with Huawei. Huawei. Huawei. It is the

00:15:01.660 Tower of Babel, the show. It is. Subtitle of the show, guys. Well, that's, you know, that's a big

00:15:06.800 thing right now with the Canada-Chinese relations at an all-time low. So he's got to answer questions

00:15:12.760 on that too. I think, Derek, you hit the nail on the head. If Sheree wins, the person who will be

00:15:18.320 most happy with that would be Mad Max because it just leaves an entire right wing spectrum open to 0.98

00:15:24.420 him. And if, yeah, and, you know, something like the Maverick, if they change their name and if

00:15:30.220 they, you know, if they get their act in gear, you know, I've always believed there is actually a

00:15:35.940 market for a Western regionalist party. How hardcore that is, that's not for me to say,

00:15:41.180 but I think there is room for a Western regionalist party in Canada, but they're not going to do it

00:15:48.200 unless they're sufficiently disappointed with the Conservatives.

00:15:50.540 If they got their act together,

00:15:52.820 both they and the People's Party

00:15:54.200 would probably be very significant beneficiaries

00:15:57.320 of a Charest campaign.

00:16:00.480 Corey, I'm not expecting Jean Charest to show up

00:16:03.400 and necessarily stand by his record,

00:16:05.940 say, absolutely, I stand by supporting

00:16:09.140 the Liberal Long Island Registry

00:16:11.020 when I was Quebec Premier.

00:16:12.540 Absolutely, I stand by being the first leader

00:16:15.000 of a government in North America

00:16:15.920 to introduce a carbon tax.

00:16:17.480 He's probably going to have to tie himself in pretzels to back away from these positions.

00:16:23.000 Or do you think he's going to embrace and say, guys, sorry, toughen up.

00:16:26.720 This is just what it's going to take to beat the Liberals.

00:16:28.300 I think you'll be quiet on those particular positions, especially when he's out here.

00:16:31.800 But we have to remember, I believe the Conservatives are going by that weighted riding formula again.

00:16:36.780 So it doesn't matter how strong you are in Alberta.

00:16:38.580 You've got to win across the country.

00:16:40.740 Yeah, but if you don't get anything, like if you're a single digits guy out here,

00:16:44.900 unless you're getting 100% of Ontario and Quebec, which no one is.

00:16:48.980 But there are red Tories out here, and there are Liberal Party members out here

00:16:53.120 who would, you know what, they would buy a membership and vote for Sean Charay out here

00:16:57.060 rather than, you know, because, I mean, they've got no one. If you live

00:17:01.160 in rural Alberta and you're a Liberal, they do exist, you know.

00:17:04.700 They keep their heads low, but they're out there. They're working on it, but they're still out there.

00:17:09.780 You know, he can draft a bit of that by being honest about being

00:17:12.700 a rentoria at least anyways. And again, no, he wouldn't win those ratings, but if you can pull

00:17:16.780 a respectable 20% from a lot of them, that can add up. But remember, a lot of people don't

00:17:22.380 understand this out here, but in rural Ontario and parts of small town Ontario, they think a lot

00:17:28.400 like us and they vote a lot like us. They don't have a tradition of breakaway parties like Wild

00:17:33.160 Rose and Reform necessarily, but they're pretty similar voter profile. They might not care about

00:17:38.600 as equalization as much, but they care about long gun registry, they care about carbon taxes,

00:17:42.840 these kinds of things. Again, to both of you, how do you think Jean Charest is going to square that?

00:17:47.020 I'm not expecting him to come to a speech here and say, yeah, carbon tax, yeah, gun registry,

00:17:52.460 but he's going to have to answer those questions because he can't 100% right off the West.

00:17:58.760 I think you said exactly what he's going to have to do. And it's, look, guys, it's not 2010 anymore,

00:18:05.760 It's 2022. And this is what we have to do to get elected. We have to have a coherent climate change

00:18:13.920 plan. We have to have these things that the liberals are very strong on. We have to make

00:18:18.800 it look like we're trying to do something about gun crime, even though it has nothing to do with

00:18:23.360 gun ownerships. Maybe let's focus it on the bad guys. We have to do something about climate change.

00:18:29.040 And, you know, and these are issues that are, you know, for some people, the key issues.

00:18:35.960 So I think that's the only way you can try and get support out here.

00:18:38.980 So you think he's not going to try and say these are necessarily good ideas.

00:18:42.180 He's just, he's going to, his strategy is going to be, guys, you want to get elected, this is what it's going to be?

00:18:47.880 You've got to change with the times, right?

00:18:49.960 No matter how terrible Trudeau is, he keeps getting elected, right?

00:18:54.800 No matter how many gaffes or how many black faces or international embarrassments he caused, he still gets elected, right? 0.98

00:19:01.760 And that's because of Quebec and Ontario.

00:19:03.980 So those are the votes that he'll be after.

00:19:09.160 Well, excellent segue.

00:19:10.820 Let's turn now to the second ever black candidate for prime minister, Lesley Lewis.

00:19:17.800 I got to admit, I dropped the ball.

00:19:20.560 Western Standard dropped the ball last time.

00:19:22.160 We did not take her seriously.

00:19:23.500 I did not take her seriously.

00:19:25.820 We're wrong.

00:19:26.600 I was wrong.

00:19:27.600 We just, I didn't think she'd come anywhere close to what she did.

00:19:31.380 I know some of the campaigns were saying the internal polling was not believable, and I didn't believe it.

00:19:38.220 But she was second in the popular vote, but it ranked her third because of the point system that discriminates against the West.

00:19:44.720 She won Alberta.

00:19:45.720 I believe she won Saskatchewan.

00:19:47.620 Yeah, she swept the West.

00:19:49.300 She swept the West.

00:19:49.940 vote and we were sitting all sitting here that night uh for our 12 hours our 12 hour broadcast

00:19:57.860 initial broadcast and yeah we were amazed as the results came in but we're dealing with a very

00:20:02.660 impressive woman here she's got multiple masters and and phds she is an impressive woman and core 1.00

00:20:10.420 has already said she is going to greatly appeal to the social conservatives you know so she could

00:20:15.540 she won't be a surprise this time, right?

00:20:18.660 People will see her coming.

00:20:20.420 Even the mainstream media may give her some coverage this time.

00:20:23.740 Even we dropped the ball.

00:20:25.960 Yeah, well, we picked it up.

00:20:26.820 I don't, we definitely, we picked her up,

00:20:29.320 but I don't think any of us here realistically thought

00:20:31.920 she'd be anywhere near contention, and she was in contention.

00:20:35.060 No, she's a smart, well-spoken candidate. 1.00

00:20:38.460 She earned that support, and yeah,

00:20:41.320 it'd be a foolish candidate now to underestimate her coming into this race.

00:20:44.860 There's no doubt she's going to be a factor this time.

00:20:47.000 You look at everybody who's announced and may announce,

00:20:51.040 she's in the top three, without a doubt.

00:20:53.280 Easily.

00:20:53.760 In any conversation, she's top three.

00:20:55.940 Honestly, I don't think it's inconceivable,

00:20:58.560 even if she doesn't win, that she beats out Sheree.

00:21:00.520 I mean, like early bets, early, early bets.

00:21:03.220 Actually, no, I'm going to save that as a segment.

00:21:04.940 We're going to take some bets here, and we're going to not write them down.

00:21:09.360 We're going to have to delete the recording after, if I'm wrong.

00:21:11.680 If you guys are wrong, you're still on the hook.

00:21:13.760 But OK, we're going to we're going to take some bets here in a little bit.

00:21:18.240 But, Corey, can she win or because in all of the previous races, at least since Harper.

00:21:26.080 So in the race, Shear one and O'Toole one, there's been the token social conservative and then the leader gets elected with their support on the down ballot.

00:21:35.000 And then they immediately turn around, cut their throat, kick them out of caucus.

00:21:38.080 she she didn't run as defined by being purely a social conservative the way the others necessarily 0.97

00:21:44.680 did but she is a social conservative do you do you think she can win I think she can oh okay but 0.99

00:21:52.180 like okay depends on how you could win theoretically but I mean like I'm saying is there a realistic

00:21:57.160 path to victory I think there's a realistic one if she can I mean kind of it she'd have to turn 1.00

00:22:02.580 around how she frames herself. I mean, she cornered and grabbed a really strong niche.

00:22:07.780 Social conservatives are also very motivated voters. They get out, they knock doors, they

00:22:11.980 take the time to vote, they buy memberships. And they are great to court that way. But similar to

00:22:16.980 Maxine Bernier saying his sort of support too, they've also got a hard ceiling. There's only so

00:22:20.580 many of them. That worked and got her a very strong base. But she's going to have to reach

00:22:26.680 beyond it because there's people like me who get nervous about social conservative type

00:22:30.660 leadership. And I have to be convinced, I mean, I can respect a person who's personally a social

00:22:34.160 conservative, as long as they frame it off, we respect each other's ability to maintain those

00:22:39.100 things and be together. If she can do that, she can broaden her appeal. And I very much think she

00:22:44.180 can actually cut a corner and win it while Sheree and Polyev battle it out for the rest of the

00:22:50.180 party there. And don't forget her recent anti-vaccination stance. No, I would not say she 0.99

00:22:57.520 was anti-vaccination uh she and maybe she is personally in her life but i haven't heard her

00:23:03.080 say anything anti-vax i've heard her she's been clearly against mandatory vaccination mandatory

00:23:09.020 vaccination vaccine mandate but i i'd say that is still pretty radically different than anti-vax

00:23:15.080 she's never uh never announced publicly what her vaccination status is yeah and i think there's

00:23:20.420 be a lot of people out west just with everything that we've just come through and all the hatred

00:23:24.600 for vaccine mandates that that will impress those voters without that so that's a segue to

00:23:30.280 another announced candidate much less known at least at west but attracted to some attention

00:23:35.080 in ontario conservative circles uh baber roman babber babber we're back to this it's spelt babber

00:23:44.040 does anyone want in the comments huge section who actually knows like really really knows put

00:23:49.000 it in the comments section and tell us how to pronounce it yeah yeah um i'm still trying to

00:23:53.080 figure out polio i've known the guy for like 20 years i don't know how to say his last name

00:23:59.160 well of course apparently gonna be interviewing him shortly maybe we can ask him yeah yeah good

00:24:03.000 good preview what is it tuesday well i know how to pronounce polio but now i just have a hard time

00:24:07.000 spelling it it looks like tuesday i should be talking yeah okay uh roman baber we're going

00:24:11.720 with baber for now sure um uh ontario member of provincial parliament because ontario's got a

00:24:16.920 parliament uh kicked out of the pc caucus by rob ford for opposing mandates yes doug i don't think

00:24:25.720 rob would have done that no i don't think rob would have done that um kicked out for opposing

00:24:32.280 policies that now the federal conservative party opposes so i'd say if this race was held a few

00:24:36.680 months ago he'd be vetted out and they'd say you're not allowed to run you're too radical but

00:24:40.520 now the conservative party has shifted and adopted his position so i don't know if they can vet him

00:24:44.840 out for a position that they hold, and his only sin was that he held the position before the

00:24:49.220 Conservative Party held the position. Real quick, I don't think any of us actually know enough about

00:24:56.240 the guy yet. He seems to have been fighting the good fight against a lot of authoritarian policies

00:25:01.880 from the Ontario government. I don't get the impression this guy can win, but I feel like

00:25:06.800 someone like that could definitely make some first ballot impression and play somewhat of a

00:25:15.220 kingmaker role for the guys who could win further down and keep this issue on the agenda. I have a

00:25:19.880 feeling he'll probably bring people into the party who will vote for him on first ballot and maybe go

00:25:24.220 to Lesley Lewis or Pierre Polliver after him. Maybe that's the only thing he wants. He's coming from

00:25:29.740 so far out of left field, he's got zero name recognition. I'd say right field. Right field.

00:25:34.560 yeah good point zero name recognition out of ontario uh yeah uh so i think you're right

00:25:42.200 there's a little chance that he'll get close to winning but he could attract some support and

00:25:47.060 you know maybe it's about setting himself up for somewhere in the future and that's often a reason

00:25:51.940 candidates run in a race not more than three people normally think they can actually win the

00:25:57.560 thing and then there's people running they want to get their issues out social conservatives

00:26:01.920 or just increase their own profile, get a cabinet spot, that kind of thing.

00:26:06.440 Leadership runs are a path to profile.

00:26:08.740 I mean, if you've had a respectable leadership run

00:26:10.660 and your party forms government later,

00:26:12.480 your odds of ending up in cabinet are a lot better.

00:26:14.980 It's a good personal move on that front.

00:26:16.860 Yeah.

00:26:17.320 So let's turn towards a guy, and I'm not sure what his play is, Patrick Brown.

00:26:22.480 Now, there was some news on Patrick Brown today.

00:26:23.960 There was.

00:26:25.380 A couple of years ago, CTV ran what was basically a fake news story

00:26:30.180 involving allegations of sexual misconduct on behalf of or against Patrick Brown basically

00:26:37.200 ruined his career. He's now had his name cleared. CTV has apologized today. He's sort of revived

00:26:43.820 his career a little bit. He's now the mayor in Brampton, apparently quite popular. Apparently

00:26:50.200 he could have won the provincial race in Ontario hadn't these allegations come out. So you know

00:26:58.300 he's got some thinking to do he's got uh while his name is cleared he's certainly got that

00:27:04.060 we'll have that to deal with uh and again but i think he's more he's kind of like uh babber does

00:27:09.260 he have the broad national support to win or is he just in it to get his name in there and position

00:27:14.540 himself uh for something else but he you know from from everything we hear he's a very uh

00:27:20.540 very qualified politician and uh good at his good at his game so he'd be a very interesting candidate

00:27:27.980 So, Corey, Brown, I think, is going to face another problem that Jean Charest has.

00:27:32.320 That's around carbon tax.

00:27:34.080 And if there's any liberals watching, a pro-carbon tax conservative is like a pro-private health care privatization NDP candidate.

00:27:44.240 Like, it's just, it's a bridge too far.

00:27:47.460 It's my question of sales tax in Alberta.

00:27:49.520 Again, you could have a million economists line up and tell you how good that might be as a tax.

00:27:53.980 If you want to run it as a conservative over here, you're dead.

00:27:55.900 Patrick Brown kind of pulled an Aaron O'Toole in his leadership. He ran, I'm not sure if they even talked about a carbon tax, but it's definitely not on the table. And then out of nowhere, as leader, he just said, we're now a carbon tax party. He was the first conservative leader that I'm aware of in Canada to come out as pro-carbon tax.

00:28:13.520 and then of course he was ousted as leader after that fake news story uh around sexual misconduct

00:28:20.320 but now he's in let's say let's say that uh you know the sexual misconduct fake stuff is in the

00:28:25.360 past cory can he shake something like a carbon tax here is he going to be able to explain his

00:28:30.960 way out repudiate his previous position you'll have to explain where he's standing i mean you're

00:28:34.880 they're going to be pro or against it's going to be one of the first things he's going to be asked

00:28:37.680 so and if he's pro carbon tax then yeah he's going to have a real tough time in the west

00:28:41.600 that that's just all there is to it right now particularly with the energy costs right now

00:28:45.920 nobody on a pro carbon tax even charade uh there's not gonna be a lot of appetite i think even among

00:28:50.960 some liberal voters they still have to make their bloody rent too and they're looking at their bills

00:28:55.280 and they're saying man in april 1st i'm gonna get hit yet again and and we're gonna keep doing this

00:28:59.120 i'm not so sure about two uh two dollars a liter gasoline will change a lot of people's political

00:29:03.920 views i think so i think they might sell from another car another good subway uh yeah but

00:29:10.320 There's something I want to finish first.

00:29:11.600 But it was a good segue.

00:29:14.140 You know what?

00:29:15.960 It was a good effort.

00:29:17.440 Make your point.

00:29:18.160 But I'm going to stop you.

00:29:20.160 Okay, we're going to do a little bets right now.

00:29:23.100 This is the early.

00:29:24.100 The race is going to change. 0.99

00:29:25.120 Not everybody on this list might even be on the ballot at the end,

00:29:27.640 and there's probably going to be people on the ballot who aren't on this list.

00:29:30.620 But we got Pierre Polyev, Jean Charest, Lesley Lewis, Patrick Brown, Roman Baber,

00:29:36.600 Baber, whatever.

00:29:37.660 um rank them how you think they're going to finish on the ballot and i know this is going

00:29:43.680 to change because it's also point systems and all all sorts of stuff uh dave how are they going to

00:29:48.880 rank who's going to win polio is going to win uh leslie lewis will be second sharia distant third

00:29:54.640 and uh babber and brown fighting for the uh breadcrumbs well just for the extra points in

00:30:01.060 case we all pick that that's for the extra points to win brown ahead of uh babber

00:30:04.460 okay okay cory how's it gonna break down i'm gonna go polyev uh but charade and uh then lewis

00:30:15.260 and i think it'll be brown either brown and lewis i think actually might be a toss-up going on but

00:30:21.540 either way brown and uh babber will be at the back you know what i'm in i'm going with uh we're all

00:30:27.660 predicting pierre's winning uh i predicted peter mckay was going to win but then they actually

00:30:32.900 extended the race because it was a short race he actually may well have won um so you know things

00:30:39.300 can change campaigns matter they change things it's a long ways away there's 100 days to sell

00:30:44.500 memberships and a lot of campaigning to go on but i'm going to say at least right now

00:30:48.740 pierre polliver for the win leslie lewis second leslie lewis second jean chariot patrick brown

00:30:56.820 roman baber where have i heard that before it sounds familiar josh doesn't it well that's why

00:31:01.380 why i said you got to pick your bottom two because you were saying oh i agree and i'm hoping not to

00:31:06.300 split the pot sharing your beer that night okay uh well dave had set us up for an excellent segue

00:31:13.880 around gas taxes carbon taxes and things like that uh jason kenney we're gonna turn back to

00:31:19.600 alberta here a guy who probably really wishes he was in this race but probably knows it's not a

00:31:23.420 good idea at the moment uh jason kenney is trying to win back the base anyone paying attention right

00:31:30.280 now says this jason kenny is a he's a different guy from the jason kenny a month ago uh because

00:31:36.180 the guy the jason kenny from a month ago was not the same jason kenny that won the ucp leadership

00:31:39.600 and had the base happy and excited for him alberta's back baby uh hasn't been so happy he has

00:31:46.060 just been dogged by caucus revolts membership revolts and we had a story go into the little

00:31:51.340 town of nobleford in southern alberta the other day minutes word went out in 15 minutes later the

00:31:56.680 places surrounded trucks and tractors. He has to get whisked away by the RCP. He's a real trouble

00:32:03.360 for his leadership. He's so desperate to win back the members that he's even talking to the

00:32:10.260 Western Standard now. He's doing things to speak to the base of conservatives in Alberta. He knows

00:32:17.700 he's got to win some of them backwards, at the very least, try to dampen the anchor. So he's

00:32:21.780 taking a sharp right turn. Dave, some of this has come into outright government policy now. It's

00:32:27.140 not just rhetoric. He's back-to-bashing Trudeau. We haven't seen much of that for two years. He's

00:32:31.500 back-to-bashing Trudeau. Trudeau's back on the menu. But some of this is now government policy.

00:32:35.700 Tell us about some of these big policy changes that have been made. One of the unfortunate side

00:32:40.100 effects of Russia invading Ukraine has seen a huge skyrocketing gasoline crisis. Depends who

00:32:46.020 you're talking to if that's a bad thing in Alberta. Invasion of Ukraine, bad. Bad, exactly.

00:32:51.660 So I think that they, Kenny announced that as of April 1st, the same day Trudeau's new carbon tax

00:32:59.180 is added, Alberta will stop collecting their provincial fuel tax. And that's going to save

00:33:04.460 every Alberta 13 cents a litre. So if you've got a 75 litre truck, that's going to save you

00:33:11.020 a lot of money. The other thing he announced was electrical rebates. Electricity has gone sky high

00:33:18.380 and he's giving everybody 50 bucks off uh three three monthly payments that'll go straight off

00:33:24.460 your bill you won't see the money uh you know some people are saying it's not enough they're

00:33:28.220 calling it kenny pennies uh other other provinces i think are a bit probably displeased with them

00:33:33.820 because they're not getting the huge influx of oil money getting the extra billions so

00:33:39.740 they can't afford to take off their fuel taxes bc has said that this week so yeah it's but the

00:33:45.100 But the PCNDP have never found a tax that could possibly cut.

00:33:47.840 No, no, no, exactly.

00:33:48.860 So, I mean, it's Kenny's good fortune that he's able to do it because of the billions that were extra we're raking in now because of the price of oil.

00:34:00.760 And Kenny's in the position that he can do it.

00:34:03.180 And it's obviously, it's an obvious attempt to try and get support from the base and say, look, you know, we're over that couple of years of bad governing.

00:34:14.040 and now look what we're doing for you uh jobs are going great investments going great uh treasury

00:34:20.680 is overflowing with cash here's some here's some of it back you know it's like the days of ralph

00:34:25.800 bucks when we all got 300 bucks cash cory i got a call last night um from a girl she said she's

00:34:34.120 calling on behalf of jason kenny and she began it by saying you know the budget's balanced he's

00:34:39.560 cutting gas taxes and utilities, these ending mandatory vaccination policies. Would you agree

00:34:45.700 that Alberta's better with Jason Kenney's leadership? Well, I knew exactly what this was.

00:34:50.740 This was voter identification. Now, they're obviously working with a very old list. If

00:34:56.580 they're calling me and my wife, they called her too an hour before. If they're calling me,

00:35:01.080 they're two things. They're calling a pretty big list because I haven't been on a conservative

00:35:03.800 list in a very long time and two uh they're not using volunteers i like to think a conservative

00:35:09.720 party volunteer might know that i'm not particularly likely to come out and vote for jason kenney

00:35:15.160 um but uh the balanced budget i don't think they have that much to do with it like the limited

00:35:21.640 spending increases they're still spending six billion dollars more a year than the ndp were

00:35:25.720 when they took power but they have slowed down the increases in spending relative to the ndp so they

00:35:30.040 get a little bit of credit for the balanced budget but it's it's mostly oil but uh you

00:35:35.320 know he's eliminating at least for now the provincial portion of the gas tax that's not

00:35:39.320 nothing that's that's nice i i like that um utilities relief uh ending mandatory masking

00:35:46.760 ending mandatory vaccination um i have a strong feeling none of this would be taking place other

00:35:55.160 and balanced budgets uh without a leadership vote coming on april 9th do you think these

00:36:00.520 are these measures these policy changes and the rhetorical changes are they going to be enough to

00:36:04.200 save his leadership and red deer a month from today there's a couple questions i mean for one

00:36:07.720 i i don't agree that i think a lot of this would have been coming today anyways because we're coming

00:36:11.640 into happy times and we're a year away from an election okay but ending mandatory masking and

00:36:16.760 vaccination uh that's a god he wants to rush because he's got a date on that's a combination

00:36:21.240 of the pressure from the truckers and because he's got april 9th coming yeah that's more immediate

00:36:26.120 but but all of these different things okay gas tax probably also couldn't happen without the 0.97

00:36:29.800 happy times if you're still running big deficits probably wouldn't be doing it but all of these

00:36:33.320 things taken together are they going to be enough to save his leadership a month from today i don't

00:36:39.420 think so i think the measures now it's going to come down to political organizing the as you said

00:36:44.060 there was a voter id uh effort made the other night and i'm sure you know we've done we volunteered

00:36:49.400 done that sort of thing you get somebody says yes i think he's great well your next move is going to

00:36:52.760 say well what are you doing on the night you know let's let's talk he didn't ask me that well i said

00:36:58.200 yes yes i think it's better whether there's leadership don't worry i have not sold out

00:37:03.960 i was just playing choose your adventures i was like a choose your adventure book you know flip

00:37:07.960 the page 10. that's when you pass it on to the follow-up well that's it i'm probably now going

00:37:13.160 to get another phone call from someone who's a bit more sophisticated uh who might know that

00:37:17.960 it's possible i'm not the most likely voter for them although she did ask if i had anything

00:37:22.600 a personal message i wanted to pass on to jc kenney i said what you're going to talk to him

00:37:27.800 tonight and then she said uh well i'll just uh i'll make a note and then the message will get

00:37:34.440 passed she backed up a bit but she asked if i had a message to personally pass on we're seeing a

00:37:39.160 political battle the people there's some groups organizing that are looking to go the other way

00:37:43.960 and sign people up, identify people who absolutely don't want them out, it's asking a lot.

00:37:47.980 You've got to be pretty committed one way or another to take a Saturday in April off

00:37:52.480 and go to Red Deer and spend a hundred bucks or more, depending on what time of the race

00:37:56.920 you're going to cast your vote.

00:37:58.440 So it's going to take some strong organizing, strong sales to find those people and get

00:38:02.900 them out.

00:38:03.240 I don't think these last changes, they might make it a little easier for them to find supportive

00:38:06.720 people, but if it was a large pool and if it would say one member, one vote, no, I don't

00:38:10.400 think it would be enough.

00:38:11.100 again it's cory's right it's all about the ground game right now and you cannot forget that jason

00:38:15.820 kenny is one of the best in the country at a ground game he can organize the hell out of anything

00:38:21.580 uh so it's up to the opposition group so i take back alberta uh to have that same sort of ground

00:38:27.260 game and to have that effort uh it is going to be i i think it's right now it's too close to call

00:38:33.820 okay well i'm uh another opportunity to bet i'm in a gambling mood today okay um we know a bit

00:38:40.060 bit more about this than we do with the uh federal conservative race um is kenny gonna survive does

00:38:47.940 he survive april 9th and i'm gonna i'll clarify the question it's not does he make it to the

00:38:54.080 next election because he could get 51 and he tries to stay on and he falls down a month later

00:38:59.120 that's kind of where i was gonna go i was gonna go with a 55 and he doesn't survive

00:39:03.380 okay okay so you're gonna say so he technically gets a majority on april 9th but you don't think

00:39:09.460 makes it to the general? No, he said 50% plus one, but of course he's got to say that, but I think

00:39:13.760 he has enough realism to know if he gets under 60%, he's not going to be able to maintain that

00:39:18.160 party. Okay, so you think he's going to get it, but actually, for the bet, it's just, what percent

00:39:23.680 is he going to get? Corey says 55. Dave, what's he going to get? I'm saying 57%. He survives

00:39:30.240 until the next election and gets kicked by Novi. You think he makes it to the general? I think so.

00:39:36.340 I think if he makes it to the general, he will absolutely lose to Notley.

00:39:40.920 I don't know if he actually gets there, though.

00:39:43.080 I'm not making a bet.

00:39:44.320 Guy never apologizes.

00:39:47.040 He rarely apologizes, right?

00:39:49.880 Most politicians would have seen the writing on the wall months ago.

00:39:53.620 And for the good of the party, they would have said,

00:39:55.860 I gave him my best shot, I'm going to step down,

00:39:58.100 I'm going to give somebody else a try,

00:39:59.640 because the main goal here is to beat Notley.

00:40:01.920 And he hasn't done it. He hasn't done the right thing.

00:40:04.640 So I think even if he gets a very slight majority,

00:40:07.660 he's going to try and hang on.

00:40:09.760 Because after that, after the majority,

00:40:11.460 there's nothing else anybody can do.

00:40:12.600 I'm going to be wrong.

00:40:13.460 I'm going to regret this.

00:40:14.760 And I've avoided, even in private, making a bet

00:40:17.520 because I'm going to probably be wrong.

00:40:20.880 I'm going to say he gets 48.

00:40:23.680 I'm going to say he gets 48.

00:40:26.040 The opposition against him is better organized

00:40:29.700 than it's looking, than I thought.

00:40:31.640 but you guys are both

00:40:33.240 everybody underestimates this guy in elections

00:40:36.100 he is a killer organizer, he's a political

00:40:38.160 animal, he's done nothing but politics

00:40:40.160 since the day he was born pretty much

00:40:41.820 he started working for Ralph

00:40:44.020 Goodell, a liberal MP, I think

00:40:45.840 even possibly in his teens, he's

00:40:48.060 done politics his whole life

00:40:49.200 but

00:40:50.500 he's facing a popular revolt

00:40:54.120 here and it's

00:40:55.240 I don't know, it depends how much they put

00:40:58.100 their fingers on the scales of this thing

00:40:59.560 but I'm going to say 48

00:41:01.920 I'm going to regret it.

00:41:02.620 I'm going to be wrong.

00:41:03.860 But at least we won't have to wait too long on this one.

00:41:06.600 It's not like the federal leadership.

00:41:07.840 We're a month away.

00:41:08.900 And just to remind everybody, we're going to be there.

00:41:11.440 Absolutely.

00:41:11.800 We've got big plans for right there.

00:41:13.660 Yeah.

00:41:14.140 It's a little early, but we're planning to bring our own army.

00:41:18.520 Pack a lunch and bring an army, baby. 1.00

00:41:20.100 The Western Standard is going to be there in force.

00:41:23.720 We're bringing the whole crew to cover that.

00:41:25.940 And, of course, we're going to provide extensive coverage of the leadership race.

00:41:29.820 sorry the leadership vote coming up to it and the conservative leadership uh federal conservative

00:41:34.340 leadership race going on right now okay well uh we've only doing two topics today because it was

00:41:40.200 so much oh oh what was uh i scribbled something else in oh just just for fun we're not we're not

00:41:46.520 going to get into this but uh just for fun i have got to mention i uh i've read the column we um

00:41:51.300 you all know i i say it ad nauseum every freaking day you guys are probably sick of me 0.88

00:41:57.320 But the Western Standard, you know, we don't take the federal media bailout. But I don't know, I must have had nothing better to do that day. I put in an application, not for the bailout money, but for official Government of Canada certification as a, quote, Canadian qualified journalism organization.

00:42:16.280 what does that do well that makes us eligible for a bailout and you have to go through this

00:42:21.600 orwellian crazy authoritarian process where the federal government gets to determine if

00:42:26.320 qualified journalists are not and therefore qualify for the bailout well i went through

00:42:30.440 this thing and uh just the other day i got uh the official letter in the mail it is official

00:42:36.460 justin trudeau's government agrees the western standard are qualified journalists yes hey

00:42:43.300 so anyway that's it that's great uh i was on the phone with lady from uh the uh federal government

00:42:49.480 the federal well yeah but i refer to them there's a board that determines this so that's the federal

00:42:55.020 government's uh media approval board and uh she says okay well your uh your application is headed

00:43:00.020 towards approval everything looks good would you like some help filling out uh the applications

00:43:03.920 uh for the bailouts and i said no that's good she said uh well why not i said i don't know i don't

00:43:09.540 want them. We don't take your money. Why'd you go through this big, long process? I just wanted

00:43:15.940 to see what you guys would do. She was pretty pissed. She was nice, but she was like, this is

00:43:23.700 a huge bureaucratic process. I've probably wasted a good $40,000 of government research. But these

00:43:29.540 are bureaucrats wasting time on us at the Canada Revenue Agency, not terrorizing taxpayers.

00:43:34.740 so you're just inviting an audit aren't you oh shit yeah yeah it's probably happening okay you 0.80

00:43:41.740 might want to alert the accounts well a segue into our membership guys that's why we need you

00:43:46.880 to become western standard members if you're not already we refuse to take justin trudeau's media

00:43:52.140 bailout bribe money we refuse to do it even now we are now officially qualified journalists

00:43:58.060 according to justin trudeau's government and we're now officially qualified and eligible to

00:44:02.300 take bailout money. We're not going to do it, but that's why we need you guys to sign up and we're

00:44:07.200 taking every dollar of that and we're reinvesting in building the new mainstream, Western Standard.

00:44:12.840 Go to westernstandardonline.com slash membership. Sign up. You can try it free for 15 days and quit

00:44:18.140 any time before then. It's only $10 a month or $99 a year and that'll support bailout free,

00:44:25.660 independent Western media. God, I love my job. Corey, Dave, everyone at home or on the podcast,

00:44:35.200 wherever you are, thank you very much and God bless.

00:44:55.660 We'll be right back.

Western Standard - March 10, 2022

The Pipeline： Conservative leadership race heats up.

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