Western Standard - The Pipeline January 27, 2021

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00:02:30.000 Good day, I'm Derek Fildebrandt. You're watching The Pipeline on January 27th, 2021. I'm coming

00:02:53.700 to you live from our downtown calgary studio uh joining me also from another location in calgary

00:03:00.260 is dave dave naylord news editor of the western standard how you doing dave very well derek

00:03:06.100 yourself beautiful and uh corey morgan who's out in the field today uh from somewhere uh corey

00:03:15.540 where are you uh today i'm cold and hungry and i'm gonna remedy that soon i'm in bash alberta so this

00:03:21.780 is about 10 kilometers north of mirror where the whistle stop cafe is where he's been defying the

00:03:28.340 lockdown orders a gentleman named chris scott who i spoke to earlier when i grabbed a coffee

00:03:32.020 coffee on the way up this is a restaurant yeah we're gonna get into it okay yeah you bet this

00:03:39.140 is a restaurant called the noble fox it's a mexican restaurant up here uh from all i've heard

00:03:43.860 it has fantastic food the menu looks great and he's opening up because he can't afford to stay

00:03:48.660 closed we're this is an intro we're gonna get to it don't worry right on uh okay well uh we've got

00:03:55.460 a lot of great topics to get into today uh as corey is uh evidently eager to talk about we're

00:04:01.940 gonna talk about uh a the alberta spring uh businesses reopening in defiance of the government

00:04:09.460 lockdown we'll be talking about a new poll showing that westerners are pretty much on our own when it

00:04:15.540 it comes to fighting for the Keystone XL pipeline. The rest of the country says time to move on.

00:04:20.500 Westerners are saying not so fast. And we'll finish up with a discussion about should we

00:04:25.780 vet the governor general, our effective head of state in Canada before we appoint them? Or should

00:04:31.840 we just appoint people that check off some nice token boxes? We'll see. So those are our three

00:04:38.900 topics today. First, we're just going to quickly put it to Dave to tee up what's happening with

00:04:45.240 these uh rogue business reopenings and then we're going to go to uh cory well derek uh there's

00:04:53.320 resentment and anger growing especially in rural alberta to the covet 19 lockdown regulations

00:04:59.960 uh especially when it comes to little pubs uh where cory's at now uh i talked to uh chris scott

00:05:06.840 yesterday at the uh at the stop in uh in uh in mirror and he says they cannot afford to lose

00:05:17.080 any more money and and that's why he opened up and he he says if he'll come and arrest him uh go ahead

00:05:25.640 all he's trying to do is make a living put food on his uh on his dinner table another pub in

00:05:31.160 When Moseley tried to open up yesterday, the Moseley Pub and Grill, they lasted a few hours, they were very busy. The authorities came and shut them down. And again, it was the same thing. The owner, Cassie Roth, says, you know, they just need to get open and the only way they can get their voices heard is to do something drastic, like reopening.

00:05:55.100 There's been social media campaigns about urging all businesses to open in Alberta on the 27th, which is today.

00:06:05.240 I'm not sure how many are following that, but certainly a growing sentiment among business owners that enough is enough.

00:06:12.800 Okay, well, we're going to go to Corey here.

00:06:14.980 Corey, we know you are in the middle of nowhere when the big city you reference as the location on the map is Mirror, Alberta.

00:06:22.240 uh so you're uh you're when we say you're in the field we mean it nearly literally that you're

00:06:28.720 nearly in a field uh cory why don't you tell us what you're doing there sure well i mean i was

00:06:34.780 just very interested as a person who owned a small bar in a rural area i worked out in these places

00:06:39.600 these are social hubs they're really important to the local community for people to meet for

00:06:44.120 local businesses and the works and i just wanted to come out in person for one to support these

00:06:48.820 guys and and just to see what happens i mean there's a lot of tables filling up the food

00:06:52.580 looks like it's excellent uh there's no sign of the authorities yet so uh so far they're gonna

00:06:57.620 let this remain open i mean they were making no secret of it they're in defiance of it they're

00:07:02.660 still got controls you know they're not asking people to come in and cough on each other they

00:07:06.020 want customers to wear masks on their way and use sanitizing you know same as any big business in

00:07:10.740 walmart you can do it why can't you do it here yeah that's great in mosley uh yeah dave it's

00:07:18.660 mosley alberta like the place from um similar sounding to the uh the the hive of scum and

00:07:25.540 villainy in uh star wars that's mosley similar to mos eisley good nerdy reference there for rural

00:07:32.580 alberta it's similar to vulcan i guess um in mosley i know i saw uh dave we can't hear you but uh

00:07:39.060 in mosley i saw a picture uh just last night um someone put a sign on the counter saying mosley

00:07:45.380 walmart so again you can't shut us down if we're a walmart um yeah no it we're starting to see a

00:07:52.900 spring here uh corey i know you're you're at the place uh yeah i guess you're at another place near

00:07:58.740 mirror that's opening uh the place you're about to go into to eat some mexican food um i'm guessing

00:08:03.860 this one's illegal too right yes yes it is it's called the noble fox it's a mexican restaurant

00:08:09.860 it's been here a few years um they they're also licensed and they've got people sitting in because

00:08:15.860 that's i know as a restaurant owner i mean you can do take out it'll keep you going a little bit but

00:08:20.100 realistically you need sit down patrons you need the liquor sales that's where your margins are

00:08:24.980 that's how you pay your lease so you pay your staff and and these guys are just at the end of

00:08:29.540 their rope so i'm happy to see them trying and so far nobody's uh holding them up it seems kind of

00:08:34.180 surreal being in small town alberta in this snowy cold weather i'm looking forward to some enchiladas

00:08:38.500 here but uh uh it's gonna be an interesting day we'll see if anybody shows up to try and shut them

00:08:43.940 down as uh chris said down in mirror the police did come in and they've served him now uh there's

00:08:48.820 been no action here yet but they're anticipating it yeah we've got um you know someone had a really

00:08:55.700 great point yesterday and i think there's a good column in this maybe for you cory when you uh when

00:09:00.580 you get back near a computer but uh you know someone made the point uh to me that you know

00:09:07.060 the province, Jason Kenney, they're saying, well, we know this is hard, but just focus on takeout

00:09:12.480 and delivery. Well, especially in small town Alberta, in most places, there is no skip the

00:09:18.720 dishes. And these places are too small to afford their own in-house deliveries. Delivery and home

00:09:23.920 service is just not an option in rural Alberta. When you're trying to get pizza out to a farm,

00:09:29.740 you got to you got to do pickup, you got to do, you know, in service. Is that something you're

00:09:35.900 hearing with these rogue business owners that you're talking to? Absolutely. I mean, they're

00:09:41.400 just scraping by when it's pickup. I mean, I guess they're lucky they can have that. And that's more

00:09:45.600 viable in an urban environment with, you know, population density to warrant it with services

00:09:51.080 for delivery, things such as that. You just don't have that here. They have to have the ability to

00:09:56.220 seek customers. And as I said, their importance is as a social hub. The neighbors want to see each

00:10:00.960 other. I mean, they live miles apart from each other. This is where you get together. It doesn't

00:10:04.560 mean, you can do that still by being six feet apart. It's important to people. So it's more

00:10:09.820 acute in these rural areas than in urban, I think. People aren't quite realizing that. That's why

00:10:14.100 it's these rural places that are standing up versus urban ones. I mean, the bottom line is

00:10:19.740 they're facing bankruptcy or defying the law. So these guys are willing to defy the law, and I

00:10:23.800 really admire them for it. Well, yeah, I think one thing a lot of politicians don't understand

00:10:29.760 when they're locking people down is that uh to the small business owner their business is essential

00:10:35.180 if they're not making money they lose their business and if they lose their business you

00:10:38.960 lose your home uh it's uh it is wild that uh you know jason kenny i thought was maybe on the right

00:10:45.700 track originally when he said they made a mistake by allowing the big guys to remain open but not

00:10:50.720 the small guys but then he backtracked on it uh now the small guys are closed too it's illegal

00:10:54.860 uh i mean i don't know what other term to come up with these restaurant others other than

00:10:58.940 rogue business owners. And I mean that as a term of endearment. If anyone thinks I'm insulting

00:11:03.220 these people, absolutely not. I'm using rogue in a very positive sense of the word right now.

00:11:10.900 They're just trying to make a living. It's incredible stuff. Corey, before we let you go,

00:11:14.760 do you have anything else? No, just to let people know, you know, it's not too far in the middle of

00:11:18.740 nowhere. This is just about a half hour east of Red Deer. It's called the Noble Fox. So if they

00:11:23.080 want to come out for some great Mexican food and help out these establishments, you know,

00:11:27.260 I'm certainly welcome to come out as long as they're open anyways they're certainly trying

00:11:30.400 and I hope to see more places doing it yeah I know uh Mosley is uh not too far from my neck

00:11:36.140 of the woods so I might uh try and head over to uh Mos Eisley and see the scum of uh uh villainy

00:11:44.140 uh the scum of villainy living in uh Mos Eisley who have the uh the audacity to oppose uh the

00:11:50.860 decrees of the government right now thanks for joining us Corey uh it's really cold so we're

00:11:54.960 i know it's it's cold there i spent uh sunday not that far from uh mosley actually ice fishing uh

00:12:01.200 very ill-fated uh ice fishing expedition um so i know how cold it is out there right now we're

00:12:07.040 gonna let you go but thanks so much for joining us cory thanks guys one quick question cory

00:12:12.160 sure dave uh do you deliver uh it might be a little cold by the time i get it down to you

00:12:18.640 but maybe on my next trip i have a microwave but uh appreciate it all right thanks dave okay

00:12:24.240 thank you corey all right dave well uh one thing to keep in mind derek is that jason kenney told

00:12:33.680 restaurant owners that he would give them a week's notice uh before they before they could open so

00:12:39.440 they could get inventory and get ready again but we haven't even had that week's notice so there's

00:12:44.560 there's no end in sight to uh to the lockdown i i thought the health minister tyler shandro may

00:12:51.520 ease a bit of it uh on monday but no he said uh no end in sight and then he went on about new

00:12:57.280 variants of the virus being found in the province so it doesn't look like uh the restaurant owners

00:13:03.200 in alberta gonna have any satisfaction anytime soon hey correct me if i'm wrong but i think

00:13:08.640 the province this time extended the lockdown indefinitely that is putting no end date on it

00:13:13.280 whatsoever uh so that they don't have to go through the political hassle of telling people

00:13:17.520 that they're locking albertans down destroying businesses while they are uh while their mlas

00:13:23.040 are jetting off to nice warm places not taking their own advice am i incorrect in saying that

00:13:27.760 lockdown was indefinitely extended no i i think you're correct and every time uh shandro or kenny

00:13:35.120 get asked when are we reopening the answer is always the same you know when it's safe uh you

00:13:41.360 know as uh as somebody pointed out yesterday there's always going to be a variant from somewhere

00:13:46.960 uh you know right now we're dealing with great britain and south africa but

00:13:50.400 you know soon there'll be one from the states soon there'll be one from

00:13:53.920 you know wherever people are so uh yeah they're

00:13:57.440 they're just getting all fed up with it with the lockdowns

00:14:00.640 dave i don't mean to spill the beans too much but i know you're about to work

00:14:03.600 you're gonna have a breaking story soon um uh some of these rogue businesses

00:14:09.360 are uh very not happy they're going an extra step not just reopening to the

00:14:13.840 the public in defiance of the provincial government lockdowns here, but some of them

00:14:19.660 are, I think, coming up with a bit of, let's say, a limited no-serve customer list.

00:14:26.320 Why don't you tell us about that?

00:14:28.360 I know we're going to be spilling the beads a little bit here, but tell us about it.

00:14:31.440 Yeah, there's some restaurants, specifically one called Paul's Pizza in Airdrie, and I'll

00:14:37.860 be talking to them as soon as we're done with this podcast, but they put a lifetime

00:14:41.700 ban. They will not serve Jason Kenney. They put a lifetime ban on Dr. Dina Hinshaw. They're not

00:14:47.620 going to serve her. Pubs in England did this several months ago when they were going through

00:14:54.100 basically the same thing. And they put lifetime bans on any member of parliament that voted in

00:15:00.580 favor of the lockdown. And this got great public support by all those people who were locked out

00:15:07.780 their favorite pub and uh you know at least one place in alberta is now is going to start doing

00:15:12.820 the same thing so jason kenny's going to have to look for his pizza elsewhere other than uh

00:15:17.620 paul's pizza in airdrie i have a feeling it won't be the only place no okay well in uh in more cheery

00:15:25.380 news um you know we're all we all know what happened with keystone xl uh uh president biden

00:15:32.820 on his very first day in office, just hours into the job, signed an executive order, killing the

00:15:38.880 Keystone XL pipeline. Not a surprise to anyone who has been, I don't know, watching American

00:15:45.300 politics for the last year. Biden and nearly every single candidate for the Democratic nomination

00:15:53.080 said that they would cancel this. Jason Kenney nonetheless thought it'd be a great idea to bet

00:15:57.560 1.5 billion dollars on a direct investment in the pipeline to put up another six billion dollars in

00:16:03.320 loan guarantees uh you know i'm not a huge gambler but i feel like that kind of money on 50 50 odds

00:16:10.900 is probably not a good bet um but uh you know nonetheless even even those of us who don't think

00:16:19.060 it's smart for government to be in the business of business many of us still wanted to see this

00:16:23.420 pipeline get built it's absolutely critical to the future of the energy

00:16:26.600 industry in Western Canada but new poll shows that well that opinion might not

00:16:33.180 be shared broadly across the country why don't you run us through that sure

00:16:37.220 Derek it's a new Western Angus Reid poll there's a big story on our website

00:16:43.040 Western standard online.com got a lots of nice graphics and up in there but

00:16:48.440 But basically what it says is 59% of all Canadians say, forget about Keystone, it's time to move

00:16:55.600 on, give up the battle.

00:16:58.120 Obviously that is not representative of the feelings in Alberta and Saskatchewan.

00:17:03.680 72% in Alberta that say keep fighting for Keystone, 67% in Saskatchewan say the same

00:17:11.780 thing.

00:17:12.780 But Alberta and Saskatchewan are the only provinces that seem to care about it.

00:17:17.860 In Ontario, for example, 62% say, ah, forget about it, Alberta, let's move on to something else. In Quebec, it goes even higher, 74%. So I guess I don't know where the blame lies there, Derek.

00:17:36.020 i don't know if it's if it's the you know the war room hasn't made a good enough selling job on

00:17:41.380 what the keystone can bring to the rest of canada uh but uh you know even our friends in british

00:17:47.380 columbia are 60 opposed uh to uh to fighting for it so uh seems like a losing battle if the rest of

00:17:57.140 canada is not overly interested in joining us there uh yeah i mean uh no one asked our opinion

00:18:04.020 when the federal government launched a trade war against the United States in retaliation for

00:18:10.020 aluminum tariffs, which affected a much, a radically smaller number of workers in that

00:18:16.700 industry, but they were clustered primarily in Quebec and a lesser extent Ontario. The federal

00:18:21.420 government went to war with Donald Trump, and I think they were right to do it. I think these

00:18:25.460 kinds of tariffs that Donald Trump put in place were unfair. They broke the spirit and the letter

00:18:30.740 of NAFTA or USMCA now that we call it, the federal government was right to defend against

00:18:37.800 that kind of protectionism from the United States. But they have no interest in doing it whatsoever

00:18:42.680 when it comes to Keystone XL. And it turns out it's not just the federal government that doesn't

00:18:47.320 believe we should do it. It is virtually every of the majorities, some huge majorities in every

00:18:53.500 single province outside of alberta and saskatchewan uh i'm not surprised

00:19:00.220 yeah no neither am i uh uh i know we've got uh alberta's got 1.5 billion dollars invested in it

00:19:07.500 and jason kenny's asking the prime minister to hey to go to joe biden and say hey please can we

00:19:13.420 have our money back uh but uh uh he may have better chances in court because uh analysis of

00:19:21.660 the free trade agreements that we've signed both nafta and the new one uh both seem to

00:19:27.980 sort of technically say that there may be some uh recess in the courts to try and get some cost

00:19:34.780 back for both taxpayers and tc energy for i made that point last week that we have recourse to the

00:19:40.700 courts but i i think i might have actually been wrong because this was authorized by presidential

00:19:45.180 permit and when you actually look through the details of that presidential permit or executive

00:19:50.060 order, it says in it that the presidential permit can be revoked at any time and at the

00:19:56.820 cost of Keystone XL, the company building this, that they would actually at their own

00:20:02.220 cost have to remove it out of the ground. That's what the executive order says. So I'm

00:20:08.200 actually worried that we might not even have any legal ground. We certainly have a moral

00:20:11.740 ground to stand on. We have ground to stand on that we are supposed to be the best friends

00:20:16.440 and allies of the United States and that the United States has an interest in buying more oil

00:20:20.840 from Canada rather than importing from overseas and often hostile regimes. But legally, actually,

00:20:27.800 I'm not sure we have much of a leg to stand on anymore. It makes it even more incredible that

00:20:32.380 the Kennedy government was willing to invest this kind of money in a project that at best had a 50

00:20:39.140 percent chance of going forward. This is why we let the private sector make determinations about

00:20:45.620 where they spend money on projects, not governments,

00:20:48.600 something that Jason Kenney agreed with until very recently.

00:20:52.240 I'm just going to say, Derek, it's been a strange life path for Premier Kenney.

00:20:57.640 Not long ago, he was in the same job you had with the Canadian Taxpayers Federation,

00:21:01.700 and he was all anti-government in business.

00:21:05.780 And so he's gone from being very anti-government in business

00:21:10.340 to giving out a billion and a half bucks here and there.

00:21:14.140 And obviously, and it wasn't just the one program, but, you know, the UCB government's invested in loads of stuff now.

00:21:22.640 And with Trudeau doesn't seem to be willing to put up much of a fight, let's face it.

00:21:27.420 When asked what he was going to do, he said, well, you know what, geez, I phoned Joe Biden in November.

00:21:32.400 What else do you want me to do?

00:21:35.100 And he actually spoke to him this week, and apparently it was brought up.

00:21:40.340 But, you know, I'm sure it went something like, well, you know, Joe, I'm pretty disappointed about the Keystone.

00:21:46.080 Nudge, nudge, wink, wink.

00:21:47.740 So, yeah, it's going to be a tough struggle for Alberta to get any money back.

00:21:54.560 Yeah, well, I want to bring attention really quickly to a column we had published just a few days ago by Rob Anderson.

00:22:01.780 Rob Anderson is a former PC and Wildrose MLE in Alberta.

00:22:05.500 He's now come on as a columnist for the Western Standard.

00:22:07.580 He published, I think, a really great piece. The title of it, if I'm not mistaken, was If Ottawa

00:22:13.560 Won't Sanction the U.S., the West Should Sanction Ottawa. The point being, as we were saying earlier,

00:22:19.380 when the aluminum industry was under attack, Ottawa sanctioned Washington. They sanctioned

00:22:24.700 the United States in retaliation to defend those jobs, and they won, effectively. And they've done

00:22:30.420 so many times before when it comes to the auto sector, when it comes to Bombardier and these

00:22:34.580 kinds of guys. The federal government is not shy about taking off the gloves to defend our

00:22:39.640 industries against protectionism, except for now. Right now, Ottawa's doing nothing. Jason Kenney

00:22:45.500 has called on Ottawa to impose sanctions, and I think he's correct in doing so. I think Ottawa 0.99

00:22:51.080 should do that. But does he honestly think that Ottawa is going to lift a finger for the West

00:22:56.340 right now? This was met with nothing but laughter by most of the East, most of the media. Even I

00:23:03.880 had to laugh a little bit, not because I thought he had a bad point, but laughing that he thinks

00:23:09.600 there's any chance that Ottawa would do this. There is a 0.0% chance they would do this.

00:23:14.320 I'm not even convinced that the federal government under the Conservatives would do it at this point.

00:23:20.100 The only ones laughing, Derek, are Jay Hill of the Maverick Party and Paul Hinneman of the Wild

00:23:26.260 Rose Independence Party, because it's just stuff like this that's going to just keep drawing

00:23:30.820 members to them like flies yeah i i think so um so but yeah uh i think uh rob anderson had a great

00:23:39.380 point in his column that if audible won't sanction uh the us then the west needs to sanction ottawa

00:23:46.180 make them hurt uh so in addition to you know the regular firewall routine of taking more

00:23:51.460 provincial jurisdiction back he talked about some great ideas uh we could turn off the taps to

00:23:56.420 British Columbia. There is significant liberal support, especially in the lower mainland of

00:24:02.980 British Columbia. Sorry about your parents, Dave, but they're collateral damage. We can turn off the

00:24:08.820 taps on natural gas and oil, bring them to their knees. Similarly, we should work with Saskatchewan

00:24:15.140 and hopefully Manitoba to turn off the taps on everything going eastwards of them. Put the

00:24:20.980 pressure on Ontario and Quebec. If we turn off the natural gas and quite literally let the eastern

00:24:27.300 bastards freeze in the dark, sorry to use that term, but if we literally turn off the natural 0.93

00:24:33.300 gas in the winter it would create an absolute catastrophe in the east and it would force the

00:24:38.980 federal government potentially to act and that's what sanctions are about. They're a middle ground

00:24:43.700 between diplomacy and war. Obviously we don't believe in war to solve really anything

00:24:50.980 That's not, that's a ridiculous option. So don't even discuss that. And politics is clearly not

00:24:56.740 working. The West does not matter to the federal government, really regardless of who's in power,

00:25:00.420 but particularly right now, this would be a way of exerting some pressure. At the same time,

00:25:04.980 we could set up some pine beetle inspection stations along the Alberta BC border and ensure

00:25:10.980 that every single truckload of BC timber is offloaded and painstakingly inspected for pine

00:25:17.540 beetles on environmental protection grounds uh before they're allowed to pass through our borders

00:25:22.900 uh that would bring one of bc's biggest industries to its knees and potentially uh what's the pressure

00:25:29.940 on the bc government to uh to back the uh us putting sanctions on the states i think most

00:25:36.260 provinces would prefer that sanctions be imposed on the united states than on themselves so uh this

00:25:42.980 is not something i think has uh any chance whatsoever of happening uh but i think it was

00:25:48.340 a good point to be made that uh if the kenny government was serious about this it would be

00:25:52.980 willing to impose sanctions on uh parts of the country that are not backing our right to uh

00:26:00.820 to earn a fair living derek the people in eastern canada should really be careful what they wish for

00:26:07.860 about pipelines uh the democratic governor of michigan is in the process of shutting down

00:26:13.780 a pipeline that supplies much of the uh the oil for for uh for ontario uh pumps it from

00:26:23.620 through michigan and uh and into a refinery in in sarnia uh so right now the the the governor

00:26:31.140 in michigan is in the process of shutting it down that oil will stop uh barring a court order

00:26:37.540 a court injunction, and Ontario may be left freezing in the dark because there's no way to

00:26:43.180 get any more oil because there's no cross-Canada pipeline, obviously. So experts in oil and gas,

00:26:51.320 like former Liberal MP Dan McTague, are sounding the alarms. Nobody seems to be listening to them

00:26:57.620 in Ontario anyways, but they could be in for a world to hurt when that Enbridge line gets shut

00:27:03.580 uh indeed uh okay well uh we're going to talk about the gg we'll keep that part real quick here

00:27:12.140 uh long story short well dave why don't you make the long story short well it just gets crazier

00:27:18.860 and crazier uh as quickly as i can there were some allegations last year that rito hall was

00:27:26.060 not a very nice place to work so they brought in a third-party consulting company who did a

00:27:32.060 A big investigation and found out that the Governor General Payette, to be blunt, was a bit of a nutcase. 1.00

00:27:39.580 She was belittling staff, screaming at them.

00:27:42.660 And a new report today on our website, CBC is reporting that she got physical with her staff, believe it or not.

00:27:50.920 This is supposed to be the Queen's representative.

00:27:53.940 Well, I don't know about that.

00:27:55.060 Dave, I've slapped you around when you get out of line.

00:27:57.280 I don't know.

00:27:59.140 That is true.

00:28:00.540 That is true.

00:28:02.240 Every once in a while, you know, if talk isn't working, the boss will be the boss.

00:28:08.580 Yeah.

00:28:08.940 And keep in mind, this is on top of, you know, we spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on a stairway that went to nowhere.

00:28:19.380 She planned it to go up to a private staircase and it was never built.

00:28:24.140 She didn't want to see the RCMP.

00:28:26.180 They had to hide in cupboards instead of outside her door.

00:28:30.120 She didn't want to see the public.

00:28:31.360 She didn't want to see workers.

00:28:32.800 So, you know, it sounded like she was, you know, a bit of a pun, but a bit of a drama queen, Derek.

00:28:41.220 And, yeah, she's gone.

00:28:44.600 Good pun.

00:28:45.980 Yeah, good pun.

00:28:47.160 So, yep, she's gone.

00:28:48.340 And now the focus is on who's next.

00:28:51.120 You're going to throw your hat in the ring, Derek?

00:28:53.580 Well, everybody knows that Ottawa Liberals are big fans of me.

00:28:57.620 uh i mean uh it'd be interesting i mean i could promise everybody it'd be an interesting uh reign

00:29:04.740 of terror uh i mean i don't know uh but you know i i bet you i i don't think i'm a particularly

00:29:13.940 good candidate but i probably passed better vetting i've actually managed people in my life

00:29:18.820 i've run a business uh i've had people report to me i've had to demonstrate at least some level

00:29:23.780 of leadership, even if I have to slap them around from time to time. Yeah, I think what we're seeing

00:29:30.400 here is the culmination of what happens when you appoint a governor general or any job really

00:29:37.520 purely on tokenism. And I get that some people have said, well, it's a token job,

00:29:43.680 so it should be token people in it. And there is something to be said about rising up different

00:29:49.140 people who might represent parts of the country, uh, parts of the nation that, uh, that deserve a

00:29:54.360 voice. Julie Payette, let's not forget, is a greatly accomplished woman. She's the first Canadian

00:30:00.600 astronaut in space, uh, sorry, first Canadian woman astronaut in space. It's a great accomplishment,

00:30:05.580 and, and I, I'm very proud of her. Uh, I didn't think she was the worst pick, when she was picked,

00:30:10.440 at least, uh, I wasn't privy to the vetting, but I thought, at least as far as symbols go,

00:30:15.000 she was a pretty good symbol. I'm very proud. I was very proud of her. I think she was a great

00:30:19.880 symbol for my daughter to look forward, look up to. But it was pure tokenism. And liberals tend

00:30:26.160 to do this. Sometimes it works out. Sometimes it doesn't. Miquel Jean, I think, was a token.

00:30:32.820 But she ate a seal. And my wife will let me forget how cool that was when she ate a seal 0.97

00:30:39.400 in defense of Newfoundland's sealing industry, I mean, that took some guts. And so, I mean,

00:30:46.340 she earned the support of a lot of people when she did that, probably the enmity too.

00:30:50.500 But I think this is part of the problem of when you're appointing a governor general

00:30:53.880 purely on tokenism. If you're going to do tokenistic appointments, at least vet them.

00:31:00.100 And essentially, they've admitted now that they didn't do a proper vetting process.

00:31:05.660 I think there's a lot of egg on the face of the government here, but they're going to,

00:31:08.600 I think they're going to shrug it off.

00:31:10.060 I don't think we're going to see much of a change, except that at least for this particular

00:31:13.620 GG, I think they're going to want to at least do some basic reference checks about how well

00:31:19.180 they work with others and what kind of leader they are with their staff under them.

00:31:26.140 If they'd have done a proper vet on Julie Payette, they would have seen some warning

00:31:30.580 signs because they were out there.

00:31:32.680 And they obviously didn't, or they didn't care, or they didn't pass it on to Justin Trudeau.

00:31:39.520 But, I mean, just compare her reign, three and a half years, nothing but weirdness since the beginning,

00:31:46.880 compare it to David Johnston.

00:31:48.980 He didn't put a foot wrong in his entire career as the Governor General.

00:31:54.340 So I think you're right, Derek, the next candidate will be going under some very serious vetting this time, I think.

00:32:04.980 Yeah.

00:32:06.060 Well, this week in Canadian regal news.

00:32:13.420 Hey, I mean, there's been a subgenre of monarchists in Canada that have believed we should have as our governor general junior members of the royal family.

00:32:25.200 So maybe Harry and Meghan Merkle.

00:32:31.920 I'm not saying it's a good idea, but it's been talked about for some time that serving as governor general may be a good role for junior members of the royals to play.

00:32:41.300 I think until relatively recently, I probably would have been open to the idea that, okay, well, let's let those who are not in the immediate line of succession.

00:32:49.920 I think maybe they would be good, bring some excitement to the role.

00:32:52.740 It's supposed to be a part of the monarchy.

00:32:55.000 It's an extension of the monarchy in a sense anyway.

00:32:58.640 But I think their behavior as kind of spoiled royal brats has probably soured a lot of Canadians since then.

00:33:06.620 So before all this drama with them, I think there would have been a good case.

00:33:10.740 I'm a huge monarchist, Derek.

00:33:12.600 I'm not even going to call Prince Harry a prince.

00:33:14.720 I'll call him Harry.

00:33:16.040 He's not a prince anymore.

00:33:17.860 He's abandoned his family to jet across and live in Hollywood in a life of luxury.

00:33:26.220 I think Prince William's doing very well.

00:33:29.620 I think Prince Charles will be like 98 whenever he ascends to the throne.

00:33:35.180 I think his mother's going to outlive him.

00:33:37.220 You know what?

00:33:38.060 You may be right.

00:33:38.800 uh she's still looking good for 94 so uh uh long may she live god save the queen god save the

00:33:46.000 queen well that's a great uh that's a great note to uh to leave it at uh thank you dave thank you

00:33:51.760 everyone who's watched uh remember everyone if you're uh well if those who are already western

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00:34:33.640 the Western Standard. We got to pay the bills around here. We're working hard. Dave, you guys

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00:35:21.480 time thank you Dave for joining me uh god save the queen god bless the west

00:35:29.940 Thank you.

Western Standard - January 28, 2021

The Pipeline January 27, 2021

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