Western Standard - The Western Standard Pipeline September 24 2020

00:00:00.000 Welcome to The Pipeline, the Western Standards weekly live broadcast discussing issues relevant

00:00:15.660 to you in Western Canada and maybe informative for our friends outside of the West who need

00:00:20.160 to understand what the hell is going on here. Much of today though is not just discussing

00:00:24.600 exclusively what's happening in the West. We'll be discussing the speech from Trudeau's

00:00:30.720 throne. We'll be discussing closer to home BC Premier John Horgan breaking the province's

00:00:39.240 fixed election law in the early election taking place there. The implications for breaking

00:00:44.160 that law and what we expect to shape up in the early parts of this election. And strange

00:00:49.640 news from the Wexit movement changing their name from the Wexit party to the Maverick party.

00:00:56.820 And we'd really like your input on all three of these topics. You can go to the comments,

00:01:02.520 you can contact us on Twitter, although the best way for us to see this, make sure we don't

00:01:07.760 that we can actually see your question is to get us on Facebook. Before we get going, please

00:01:13.300 remember to go to westernstandardonline.com and go to the membership section if you're

00:01:17.720 not already a member and become a member of the Western Standard. Your contributions ensure

00:01:23.000 that we can have an independent, genuinely independent media here in Western Canada that

00:01:28.540 is not beholden to government funding, isn't controlled by the golden triangle of most of

00:01:33.840 the other private media outlets of Toronto, Ottawa, Montreal. Your support ensures that we

00:01:38.720 can continue to make sure that we have a genuinely independent Western media here. Joining me today,

00:01:44.480 well, I'm Derek Ful, the brand publisher of the Western Standard. Joining me today is Dave Naylor,

00:01:48.800 the news editor of the Western Standard. Hi, Dave. Beautiful. Can't you tell from the beautiful weather on this

00:01:59.760 completely live shot behind me? Yeah, it's actually a beautiful day here in Calgary. Also joining us, but not on video today, due to technical issues,

00:02:13.760 but joining us by audio is Corey Morgan. Corey Morgan, do you want to verbally wave to the camera?

00:02:18.760 Normally, Corey leads off the kind of hosting referee role in this podcast and live broadcast, but without him available by the video today, I'm gonna try and take my hand and see how well it does.

00:02:28.760 Okay, well, let's start off a speech from Trudeau's throne. Trudeau prorogued parliament a bit over a month ago for reasons that had nothing to do with the we scandal and inquiry.

00:02:43.760 Dave, why don't you lead us off and set the table about what really what were the contents of the speech from the throne?

00:02:50.760 Well, let's start off a speech from Trudeau's throne.

00:02:52.760 It was Trudeau prorogued parliament a bit over a month ago for reasons that had nothing to do with the we scandal and inquiry.

00:02:58.760 Dave, why don't you lead us off and set the table about what really what were the contents of the speech from the throne?

00:03:06.760 Thank you.

00:03:34.760 Dave, why don't you learn.

00:03:35.760 Thank you.

00:04:05.760 Thank you.

00:04:35.760 Well, it was frozen for some time, but some people are saying there's no audio.

00:04:40.280 So maybe, oh, geez, it looked like we had some audio issues there.

00:04:46.840 Dave, that was wonderful.

00:04:49.640 Do you want to briefly recap what you just said about the throne speech?

00:04:54.620 I suppose we just had a long intro from you without much.

00:04:59.060 So maybe just briefly recap what you just said.

00:05:02.780 Oh, Derek, I nailed it.

00:05:04.500 I nailed it.

00:05:05.100 I know it was beautiful.

00:05:06.420 The poetry will never replicate it again.

00:05:09.240 But just give your best, give a quick synopsis of the throne speech again.

00:05:12.540 The liberals promised everything under the sun, jobs.

00:05:18.300 See, there I go.

00:05:19.380 I'm umming and aahing.

00:05:20.180 Women's issues, daycare across the board, pharma care, jobs for everybody.

00:05:26.700 It's going to be sunshine and lollipops.

00:05:29.420 No total cost given on the billions of dollars.

00:05:32.500 All the provincial premiers are against it.

00:05:36.320 The federal Tory party came out and said they will not support it.

00:05:39.760 The Bloc Quebecois said they will not support it.

00:05:43.760 So the government's resting on the NDP party now to see whether they will survive or will be in an election.

00:05:51.300 He typically was very wishy-washy last night.

00:05:54.100 But I predict in the end they will support it and there will be no election.

00:05:58.220 Well, Dave, you've got some funny noises in the background, I think, from your electronic devices, if you can mute that, please.

00:06:11.240 Well, thanks very much.

00:06:12.920 Corey, what was your take on the throne speech and the contents of it and how the politics is going to play out?

00:06:22.720 Did Trudeau want another party to support this so there wasn't an election?

00:06:26.840 And do you think he's got any hope from the NDP or the Bloc?

00:06:32.180 Clearly Trudeau doesn't want an election.

00:06:34.640 So anybody who's wondering about that, I mean, he put out an NDP statement, basically.

00:06:40.440 He promised spending on everything with absolutely no mention on how he's possibly going to fund it.

00:06:47.280 You know, Jagmeet Singh could have written that throne speech.

00:06:50.000 So, I mean, I understand that the Trudeau government have been a free-spending, left-leaning government as it is anyways.

00:06:56.760 But in light of that throne speech, it's clear that he modeled that to make sure he kept that NDP support so we don't have to go to the polls.

00:07:04.800 And the other thing that was odious about it is then he used that as a point to leap off with that addressing the nation.

00:07:10.920 So he got, you know, the entire mainstream media up and sitting in watch, a lot of Canadians up and sitting in watch time.

00:07:17.460 And this is usually only done if there's a constitutional crisis or an act of war or something serious.

00:07:22.740 Boy, Trudeau has to be saying something of significance.

00:07:25.220 Is he going to resign or does he feel that we do have to drop the writ over this throne speech or something of the sort?

00:07:31.900 No, no, he mumbled a little bit about a spike in the COVID deaths and, or not even deaths, infections, I should say.

00:07:39.040 And then just went on with a grandstanding, self-serving political speech.

00:07:44.480 Talk about a slap in the face to the media who danced to his tune and gave him that free airtime.

00:07:49.260 I hope the next time that jackass calls for a state of the nation address like that, they tell him, no, sorry, we got to run out of the throne speech when his nice breathless voice while he was at the media learned their lesson from giving Trudeau free airtime.

00:08:08.400 Fat chance of that, I'd say. 0.79

00:08:09.460 Fat chance of that, but certainly many of them were a bit upset.

00:08:13.740 You know, they might work for him now and take tax dollars handed out from him, but they, you know, they had their knickers a bit in a knot.

00:08:22.260 You're right.

00:08:22.780 It doesn't necessarily have to be on the scale of the declaration of war, but it generally has to be an issue of major national significance.

00:08:29.820 And it was generally just saying, please download the app, social distance, wear a mask and vote for Justin.

00:08:36.100 It was pretty, pretty simple stuff that he just wanted airtime for that all 13 premiers have already said ad nauseum, some of them at the point of a gun.

00:08:49.560 So, yeah, it was pretty strange.

00:08:53.160 I think you're right.

00:08:54.040 This throne speech could have been written by the NDP, but the NDP can't say that.

00:08:57.660 They have to try and remain politically relevant.

00:09:00.160 It's always very difficult for the NDP to remain relevant when there's a pretty hard left-leaning liberal government in power.

00:09:10.320 You know, when there were moderate liberals like Michael, you can call them that, like Michael Ignatieff or Paul Martin or to an extent Jean Chrétien, the NDP were able to kind of carve out a niche as the real left party.

00:09:24.200 But, you know, when there's been pure Trudeau or Justin Trudeau in power, it's very difficult for the NDP to stay relevant.

00:09:30.240 So even though the NDP could have written this throne speech, and I doubt there's really nothing they could genuinely disagree with in there, they have to try and find little things to nitpick.

00:09:38.840 And because they haven't closed the door on voting for it yet, it seems like they're setting the table to get some minor amendments to the throne speech so they can claim victory, that they got something out of it.

00:09:50.900 And I doubt ideologically Justin Trudeau would have very much of a problem with anything they would propose.

00:09:56.580 So I'm expecting that the government's going to survive the throne speech here.

00:09:59.620 There will be no fall election unless something very strange happens.

00:10:03.680 But it won't happen on the throne speech.

00:10:05.260 I think we're now looking at a spring election rather than everyone panicking as the media perennially, like the naval gaze, about a fall election here.

00:10:14.580 So there's a bit of a bit of breathing room.

00:10:18.700 Derek, the government announced today that they were going to be increasing the benefits for unemployment people who were on CERB from $400 a week to $500 a week,

00:10:32.360 which meant that would be enough for the NDP to sign on.

00:10:37.960 Yeah, one of the key demands was the extension of CERB.

00:10:41.220 I don't see the Trudeau government having a problem with that.

00:10:44.360 They're now trying to float utopian ideas of a permanent guaranteed basic income, whatever you want to call free money.

00:10:52.720 And so, you know, the left have been having wet dreams right now about the idea of turning CERB into a universal basic income.

00:11:02.380 So I think it's highly likely that we're going to see it.

00:11:05.020 I don't think CERB goes away until the election's over.

00:11:09.300 People are going to, people enjoy having the money come from thin air in Ottawa, as people believe it tends to, tend to believe it comes from.

00:11:17.020 So I think the Liberals will be very willing to sign on to an extension of CERB as a key NDP demand.

00:11:25.040 I think that's something the Liberals would do anyway, but they probably left that out of this throne speech so that they have something that they can give the NDP, make it look like the NDP got a win out of it.

00:11:36.360 Anything else?

00:11:37.240 Yeah, well, just, you know, going further, I mean, some of the things he also dipped into that I kind of didn't expect, but I'm not shocked with.

00:11:45.620 Like he was talking about National Pharmacare program.

00:11:48.000 He was talking about a national child care program.

00:11:50.780 Like these are huge, multi-billion dollar initiatives that aren't even fleshed out.

00:11:56.220 And then he hinted at a whole pile of other things.

00:11:58.760 I noticed Nahed Nenshi made sure to jump right out with his hand and say, if he can just get enough from Trudeau out of this, he's going to end homelessness.

00:12:06.000 This is just an unbelievable kind of open commitment to everything.

00:12:12.280 It'll be interesting to see, I guess, as it goes through Parliament when they actually try to make legislation to follow up on these broad promises.

00:12:19.100 Thankfully, the Liberals have promised a national daycare program, a national pharmacare program for about 40 years and not delivered it. 0.97

00:12:25.860 So that is the only silver lining is they're probably lying about it again, hoping that their voters are dumb enough to believe it.

00:12:32.180 This is a regular ploy by the Liberals to show up their left flank, to keep swing voters between them and the NDP in their camp, believing that their voters are Charlie Brown, that they're going to go for it again. 0.74

00:12:45.500 It's kind of like conservatives promising balanced budgets.

00:12:48.000 They promise it every time.

00:12:49.180 They tend not to deliver it, or at least with very much gusto.

00:12:52.360 So it's kind of, it's equivalent of balanced budgets on the left.

00:12:57.140 They'll promise it every time they don't deliver it.

00:12:59.380 And thankfully for, at least from my perspective, that's a good thing that they're lying.

00:13:03.480 Okay, well, let's move to more craziness, but where an election actually has been called on the West Coast.

00:13:14.200 In B.C. last week, B.C. Premier John Horgan has broken both his pact with the NDP for a kind of quasi-coalition government,

00:13:30.580 which was supposed to last four years in their agreement.

00:13:32.820 And he's also broken B.C.'s fixed election law, which dictates that there is not supposed to be an election right now.

00:13:40.260 But, you know, fixed election legislation in Canada, in Canada's quasi-Westminster parliamentary system, is a bit of an odd fit,

00:13:49.400 because Parliament exists at the confidence of the House, governments exist at the confidence of the House,

00:13:56.880 and you can't force a Premier or a Prime Minister to continue governing if they want an election.

00:14:03.840 So, you know, while you don't go to jail for this kind of breaking the law, it certainly breaks the spirit of it,

00:14:09.820 and wrecks any confidence people have that there'll be a fixed election date that the government will respect.

00:14:15.240 Jim Prentice's wantonly throwing out of the fixed election date in Alberta in 2015 shattered confidence in that legislation that people can have in a fixed election date in Alberta.

00:14:25.120 For all four years of Rachel Notley's government, people speculated that she would not respect it as well.

00:14:33.540 I mean, there was speculation that she would call an early election to preempt a merger of the Wild Rose and P.C.s, 0.78

00:14:38.540 that she would try to stop that.

00:14:39.680 That was a perennial boogeyman, not one that I ever personally believed in.

00:14:43.180 I thought it was always more likely, and I was speculating, that she would delay the election to the fifth year,

00:14:49.060 which they can do constitutionally, but not legally under the Elections Act,

00:14:52.960 that she would delay it in hopes that, you know, more scandal would come out from the various issues the UCP and Kenny had,

00:15:01.140 or at the very least, just to get an extra year in hopes something, the economy turns around or something.

00:15:06.080 But Prentice's breaking of that law in 2015 shattered everybody's confidence in that.

00:15:10.480 I generally think in Alberta that Kenny will live by the fixed election date,

00:15:15.780 but no one has complete confidence in that anymore because trust in that law was so completely shattered by Prentice in 2015.

00:15:23.180 I think the same thing has now happened in B.C. where Horgan's been riding high in the polls.

00:15:28.420 He couldn't help himself but to take advantage of the situation.

00:15:31.400 Very similar has happened with Alberta in 2015.

00:15:35.120 And all the polls show that he's going to cruise his way to a huge majority government.

00:15:40.480 Dave, do you want to, maybe I preempted you a little bit, but do you want to maybe set the table about, you know,

00:15:50.660 the reaction to this in B.C. and what the implications are right now?

00:15:55.440 I guess the lure of a majority government was just too much for Premier Horgan.

00:16:02.040 As you mentioned, he is riding high in the polls, enough for a majority government.

00:16:06.460 Right now he sort of governs at the pleasure of the Green Party.

00:16:10.200 Interestingly, it's going to be a COVID pandemic.

00:16:14.960 He's called the election for October 24th, which is a Saturday.

00:16:18.860 OK, 44 percent of polling stations last election in B.C. were at schools.

00:16:24.320 So they've got they're going to have the election on Saturday.

00:16:27.220 Then they've got a day to scrub all the schools out before the kids come back.

00:16:31.740 They expect 40 percent of voters, that's 800,000 votes, Derek, to be mail-in ballots.

00:16:40.160 And they cannot even legally start counting the mail-in ballots until 13 days after the election is held.

00:16:47.880 So that takes you into November before they even start to count those ballots.

00:16:52.360 Then they've got to properly register.

00:16:54.880 It's probably counted in the writing that they represent.

00:16:58.180 So it's going to be at least three weeks, say, elections officials, until the results of the October 24th ballot are made public or made official.

00:17:09.980 I mean, that's some city of Calgary election counting going on right there.

00:17:14.380 That would actually make the city of Calgary look good.

00:17:16.820 That's that's third world stuff where we have to win a month for a result. 0.61

00:17:21.040 Yeah, the city of Calgary, I think, uses abacuses to count their ballots.

00:17:25.520 It's going to be an interesting election because of the you know, all the campaigns have to abide by coronavirus rules, you know, so you can't have the big election rallies and and stuff that you're normally used to in an election.

00:17:42.020 So it's going to be an interesting couple of weeks on the campaign trail there.

00:17:47.460 Corey, what's what are your thoughts on the on the early call here?

00:17:50.760 Do you think that voters, you know, generally the thought on early elections from political strategists is, yeah, people be upset for a day and then they move on.

00:18:00.580 The exception not to beat this dead horse, but an exception to that was in 2015 when Jim Prentice called an election a year early.

00:18:08.820 But that wasn't some particularly unique circumstances surrounding the shelf life of that government and a lot of other nasty political stuff that had been taking place in the province.

00:18:17.780 Do you think, Corey, do you think that voters in BC are going to punish the government for for this or are they just going to move on?

00:18:29.800 Yeah, well, I don't think we could compare it to when Prentice went, because, as you said, that was also coupled with a lot of issues that, you know, really questioned his principles and his motives.

00:18:41.680 I mean, with the floor crossing and a great number of issues that really shattered confidence in pretty much everybody who was sitting in the legislature at that time.

00:18:49.460 Horgan doesn't have that going on. And it's kind of, as you said, it's people like us or close political watchers who get annoyed when things like fixed election dates get abused.

00:19:00.740 But your average voter has close attention to it. And by the end of the campaign, it's not going to be that big a factor with them.

00:19:06.800 Horgan's riding high and I don't see a real powerhouse coming out of the Liberals to to challenge him, though we will see.

00:19:13.860 I mean, campaigns are crazy times. As Dave said, it's kind of unprecedented, though.

00:19:18.700 I got a feeling that the limited campaign is going to reduce the amount it could swing.

00:19:23.580 You don't have live rallies that'll build some hype.

00:19:26.000 You can't even really get your candidates door knocking to try and get some of those upsets that could get out there and really work the ground and take a few seats or something.

00:19:34.040 I mean, this is all going to be based on the leaders and, you know, almost digital campaigning and how much that impacts the status quo.

00:19:41.300 I don't think it will very much. And Horgan probably will cruise to an easy reelection.

00:19:45.820 I don't mind being proven wrong when the time comes. And due to the late counting.

00:19:50.420 Yeah, I don't know if we'd want to do a live event to try and cover that sucker.

00:19:53.300 We'd have to sit online for a couple of weeks. 0.53

00:19:55.460 The Tory leadership race was bad enough, about roughly six hours overdue.

00:20:01.140 I'm not sure we can sit around for the better part of a month.

00:20:04.040 But I do think that despite the delays that will come in with the huge numbers of mail-in ballots,

00:20:10.900 I think we're going to have a pretty good idea of who's going to win for the most part on election night.

00:20:17.660 Because the mail-in ballots, they tend to favor, to a small extent, parties of the right.

00:20:25.560 Because mail-in ballots are going to be older people, because they're going to be more concerned about COVID.

00:20:31.920 Mail-in ballots in normal elections outside of a pandemic, they're also disproportionately used by older voters who might be on, you know, they might be snowbirds away.

00:20:41.340 Although I'm not sure how much BC has snowbirds, because at least in the lower mainland, it's so much warmer there than the rest of Canada.

00:20:48.100 People move to BC to retire.

00:20:52.780 But those mail-in ballots tend to favor parties of the right.

00:20:56.940 In BC, they don't really have a major party of the right, though.

00:21:00.040 The liberals are not considered a party of the right or even center-right.

00:21:04.040 They're just generally considered the not-NDP party.

00:21:06.300 If you want a party that's not explicitly socialist, you vote for the BC liberals.

00:21:11.620 The BC conservatives have been polling somewhat respectively, around 6% to 8%, but they traditionally are not organized.

00:21:19.100 They don't get attention.

00:21:20.500 They don't have enough money.

00:21:22.520 So, you know, they might be able to make a little bit of a dent in a couple of interior BC ridings.

00:21:27.860 But those are likely ridings, for the most part, that the liberals already have a lock on and the NDP can't win.

00:21:32.400 And so on election night, I still think we're going to get a pretty good idea, expecting that the mail-in ballots are more or less going to follow the pattern of the ballots that are cast in person at polling stations, and that things could shift a few degrees.

00:21:49.180 So, you know, the ridings that are within 5%, maximum 10%, we have to keep an eye on that.

00:21:54.420 But if the NDP perform anywhere close to what they're doing in the polls, which is pushing around 50% right now, the only question then from the mail-in ballots will be, do they have a majority or a huge majority?

00:22:07.800 So I still think this is going to be worth covering on election night.

00:22:10.640 Just a lot of asterisks and question marks wherever there's any kind of close race.

00:22:16.660 Derek, I'm going to have to disagree with you here.

00:22:18.860 I don't think that the mail-in ballots, for this election anyways, will just be strictly from older people.

00:22:25.300 I don't think anybody wants to go stand in line and vote during COVID.

00:22:30.200 I think the number of mail-in ballots will be huge across the age range.

00:22:37.380 You know, if you're a young mother with a couple of kids, you don't want to go stand in line and expose your kids to COVID.

00:22:42.760 You're going to go for the mail-in ballot.

00:22:44.640 They're expecting 800,000 of them.

00:22:46.660 That's not just elderly voters.

00:22:49.800 But I think you're right.

00:22:50.960 I think it's the NDP.

00:22:52.600 Before I get to that, there was also a poll before the election showing the majority of voters did not want an election during COVID.

00:23:00.800 So that's also going to spike up the mail-in ballots.

00:23:04.620 A poll released today showed 44% in favor of Premier Horgan.

00:23:08.680 So I don't think there's much doubt, unless there's a major campaign issue or a campaign flub, that he will get majority.

00:23:18.140 But I don't think it's going to be on election night.

00:23:22.780 It'll take those three weeks to see how big a majority it is.

00:23:26.320 Well, mail-in ballots have never been exclusively older people, but they are disproportionately older people.

00:23:32.080 I think it's going to be used much more broadly by other demographics.

00:23:35.520 But I think it'll still be disproportionately used by senior citizens because they are the most at risk of COVID by massive margins.

00:23:43.960 They're the most likely to be – well, I'm not sure how many snowbirds are going to be gone at this time of year because it's still fall.

00:23:50.340 And in B.C. it's practically still summer until December.

00:23:54.620 But I think it's still going to be used disproportionately by them.

00:23:57.340 But, you know, if we take your argument that it's going to be used in roughly equal measure by all the different demographics and all the different areas in B.C., that means that, for the most part, Election Day will be a giant poll.

00:24:10.480 And it'll probably give a good indication of the way the results are going to come in.

00:24:16.100 And the mail-in ballots, well, they'll be huge in numbers.

00:24:18.600 If their votes are still in the same proportion as those that were counted in person on Election Day, all they're really going to do is only make a difference in close marginal ridings decided between 5%, maximum 10%.

00:24:30.380 So the big thing to look at is not who's just leading in each of the ridings on Election Night.

00:24:36.340 We're going to have to look at the margin of those.

00:24:38.400 So it's going to take a much more detailed election analysis to be able to call the election on Election Night.

00:24:42.980 But as I said, if they're anywhere close, if the NEP is anywhere close to what they're looking at for the polls they've got right now, they've got it in the bag.

00:24:54.720 Corey, did you have anything to add?

00:24:57.860 Yeah, no, I kind of agree.

00:24:59.500 We're still going to get actually a pretty good picture of where the general thing is going to go and who's probably going to be in government.

00:25:06.400 I mean, we might see an anomaly where it's just really tight and then we'll just have to sit on the edge of our seats for a few weeks.

00:25:11.700 But more than likely, again, yeah, due to that sheer volume and the broad amount of people who are going to be using those ballots, I don't know if it'll swing the in-person vote that much one way or another.

00:25:22.240 So we will certainly be watching closely on Election Night.

00:25:26.000 Right.

00:25:26.400 Well, before we move on to our next topic, I mean, we'll just bring it back to throne speech for a second.

00:25:29.940 Right while we're sitting here, a statement issued from Rachel Notley has just come across the wire.

00:25:36.400 Quite a – not unexpected, but bizarre.

00:25:41.660 You know, I've still got some friends left in the NDP from my time in politics.

00:25:47.340 And, you know, we chit-chat about different things.

00:25:49.480 And I keep on telling – the big error of the NDP in Alberta is that they're not viewed as the home team.

00:25:55.780 They're viewed the way conservatives are viewed in Quebec, that they want votes there, but they're not really viewed as the home team.

00:26:01.660 They're viewed with suspicion that they don't – they're not for them first.

00:26:05.240 And the NDP are just constantly aligned with Ottawa.

00:26:08.120 I keep telling them, if you guys want to be relevant in Alberta, you've got to be seen more as the home team.

00:26:12.580 And just coming across my desk now is a statement from Rachel Notley blasting Kenny for his criticism of Justin Trudeau's throne speech.

00:26:21.600 Now, it's not unexpected that the leader of the opposition criticizes the premier.

00:26:25.360 That's pretty regular stuff.

00:26:27.520 But traditionally, that takes the form of criticizing the premier for not being tough enough with Ottawa.

00:26:32.740 That's not the case here.

00:26:34.300 Notley – I'm not going to put words in her mouth.

00:26:36.160 It's not a crazy long statement.

00:26:38.400 I won't read the whole thing here.

00:26:39.520 But, you know, just – she's saying, how dare you attack Ottawa for this?

00:26:45.580 You're failing here at home.

00:26:47.820 I mean, like, there's some fairness in that.

00:26:50.280 You know, they have failed to create jobs.

00:26:51.780 Some of that is the pandemic.

00:26:52.680 Some of that is that their policies might not be working as well as they had expected because, you know, they're kind of a mishmash of capitalist free market, low taxes, but also huge mass of corporate welfare of the kind you saw from Getty, from Redford, and from Notley herself.

00:27:11.680 So, you know, it's fair enough to say that she might be distracting from things.

00:27:14.840 But then she's outright saying that Kenny shouldn't even – shouldn't be criticizing the speech from the throne, that it's bad for relations with Ottawa.

00:27:22.800 It really just looks like the NDP has not learned the lesson that the biggest problem with the NDP, with voters in Alberta, isn't just that they're socialist or democratic socialist, depending on what kind of weird terminology you want to use.

00:27:35.460 It's that they're viewed as doing the bidding of Ottawa, and they still haven't seemed to learn that lesson.

00:27:44.200 I'll give it to you guys for a reaction for a second.

00:27:45.900 I'll be back to the broadcast in one second.

00:27:50.280 Just looking at Notley's speech, which you probably may or may not have in front of you, Derek, or Corey, I'm sorry.

00:27:57.040 She calls Kenny's reaction a, quote, abdication of leadership – uh-oh, I think we're getting some whinny talk here.

00:28:09.480 She says Albertans, quote, deserve a leader who will do the hard work of building a real economic recovery plan.

00:28:17.400 A leader who will continue to do what it takes to get – and continuing on with a quote from Kenny,

00:28:24.080 a leader who is – or sorry, from Notley, a leader who is laser-focused on the challenges facing Alberta, not fake fights with federal politicians.

00:28:34.220 So, yeah, Derek was right.

00:28:36.960 The NDP is, again, throwing their lot in with the federal Liberals.

00:28:43.000 Well, I don't want to have to say Premier Notley ever again.

00:28:48.660 Walk down the garden path hand-in-hand with Justin Trudeau.

00:28:51.520 If she really thinks that's something that's going to help her out in Alberta, boy, Rachel, go knock yourself out. 1.00

00:28:57.700 I mean, aside from, yeah, what they're kind of said, it's just a natural inclination for the NDP and the left to believe in central government as opposed to regional leadership.

00:29:08.200 This is going above and beyond, though, and that's getting in bed with the Liberals and saying that we don't have a dispute with Ottawa when Alberta has had a dispute with Ottawa since 1905.

00:29:16.700 So, yeah, carry on, Madam Notley, and the rest of us will work on supporting what Albertans actually want to see.

00:29:23.280 Every time she does this, Kenny and his staff are popping corks in the Premier's office.

00:29:28.220 They just don't learn. 1.00

00:29:29.460 This is a loser in Alberta. 0.97

00:29:31.980 Alberta is very much like Quebec in the sense that we like our premiers, we like our government to be seen as on the home team. 0.94

00:29:40.140 And, you know, if there's a hostile government in Ottawa, they want to see them fighting it.

00:29:45.480 And really, I'm not sure why Notley continues this.

00:29:50.240 People in her own team, who I know pretty well, they all feel deeply betrayed by Justin Trudeau.

00:29:55.300 Remember, Notley went on a huge limb working with Justin Trudeau on the whole carbon tax nationally and buying in.

00:30:03.000 They really took a risk on him.

00:30:05.000 And then he turned around and screwed them on a couple of big files on pipelines and stuff, left them hanging in the wind because, you know, Notley pitched a thing as a grand bargain.

00:30:14.180 Well, we're going to have this carbon tax and Ottawa will be nice to us and give us this and give that on pipelines.

00:30:19.140 And then Trudeau turned around, killed Energy East, killed Northern Gateway.

00:30:23.320 He didn't lift a finger for for Keystone XL.

00:30:27.940 So they feel deeply betrayed by this guy, but they they somehow still feel this loyalty towards central federal control in Ottawa.

00:30:37.740 And I don't and I don't think it serves them well politically.

00:30:40.060 But if that's what's in their hearts, that's what's in their hearts and they should speak their mind.

00:30:44.560 But whenever they do, they're popping corks in the premier's office.

00:30:48.040 Yes. Well, why don't we move on to what's going on?

00:30:55.620 Well, speaking of a home team, let's let's deal with what's happening within the sovereignness movement right now.

00:31:03.560 You know, Wexit Canada, which has undergone already some transformation.

00:31:06.620 You know, several months ago, it earned a new interim leader in J. Hill.

00:31:12.500 That was seen to give it huge credibility.

00:31:16.420 It's you know, he was a former senior Harper cabinet minister and leader of the government in the House of Commons.

00:31:22.620 It's a very key position in the government.

00:31:24.240 He was a key confidant of Harper.

00:31:25.740 He was one of the original class of 1993 reform MPs.

00:31:28.760 And he came on as the interim leader of Wexit.

00:31:31.480 A lot of people, supporters and detractors alike, said that this is a big deal.

00:31:36.200 It's a game changer.

00:31:37.500 It gives them a huge degree of credibility.

00:31:40.060 It's been an open discussion for some time, knowing that they're going to be changing their name to something probably a bit more professional.

00:31:48.200 Those of us who watch this kind of thing closely thought it would be something like the Buffalo Party or the Western Independence Party or Western Alliance or even Western Bloc.

00:31:57.180 So many of us were very, very surprised when Dave broke the story exclusively with the Western Standard, when they announced that their new name was going to be the Maverick Party.

00:32:14.080 It's unique at the least, and reactions have been pretty mixed.

00:32:19.620 Dave, why don't we put it to you about, you know, what really went on here, how it happened, what their reasoning was.

00:32:26.520 So then we'll get some comment from Corey.

00:32:30.940 The Wexit Party or Wexit Canada had a Facebook poll, whether or not to change their name.

00:32:37.320 And two-thirds of them had their first in-person meeting ever.

00:32:47.560 And out of that board meeting came the name, the Maverick Party. 1.00

00:32:52.800 It's either the most brilliant move in political history or the stupidest. 1.00

00:32:57.280 I still haven't figured it out myself, Derek. 0.99

00:33:00.480 But, and this is where I admit I'm the only guy in the Western world not to have seen the movie Top Gun.

00:33:06.840 Are you serious?

00:33:07.900 I'm afraid so.

00:33:10.260 It's on my list.

00:33:12.120 It's on my list.

00:33:13.020 But there were immediate memes of the Top Gun Maverick.

00:33:18.700 There was Mel Gibson's Maverick.

00:33:21.180 And there were James Gardner's Maverick.

00:33:23.480 So they certainly got a lot of publicity through the name.

00:33:27.540 But I'll leave it to Corey to tell us whether he thinks it'll work or not.

00:33:32.280 Yeah, I don't know if it'll work or not.

00:33:36.340 You know, I basically, I wouldn't go as far as saying it was mixed. 0.66

00:33:40.140 It's almost been universal that people think the name is ridiculous.

00:33:44.440 I was being polite. 0.93

00:33:47.220 I was trying to play a bit of devil's advocate and polish that turd. 1.00

00:33:52.380 And I wrote that piece, you know, trying to at least lay out the name and the need for it and so on.

00:33:57.960 And even then, feedback was just, no, that's just not the way to go.

00:34:02.720 Part of why I did that, though, is I just, I really do want to see a decent, unapologetic, regionalist Western Party form.

00:34:11.880 I'm really happy to see Jay Hill take the helm, see these guys build some steam and credibility.

00:34:16.440 And I remember from going depressingly way back to when I led the Alberta Independence Party and then into the, on the executive with the Wildrose Party, you can get hung up so badly on some of what are still relatively little things.

00:34:30.220 I remember spending hours after hours in meetings because some people wanted to develop the independent Alberta flag and they would fight over the colors that were going to be on the bloody flag.

00:34:40.060 Meanwhile, our membership numbers are dropping, you know, we haven't paid this bill or something.

00:34:43.380 But no, we're pissing around fighting over a flag or we're fighting over the motto or we're fighting over the party name.

00:34:49.960 And the name is important, but you could be hung up on it forever.

00:34:53.600 I think on Facebook to find out people want to change it.

00:34:58.280 Okay, they want to change it.

00:34:59.920 It would have been a great member engagement opportunity.

00:35:02.580 Okay, here's five names to choose from.

00:35:05.200 Let the members pick their first and second choices.

00:35:08.120 You can make a big to-do about it.

00:35:10.020 It's like a little internal election.

00:35:11.500 Make them feel like they're taking part.

00:35:12.480 You don't have to put 100 names and go down that rabbit hole.

00:35:14.980 Commit to five names, put it out there, engage them, and then get one and settle on it.

00:35:20.300 I'm only guessing that they were sitting around a table probably fighting over it for a long time.

00:35:24.200 And I'm still mixed up as to whether or not, you know, looking at the feedback, whether they should just admit they made a mistake, toss it in the garbage, and do that engagement I was talking about, and then move on.

00:35:34.200 Or embrace this thing and hope people kind of forget and try to take this a little more seriously.

00:35:39.120 But I don't think it was a wise move on their part.

00:35:41.840 Yeah, Corey, I was shocked by your column.

00:35:43.840 It was literally the only positive thing I had seen anyone say about the name change.

00:35:48.840 The people most upset about it are a lot of their key supporters.

00:35:53.820 I think their opponents, particularly conservatives who are worried about this, they were jumping for joy because it just doesn't sound credible.

00:36:01.500 I mean, as someone who, I mean, to ring my own bell a little bit, was probably fairly considered a maverick in politics, I still don't like it as a party name.

00:36:12.760 It just doesn't sound credible.

00:36:14.700 It doesn't sound like it's ready for prime time.

00:36:19.920 I mean, of course their members said, when they polled their members, said that they wanted a new name, but they didn't ask them what the name would be.

00:36:26.260 I think, considering the alternative they chose, people would have preferred their old one as insufficient as I think it probably was.

00:36:35.560 This was a big mistake.

00:36:38.080 It's, I mean, for their party members who like it, good on you, but it just doesn't come across as credible.

00:36:48.640 As bad as Wexit, I think, was as a name, everybody knew what it was.

00:36:52.240 I mean, even outside of, even outside of Canada, people had heard of Wexit in Britain.

00:36:57.980 People knew what it was.

00:36:59.540 So if they were going to change their name, which I think they should have, they should have stuck with something that at least people understood what it was about right in the name.

00:37:08.800 The Bloc Québécois, you could be, you could be from Bangladesh and show up, and if you speak English or French, you kind of know, well, that's probably sounds like just a Quebec party.

00:37:19.180 You know what it is. Maverick party, you have no idea.

00:37:23.420 And so they have no brand recognition whatsoever.

00:37:26.980 People are going to see this on the ballot and not know what it is or what it stands for.

00:37:31.780 So they're going to miss a lot of that protest vote, and I think it diminishes their credibility significantly.

00:37:38.620 I really think that they should, if they're looking to establish themselves as a credible and real force on the political scene in the West, I really think they need to revisit this one.

00:37:49.380 Paul Holmes, former digital editor of Western Standard, has commented, says, Top Gun was a terrible movie. Don't bother, Dave.

00:38:02.040 Yeah, it's not a particularly good movie, but it's kind of just a part of the canon of Western pop culture that you're just going to miss too many references.

00:38:13.080 It's like not watching The Simpsons and, you know, someone's going to talk about monorails and you're just not going to get the reference.

00:38:20.140 So I think, Dave, that you need to watch it. If nothing else, you're just not going to understand all the gifs and memes of people posting on our pages if you don't watch this movie.

00:38:30.660 It's quite necessary, I think, as subpar as the movie is.

00:38:36.560 Well, not a ton of questions, but we do have a question from Andrea Kettle Burrell.

00:38:43.160 She says, will this B.C. election influence oil transport via the B.C. border?

00:38:47.780 Sure. Well, let's put you guys, let's start with Corey.

00:38:52.380 Will the B.C. election influence essentially Albertans, Saskatchewan's ability to get oil through B.C.?

00:38:59.260 Oh, hey, Andrea, it's good to see you out there listening up.

00:39:02.540 I don't think this election in particular is going to have much impact on it.

00:39:06.860 The Trans Mountain thing has kind of been settled on as a federal thing.

00:39:09.760 It's going through. It's being pushed. Horgan doesn't want to talk about it.

00:39:14.840 Everybody's coming from the left.

00:39:16.000 But if we're looking at future developments or any new pipelines, I don't see anybody in B.C. standing up looking to promote more of that.

00:39:23.200 I think we've got a big problem for a long time dealing with that if we want to expand capacity.

00:39:27.680 But this election in particular, I don't think it's an issue that's going to be top of mind for B.C. citizens.

00:39:33.760 Dave?

00:39:34.160 Yeah, I think much like the throne speech, I don't think the word pipeline will be mentioned at all.

00:39:42.060 As Corey said, the TMC, TMX pipeline is a done deal.

00:39:47.020 And I don't think there's any more new pipelines on, you know, that's going to be close enough to being completed or even talked about for it to be an election issue.

00:39:56.840 Yeah, I think you're right. You both are right.

00:40:00.320 Essentially, the bargain that Trudeau has struck with himself and to a lesser extent, Rachel Notley, when she was premier, was we're going to have this carbon tax and we're going to give you a pipeline.

00:40:10.000 But this is the last pipeline.

00:40:11.540 That was very clear with the tank, the B.C. coast tanker ban legislation.

00:40:15.880 It was very clear with the No More Pipelines legislation, Bill C-69.

00:40:21.560 It has essentially made it impossible for new pipelines to go forward in any realistic way.

00:40:27.980 I do believe Keystone is going to get built.

00:40:30.200 It's just they're way too far into it to stop.

00:40:34.840 I mean, even Jason Kenney would probably become a sovereigntist if they canceled that.

00:40:40.540 So I think that Keystone XL is going to go through.

00:40:43.520 But it's the last pipeline I think we're ever going to see in the foreseeable future, regardless of who is in government federally or in B.C.

00:40:51.000 It's just unlikely to happen.

00:40:52.880 I think the bigger implication is a continued status quo of the very strange regional alignment in Canada right now.

00:41:02.960 It used to be in the 90s that the Western premiers all worked as a bloc, despite some pretty significant ideological differences.

00:41:09.520 differences. You know, B.C. had, you know, Glenn Clark, an NDP premier with Ralph Klein and then Lauren Calvert in Saskatchewan and whoever the hell was in Manitoba.

00:41:22.500 I can't recall. Sorry about sorry, Manitobans. 1.00

00:41:24.820 The Western premiers, despite vastly different ideological outlooks, worked as a bloc when dealing with Ottawa and on federal issues.

00:41:36.120 Now, the alignments are very different.

00:41:40.560 You have an ostensibly conservative government in Quebec with the with the CAQ, the CAQ, aligned with a socialist government in British Columbia on on the major issues right now, like transfers and and pipelines.

00:41:57.360 Essentially, no, no changes, you know, Alberta and Saskatchewan are still a very solid block, but it's really just the two of them.

00:42:06.840 Ontario, though, while it's aligned with Quebec, traditionally has been aligned with Quebec on most things.

00:42:12.840 It's kind of tried to position itself as the honest broker in the country.

00:42:15.960 It's spoken favorably.

00:42:17.880 Doug Ford has spoken favorably of Alberta's positions vis a vis Jason Kenney.

00:42:21.500 But it really hasn't really done much.

00:42:24.240 It hasn't forced any issues, but it has supported pipelines and it hasn't supported changes to equalization, at least that I'm aware of.

00:42:31.940 But it has supported the very strange case that Kenney is making for the fiscal stabilization fund, which which is essentially equalization for half provinces, which is a very bad argument, I think, for Alberta to be making in general.

00:42:48.140 But, you know, Ontario has been moderately soft.

00:42:51.120 So now you have Socialist BC and Conservative Quebec on the same page against, you know, Conservative Alberta and Saskatchewan and very mushy, very Liberal-like Conservative in Ontario.

00:43:08.240 So the Federation is making for very strange bedfellows right now.

00:43:11.300 OK, well, I think that's that's it for today.

00:43:19.040 Our technology is, I think, run smoother today than it that it has previously.

00:43:23.320 It's still not good, as you can see from the constantly shrinking and enlarging head of Dave Naylor on the side and the fact that we haven't got Corey here.

00:43:32.560 But that's because he's broadcasting to us from the boondocks today.

00:43:35.000 I think that's more of a connection issue.

00:43:36.380 But we really thank you for your time.

00:43:39.560 We appreciate you tuning in.

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00:44:25.140 God bless the West.

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Western Standard - September 25, 2020

The Western Standard Pipeline September 24 2020

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