Western Standard - Triggered： Let the UCP leadership race begin

00:00:00.000 Thank you.

00:00:30.000 Good morning. It's May 19th, 2022. Welcome to Triggered. I'm Corey Morgan. We've got a really

00:00:38.580 packed show today. Lots of politics, lots of sports, lots of everything going on. Of course,

00:00:43.720 we've got to go with those important observances I like reminding everybody of every day. Today is

00:00:48.480 National Devil's Food Cake Day. Make sure to observe that. Enjoy your devil foods cake. As 0.81

00:00:54.460 well, it's International Hummus Day for a more exotic food, in a sense. Hummus is great stuff

00:00:59.980 you know, for a veggie dip with some garlic and that. It's made out of chickpeas. If people aren't

00:01:04.700 too familiar with chickpeas, one of the things to remind you, the difference between a chickpea

00:01:09.480 and a lentil, for example, is Hunter Biden never paid $500 to have somebody put a lentil on his

00:01:13.980 face. I'll let you guys think about that one. So we got a number of good guests on today.

00:01:19.180 Danielle Smith is going to come on. She's made her announcement to run for the leadership of 0.99

00:01:23.720 the UCP. That was kind of anticipated, though. Until last night, we didn't know the job was

00:01:28.880 actually going to be open. So now she's hitting the ground running and it's time to get rolling

00:01:33.620 with that. I'm going to have Rachel Emanuel. That's our Alberta legislative bureau chief there. She was 1.00

00:01:39.120 at the center there when Jason Kenney made his announcement that he was no longer going to stay

00:01:45.120 on as the leader of the UCP. So she'll tell us a little bit about what she saw and heard there.

00:01:51.260 And then Jean Charest. I interviewed him. That was a prior one. It was recorded. Again, it's hard

00:01:55.800 with those federal candidates. But he put out a policy on justice reform, and I found it to be

00:02:01.100 a good one, actually. I found it to be admirable, at least from that direction. You know, you don't

00:02:04.740 have to support everything a candidate puts forth or support the candidate. But hey, I like good

00:02:08.380 ideas no matter where they come from. So we have a conversation with him. And of course, we'll be

00:02:13.900 covering lots of other news. The Battle of Alberta, the other one began last night. What a crazy game

00:02:18.940 that was. I mean, what? We almost had more goals scored in that one game than we saw in the entire

00:02:24.760 previous series there with Dallas. But, you know, very sloppy back and forth. That could

00:02:31.680 have been anybody's game. I don't think anybody can come out of there feeling confident that

00:02:35.420 either of their teams would necessarily win the rest of the series. It was an interesting way to

00:02:39.620 see it blast off like that. The same though, I mean, the Flames after their last series were used

00:02:43.980 to just shooting at a net and never getting it in. They didn't anticipate scoring so often.

00:02:49.540 So that threw everybody for a loop. Either way, game one is down. We'll see how many more

00:02:54.700 there are to go. That's certainly going to grab Alberta's interest for the next little while. 0.84

00:02:58.480 Another thing grabbing Alberta's interest, though, and I'll get into that, was the announcement last

00:03:03.160 night. We did that live special. We were up quite late, pretty tired around the newsroom today.

00:03:07.300 And that was the results of the leader's review. So Kenny's last decision as his leader of the UCP

00:03:14.340 was the right decision. I mean, while he technically won the leadership review with

00:03:18.740 more than 50% support, he realized his position was untenable. So for the sake of the profits

00:03:23.060 in his party, likely his own sanity, he chose to step aside. If Kenny had tried to cling to power

00:03:29.520 despite such a weak showing in the review, the UCP would have torn itself to pieces. I mean,

00:03:33.960 there's no guarantee that's not going to happen still in the future, but he couldn't sit on there

00:03:38.220 with such a slim number support at that point. In the end, what many members at the ground level

00:03:45.660 and even in caucus concluded is that Kenny just couldn't lead the party to victory in the next

00:03:49.600 year's general election. Polling numbers have consistently indicated that Rachel Notley's NDP

00:03:54.040 could win the next election if nothing dramatic changed within the UCP. And the dismal fundraising

00:03:59.620 numbers were telling the same story. So with three years in power and with Kenny at the helm, the UCP

00:04:04.720 had lost the confidence of Albertans. There's no guarantee by any means that a new leader will

00:04:09.980 manage to right the boat and win the next election. It's possible that a new leader could actually

00:04:14.440 fare worse than Kenny had. I know some Kenny loyalists are implying as much, but the party

00:04:20.540 had reached such a state internally and in public opinion, they had to take a dramatic change in

00:04:25.200 course. And I agree, it means you have to replace the leader. I still have nothing but respect for

00:04:30.520 Jason Kenny. I differed with many of his decisions, but I still felt that it was time for him to go.

00:04:36.540 It was with a feeling of regret that I came to those conclusions, though. I mean, Kenny worked

00:04:39.980 his way to the top, from being a persistent activist with the Canadian Taxpayers Federation

00:04:44.600 at the start of the 90s, to his time with the Reform Party and the opposition, to his cabinet

00:04:49.000 roles with the Harper government, and then his uniting the progressive conservatives in wild

00:04:52.820 rows into the UCP and becoming premier. I mean, Kenny's trajectory had been nothing but upward.

00:04:57.980 He was a tireless worker and a savvy political operator with vision and ambition.

00:05:02.660 One skill, though, that just seemed to elude him and that brought him down in the end was that of

00:05:07.320 leading a party. Some people have that royal jelly and some don't. It's a rare trait to see

00:05:13.320 conservative leaders who can hold it together. I mean, by their very nature, conservative-minded

00:05:17.480 people tend to be individualists. You know, we don't like being governed and we chafe under

00:05:22.800 authority. They're inherently the worst possible people to try and unite and hold together.

00:05:27.660 Jason Kinney tried and he failed. The skill of being an opposition MP or even a cabinet minister

00:05:33.560 is much different than that of a party leader.

00:05:36.120 Communicating, compromising, seeking general consensus

00:05:38.600 has to be done in a leadership role.

00:05:40.980 Kenny, on the other hand, tended to be introverted

00:05:42.700 even within his own party,

00:05:43.920 preferring to keep within his own tight circle of staffers.

00:05:46.640 He rarely compromised on any positions

00:05:48.460 until he felt cornered and forced to do so.

00:05:51.860 And he didn't engage directly or candidly

00:05:53.960 with his own caucus members often.

00:05:55.620 It created a recipe for internal party discontent.

00:05:59.960 In trying to put out the fires within his own party,

00:06:01.800 Kenny's team played political games. They stacked nominations while disqualifying other contenders

00:06:06.760 and fighting off all efforts to hold a leadership review at all, you know, through controlling the

00:06:12.560 party executive and eventually pulling every string possible to try and stack the review itself.

00:06:17.220 Those efforts soured the membership and watching those will sour the electorate. When Jim Prentice

00:06:22.860 lost the general election in 2019, it was due to voters expressing disgust with the political games

00:06:27.300 being played. The luring of Danielle Smith across the floor with the other crossers was considered 1.00

00:06:31.940 by political insiders to be a brilliant coup, but it was viewed by voters as dirty inside political 1.00

00:06:37.060 brinkmanship. The view shattered trust among the electorate with both the PCs and the Wilderals

00:06:41.840 parties. People didn't vote for Notley's NDP because they liked the socialist policies. They

00:06:46.300 did it because Notley appeared more trustworthy and honest when compared to conservative options.

00:06:51.340 The new leader of the UCP will be well served to remember that lesson. Trust is far more important

00:06:56.860 than policies when it comes to elections.

00:06:58.560 The trust with the UCP was eroding early

00:07:01.280 as constant revelations of dirty play

00:07:03.120 within their own leadership race came out.

00:07:05.100 People were repulsed and it just never improved.

00:07:07.960 If the next leadership race becomes mired

00:07:10.420 in questionable political play,

00:07:12.420 Notley's gonna waltz back

00:07:13.480 into the premier's chair next year.

00:07:15.380 The UCP needs more than just a new leader.

00:07:18.180 They need a new attitude.

00:07:19.740 And this winning at all costs approach

00:07:21.280 from staffers and campaigners has to stop.

00:07:23.420 The public at large is no use for it.

00:07:25.200 And they're gonna reject it at the polls.

00:07:27.320 Kenny's tenure is finished.

00:07:28.680 I suspect whenever he fully steps down,

00:07:30.900 he's going to have the best night's rest he's enjoyed in a decade.

00:07:33.200 He's earned it.

00:07:34.280 He did what he could, and it was a lot.

00:07:36.400 But he fell short in the end.

00:07:37.880 Let him retire from public life and peace, should he choose to.

00:07:41.380 There's a little sense dancing on his political grave now.

00:07:44.100 The clock is ticking.

00:07:45.040 The UCP has an opportunity to turn the ship around.

00:07:47.960 But it will have to happen quickly, and they have to do it right.

00:07:50.880 Let's hope that some lessons have been learned

00:07:53.300 as they go into the process of picking a new leader.

00:07:56.860 All right. Actually, I don't see Dave in the newsroom there. He's typically there

00:08:01.180 waiting for us. Oh, I see him down there. Yes, I got a different screen on the go. Let's bring

00:08:05.140 Dave in and check in with what's going on in the news there. Hey, Dave, how's it going?

00:08:08.820 Good, Corey. I was getting worried I was invisible there for a second.

00:08:12.060 Oh, you were. I've got that nice big screen off to my right, but it takes different

00:08:15.400 scrolling and such to see who's where. So I overlooked you. I'm sorry about that.

00:08:20.320 That was a hell of a night last night, wasn't it?

00:08:22.080 Oh, boy, it sure was on every level.

00:08:24.900 UCP once again proved their incompetency

00:08:27.120 at counting ballots in a timely measure.

00:08:30.260 We missed most of the Flames game.

00:08:32.320 Did you have to share the kennel

00:08:34.840 with Duke the Wonder Dog last night?

00:08:37.140 You know, I was allowed to come into my own bed,

00:08:39.440 but Jane was not amused that our date night 0.88

00:08:41.440 got overrun by covering a live political event.

00:08:45.100 I'll have to work hard to make up for that over time.

00:08:47.820 Well, I'm sure living with you,

00:08:49.360 she's probably used to that by now.

00:08:51.700 Seems like you met on the political tour, didn't you?

00:08:55.300 Well, our earliest dates were going to political events, yes.

00:08:58.140 So she had a pretty good idea of what I'm about.

00:09:00.860 Nice.

00:09:01.220 Very romantic.

00:09:02.260 Yes.

00:09:02.960 We've got lots of stuff today already on the Kenny fallout.

00:09:07.020 We've got a University of Alberta professor, Wesley, who says, hey, don't count him out.

00:09:12.120 He may not be done yet, noting that he hasn't actually resigned the premiership yet.

00:09:18.780 And really, there's nothing to stop him from running in the leadership race.

00:09:23.340 But really, he's got to be a sucker for punishment if he wants to do that. 0.66

00:09:27.980 Arthur Green is a very happy Flames fan this morning. 0.85

00:09:31.200 He was on your show with his bitter rival, Lee Harding, the other day, the big Oilers fan.

00:09:36.980 Well, it was Arthur that was having the last laugh last night,

00:09:40.820 as Mike Green proved to be the great goalie we always knew he was,

00:09:44.940 letting in the first two shots in less than a minute.

00:09:47.460 So Arthur's got his very biased game report up there now.

00:09:52.100 Big political news in Saskatchewan.

00:09:54.060 I guess resigning is in the water.

00:09:56.480 Saskatchewan's NDP leader Melly resigning this morning after not increasing their seat tally in the last provincial vote.

00:10:05.760 Scary story right now on the site.

00:10:08.860 The worldwide breakout of monkeypox has hit Canadian shores.

00:10:14.760 There's 17 suspected cases of the dreaded disease in Montreal, and it's been spreading around Europe and Spain and Portugal and the United Kingdom.

00:10:25.720 And the United States had the first cases yesterday, so it was only a matter of time before it hit Canada, and it seems to be hitting Montreal in a big way.

00:10:34.660 So that's something else to worry about, along with the bird flu.

00:10:40.540 Our Matthew Horwood has talked to various people in the chicken and egg industry about the bird flu.

00:10:46.860 That's ended up killing hundreds of thousands of birds in Canada.

00:10:52.520 The Conservative political leadership as its first victim, Ed Fast, a BC MP,

00:11:00.580 who has resigned as the party's finance critic

00:11:07.080 after complaining about Pierre Polyev's comments

00:11:12.140 that he was going to fire the Bank of Montreal,

00:11:16.440 or sorry, the Bank of Canada president.

00:11:19.420 So, yeah, you'll have to excuse me, Corey.

00:11:21.920 We're all dragging our tails a bit today.

00:11:24.760 This afternoon, though,

00:11:26.660 our Mel Rizdin is less than a happy reporter.

00:11:29.620 It was interesting.

00:11:30.260 She got a shout out on Hockey Night in Canada last night from Ron McLean as it was our mail that officially named the Red Mile.

00:11:39.240 So that was good for her.

00:11:40.860 She's now standing in the cold and miserable rain of Calgary outside the McDougal Centre covering the UCP caucus meeting.

00:11:50.700 And to be a fly on the wall in that meeting would be highly entertaining, I think, Corey.

00:11:55.780 Yeah, no, it's going to be a full busy day.

00:11:57.240 I see one of our people who does like to watch details to get the facts

00:12:00.680 correctly.

00:12:01.300 And Mr.

00:12:01.580 DeMore was commenting,

00:12:02.760 Mike Green,

00:12:03.800 who might that be?

00:12:05.080 I suspect you meant Smith,

00:12:06.380 but as you said,

00:12:07.160 you're pretty run down.

00:12:08.120 It was a long night for a number of people last night.

00:12:10.940 Our office is still missing a couple of folks,

00:12:12.440 I think.

00:12:13.100 Yeah.

00:12:13.360 Could you,

00:12:13.820 could you tell DeMore that there's stories in there for him to edit and

00:12:18.060 less time watching you more time editing players.

00:12:21.200 I'll see if I could pass that along.

00:12:24.160 All right.

00:12:24.580 Have a great show.

00:12:25.880 Right on.

00:12:26.320 Thanks Dave.

00:12:27.240 So yes, that's our news editor, Dave Naylor. As I said, lots and lots of stuff on the cooker right

00:12:32.280 now. These are, yeah, he's running in a hundred directions, getting a name wrong. Isn't that

00:12:36.980 surprising in light of such things? So that's that reminder to everybody. Hey, this is how we can do

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00:13:43.140 Well worth it.

00:13:44.940 All right.

00:13:45.740 And Pamela Jones-Kenny, what's this about EdFast?

00:13:48.300 Yeah, I saw that briefly earlier.

00:13:50.680 So the stuff on the federal front with the race going on out there, Ed Fast, yeah, he was the critic for finance and he's a member of parliament.

00:13:57.860 He got upset with Pierre Polyev when Polyev was talking about and calling for the resignation of the head of the Bank of Canada.

00:14:08.020 And he commented on it.

00:14:09.120 Part of the problem when you've got an internal party race is, especially if you've got a critic's portfolio or position,

00:14:13.160 you've got to kind of try and stay clear or impartial or at least look that way.

00:14:17.560 So I believe because of that, it's not that he's not exactly allowed to critique other candidates, but you can't really hold a position of prominence at that point when you've done so.

00:14:27.240 So he's not out of the party or anything like that.

00:14:29.840 It's just that he's out of a critic's portfolio.

00:14:34.360 Leadership races are dicey areas.

00:14:36.620 You know, something that some people might have seen as we're waiting for Danielle to get in there.

00:14:41.140 That was really, you know, this race, it's going to get worse. 0.67

00:14:45.860 and I'm really not impressed whatsoever, and a lot of people aren't, with the stunt, 1.00

00:14:50.660 I'll call it that, that Michelle Rempel pulled off. 0.82

00:14:53.660 She's the co-chair for the Brown campaign for the leadership of the Conservative Party of Canada.

00:15:01.420 Apparently, apparently, they got an email, and I'll read you what this email supposedly said.

00:15:06.700 You know what? I'll believe it. I'll believe this email came in.

00:15:08.780 I just don't believe it's from anybody legitimate. It just stinks. 0.93

00:15:12.060 So they got an email, apparently, to their campaign that said,

00:15:14.960 you have sent this to the wrong person. 0.95

00:15:17.040 I believe in Nazism. 0.87

00:15:18.780 And if Adolf Hitler had won World War II, 1.00

00:15:20.960 he would not have all the BS that these Asians, 1.00

00:15:23.240 Chinese, Koreans, Africans bring to our country. 1.00

00:15:25.700 They would not exist. 1.00

00:15:26.740 And then he finished it with, I support Pierre Polyev. 1.00

00:15:29.740 What a load of crap. 1.00

00:15:31.440 What a load of crap. 1.00

00:15:32.360 There is no way that person supports Polyev. 1.00

00:15:34.780 That just totally reminded me of that BS story

00:15:39.460 that was going out with the supposed arsons

00:15:42.000 during the convoy.

00:15:44.960 You know, when they were apparently in the hallway lighting the place on fire and a resident came

00:15:49.960 by them and they looked up and said, oh, hi, we're burning down your building. Oh, and we're with the

00:15:54.340 trucker's convoy. And as it turned out, of course, they weren't with the trucker's convoy. This looks

00:15:58.200 like a six-year-old child's effort to try and frame Polyev as somebody who draws the interest

00:16:04.500 in support of extreme racists. It's ridiculous. So that sort of idiocy happens. That's fine. Those 0.99

00:16:11.060 sorts of emails get sent by morons, that's fine. But to have a member of parliament actually 1.00

00:16:16.720 screen snap it and throw it on Twitter as if it was legitimate or something worthwhile, that 0.79

00:16:22.460 is disgusting. And I don't know what's up with Rempel lately, but this, it was beyond the pale.

00:16:28.780 The only reason you would put that out publicly is because you wanted to try and smear Paliyev

00:16:33.880 with it. It's a low tactic, and it only hurts your own party. It hurts everybody. This race

00:16:39.180 and this crap has got to stop. And participating in it like this, this is the problem we have with 1.00

00:16:46.200 leadership races. When a party can tear itself up from within, then you end up more damaged.

00:16:53.380 We talked about that a bit on the show last night. A leadership race can be a great party

00:16:58.320 building thing. When you've got multiple candidates out there selling memberships and building a base

00:17:03.120 of support, it can be really good for the party. But if you get out there and start ripping into

00:17:08.200 each other, tearing yourselves apart with your own candidates and things, you can do more damage

00:17:13.640 than good. So when I saw what Ms. Rempel-Garner did with that posting, this race is going to be

00:17:21.460 going on until September 10th. And if you're going to smear each other with stuff like that, 1.00

00:17:25.640 the Conservative Party is going to come out of this federal race a heck of a lot weaker than it

00:17:29.620 went in, no matter who ends up winning it. And I was just, this has got to stop. It's just not the

00:17:34.140 way to go. So I see in the lobby and I know she's extremely busy. We've got Danielle Smith. Speaking

00:17:39.040 of leadership races that are kicking off, let's bring her in and have a quick chat. Hello, Danielle. 1.00

00:17:43.900 How you doing? Hello, Corey Morgan. I feel like I just saw you yesterday. Almost, right? So who

00:17:49.340 ended up winning on the bet? I thought it was going to be a 43% vote. Who ended up predicting

00:17:56.600 51% but then the Premier would decide to step down anyway? I don't know if I heard anyone

00:18:00.740 predict that nobody predicted that no i came in at 48 so i was the closest in percentage but as i'd

00:18:06.040 said too i was throwing a dart at the board i i i it could have been 10 away from that just as

00:18:10.760 easily i wasn't that was just a lucky guess well i i let me just commend the premier for for making

00:18:17.660 the decision that he did because i i think he recognized that there would be serious unity

00:18:22.540 problems in the conservative movement in the in the province if he didn't step aside and you know

00:18:27.160 I've had my differences with the premier, but he has done just such tremendous work on the energy

00:18:32.720 file and getting our voice out in Washington and the rest of the country. And I hope that

00:18:38.180 by putting my name forward, I can continue that good work. So I appreciate all the public service

00:18:43.220 that he's done and him taking a step back for now so that we can turn the page on a few of the

00:18:48.780 things that have been controversial over the last couple of years. And so I'm looking forward to

00:18:51.500 being in that discussion. Right on. Yeah. And that's something I kind of said in my opening

00:18:54.800 monologue was just, there's no sense dancing on this political grave. We had differences on and

00:18:59.820 off. But as you said, I mean, the worst thing that could have happened is if you'd hung on with such

00:19:03.480 a weak mandate, then the infighting would have continued and there would be a lot of damage. So

00:19:07.120 you never made a secret of if the job was going to open up, I believe you kind of leaked that out

00:19:11.860 way back at the AGM this year, that you would throw your hat in the ring. So you've formally

00:19:17.100 announced your full intent and started your campaign today, have you? Yeah, I did. We did

00:19:21.580 at 11 o'clock. I know that you were busy doing your show, so I'm glad you're able to make some

00:19:25.520 time for me. The only sad part is I had a couple of other shows that I had planned for Western

00:19:30.240 Standard, but I'm going to have to suspend the Danielle Smith show until further notice as we

00:19:34.580 go through this leadership campaign. And I think from my perspective, part of the reason that I

00:19:40.260 want to do this is I know that my decision years ago to join Jim Prentice and try the early flawed

00:19:47.940 failed effort at unity was very unpopular. And both of us suffered as a result of that. But I

00:19:54.000 think that what we're seeing now with the passage of time is that unity is really the only answer

00:20:01.520 for conservatives in this province, especially now that we see that Rachel Notley and the NDP

00:20:06.700 have been polling at 40 to 44%. That may not have been the case back in 2015. So who knows how that

00:20:13.640 would have turned out. But the fact that the left is that unified, it means that there needs to be

00:20:18.500 a unified conservative movement. And if we can get a lot of voices from a lot of different

00:20:22.660 perspectives rebuilding this party, I think we have a really good chance of winning another

00:20:27.340 majority in 2023. And I hope I can contribute to that discussion and hope I can contribute to

00:20:33.040 keeping the party and the movement unified. Well, that's it. And it's kind of, again,

00:20:38.720 I had my opening monologue was the difficulty we always have as conservatives to try and stay in

00:20:42.640 the same room and not be at each other's throats. I could look at your experiences as being good and

00:20:48.740 bad in a sense. I mean, a lot of people are saying, well, that was a negative outcome, but

00:20:52.280 if a person learned from it, then you're bringing more experience in dealing with disunity than

00:20:57.380 most people would have had to experience. You've dealt with a raucous caucus and members being

00:21:03.740 upset and things such as that. So I imagine you're going to intend to apply that experience to try

00:21:10.620 to keep things unified going forward. Yeah. And like the premier who's got now a perfectly

00:21:14.540 unblemished record of winning. I mean, must remember he won his last vote there too. He

00:21:18.640 just made the decision to step aside. I have both won and lost and you learn just as much from your

00:21:24.760 losses as your wins. And it was a pretty bruising experience, I think, for the entire province

00:21:30.940 and the conservative movement. And I'm hoping I can make amends with people because I know that

00:21:36.620 there's still a lot of people who are hurt and angry by that. But to me, one of the things that

00:21:42.180 I certainly learned was how vitally important it is to let the grassroots decide. I made an error

00:21:49.200 because I'd done so much work to help build up the movement and thinking that the movement would

00:21:53.580 follow me. And that's not how it works. In politics, the leader sits at the pleasure

00:21:58.780 of their membership and they sit at the pleasure of their caucus. And if they lose caucus support

00:22:03.660 because caucus members don't think that they can get elected under that leader, or if they lose

00:22:07.800 the grassroots support because the grassroots don't feel that the leader is reflecting what

00:22:13.680 it is that they want them to do, you don't survive very long. So I allowed a little bit of hubris,

00:22:19.240 I think, to get in my way back in 2015. Certainly learned a lot from that over the last number of

00:22:24.700 years. And the nice part about having been on talk radio over the last over six years was,

00:22:29.360 boy, people just give you their opinion full throated. So I had to monitor my own text line

00:22:35.320 and do my own emails and talk to people at events. And so I really feel like I understand

00:22:42.500 grassroots politics better than I ever did before. And the respect I have for grassroots members

00:22:49.620 is very high. I think we've done a really terrific job in the United Conservative Party at the AGM

00:22:56.580 in marrying the two cultures from the legacy parties.

00:22:59.640 It's just a matter that we've got to give our MLAs

00:23:03.100 a little bit more profile,

00:23:04.840 a little bit more ability to represent their constituents.

00:23:07.500 And I think we'll have the perfect balance.

00:23:09.400 And so my love of grassroots politics

00:23:12.040 and the love of the role of the individual MLA

00:23:14.220 has not dissipated at all.

00:23:16.340 And I hope that I can bring some of that

00:23:18.260 into the party if I become leader.

00:23:20.700 Well, and you've jumped back in

00:23:22.360 and something you've said is if you become leader.

00:23:25.660 So a question I'm going to be asking as the candidates come forth, and this is something people ask a lot all the time, are you in for the long game?

00:23:31.600 Like you were already pursuing a nomination down in Livingston-McLeod and you're looking for a seat, but I know it's hard to speculate.

00:23:39.020 Your goal is to win, but in the eventuality that if you squeak by and come in second, would you still remain as a member of the legislature and carry on in that capacity?

00:23:47.220 100%. I mean, I launched my campaign April the 1st in Livingston-McLeod so I could seek the local nomination here.

00:23:55.660 And sorry about that.

00:23:57.480 I'd be prepared to serve under any of the leaders who win.

00:24:04.020 The mute button's handy for those things.

00:24:05.940 Yeah, we all, and I know I'm almost, I think yesterday I was five hours on the air when

00:24:10.000 it combined all the shows together.

00:24:11.960 I've been talking for almost two hours straight.

00:24:14.020 Yeah, you'll be at it for quite some time yet.

00:24:16.400 So you get your vocal cords back in order.

00:24:18.860 Well, before I let you go then, and I appreciate you doing the shows and it's understandable.

00:24:23.000 Well, that's part of why I want to get you on

00:24:24.200 because we've got a shared audience quite often

00:24:26.240 and I understand that it's quite a conflict now.

00:24:28.620 At this point, you have to step away from doing the shows,

00:24:30.820 but it was great having you for that short period that we did.

00:24:34.500 Have you got an events planned then already or slated?

00:24:37.360 Where can people follow up on the campaign

00:24:38.940 and keep up with what you're doing?

00:24:40.460 Best way to follow me is daniellesmith.ca.

00:24:42.980 I've kind of added a leadership campaign webpage

00:24:47.140 to that landing page.

00:24:48.880 And my regular website is underneath my personal website.

00:24:51.540 plus I've got a link to the UCP Livingston McLeod nomination page as well. And so people

00:24:56.960 can sign up to the campaign. And every week I do a newsletter. I'll continue doing that weekly

00:25:02.720 newsletter, just commenting on the issues of the day. I may end up doing a weekly podcast as well,

00:25:08.340 just for the fun of it, to stay in the swing of things. There's always something to learn.

00:25:13.140 And I love having those long form interviews. Those are something I really got into in the

00:25:17.720 in the last year but that would be the best way to keep in touch with me and i always make sure

00:25:21.960 that i let people know what my upcoming events are so i've got a number of events already today

00:25:26.280 i'm delighted to be moderating the event for the alberta adolescent recovery center tonight as we

00:25:31.320 know mental health and addiction is probably an even more urgent and pressing issue after these

00:25:37.240 last two years and so we haven't been able to have an in-person event with arc for a couple of years

00:25:42.760 i've moderated their event for i think three years running now this will be the first time we get

00:25:46.440 together in person again and they always have such uplifting success stories so those are those are

00:25:51.160 the kind of things that i'll keep on doing but that's uh but i also have an events plan coming

00:25:56.360 up in uh probably planning on going to the vasaki uh parade in edmonton on on sunday so hopefully

00:26:02.680 i'll see some of our edmonton friends there and then down to pincher creek next week on the 24th

00:26:06.680 so there'll be lots of opportunity to to meet and i'm looking forward to traveling the province again

00:26:11.000 great well we're in campaign mode as i was kind of saying just before you got on let's hope we can

00:26:14.680 have a good positive leadership race out of this as the the federal one's starting to get a little

00:26:19.560 off the rails i hope that gets back on track for everybody's sake so kick things off on the right

00:26:24.440 note you're one of the first out of the gate there uh looking forward to watching your your campaign

00:26:28.360 develop thanks for coming in to talk about that cory anytime you want to chat be happy to come

00:26:32.600 back on right on thanks danielle you better talk to you again so yes of course as everybody knows

00:26:38.680 That was Danielle Smith, and she's now gone from, well, a Western Standard show host to leadership candidate with the UCP,

00:26:47.060 as well as nomination candidate with the UCP, and still got the other social obligations, as she was pointing out with tonight's thing.

00:26:52.820 A very busy person.

00:26:54.560 So it's going to be quite an interesting race as this unfolds.

00:26:59.780 The only, I guess, known candidates we have at this point are the ones that self-declared earlier, you know,

00:27:04.720 Danielle never made a secret that she's considering going for it.

00:27:07.540 either is Brian Jean. I got a feeling there's going to be others coming out of the woodworks,

00:27:12.940 of course, as we go. I mean, a lot of speculation when we look at cabinet, you know, would Taze go

00:27:19.460 into things, Sonia Savage? There's a number of names that pop up. We'll see. I mean, nobody

00:27:26.140 quite knew. I mean, this was kind of fast. So people can make your long-term plans, but we didn't

00:27:31.180 know 100% until last night what was going to happen. And not everybody would necessarily

00:27:39.660 trust the results. You know, there was a lot of questions about that and things too, but

00:27:43.520 maybe Kenny would have come in at 70%. Then what do you do? Or what if he came in at 30? We just

00:27:48.380 didn't know. So now it's happened. Kenny has stepped aside and the race is on. Let's see, Vlad,

00:27:57.740 You know, whatever.

00:28:01.960 Kenny's gone.

00:28:02.660 If you want to carry on and rant about it, what do you want?

00:28:05.940 He's left.

00:28:06.740 I would say the questions, I'm sorry, for those who are just listening to the audio,

00:28:09.720 I'm responding to a commenter who's just quite upset with Kenny's past governance.

00:28:13.540 That's fine.

00:28:14.100 That's fair.

00:28:15.340 But what do you want us to do?

00:28:16.820 You know, entire show is ripping about it.

00:28:18.560 He's moved on.

00:28:19.380 I'm moving on now to seeing who's going to come in next.

00:28:21.420 You got valid questions about what Kenny did in his term, and that's fair enough,

00:28:25.580 and a lot of things to be upset about.

00:28:26.660 That's why he didn't win his review for a number of reasons.

00:28:30.760 I would put those questions to the candidates, not to the media who cover it.

00:28:36.240 And either way, we were going to keep watching.

00:28:39.380 And I mean, myself, you know, for the first time in this last year now, for the first time in decades, I don't have a membership.

00:28:44.840 I'm not in any of the parties.

00:28:47.560 Who's this John Ben Jehovah saying, why wouldn't Todd Lohan or Nathan Cooper be viable options?

00:28:52.280 No, they are viable options.

00:28:53.440 If they throw their names in, we'll see.

00:28:56.660 that's, you know, right now we have Smith and we have Gene, but that's only because they're the

00:29:02.500 only two who've said they're going to go for it. It doesn't mean that they're necessarily

00:29:05.460 in the bag or the front runners. They're just the only runners at this point. But again,

00:29:09.640 it's not even been, what, 18 hours since Kenny announced he's going, if that. So some people,

00:29:16.060 I'm sure there's a lot of backroom talk going on. So as we said, Mel's out there shivering 0.98

00:29:20.140 just a few blocks away from our offices here at the McDougal Center because there's a 0.97

00:29:23.880 full caucus meeting going on. I imagine Kenny's talking with them about what the plans are,

00:29:28.060 what's going on. There's a lot of question whether Kenny's going to stay on as the interim leader

00:29:32.540 until a new one's selected, or if they will pick somebody else to sit in that role. Now that's a

00:29:38.800 big one. It takes, and we see it go both ways. We see when a person resigns from a leadership that

00:29:44.220 they sometimes, you know, well, they just leave and pack it in on the spot kind of and move on.

00:29:48.360 And others who stay in as the interim until another one's selected. It takes swallowing a

00:29:53.120 lot of pride, I think, to be able to stay there when you know you're on the way out, but to

00:29:57.080 maintain that role. But I guess it also helps to tie up loose ends or things you had to do. I mean,

00:30:02.120 again, it was pretty sudden. We didn't know until last night what was going to happen.

00:30:07.220 All I can say is that at this point, this race for the UCP is very, very important. A lot of

00:30:13.060 people have a lot of views. The bottom line is there's going to be a new leader or again,

00:30:17.700 somebody's thrown out there, maybe Kenny will run for the leadership. There's nothing stopping

00:30:22.100 him there. Whether or not he'd win, I doubt it, to be honest, with so many efforts to try and get

00:30:30.680 things working his way and winning the leadership review. If he couldn't win that, I just can't see

00:30:35.160 him winning a leadership. I've got to imagine he's tired, he's dejected, he just wants out at this

00:30:40.080 point. I mean, he's already resigned once. Would you want to go in and work your butt off for

00:30:44.780 another few months only to not win the leadership after that? We'll see. There's a lot of balls in

00:30:50.400 year right now. And where they land, we'll see. Let's see, before we get to Rachel, she's going

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00:32:13.680 help you take control of your money. All right, let's see with a little more. What do we got?

00:32:23.820 So Lorraine Nash saying, people were so scared by media that the next race would be Notley versus

00:32:27.660 Kenny. Never believing there are very smart people who could lead Alberta other than professional

00:32:32.620 politicians and their lobbyists. Yeah, it's a fair comment. I'm just not sure, I guess, where it's

00:32:38.240 quite gone. But yeah, the next race, Notley versus Kenny. I mean, as we were sitting, as I kind of

00:32:44.240 said in the monologue, I mean, it's not to say that Kenny couldn't turn things around over the

00:32:49.120 course of the next year, but it wasn't looking good. I mean, they weren't raising the money.

00:32:54.520 The public support, the polls just weren't there. And people are terrified. I mean, anybody

00:33:00.280 aside from a hardcore socialist is afraid of another four years of the Notley government.

00:33:06.720 We can't afford it. We can't go there again. So when the push came to shove, I think a lot of

00:33:14.160 people, I'm just guessing, who voted for Kenny to move on, they didn't do it with, they might

00:33:20.860 have been more like me, regretfully doing it. They wished Kenny could have done better. They

00:33:25.480 wished they could have hollow, but they just felt it's just not going to work out. We've got to

00:33:29.880 move them along. But it didn't mean that they were really hardcore and ready to go.

00:33:36.720 so we'll see what happens now with caucus and that i mean there's a lot of variables

00:33:42.000 would they look to bring back drew barnes and and todd lowen or is that up to caucus do those guys

00:33:49.220 want to come back well everything's up in the air now all of a sudden so let's see rachel should be

00:33:55.600 here soon let's look at some of the news items ah yes this is uh some of the terms being used

00:34:01.120 and uh when it comes to again the the attempts by the liberal government to control information

00:34:06.080 the federal liberal government, the ones trying to shut down media like ours, the ones that try

00:34:10.760 to shut down discourse like you guys, you know, on the comment scrolls even, and things such as that.

00:34:16.600 And, you know, Bill C-11 and others are out there to take away your free speech. Well,

00:34:22.040 this is the language being used by guys like Bernie Farber, and he's on a panel. Like,

00:34:26.700 Farber's an extremist. He's right out there. These guys model themselves, we're anti-hate,

00:34:31.600 we're anti-that. Fine, people don't like hate, but it doesn't mean the person, just as you say,

00:34:35.240 or anti-hate, that doesn't mean you're right. It doesn't mean you're taking the right approach to

00:34:38.560 it. And he says, we must control web craziness. That's his term. We got to control it. And he

00:34:44.540 says, we live in a time of craziness. We live in a time where people believe whatever they want to

00:34:48.540 believe. Well, yeah, it's called freedom. And people have the freedom to be wrong. People have

00:34:54.560 the freedom to be disgusting. People have the freedom to say nasty things. It's part of what 0.95

00:35:00.760 comes with the freedom. It comes with the responsibility. It comes with dealing with

00:35:04.580 stuff you don't like. Get over it, Bernie. We don't want to try having you as the arbiter,

00:35:10.100 what we're allowed to say and what we're not allowed to say publicly or on the internet.

00:35:15.420 This is where they're going. And they use that. They use the most extreme examples of lunatics

00:35:19.460 and racists and nasty people as an excuse to control the speech for all of us. It's way too 0.90

00:35:26.120 dangerous to start squeezing away the free speech, the free expression of the majority because of the

00:35:33.600 words of a tiny, and they are, they're a tiny vocal minority. But these committee hearings,

00:35:38.720 when they listen to guys like Farber, unfortunately, we're moving towards the

00:35:44.780 wrong direction. And of course, we get back to the public safety minister, the king of lies there

00:35:49.940 with his constant BS that comes out. And others, I mean, we had a senator, they were talking,

00:35:57.140 he was talking about how some of the stuff he gets in his emails that would make you throw up

00:36:00.780 because the anti-Semitism and racism and the rest of it. I can believe it. So what? It's an email. 0.71

00:36:05.840 How are you going to stop that? How was your bill controlling independent media going to stop that?

00:36:10.220 How was your bill controlling internet speech going to stop that? Are you going to monitor

00:36:12.920 everybody's email? I wouldn't put it beyond you clowns, actually. So we got some very dangerous 0.99

00:36:17.380 discussions going on in the House of Commons, unfortunately. And it's pretty torqued. Okay,

00:36:22.200 let's get to Rachel Emanuel there. She's had a long night like everybody else. Hey, Rachel, 1.00

00:36:27.480 how you doing hey i'm doing well happy to be here but yeah a little tired yeah lots are so uh just

00:36:34.000 to frame it up you were there in person at the event it was kind of an invite only thing down

00:36:38.200 at spruce meadows for kenny's announcement last night yeah exactly um initially they had said

00:36:44.080 they were not going to be any media allowed they said it was just going to be a private event for

00:36:48.200 ucp members but then sort of the evening before they changed their tune they said they were going

00:36:52.440 to be allowing select media there i didn't expect to see as many media as i did there was quite a

00:36:57.020 few people there some of the other reporters i talked to said they had kind of just heard of

00:37:00.260 the event secondhand and invited themselves as media do so i think they kind of lost control

00:37:05.580 of the narrative that it was going to be just a small number of media i think people probably

00:37:08.940 just started showing up eager to cover the events obviously well it's kind of indicative of another

00:37:14.700 thing that's dogged the kenny government uh to some degree to the benefit of the western standard

00:37:19.360 that they've always been hard to have a hard time keeping things private things leak they get out

00:37:23.420 you were formally invited, but, you know, things were leaking out otherwise. So not everybody who

00:37:29.340 was at the event was necessarily loyal to the guest list, I guess you could say. So the room,

00:37:34.720 though, I mean, that was something you got to experience that, you know, the rest of us didn't.

00:37:37.700 We saw the announcement. Premier Kenny looked definitely quite dejected as he made a short

00:37:41.940 speech. I guess it was kind of an up and down, though, right? Like that was a hand-picked room

00:37:46.100 predominantly of Kenny supporters. So they were kind of excited with the first announcement that

00:37:50.260 he had won enough though slimly to maintain his leadership but then when he got up and said that

00:37:55.320 wasn't enough there was quite a bit of uh i guess sadness and disappointment yeah absolutely it was

00:38:02.140 a room full of kenny supporters everyone was wearing the vote yes to kenny pins that were

00:38:07.060 seen around the room we could grab one everyone was wearing those when they announced the results

00:38:10.660 the crowd erupted in chairs people were very excited obviously it was not a wide margin by

00:38:15.500 any sense but nonetheless he had passed and everyone had expected he was going to stay on

00:38:19.480 because he said he would stay on if he got 50 plus one so people were very excited then he showed up

00:38:23.860 into the room to do his speech the crowd was you know it was a lot of energy in the room and then

00:38:28.500 he said you know these weren't the results that I was hoping for also wasn't what I expected

00:38:31.780 which immediately caught my attention because that's just not the way someone would normally

00:38:35.180 begin their victory speech and I was sort of expecting a pivot and then he goes and he

00:38:39.660 announces that he will be resigning as UCP leader and there was just audible shock throughout the

00:38:44.800 crowd everyone gasped his staff looked pretty surprised I'm not sure how many people knew that

00:38:48.780 was a decision he was going to be making but staff that was specifically in charge of media

00:38:52.620 didn't have any answers for us immediately following it so i think they didn't know that

00:38:56.460 the he was going to be announcing his resignation either and then following kenny's speech he

00:39:00.700 immediately was whisked away i didn't see him again throughout the evening um but people were

00:39:04.380 really really sad throughout the room there's a lot of people hugging consoling each other lots

00:39:08.220 of tears a lot of sadness people were really just shocked and upset and then of course you know it

00:39:12.540 wasn't really a party after that anymore people left pretty quickly uh the room emptied pretty

00:39:16.460 quickly after that and no one really seemed to be in the mood to celebrate anything no no i i don't

00:39:22.140 imagine and i mean it was a result that kind of caught us all off guard all of us were kind of

00:39:26.620 thinking it was going to be one of two ways either he was going to win and stay on or lose and leave

00:39:31.820 in this case he won albeit very slimly and chose not to stay on so it was a third uh alternative

00:39:37.900 that that none of us would have thought would happen there yeah absolutely the irony of that

00:39:42.380 is of course as media when you know a breaking news story about election results are coming you

00:39:45.740 always have two stories prepared and we definitely didn't have this story prepared we didn't have oh

00:39:51.180 he survives the leadership review but he resigns anyways i think a lot of media were caught off

00:39:55.140 guard it's actually funny because i of course was traveling to dc with the premier so i spent

00:39:59.680 you know a lot of time with him over the couple days leading up to his leadership review and i

00:40:03.240 was even chatting with his staff and some of the people who write you know who have formerly written

00:40:07.140 um speeches for politicians they work for and they've said oh yeah it's always the worst when

00:40:11.040 you get caught in a situation where you don't have the proper speech prepared um it's always

00:40:14.920 best to have a couple things written because I'd asked Kenny, you know, are you going to have two

00:40:18.200 speeches prepared for Wednesday evening, depending on what the results are. And he said, you know,

00:40:21.960 I probably would. And then his staff commented, you know, it's better to have all the options

00:40:25.260 prepared. But, you know, we were caught a little bit flat footed. I think we recovered fairly

00:40:28.620 quickly, but I think every media was in the same camp last night. So while I've got you, and yes,

00:40:34.120 you traveled to Washington with the premier, you had some time talking with him one-on-one.

00:40:38.740 You know, it was unfortunate. It was kind of, that was almost a good high point of his premiership.

00:40:43.320 It seemed like it was a productive visit down there.

00:40:45.520 It was well-received.

00:40:47.300 And ironically, the day after he gets back, it's the end of his tenure.

00:40:51.280 What else did you witness, you know, down there with his presentations to the Senate and such?

00:40:55.480 Yeah, absolutely.

00:40:56.440 It was definitely a very successful trip for the Premier.

00:40:59.180 Definitely a high point, as you just mentioned.

00:41:00.940 I think it went really smoothly.

00:41:02.460 He met with a lot of U.S. officials and was advocating for Alberta energy down there.

00:41:06.840 And, you know, at the Senate Committee, there was lots of other people testifying from Canada as well.

00:41:11.240 We also had Federal Natural Resources Minister Jonathan Wilkinson, but everyone was really interested in talking to Kenny.

00:41:17.300 All the senators that trickled through the room primarily had questions for him.

00:41:20.740 So I think it was very successful for him.

00:41:22.860 I think he really did a good job advocating for Alberta clean energy and oil at his committee hearing.

00:41:27.840 It seemed to go really well.

00:41:28.940 He has plans to, you know, continue sending delegations to D.C. and other states to continue advocating for Alberta oil.

00:41:35.140 I think he said, you know, we haven't been front facing with our PR in the US and that's something that we need to change in order to open up that channel and to get the US to invest in Alberta oil.

00:41:44.100 So it was definitely successful for him. I mean, maybe for him, you know, looking back on it, it is kind of a high point to end your career on for him.

00:41:49.880 You know, he got to have that cool experience of going there, that new relationship he has with US Senator Joe Manchin.

00:41:54.800 So I think it was a good way to end for him. I mean, probably a little bit bittersweet.

00:41:58.600 it's just interesting to me because even as early as tuesday media had asked him again about the

00:42:02.600 leadership review and he had again said if i get 50 plus one i'm going to stay on i don't know if

00:42:07.220 he just you know didn't really want to admit yeah like i'll have to leave if i don't get a big

00:42:11.020 mandate um i don't know if he didn't want to say that in advance or if something changed in his

00:42:14.920 thinking in the 24 hours since i last spoke to him till when he gave his speech last night i'm

00:42:19.900 just curious i'd be curious to know a little bit about what conversations were had and his process

00:42:23.960 of thinking there that led him to make the decision to ultimately resign of course we did

00:42:27.380 also have a bit of delay getting the results last night and everyone was kind of wondering about

00:42:30.780 that i didn't really think anything about the time these things always run late these things are

00:42:34.060 always delayed but maybe he had gotten the results and then had to quickly make the decision as if he

00:42:38.060 was going to continue going ahead or if he was going to actually step back yeah that's kind of

00:42:41.800 where my speculation is i think i mean even premier kennedy hadn't really thought about the third

00:42:45.840 alternative i i'm sure you know when asked he was always asked repeatedly and he said 50 plus one

00:42:51.120 personally it's just guessing on my part i think he always believed though it would be much higher

00:42:55.520 than that. You don't want to get pigeonholed and say, well, my number is 57%. Then he comes in at

00:42:59.920 56 and then he's bound by his own words. So you set the bar low and hope for a high, but after

00:43:05.020 some, I'm just guessing, but after some thinking about it with a 51.4, he just couldn't sustain

00:43:10.360 a leadership with that. Yeah, absolutely. I think you're probably right on about that.

00:43:15.280 I didn't really kind of thought that through yesterday. And, you know, because if he was to

00:43:19.340 say, I am going to step down, if it's a low mandate, it just makes things a little bit more

00:43:22.760 difficult this way he left the door open to do anything that he wanted to do after he got the

00:43:25.980 results in last night so that could have been the reason for the delay last night on getting those

00:43:29.480 results as well so i i imagine i i doubt you know perhaps it would have been in poor taste but all

00:43:35.020 the same did you see any indications i mean it's it's amazing how fast it happens once the jockeying

00:43:39.460 starts the job becomes open uh any uh potential leadership contenders at that event looking to

00:43:45.340 start to make ground or i imagine they were probably just kind of keeping it themselves

00:43:48.240 for the time being uh i think last night everyone seemed pretty shocked but i'm sure for those

00:43:52.800 interested in the job that's immediately where their mind goes and no doubt today that's where

00:43:56.560 all the conversations are going you know who's going to be stepping up as interim is he going

00:44:00.080 to be staying on in the interim is he going to be stepping down right away and of course we're

00:44:03.280 seeing a lot of speculation about people danielle smith of course um has just announced her um her

00:44:08.320 candidacy she's put her name forward but lots of other names are kind of floating up there

00:44:11.840 so it's definitely going to be a very exciting summer for us um you know in media it's always

00:44:15.840 we're a bit lucky when things are a little more chaotic. So it's going to be keeping things

00:44:19.380 interesting. I don't think we're going to be getting the break that we thought we might have

00:44:22.380 gotten this summer, but that's all right. I'm definitely looking forward to the leadership

00:44:24.860 review and looking forward to seeing who else is going to put their name forward.

00:44:28.300 Yeah, well, there is that. I mean, on the self-serving front, anyways, summer can usually

00:44:31.560 be the doldrums for us. The legislatures aren't sitting and nothing's happening. But now with

00:44:35.560 two conservative leadership races, both going federally and provincially, I'm certain we'll

00:44:39.620 find plenty to keep covering and following and doing. So I imagine for the rest of the legislative

00:44:46.540 session, though, you got some interesting times ahead of you until that one closes out when you

00:44:49.640 get back to Edmonton. Yeah, it's going to make things very interesting. I'm not really sure what

00:44:54.260 to expect now. I think we're going to have to kind of wait to see what the UCP caucus today and

00:44:57.940 what's going to be coming out of that to have any more clear answers. Even yesterday, Kenny's staff

00:45:02.360 didn't have any answers for media. They were like, we're not super sure what's going on. They did say

00:45:05.880 that in his speech, he'd announced his intent to resign.

00:45:08.580 So he had kind of left it a little open-ended there.

00:45:10.720 So I guess we're waiting to see exactly

00:45:12.000 when the gavel is going to come down on that.

00:45:13.960 I think that's what we're waiting for at this time.

00:45:16.460 Great. Well, I thank you for getting up there

00:45:19.060 and covering it and checking in with us today, Rachel.

00:45:21.240 We look forward to hearing more updates

00:45:22.780 as you have your ear to the ground up there

00:45:24.300 and watching as the political game unfolds for us here.

00:45:28.240 Yeah, absolutely. Thank you for having me.

00:45:29.980 Great. Thanks.

00:45:31.160 That's the Western Standards' Rachel Emmanuel.

00:45:32.940 well. And just watch, as I constantly say on westernstandard.news, she's a prolific writer 0.79

00:45:38.580 covering her Alberta stuff, or even going as far as Washington with Premier Kenney to get that

00:45:43.960 firsthand accounts there. So some great news out of Rachel. Watch for her on Twitter too. Very

00:45:48.360 prolific, keeping the news up to date and out there. So yeah, I don't know. As she said,

00:45:54.340 it's going to keep us busy for quite some time, seeing what's going on. I know for the general

00:45:59.100 public, they get sick of it for, but for political weenies like us, this is just gold. This is our

00:46:03.040 Superbowl. We, uh, watch these maneuverings, but hopefully, as I said to Danielle, when I had her

00:46:08.200 on to that, that they can keep this positive as much as possible. I mean, you're, you're fighting

00:46:12.680 in a serious race, you're competing, you're, you know, but you don't want to get the elbows up in

00:46:17.020 the corner too much guys. You got to theoretically work together after the race. And this is going

00:46:22.340 to have to be an open and shut race. They can't take their time like the federal conservatives

00:46:26.500 have been where they're under the assumption they probably got a couple of years before a general

00:46:30.760 election. We're a year away from one. So these UCP has to get it together, has to get through this

00:46:36.840 race, because a new leader is going to have six months at best to consolidate their power and go

00:46:44.220 forward and win Albertans love before going to the general election. Some of the questions,

00:46:49.940 Cheryl Dawn asking, do candidates have to have a deposit to run? They will. I don't know what

00:46:55.660 it'll be. I think from past races, provincially, they were usually in the 50 to 75,000 range.

00:47:02.640 It's not cheap. I, you know, I'm kind of, you know, mixed on those. You got to have a deposit.

00:47:08.460 You got to have it. You got to make sure they're serious about it. But also saying you don't want

00:47:11.740 to set it so high that it's only an elite who can manage to put their hat in the ring. I mean,

00:47:16.260 the intention is that you're going to have anybody come out of the grassroots and make a run for us.

00:47:21.620 I don't know, 50, 75,000.

00:47:23.980 I mean, some people point out

00:47:25.100 not everybody has that in the bank.

00:47:26.200 No, but if you are an effective leader,

00:47:27.660 you're an effective organizer and you're serious,

00:47:30.700 you should be able to round that up.

00:47:32.160 I mean, this is a party that's going to need

00:47:33.660 to round up millions of dollars from donors

00:47:36.260 in order to contest the next election.

00:47:37.760 So if a leadership contender can't manage

00:47:39.820 to put 50 or 75,000 together,

00:47:42.780 maybe they just won't have it enough

00:47:44.860 to take the party to that next level,

00:47:46.520 even if they're genuine and moving forward.

00:47:48.500 So, I mean, that's things that the party executive

00:47:50.900 is going to have to do what happens. And I've been through these races. My long-suffering wife,

00:47:56.540 Jane, in politics has a number of times as an executive director with the Wildrose and in other 0.97

00:48:01.620 roles been on committees for leadership and talk about a thankless, miserable job. I tell you,

00:48:06.380 when you try to manage those internal leadership races, it's a workout. The first thing though,

00:48:11.000 they're going to strike the committee. Then they're going to set about their rules. That'll

00:48:15.260 include the timelines. That'll include the entry requirements, the deposit requirements,

00:48:19.440 all of those things and they're gonna have to do it fast fast and careful because you don't want

00:48:24.280 to screw up either uh this is a an important big race and uh we'll see what happens i mean albertans

00:48:30.600 it's up to them now to choose uh the other ones that are going to suffer a bit from this uh you

00:48:34.720 know unfortunately it's the way it goes though is the other alternative parties we talked to paul

00:48:38.880 him in a bit last night uh i worked with paul quite a bit in the past and you know with the

00:48:43.880 wild rose and then the alberta alliance even and things like that and derek asked paul about that

00:48:48.200 a bit too. It's painful when you're running an alternative party. These leadership races suck

00:48:52.900 the oxygen out of your room. It's hard to get members. It's hard to get people excited because

00:48:57.560 they say, well, wait a minute, wait a minute. I want to see what's going to happen with, you know,

00:49:01.600 in the past, it was the progressive conservatives. Now it's the UCP. So there's that new Buffalo

00:49:06.080 party. There's the Wildrose Independence Party out there that, you know, there's a couple of

00:49:11.260 other things, the Independence Party of Alberta, they changed their names. They're fighting with

00:49:16.220 each other, the Judean People's Front or whatever the hell they are this week, but they're there too.

00:49:20.380 They're going to have a very hard time gaining steam now because all the eyes are going to turn

00:49:25.340 on to the UCP. Doesn't mean they're gone by any means, but it does toughen their task.

00:49:32.580 Okay, I'm going to speak to a sponsor and then pivot a bit to federal because I've got the

00:49:35.160 interview with Sean Charest that I do want to run. But let's talk about the Canadian

00:49:39.340 Shooting Sports Association, one of our great sponsors, these guys. Their name says it all.

00:49:45.140 they're an association of people involved, interested in shooting sports. They have all

00:49:49.340 sorts of resources online, like any association would, whether it's networking with other firearm

00:49:54.380 aficionados, things like gun shows, events, you know, instructional videos on safe use of firearms,

00:50:02.840 of course, things like that. As we can see, yeah, cowboy action, black powder, there's all sorts of

00:50:07.000 firearm hobbies, perfectly safe that people enjoy. And this association helps you get the resources

00:50:12.940 to do that. And then most importantly, on top of it all, they're standing up for your right to

00:50:16.980 continue to safely, legally use firearms as you have been for a long time. And it's important

00:50:24.780 though that you help them. Because I mean, if you don't take part, you don't take out a membership

00:50:28.940 with them, they don't have the resources to get out there and stand up for you. So check them out.

00:50:34.120 Go to the Canadian Shooting Sports Association. It's cssa-cila.org. Take out a membership. It's

00:50:40.180 not that much, and it's a worthwhile, it's an investment in making sure you can continue to

00:50:44.060 have your right to enjoy firearms. All right, so let's turn to the federal front. The federal race,

00:50:48.920 as I said, has been pretty heated, pretty rough, pretty dirty, but it was good timing. You know, 1.00

00:50:53.100 there was the column I wrote the other day about how we're getting, you know, three young

00:50:56.840 Albertan mothers have been murdered in the last year because of repeat offenders who have been

00:51:01.780 released. So the timing was quite something. And Jean Charest put out actually, and it didn't have

00:51:08.300 anything to do with that event. It's just happened to me when it came, but his campaign plank on where

00:51:12.020 he wants to go with justice reform. And I was impressed with it. And he came on the show to

00:51:16.720 expand on it. So I'll run that interview. We'll talk a little after that.

00:51:25.200 Well, thank you very much for coming back to the show, Mr. Chere. I saw the release

00:51:29.300 this morning with you putting out your policy on justice issues. And it was just

00:51:34.160 quite the timing. I don't know if you've been watching Calgary Issues much lately, but we've

00:51:39.180 had a lot of crime issues going on and a recent event where a mother of five was unfortunately

00:51:44.340 killed in an incident with a couple of cars that had been chasing each other and shots were fired.

00:51:50.420 And it turns out that the suspect had been charged with six previous attempted murders,

00:51:57.560 gangland involvement. He'd pled it down, got recently released, and now we found

00:52:04.020 ourself with a a woman who's lost her life and left five children without a mother so the you

00:52:09.380 know to to see the timing on on with where your release is going i guess on justice reform and

00:52:13.620 really targeting the violent crimes and the inappropriate firearms use was uh i just wanted

00:52:18.260 to get you on to expand on that because this this race really hasn't gone into the justice system 0.93

00:52:22.100 yet and it's a very important one and and corey what you're describing i'm which is a terrible 0.96

00:52:28.100 tragedy and calgary is also happening in other cities including montreal where in the last few

00:52:35.140 days we've had shootings in broad daylight and and murders gang crime and toronto of course

00:52:43.220 is also another city that's under pressure and more of a reason to be very firm on crime and

00:52:48.820 i would bring back an opportunity for crown prosecutors to ask for minimum sentences

00:52:54.740 on gun crimes i would also increase sentences for those who assault police officers or first

00:53:01.140 responders firemen or or those who are healthcare workers or social workers also stronger sentences

00:53:08.580 on hate crimes and a special rcmp unit to deal with this issue of all these illegal handguns

00:53:15.620 coming into canada that's the real issue on on guns in canada it's these handguns that are coming

00:53:21.060 in from the United States and to stop that as much as possible. Also, more policing on transit

00:53:28.420 routes because we've had incidents there. But Canada needs to get up its game on security in

00:53:35.540 all the cities of Canada, including Calgary. And that's a good conservative approach,

00:53:40.980 and that's where some people get a lot of concern with the long guns. People who hunt or target

00:53:45.060 shoot and things like that often feel like we're being picked on or targeted in these.

00:53:51.060 statistically, that's not where the issues are coming from. As you said, it's predominantly

00:53:55.440 illegal handguns or people with gang involvement where these issues are happening, and we're not

00:53:59.560 going to address them properly if we don't target them. And Corey, I am a hunter, and I know

00:54:05.280 hunters well. I know farmers also well enough to tell you that if we have limited resources,

00:54:13.780 which we always do, I mean, it's never been unlimited, but all the energy and money and

00:54:18.460 resources that we have and should be put into fighting crime in cities and these gangs and

00:54:24.680 these organized crime in cities who are using handguns and handguns that are coming in from

00:54:30.360 the united states that's where the effort needs to be that's where the threat is and i'm i it

00:54:35.480 breaks my heart to see that this uh what happened in calgary over the last uh few days and but i'm

00:54:42.220 sorry to report the same kind of acts things and crimes are happening in montreal which used to be

00:54:48.440 You know, Montreal used to say, oh, we're not Toronto and we don't have a crime problem.

00:54:52.560 Well, you know what?

00:54:53.560 They do now.

00:54:55.160 And so we need to get serious about this and have tougher sentences and be very firm in

00:55:00.580 dealing with handguns, illegal handguns.

00:55:03.640 Well, that's it.

00:55:04.100 It's frustrating.

00:55:04.940 As I said, we see that these are people that we've had in custody that have already indicated

00:55:08.840 that they're quite dangerous individuals, yet somehow we seem lapsed.

00:55:12.020 But then just to play devil's advocate, mandatory minimums can be pretty dicey in the justice

00:55:16.980 system and often don't withstand court challenges down the road. Can legislation be crafted that

00:55:22.660 would be able to withstand those sorts of challenges if it came about?

00:55:26.100 I think the way of dealing with that, Corey, is what we're proposing to make it optional for

00:55:30.100 Crown attorneys to either press that charge or not press that charge. Now, that means

00:55:34.980 that they have to think this through, they have to justify it, they have to invoke the special

00:55:39.620 circumstances that would justify them uh laying a charge that for a minimum sentence which i think

00:55:46.980 will meet the test of a charter challenge that will inevitably come down the road the problem

00:55:53.220 in the previous format is that the courts looked at this and said well you just can't blanket

00:55:57.860 charges in the same way on everybody in every circumstances okay so we listen to what they

00:56:03.940 have to say this is an approach that will give the crown attorneys though real tools

00:56:08.900 to work with so that we are dealing with repeat offenders and make sure that we keep them

00:56:13.860 behind bars and keep our communities secure.

00:56:16.200 And I didn't see it necessarily in that release, but it's all justice related.

00:56:21.200 It's one of the larger problem and it kind of, you mentioned transit and emergency workers

00:56:25.160 and people who put themselves at a lot of risk.

00:56:28.880 Often it's connected with, you know, we've got a very bad opioid problem and addiction

00:56:32.380 epidemic going on.

00:56:33.880 And I mean, that's part of what brings the gangs, of course, too, when they see a means

00:56:36.920 of making money. Unfortunately, the unprincipled and organized crime always follows. Are there

00:56:43.240 measures perhaps to try and see how we could address that aspect of things? I mean, if it's

00:56:48.200 not profitable for organized crime, that could reduce some of the impacts. It's a big, complicated

00:56:53.000 issue, I know. Well, the opioid crisis in the country right now is a terrible tragedy also.

00:56:58.920 It's more concentrated actually in British Columbia than what we've seen in Eastern

00:57:03.000 canada and i guess that means the droops the drug roots are are probably more uh organized in certain

00:57:09.960 parts of the country than they are in other places fentanyl and and these are drugs that are often

00:57:14.920 coming in from asia and other places that means tart much tighter border controls and policing

00:57:22.040 to make sure that these drugs don't come in and then treating those who are victims of opioid

00:57:27.240 abuse and who are victims to that. We also need to find ways to help them out so that they can

00:57:34.460 kick their addiction and return to some normalcy in their own lives.

00:57:40.100 So hate motivated crimes you had in there as well, which again, as with any, it's an odious thing.

00:57:48.000 So you're not talking about bringing new laws on the books, though? Your policy is just talking

00:57:51.800 about increasing the potential sentences for that sort of crime?

00:57:54.680 Well, actually, Corey, it would demand that we legislate. If we want to bring in legislation, if we want to have the ability to give Crown attorneys an option to lay down minimum sentencing, then we have to bring in legislation.

00:58:08.300 The same would be true for tougher sentences for those who attack or who aggress either police officers or firemen or first responders or nurses or health care givers or even social workers.

00:58:23.220 So yes, we would have to bring in legislation. I'm hoping that the other opposition parties would,

00:58:29.380 because we'll be in government at that point, would cooperate to make this happen as rapidly

00:58:33.780 as possible. So if we were to increase incarceration times for people upon conviction,

00:58:41.620 quite often we have a lot of our correctional facilities are already full or overloaded. I

00:58:45.860 imagine that would have to be coupled with some sort of means of either freeing up space or

00:58:49.780 increasing space in our facilities to to take in more people for longer well we have to look at

00:58:55.540 that on a regular basis on how we're organized do we have to expand space if we hopefully we

00:59:01.700 you know we're not in a world in which we're actually just jailing more people because there's

00:59:07.060 more crime but if we have to do that we'll do that but we'll do it on a needs basis and we'll

00:59:13.140 do it in a in a context where we're not trying to jail more people i mean let's be clear that's not

00:59:18.820 the idea the idea is to deal with criminals and hardened criminals who are a threat to our

00:59:24.500 community and make sure that we always observe the cardinal rule corey the cardinal rule is security

00:59:32.100 of our communities first and foremost everything else is uh is comes second and uh and that's that's

00:59:40.420 the way that my government would approach this yeah well and it's likewise i think most people

00:59:45.300 with common sense realize we don't want to pack our prisons full of car thieves over extended

00:59:49.220 long sentences, though, I mean, it's still a crime. It's of concern we want to get the people

00:59:53.860 who've been committing violent crimes and seeing a pattern of that. I think the California Three

00:59:57.700 Strikes Law, when they tried that some years ago, failed dramatically because of that, because people

01:00:00.900 with very minor offenses found themselves with very long sentences, and then they didn't have

01:00:04.900 space for the very serious offenders when the time came. But it's just, you know, asking because,

01:00:08.980 of course, when you do justice reform, it has a ripple effect all the way around throughout

01:00:12.100 the entire system and being smart about it means that you have to trust the judgment of the crown

01:00:17.140 attorneys who are laying these charges who have the information about individuals about their

01:00:21.940 prior convictions about their behavior about their releases and who are in the best position

01:00:27.140 to say well this is a person who deserves a minimum sentence because they obviously they're

01:00:31.540 not getting message and we need to protect our communities so if we trust that we can trust the

01:00:36.660 right people to make those calls we just need to give them the tools so that they can actually do

01:00:41.380 the right thing. And likewise, as you said, you know, setting up a police task force to target

01:00:46.740 the smuggled firearms and handguns in particular, would there perhaps be examining giving more

01:00:51.860 resources to Canada Border Services Agency as well? I mean, they're on the front line trying

01:00:55.700 to prevent that. Definitely. Canada Border Services is a key role to play and to allow

01:01:02.260 them to do the work they need to do to be able to find these firearms where they come in or patrol

01:01:08.820 in areas that are vulnerable. We have a very long undefended border with the United States,

01:01:13.780 and that means there's a lot of ways for criminals to be able to make their way through.

01:01:19.780 And so the border services have a key role to play in this respect.

01:01:25.380 Great. Well, I guess it's a big issue. I'm just happy to see it come up. Crime and justice have

01:01:30.980 always been big ones with me, and we often don't hear about them. They don't hit the top of the

01:01:34.820 the polls with the public off in an election time, it seems to be more like incident by incident when

01:01:38.960 we get upset with it. But we've always got to look at these things. So hopefully the other

01:01:44.280 candidates will respond now that you've broached the issue. It's important to hear from everybody

01:01:48.420 on it. And I appreciate where you're coming from with it. Is there more you'd like to add before

01:01:52.760 I let you go on? Conservatives are about law and order. This is a core value of the Conservative 0.97

01:01:59.440 Party and one that I believe in. So this policy is about our value of respecting law and order

01:02:05.700 and the role of law. Thank you, Corey. Great. Well, thank you very much, Mr. Charest. And

01:02:10.600 well, we look forward to watching and hopefully speaking again as the campaign continues to

01:02:15.020 unfold. Thank you. Talk to you soon. Bye-bye.

01:02:22.400 So as you saw, that was Jean Charest and the Federal Conservative Party of Canada

01:02:26.700 candidate and his justice platform I spoke to the other day. I'll address a couple comments. I know

01:02:32.620 that I think among our viewer base and audience that Sheree is far from the first choice for

01:02:37.840 people who'd be voting in the conservative leadership race, but I do want to address

01:02:41.020 like why I cover some of these. So Sylvia Holowatch says, but the Western Standard seems to be giving

01:02:44.900 him a huge amount of time and makes me wonder which way the Standard leans. Well, I don't know

01:02:50.560 about a huge amount of time. I do five shows a week with two guests on. This is only the second

01:02:54.920 time I've had Mr. Charest on. He is the second, more than likely, if there were a poll to be held,

01:03:02.080 he's holding second place within the Conservative Party for the leadership right now. It makes him

01:03:06.240 a newsmaker, and we're still going to cover him. It doesn't mean we lean one way or another. I mean,

01:03:10.600 it's important for us to cover all of the ones who are on top and who are there. I've interviewed

01:03:15.200 all the rest of the other candidates, aside from Brown, who hides from the media. He's got a weird

01:03:18.680 campaign going. And I'll probably talk to the others again, getting back to what I said at the

01:03:23.700 start, though. And I'm happy Mr. Charest brought it up, because as conservatives, and one of the

01:03:28.280 things he was right about at the end, and I know he's not very conservative on most fronts, that's

01:03:32.240 for sure, is that crime and punishment, justice, these are core conservative values. And we haven't

01:03:40.440 heard from the other candidates on that. They haven't made this an issue in this race yet.

01:03:44.480 And maybe now that Jean Charest has brought it up, it'll prompt the other ones. Babber might come 0.96

01:03:49.020 out with a statement on it, or Atchison, or less than Lewis, all of them. I mean,

01:03:54.360 Sheree came out of the gates first with it, and I was happy to talk to him about it,

01:03:57.100 particularly when he was taking a stance of being tougher on crime rather than lighter.

01:04:00.920 It doesn't mean you embrace every part of his platform, but that part of it was, in my view,

01:04:05.520 correct. I wanted to hear more about it, and I hope to hear more about it from other candidates,

01:04:09.360 but it doesn't indicate which way the standard leans or doesn't. But something else with this,

01:04:13.220 this is an opinion show, so yeah, you get my slant here. There's no doubt about that. It's

01:04:17.220 triggered with Cory Morgan. The reminder of the standard, I mean, we're predominantly a conservative

01:04:21.860 outlet, but our news copy stays balanced. Just that reminder that that's, we cover who's on top,

01:04:28.580 who's making news. So when you see stories about Sheree, well, it's because he was making the news

01:04:32.320 like Dave Naylor, our news editor, makes sure things stick to what's important in the news.

01:04:37.200 It's not a leaning one way or the other. So we give a heck of a lot of oxygen to all the rest

01:04:42.760 of the candidates too. We just take them as they make the news. But it was a good conversation.

01:04:47.380 As I said, I just want to hear more on it. And I'm glad that it was brought up by somebody. It

01:04:53.880 doesn't matter who. That's the important part with these things. So as I always said, maybe

01:05:00.200 if there's other candidates you're strongly supportive of, that's where you send them the

01:05:04.980 email. Hey, what's your stance on it? Get it out there. Because right now, we haven't heard from

01:05:11.580 you on justice issues yet. I mean, it frustrates me a lot, you know. So let's see. Kim Holmes

01:05:18.920 saying, do all your interviewees pay to be on your show? Well, I can say with confidence and

01:05:23.900 you can investigate all you like. Nobody has paid me so much as a nickel or a glass of beer or

01:05:30.240 anything of this sort to be on the show. It doesn't work that way. We don't pay people to

01:05:34.700 come on the show. They don't pay us to come on the show. Come on, guys. That conspiracies. Just

01:05:39.920 because I interview somebody you don't like doesn't mean they paid to get there. And he made

01:05:45.100 valid points. You don't have to agree with him. You know, we just want to cover everything. It's

01:05:51.520 a race. This guy is second. Wildrow is asking if I've extended an invitation to Notley. You know

01:05:57.240 what? There's a good fair point to throw back at me. No, I haven't. Maybe I should. I got nothing

01:06:01.740 to lose. I know the odds of Ms. Notley responding and saying she would come on the show were extremely

01:06:08.200 slim, but there's nothing to lose in asking. And it would be very interesting to get her on,

01:06:13.720 to be honest. I certainly would, same sort of thing. I would disagree with her strongly

01:06:17.460 on most issues, but I'd like to have the discussion. And if, and when I do get

01:06:22.040 Rachel Notley or any of the, you know, progressive type candidates that I disagree with,

01:06:27.400 the other thing I got to, some people have gotten at me too, and I've gotten some sort

01:06:30.560 of left-leaning candidates. Why weren't you more on their case? Why weren't you the pit bull? Well,

01:06:34.280 I have a couple of different roles. When I do my monologues, when I get going, I'm giving my

01:06:37.620 opinion. When I'm on Twitter, I'm the Corey the jerk. I'm doing my knifing. When I've got a guest 0.99

01:06:44.620 in, I value them though as a guest. I treat them as a guest. They're here. They're giving us time.

01:06:51.380 I want to listen to them out. I'm not here to debate with them. I mean, I can question them

01:06:55.340 if they throw BS at me or something like that, but I want to have a comfortable, polite environment

01:07:00.520 because I want the guests to come back. And this is how we get into those things. So I know I'm not

01:07:05.900 always going to interview people that you necessarily agree with or even like the interview

01:07:10.080 itself, but you get a widespread and that's what makes it, I like to think an informative show

01:07:15.280 where we can cover a lot of things. So speaking of, so no guests have paid us to be on, but somebody

01:07:20.200 who does pay to get mentioned on here actually is our sponsor because we don't hide any of those

01:07:23.800 things. That's Bitcoin. Well, I'm going to talk about them one more time. And that is with

01:07:28.860 getting involved in Bitcoin, their educational component. These guys, their whole goal,

01:07:36.720 as you can see with that map too, by the way, they have ATMs all throughout the West. They make

01:07:39.760 Bitcoin easy. They make it make sense. They make it practical. You can start realizing that you

01:07:45.040 can treat it like any other currency. So this is the way you could get led into it because it all

01:07:52.700 seems kind of foreign. It's new. It's different. They can set you up so you can pay your utility

01:07:57.280 bills with it. Make your car payments with it. Have a regular plan where just a few bucks go into a

01:08:01.820 Bitcoin wallet every month. They automate it for you. And again, the educational part, as you can

01:08:06.140 see, Bitcoin Academy, they call it, they partnered with Athabasca University. There's online seminars,

01:08:10.720 all sorts of free resources for you to check it out. Because again, it's not for everybody.

01:08:14.780 But you want to know and you want to go in informed. And that's what these guys are all

01:08:17.980 about. A trustworthy source to inform you and let you know whether or not Bitcoin is right for you

01:08:22.620 and then help you in the process if you choose to invest some of your hard-earned money into it.

01:08:26.540 and you work hard for it,

01:08:27.380 you want your money to be safely invested.

01:08:29.820 I mean, I can't guarantee

01:08:30.580 whether it's going to go up or down.

01:08:32.040 The main thing is make it at least, though,

01:08:33.220 make sure you're not going to get ripped off

01:08:34.420 in the process.

01:08:35.560 And that won't happen

01:08:36.280 because you always have control of your money

01:08:38.040 and Bitcoin Well will help you

01:08:40.020 direct it towards digital currencies

01:08:42.920 should you choose to.

01:08:43.760 So check them out, guys.

01:08:44.940 Bitcoinwell.com, a good Canadian company.

01:08:48.700 All right, let's have a look.

01:08:51.320 Let's see, there's a John Williams saying,

01:08:52.840 it's sad to see Jason resign.

01:08:54.380 Brian Jean would be a disaster

01:08:55.400 for this province,

01:08:56.020 The last thing we need is Notley running the province again.

01:08:58.740 Yeah, there's going to be a lot of discussion.

01:09:00.420 You know, I'm really looking forward to seeing more candidates surfacing out of these.

01:09:06.980 You know, so far, I mean, they've never made a secret.

01:09:09.060 We've had Daniel Smith and Brian Jean saying they're going to go for it.

01:09:11.880 But others are going to come up, as Colleen is saying, you know,

01:09:14.860 having seen me interview more people.

01:09:16.260 And that's it.

01:09:16.980 And I want to talk to, when the race gets going, I'm going to want to talk to every one of them.

01:09:20.180 I suspect there'll be a couple of UCP candidates people aren't going to like, already are perhaps.

01:09:26.580 Well, you know, you can't learn about them

01:09:28.760 without talking to them.

01:09:29.500 I'll bring them on.

01:09:30.280 If they're running, they're welcome on the show.

01:09:33.140 So let's look at some other news items

01:09:35.040 while we get going, wrapping today.

01:09:37.620 Here's some other stuff from these.

01:09:38.960 Higher costs without results. 0.98

01:09:40.280 Yes, the cabinet created two indigenous departments 0.87

01:09:43.360 that mirror, and this is in indigenous affairs

01:09:46.260 all the time, with added costs, but no results.

01:09:51.220 This is one of the issues with government in general,

01:09:53.760 and again, particularly progressive government,

01:09:57.080 where they focus everything on intention

01:10:00.140 rather than outcome.

01:10:02.340 I want it to be like this,

01:10:03.700 so we'll spend the money on this.

01:10:04.720 We won't sweat how it actually turns out.

01:10:07.100 So we're going to throw a whole bunch of money 1.00

01:10:08.880 into this indigenous department 1.00

01:10:10.100 under the presumption it's going to make things better

01:10:12.220 for indigenous people all over

01:10:13.540 and it's going to improve things for them.

01:10:16.000 And I don't want to hear about it if it fails.

01:10:17.720 Well, it's failing, guys.

01:10:18.820 You got to look at it realistically.

01:10:20.920 You got to look at it if it's going to work,

01:10:22.720 But that's not how things work in our federal government.

01:10:25.180 Well, on every level of government.

01:10:26.420 It's not just progressives who are guilty of it.

01:10:28.500 But we need results-based policy.

01:10:30.600 We need realistic policy, not just I want, I want, I want.

01:10:34.300 What is it you want that you can achieve then?

01:10:36.900 What can you do?

01:10:38.600 And these policies keep coming in.

01:10:41.100 And then you see it makes it hard to oppose it.

01:10:42.600 Because if an opposition member says, you know, you put out this bad policy for Indigenous people here and there,

01:10:49.500 they'll say, you hate Indigenous people.

01:10:51.200 No, I don't. 1.00

01:10:51.680 I hate your stupid department. 1.00

01:10:53.480 I hate you pissing money away on something that doesn't make a positive change. 1.00

01:10:57.280 But they use it to corner people, pigeonhole people.

01:10:59.260 Same with anti-poverty initiative. 0.91

01:11:01.320 You know, if it's a ridiculous, bad initiative that doesn't help, you'll get called a heartless 1.00

01:11:07.080 jerk. 0.99

01:11:07.580 And I am a heartless jerk, but all the same, I do care about some things. 1.00

01:11:10.660 You'll be called all those things if you question the policy. 0.98

01:11:13.980 And I mean, if the policy isn't working, it isn't working.

01:11:15.460 Rent control is one of those big ones.

01:11:16.900 Rent control is a dog that never, never makes it.

01:11:20.780 it's a terrible, terrible policy. It makes sense to the fiscally illiterate. So in other words,

01:11:25.300 the progressive, but anywhere when rent control gets brought in, we're saying, you know, and you

01:11:30.800 see, you could put the sob stories, you can show, and they're real. There's people under real

01:11:34.260 pressure. There's, there's families with limited incomes that are getting evicted. There's people

01:11:38.240 can't pay their bills. And you can show that when they're moving out or moving into a shelter or

01:11:42.440 into subsidized housing. So this is terrible. And you're right. It is terrible. But putting a cap

01:11:46.660 on what a landlord can charge for rent doesn't work.

01:11:51.540 See, even if your intention is to help everybody there,

01:11:53.620 it doesn't work.

01:11:54.420 That's the part you gotta face.

01:11:56.320 When you do that,

01:11:57.500 what happens is you get less rental property on the market

01:12:00.240 because people say,

01:12:00.840 well, I'm not going to spend my money

01:12:02.620 and invest and risk

01:12:03.780 and deal with managing rental properties

01:12:05.780 if I can't make money on it.

01:12:06.960 So they get out of it

01:12:07.700 and you actually end up with less housing

01:12:09.820 for the people who are most vulnerable.

01:12:12.420 Your policy has the opposite outcome

01:12:15.760 of what your intent was, but they still won't face that. They won't accept that. You've got to

01:12:22.300 have results-based policy. So particularly in areas, like I said, insensitive ones,

01:12:26.140 indigenous affairs, we're finding that, yeah, increases in spending, hiring additional employees. 0.97

01:12:31.240 And we're talking, we're not talking about small bucks here, guys. In spending, let's see, in 2019,

01:12:36.200 the estimated spending grew in that department from $14.1 billion, $14.1 billion to $18.9 billion.

01:12:44.140 the employees grew from 4,600 to 8,300

01:12:46.780 and you aren't seeing any outcome.

01:12:48.920 You aren't seeing any improvements.

01:12:49.900 You aren't seeing any benefit from this.

01:12:52.320 We're just throwing good money after bad.

01:12:54.540 And it doesn't mean that you hate indigenous people

01:12:56.800 if you oppose these policies.

01:12:58.440 It means you hate seeing the money going down the toilet.

01:13:00.920 If it's not actually working, why are we doing it?

01:13:04.720 It shouldn't be considered extreme

01:13:06.040 or unreasonable to ask these things.

01:13:08.260 We really got to change this government out.

01:13:10.540 That's one of the problems we get a lot too

01:13:12.320 in government on every level.

01:13:13.280 if they're in too long, they get stale. It doesn't matter if it's left or right.

01:13:16.800 I mean, that was one of the things back when I used to be involved in politics and I'd run

01:13:20.440 in campaigns. I was born in 71. It was the same year that the progressive conservatives got in.

01:13:25.980 And all the way into my 40s, I was able to say that in my entire life, so I'm getting to be a

01:13:31.380 middle-aged man, I'd never seen a different provincial government in Alberta. That's pretty

01:13:36.060 scary. That's way too long for any one party to be in power. It's not healthy, even if it's a

01:13:41.120 conservative type of party. And federally, same thing. So the longer the liberals are entrenched,

01:13:45.880 the uglier it's going to get. And you know what? If the conservatives got in and they were in for 0.93

01:13:49.000 12 years, things are going to be getting very stale, sour. You're going to see corruption in

01:13:52.480 a lot of those issues as well. It's important for us to stay engaged and keep turning things over.

01:13:56.900 Not, I guess, turning them over in a crazy way, like Italy goes through about 18 governments a

01:14:01.420 year or something, but we can't let them entrench too long either. Here's another justice one,

01:14:08.060 a story. It's interesting, you know, put a face to their crimes, federal prisoners who meet their

01:14:13.080 victims face to face. So let's talk about outcome based stuff are less likely to reoffend. This is

01:14:17.920 correctional service research. Because I mean, this is something I've talked about too. I mean,

01:14:22.340 I want to see violent offenders locked away for good. I do want to see a real sentence to get

01:14:26.920 these people off the streets, get them out there. But the other thing is too, for those who are 0.99

01:14:29.700 going to get out, whether we like it or not, they're going to get out. Let's do everything

01:14:32.220 we can to try and make sure they are not, you know, as well as we can, that they're not going

01:14:37.640 to reoffend, which is hard. I mean, the recidivism rates are terrible, depending on the crime.

01:14:42.580 But one of the things, apparently some data, and I can see this making sense, show them what they

01:14:46.760 did. Let them see the victims face to face. Now, this is hard because the victim doesn't necessarily

01:14:51.220 want to face the person who violated them, the person who assaulted them, the person who robbed

01:14:56.240 them. So, I mean, you can't just force the victim to come in and have to re-endure that. But for

01:14:59.840 the victims who are willing to, hey, anything that helps, show the real cost. Because these guys,

01:15:05.300 to a degree are sociopaths. They shield themselves, I'm guessing. That's the only way 0.98

01:15:09.180 they can commit crimes and sleep at night. They don't think about who they're hurting. They really

01:15:13.340 don't. They don't think farther down the line, even if it's property crimes or

01:15:16.920 other things. If you want to see the effect, when I owned

01:15:21.380 my bar, I mean, not just violent crimes, but crimes that are repeating.

01:15:25.980 When I owned my bar in Prentice, we got robbed a couple of times. There was a crime spree.

01:15:29.140 There was a gang of guys. It turned out they were extremely dangerous. It's a long, long story. I've talked

01:15:33.120 about it a couple of times. But they robbed us repeatedly and they were on the loose and they

01:15:36.800 were on a crime spree and they robbed other bars and businesses all throughout our area over the

01:15:40.360 course of weeks. It was violating. When we showing up, my wife Jane and I at our business when the

01:15:45.820 windows are smashed and they smashed all the equipment inside, they smashed my POS system,

01:15:50.400 they stole our stuff. You feel violated, you feel wronged, you feel stressed. And there's a picture

01:15:56.020 of me from a CBC interview I did because it was in the middle of all that. It'd been after about

01:15:59.340 10 days of it. And I know I'm no spring chicken and I don't look all that young at the best of

01:16:04.080 times. This was about four years ago. And I swear that picture makes me look like I'm 70 years old

01:16:07.960 because that's how stressed and exhausted and sleepless and horrible I was feeling just from

01:16:14.620 being robbed property crimes. I mean, I never even one-on-one with them. So it's just, I like

01:16:21.120 seeing some of these studies. Maybe how can we stop these jerks from reoffending at least? Maybe 0.99

01:16:26.400 if they got to face more of those people, it sounds like, and actually realize there's a cost

01:16:30.740 down the line for the actions they do, is there less of a chance they're going to re-offend. So I

01:16:35.300 like any studies that perhaps, again, that's what I'm talking about, outcome-based. Maybe if they've

01:16:38.520 done the study and found it didn't help, well then don't bother with it. But I want to see

01:16:44.280 things happening. The best thing that can ever happen with anybody who does go to jail is that

01:16:48.720 they come out and don't offend again. You know, it's the thing we can always hope for. I mean,

01:16:56.100 then they can get to work. They can participate in society. They're not going to stress people

01:16:59.100 anymore. Let them go. I'm not big on the whole vengeance idea. I understand it. Oh, rest assured,

01:17:05.260 I wouldn't have minded a few day moments with those guys who kept robbing me with some thumb

01:17:10.200 screws. But all the same, it's not beneficial. If they can just get reformed and get out and be

01:17:14.140 safe for them, it's a better outcome for everybody. John Williams saying we need the right for open

01:17:19.880 and concealed carry more guns for clothing. I'm with you. I'm fine with that. And part of the

01:17:24.360 things too. And if you're not gonna, you know, if we don't have the resources to protect ourselves

01:17:28.500 from criminals and robbers and things such as that, allow us the ability to protect our own

01:17:32.180 stuff. You know, look at the crap Eddie Maurice had to go through because he defended his family 0.70

01:17:35.520 and his baby in and out of the court system for months and months. We should have the ability to 0.90

01:17:42.560 defend ourselves and our property and with force if need be. So that's another area of justice

01:17:47.940 reform. I should have asked Sheree about that one. I wish I had in hindsight, but I'll get the chance

01:17:51.920 to talk to him again. So yeah, here we go. I'm just that story about what I was going on about

01:17:56.260 before too, with that BS, with the conservative race, with Michelle Rebel Garner and Patrick

01:18:00.280 Brown. They're investigating a complaint now against party lodged by Patrick Brown's campaign

01:18:06.100 about a racist email. It says it received from a member and she threw it out on Twitter and a

01:18:10.520 Canadian press of course is reporting on it. They say they haven't been provided with a copy of it,

01:18:14.860 by the way. Guys, is this it? Is this really it? Every random, stupid, extreme email gets a press

01:18:24.040 release nationally, goes out to an investigation by the party. Every dumb asshole who can set up 1.00

01:18:32.340 a Gmail account, spend $10, take out a membership and write what could be a completely anonymous 1.00

01:18:37.520 email and say they're a supporter of somebody. It's repugnant. And I'm still ticked off. You 0.87

01:18:42.340 could tell I get ticked off. I like Michelle. She's done some decent things, although I was 0.99

01:18:47.300 critical of her. Of course, yeah, John Williams brought up with her weird, bizarre apology for

01:18:50.940 being white at one time. And now with this crap, this is shredding your own party. This is burning 1.00

01:18:56.500 your own party to the ground with liberal style crap, with fake race baiting. There's no need for 1.00

01:19:04.460 this. None. It's repugnant. Your candidate Brown doesn't have a bloody chance. I don't even know

01:19:09.660 why he's in the race. He won't talk to us. He won't talk to any media. He didn't even attend

01:19:15.040 the first debates. So you're just going to sit there and play a spoiler. You're just going to

01:19:19.660 lob these turns into the punch bowl throughout the race. You know, this isn't going to win you

01:19:24.960 the race. Not by any means. I don't think he plans on it. Getting to conspiracy theories and things

01:19:29.940 like that. Look up stalking horse because I'm starting to think that might be a little what

01:19:33.080 we've got going on there. Let's see. Canada's public safety minister. Yes, again, the man who

01:19:39.580 was found lying 11 times at committee meetings, lying, outright lies, doesn't matter. And he's

01:19:49.280 saying racism, white supremacy, behind the mass shooting in Buffalo, New York. And that was

01:19:52.740 horrible. That's just an awful, awful thing. There's the most extreme of awful examples. I

01:19:57.200 mean, again, you know, we get frustrated with the race baiting, but we can't deny that it really 0.99

01:20:00.860 exists. And there really are some dangerous, sick lunatics out there. And that sick man killed 1.00

01:20:05.800 all those people it's awful but then when you see the political games when you see this public 0.76

01:20:11.620 safety minister just reminding everybody this is all alive and well in canada too oh bs cut it out

01:20:16.400 doesn't mean we don't have that kind of lunatic here but it's extremely rare don't start getting

01:20:20.760 people scared don't start making people divided don't start saying this is a problem up here

01:20:24.820 that's the american culture wars i spent years working in the united states i love it down there

01:20:29.660 i love america but they got some very serious social issues going on that hope they can address

01:20:34.480 particularly when it comes to race.

01:20:36.600 We don't have those same issues here. 0.89

01:20:38.260 It's not to say we don't have any.

01:20:39.660 We've always got stuff we can improve on.

01:20:41.560 But quit trying to make direct comparisons

01:20:43.000 with their mess with ours,

01:20:43.960 because that is not fair.

01:20:45.400 It's not right.

01:20:46.220 It's not making anything better.

01:20:47.360 That public safety minister,

01:20:48.300 if there's any minister second to Gilboa,

01:20:50.400 should be thrown out of there.

01:20:51.380 Well, not to mention the prime minister.

01:20:52.980 He's up in there, that Mendocino. 1.00

01:20:54.520 He's full of crap. 1.00

01:20:55.680 He's a political opportunist. 1.00

01:20:57.540 And he's trash. 1.00

01:20:59.960 All right. 1.00

01:21:00.980 Well, I think that's enough out of me for a little while.

01:21:02.700 Let's see what else we got going here.

01:21:05.860 Probably going to work towards wrapping things up

01:21:07.980 as we get towards a long weekend.

01:21:09.820 Battle of Alberta is going on tomorrow.

01:21:13.740 I've got, yes, so this is going to be two representatives

01:21:17.340 from the Association for Disability Workers.

01:21:20.800 This is an interesting one.

01:21:22.320 They've been in a wage battle.

01:21:23.320 You might have seen a bit of that in the news.

01:21:25.320 And these are people who work with individuals

01:21:27.020 with disabilities at all sorts of levels.

01:21:28.800 They're caretakers, care individuals.

01:21:31.400 It's a tough job.

01:21:32.080 it's not an easy one. And they haven't gotten a raise in something like seven years. I mean,

01:21:37.680 the cost of living for everything has gone up. It's one of those areas where, and they're not

01:21:42.000 unionized, they're not necessarily direct civil servants. But as a conservative, one of the

01:21:47.400 things I've always felt, our obligation is always to take care of those who can't take care of

01:21:51.740 themselves. You know, it's distinguishing between those who can and those who won't. But people with 0.97

01:21:56.300 serious disabilities can't. And those are the ones we should help. Those are the ones I don't mind a

01:21:59.740 my tax dollars going towards helping. And the people we have in charge of that are grossly

01:22:04.360 underpaid. And of course that puts the, the, the living standard of living for disabled people at

01:22:09.160 risk and, and a lot of things. So I'm going to talk to them a bit about that and what they got

01:22:12.240 going on. Uh, then I'm going to talk to a Franco Terrizano because, uh, yes, uh, Taxpayers Federation

01:22:17.000 we're due. I haven't had him on in a few weeks, but there's always tax talk, spending talk,

01:22:20.640 things like that. And, uh, Franco and I are going to have a chat about a few more things. I think

01:22:24.420 he was talking about a gas tax freedom day and some other things they've released. So

01:22:27.520 that and updates on whatever's going on in the caucus meeting today and whatever other news

01:22:33.020 breaks in the next 24 hours and more. So thanks for joining us today, guys. That was a good show.

01:22:38.800 I appreciate the interaction and I'll see you all tomorrow morning at 1130 a.m. sharp.

01:22:57.520 We'll be right back.

Western Standard - May 20, 2022

Triggered： Let the UCP leadership race begin

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