Western Standard - Triggered： UCP leadership rules show they still just don’t get it

00:00:00.000 Thank you.

00:00:30.000 Good morning. It's June 14th, 2022. Welcome to Triggered. I'm Corey Morgan. It's a dreary

00:00:40.500 and dark one out there as we're in for a rainy few days here in southern Alberta. Everybody's

00:00:46.100 worked up the flood warnings and the rest. I guess, you know, as long as it's manageable,

00:00:49.840 getting that forest fire risk down and getting some rain into the ground for the hay and the

00:00:54.760 farmers probably won't hurt. Let's just hope it doesn't break the banks, but we shall see,

00:00:59.380 I guess. So this being live, this is where I like to remind everybody, hey, make use of that

00:01:04.860 comment scroll. I really appreciate it when you do. Good to see you there, Helen. And chat with

00:01:10.260 each other, send comments, send me questions, ideas for the guests, things like that. Keeps it

00:01:15.260 interactive, makes it worth doing live, keeps this fluid. And I just like seeing them out there. So

00:01:19.160 I know I'm not just talking into the ether and thin air. There's actually people on the other

00:01:23.240 end listening to this, whether they're appreciating it or loathing me, it doesn't matter as long as

00:01:27.380 listening to our sponsors. So good to see all there. Randy, Gregory, Lori, all kinds of folks

00:01:33.000 joining in. Arthur Green. Oh, that guy. Now there's a character. All right. So let's look into our

00:01:39.060 daily observances before we get onto the serious stuff. And there's plenty of it. And yeah, Arthur

00:01:42.780 saying it's time to build an ark. It could be. We'll see what we can save. There's a few creatures

00:01:46.760 I wouldn't. A few people I wouldn't. But that's a separate story altogether. So it is National

00:01:52.580 Corn on the Cob Day. You don't want to forget this one. This is important. Hey, everybody loves

00:01:56.840 corn on the cob. A little bad if you've got gaps in your teeth, I guess. Maybe they should couple

00:02:00.760 it with dental floss day or something like that, but corn on the cob is a fine dish, a summer one.

00:02:06.920 Barbecuing it out here in Alberta might not work out so well today, but come on, it's easy to boil

00:02:10.460 it, slap some butter on that thing and have at it. So make sure to observe that corn on the cob day

00:02:15.920 and then, you know, you always have something to brighten your morning during your constitutional

00:02:20.380 the day after. And it is World Bike Naked Day. Yes, you don't want to forget that one. Get out

00:02:26.640 there, jump on the bike, have a ride. Again, it's a little rainy, but that'll really show your

00:02:30.800 dedication if you're out in that cool weather. And, you know, just share what you got. I don't

00:02:38.160 know how they come up with this sort of thing. They come up with these, and I imagine it'll also

00:02:41.820 be, maybe it's lawyers who come up with this sort of thing, because they know they can make a fair

00:02:46.400 amount of money trying to defend the people who got arrested for cycling around naked and of

00:02:50.740 course like so many things in life not everybody should really be wandering around naked out there

00:02:54.820 not to knock them I mean hey rest assured you don't want to see me without clothing on it's

00:02:58.900 not a pretty sight the years have done their thing to me either way if that's your thing

00:03:04.020 today is the day to strip down get on your bike and pedal around a little and show your neighbors

00:03:10.260 what you're all about okay let's see so a couple of guests today this can be interesting a little

00:03:15.200 different, you know, outside of the political a bit. And her name is Aurora Townsend, and she's 0.83

00:03:20.200 started a software or an app business on, it's in the metaverse. It's basically, it's called

00:03:25.740 Planet Theta, and it's virtual dating, like in a virtual coffee shop. It's those things like we

00:03:31.320 see on TV, that virtual world, people moving in and living in there, socializing with each other,

00:03:35.800 interacting. And she's responded to some things because I guess women on there even tend to deal

00:03:40.400 with a bit of harassment and issues, unfortunately, almost too much like real life. But it's a weird

00:03:44.860 development. I think I'm of an age where I'm going to miss that boat of virtual living online, but

00:03:49.800 it's obviously a big and growing thing out there. So it'll be an interesting conversation with us,

00:03:55.380 see how that's coming along and what's going on with that. Then I'm going to speak to Ryder Lee.

00:03:59.640 He's the CEO of the Saskatchewan Cattlemen's Association. And of course, they are not happy

00:04:05.920 with the proposed labeling on ground beef products coming out of Health Canada and the usual

00:04:13.000 targeting of Western industries and just, you know, how is it when you, how does it feel when

00:04:18.000 you have an industry, a business, something you're making a living with, and you have a government

00:04:20.800 agency basically wanting to tell the whole world that your product's unhealthy and wrongly tell

00:04:25.100 them at that. And to make sure that you can't sell it without having that front and center

00:04:29.480 on the labeling in front of them. So that'll be, I suspect I have an idea of how Mr. Lee is going

00:04:35.020 to feel about that, but we'll have him on for a conversation to be sure. All right. Something

00:04:39.880 that broke in on the news today. The rules for the UCP leadership race have finally come out.

00:04:47.160 I shouldn't say finally. They weren't terribly delayed. They got it going in a reasonable speed.

00:04:52.200 But unfortunately, it's not good. The UCP has now shed the last remnants of being a grassroots-based

00:04:59.140 party with the release of these leadership rules. Now, if a person wants to throw their hat into the

00:05:03.860 ring and run for the UCP leadership, they're going to have to come up with no less than $175,000

00:05:08.760 in order to do so. $100,000 of that fee plus a $25,000 deposit has to be paid by July 29th,

00:05:18.320 you know, a month and change, and the remaining $50,000 has to be paid two weeks later.

00:05:24.220 That sort of fee for participation in what's supposed to be a democratic exercise is a slap

00:05:28.260 in the face for people who value bottom-up grassroots politics. There's good reasons

00:05:33.160 for deposits and adding a cost for entry in leadership races. I'm not denying that.

00:05:37.460 Leadership races are serious business,

00:05:39.020 particularly when the new leader will become the premier of the province.

00:05:42.620 A bar has to be set to ensure the contender is making a serious bid for the position

00:05:46.300 and has the ability to reasonably contest it.

00:05:49.500 It's difficult to run a race if there's over a dozen contestants in there,

00:05:52.840 so, you know, you want to kind of narrow the field.

00:05:54.920 That said, too damn bad.

00:05:57.020 Who said it's supposed to be easy?

00:05:58.080 If we end up with 12 in there, so what?

00:05:59.720 Let's have at it. May the best candidate win.

00:06:01.680 The bar has never been set for a provincial race like this as ridiculously high as $175,000.

00:06:09.360 In the 2017 race, contestants had to pay two installments of $37,500, and they had months to do it.

00:06:17.120 There was also a $20,000 deposit.

00:06:19.780 That totaled $80,000 less than this upcoming race and with a much longer timeline for organization getting ready to do it.

00:06:27.280 In 2017, despite the much lower bar for entry as well, only four candidates entered that race.

00:06:32.020 It's safe to say the bar was high enough to be effective.

00:06:34.380 It may, in fact, even have been too high at that time.

00:06:37.240 No signatures were required from members in 2017 either, by the way.

00:06:40.880 In the 2022 race, you need 1,000 signatures from members, and it's going to be required from a number of regions.

00:06:46.920 Now, I'm okay with setting a high bar for petition signatures.

00:06:49.480 A candidate can meet that requirement with hard work and good organization, even if they don't have a large campaign war chest.

00:06:55.820 It also stops somebody who may have more money than they know what they do with,

00:06:59.180 and they're just going to toss a whimsical application in for the job.

00:07:02.440 There's a minimum bar of work that's going to be required.

00:07:05.720 A deposit for compliance is good policy as well.

00:07:08.620 I've served on leadership committees, and I know all too well what kind of stunts some campaigns can try and pull off.

00:07:15.920 Having a deposit on file helps encourage good behavior on the part of the campaigns,

00:07:20.160 and it gives the party a means to quietly discipline campaigns if it's required,

00:07:24.140 rather than turning it into a public debacle.

00:07:27.540 If a candidate is trustworthy and has good connections,

00:07:29.520 they could perhaps find sponsors confident enough to front the fee,

00:07:32.480 at least for the deposit, but the knowledge they'll get it back later.

00:07:35.880 Now, Albertans rejected the Progressive Conservative Party

00:07:38.740 because it had become too elitist and disconnected from ground-level citizens.

00:07:42.560 The Wildrose Party grew and flourished as people embraced

00:07:45.020 the grassroots principles of the movement,

00:07:47.520 reminiscent of the Reform Party of the 1990s.

00:07:50.160 We like the idea that as members we count,

00:07:52.660 and anybody can reasonably contest any position within the party even if they aren't part of a

00:07:56.920 well-heeled establishment. Much of the decline of the UCP in support in this last couple of years

00:08:02.500 has been due to the top-down management style of Jason Kenney since he became premier. People felt

00:08:07.760 the party had returned to the PC style of closed-door elitism and they were right. To quote

00:08:13.540 Rick Bell, Tory Land had returned. In setting such a ridiculously high bar for entry into the

00:08:19.320 leadership race, the UCP is demonstrating that they still don't have a clue why their support

00:08:23.860 both in the polls and in grassroots financial contributions has plummeted. If they do have a

00:08:29.060 clue, they're demonstrating they don't care. And I'm not sure which is worse. This does not bode

00:08:32.860 well for a party reliant on strong rural support for donations and volunteers. And of course,

00:08:38.420 there's urban people who value grassroots participation as well. Elitism is not going

00:08:42.640 to draw back the members who had turned away because the party's return to the old progressive

00:08:47.560 of conservative ways. The UCP has an opportunity to rebrand itself and rejuvenate. They can

00:08:52.640 demonstrate to former supporters, and there's a lot of former ones now, that they've learned

00:08:56.980 their lesson in this last four years, and they're going to return to the grassroots principles they

00:09:00.640 sold to voters when the party was formed. Instead, the UCP is appearing tone-deaf and elitist.

00:09:07.120 One can hope the new leader, and I'm not going to blame the leader candidates for this,

00:09:11.480 for whoever it might be, can change this perception. For now, though, Rachel Notley's

00:09:16.020 rubbing her hands together in anticipation of another term as premier, while the UCP

00:09:20.180 appears as determined as ever to alienate its own support base. I'd really hoped for better.

00:09:26.420 All right. Well, that rant out of the way. Let's check into the newsroom with our news editor,

00:09:30.900 Dave Naylor, and see what else is top of the news today. Hey, Dave, how's it going?

00:09:34.360 Good, Corey. Did you miss me yesterday?

00:09:36.840 Terribly, terribly.

00:09:38.340 I had to go to Edmonton to attend my daughter's graduation at the University of Alberta. She

00:09:43.980 She got her master's degree.

00:09:45.580 She's now a qualified physiotherapist, working away at the Foothills Hospital.

00:09:50.820 So a great day for us.

00:09:52.000 And I understand it's a day of celebration for Jane.

00:09:56.060 It is, yes.

00:09:57.280 Jane's another year older right now.

00:10:00.280 You know, she's turning 40 or something like that.

00:10:02.920 I thought it was 29, you told me.

00:10:04.600 Something like that, yes.

00:10:05.560 I'm not sure.

00:10:06.040 I have learned through a course of a number of failed relationships or getting myself in trouble

00:10:11.440 that I'll just forget what her age is

00:10:13.000 and we'll celebrate the birthday all the same.

00:10:14.660 There you go.

00:10:15.420 So knowing you, I take it you're leaving work early

00:10:17.640 to go try and find a present?

00:10:19.320 If I can manage to sneak out, yeah.

00:10:21.840 The usual 7-Eleven shopping centre.

00:10:24.120 Yeah, well, you've got the bees arriving tonight, right? 0.99

00:10:26.440 I do.

00:10:27.100 We've got our new bees coming in.

00:10:28.360 I've been waiting for months

00:10:29.160 and I've got to try and put those things

00:10:30.560 into a new hive in the rain.

00:10:32.760 It's going to be interesting.

00:10:34.120 So I'll probably have some great welts

00:10:36.140 and stings to show off tomorrow.

00:10:37.840 Okay, is there going to be an ambulance

00:10:40.160 on standby in Prentice for anaphylactic shock?

00:10:44.020 No, I don't respond that badly to them. 0.80

00:10:45.680 I'll just whine and run around and be a wimp. 0.72

00:10:48.140 Good for you.

00:10:49.660 Yeah, busy day in the news already today.

00:10:52.380 At this very moment, the Liberals are holding a press conference

00:10:55.480 talking about what they're going to be doing with vaccine mandates.

00:10:59.440 Looks like they're dropping them all over the place

00:11:01.900 as Trudeau flew back with COVID.

00:11:05.600 So it looks like people are going to be able to travel

00:11:08.740 without having to be vaccinated.

00:11:11.860 So good news for thousands and thousands of Canadians.

00:11:16.180 Not so much good news for a Flames fan.

00:11:18.840 The legendary trainer, Bearcat Murray,

00:11:22.900 passed away today at the age of 89.

00:11:25.820 He was a Flames trainer for decades

00:11:29.020 and a stalwart in the community,

00:11:30.780 and he's certainly going to be missed.

00:11:33.580 Speaking of the UCP leadership,

00:11:36.240 Former Children's Minister Rebecca Schultz is announcing at 1.30 this afternoon.

00:11:42.740 Her campaign is on.

00:11:45.740 Rebecca Emanuel talked to her prior, and we've got a story up there on that.

00:11:51.620 And, yeah, holy cow, Corey, is it ever wet out there?

00:11:54.060 We've got Eva Sudwick with a flooding update for not only Calgary but southern Alberta,

00:12:00.060 and even the southern B.C. is getting hammered with snow, believe it or not.

00:12:05.300 I saw a photo out of Elkford yesterday, and it looked like a good foot of snow.

00:12:10.900 The Liberals have brought in closure, invoked closure on the new bill to C-11 to restrict the Internet.

00:12:20.420 Elizabeth May, who's actually not crazy on this one, says that she's seen,

00:12:26.020 And she says even Stephen Harper wouldn't do something as censorship as that.

00:12:32.880 And we've got to follow on that Ontario school who sent a permission slip home for kids to sign if they wanted to get a flag on Flag Day.

00:12:41.760 And the school has responded by saying, hey, you know what?

00:12:44.680 Some people may be it may harm them to receive a Canadian flag if they've been if they've been wronged in the past.

00:12:52.140 So that and some other stories up there, Corey.

00:12:55.120 And our Amanda Brown has got a story on Buzz Lightyear, the new Disney Pixar flick coming out shortly.

00:13:03.140 It has been banned in 14 countries, and her story will tell you why.

00:13:07.960 And we've got another story on the elephant in the New York Zoo.

00:13:12.240 His name is Happy, but today he is sad because a judge has ruled he is not a person and has to stay in captivity.

00:13:20.380 So how that ever gets to court is beyond me.

00:13:23.220 but we'll have the stories up soon, Corey.

00:13:25.760 Well, it's good to know our American cousins

00:13:28.840 that their court challenges are as crazy

00:13:30.460 as we Canadians are with ours.

00:13:32.340 So there's some comfort to be taken in that.

00:13:34.820 You bet.

00:13:35.800 All right.

00:13:36.300 Well, thanks for the update, Dave.

00:13:37.660 And we'll talk to you after the show.

00:13:39.600 Thanks, Corey.

00:13:40.800 So that is our news editor, Dave Naylor,

00:13:43.760 with his newly graduated daughter.

00:13:46.600 I can't think of a better reason to take a day off work

00:13:48.660 than to celebrate something like that.

00:13:50.600 It's not a trivial thing to go out and do.

00:13:52.760 So congratulations are in order there.

00:13:55.080 And just that reminder to everybody,

00:13:56.880 the reason we have so many reporters across the country

00:13:59.440 or the reason we're bringing out these stories

00:14:01.800 on such a timely breaking fashion like this

00:14:04.300 and all of this unique content

00:14:05.260 is because of you guys who've been subscribing.

00:14:07.520 So I wanna thank everybody who's subscribed so far.

00:14:09.920 It's been fantastic.

00:14:10.900 Our growth has been just awesome this last couple of years.

00:14:15.040 And if you haven't subscribed yet,

00:14:16.720 hey, come on, get on there, guys.

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00:14:21.520 It's not much.

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00:14:40.180 So check it out, guys.

00:14:41.660 Westernstandard.news slash membership.

00:14:44.700 I'll have to look into that one.

00:14:45.860 You know what?

00:14:46.100 The Buzz Lightyear is banned in 14 countries.

00:14:49.240 What on earth?

00:14:50.540 I mean, we got a hypersensitive world

00:14:52.560 and a lot of things that get people worked up.

00:14:55.200 I just would have thought of all the movies,

00:14:57.140 you know, Toy Story, I think, you know,

00:14:58.420 because of my kids and the age they were,

00:14:59.860 I saw the original one more times than I like to think of,

00:15:02.880 but it was still a fun, kitschy little movie.

00:15:04.520 I don't think there was anything all that offensive

00:15:06.460 or, you know, problematic with that one.

00:15:09.340 I couldn't see how this sequel would be,

00:15:12.120 but who knows?

00:15:12.720 We'll look into that, as I said, myself.

00:15:14.500 Even I'll have to get onto the site

00:15:15.520 and catch up with the news as it comes.

00:15:17.760 So let's see.

00:15:19.360 I'm going to get through my sponsor, too, before we get on to our guest.

00:15:22.800 And that is Bitcoin Well.

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00:15:30.760 So many things are becoming virtual.

00:15:32.620 They're going online.

00:15:34.140 They're going outside.

00:15:35.140 Well, currencies are no exception.

00:15:37.100 Bitcoin, of course, is the big one everybody's heard of.

00:15:39.500 But a lot of us don't know how the heck do you get into it?

00:15:41.360 How do you get involved in it?

00:15:42.380 How do you buy into it?

00:15:43.360 Is it for you?

00:15:44.720 Well, or is it a trustworthy company getting you involved with it?

00:15:48.840 that's the important thing. Well, Bitcoin Well is a good local company out here, publicly traded,

00:15:54.280 offering free personalized one-on-one consultation. You can sit down with a person

00:15:58.620 and talk about how to set up your Bitcoin wallet, how much you want to put in, how you're going to

00:16:03.320 put it in, how you can pay your utility bills, all sorts of things. They facilitate your entry

00:16:07.920 into the world of digital currencies through Bitcoin and they're trustworthy. So if you're

00:16:12.660 curious about it, again, maybe it's not for you, but you know, this is the site to go to, to check

00:16:16.340 out to find out all things Bitcoin and see if they offer a product that can help you take control

00:16:23.000 of your money. All right, bitcoinwell.com. Yeah, so I'll just go on to one news thing. We're still

00:16:28.640 a few minutes from our guest segment here. As people might know out here, we are into some

00:16:33.300 heavy duty rains going on. And the flood warnings were in a state of emergency in the city of

00:16:37.500 Calgary right now. I think it's a bit a bit exaggerated. I think they've pulled the trigger

00:16:42.380 early. You listen to most meteorologists, they're saying they don't anticipate floods like we saw

00:16:46.120 2013. But when we consider that the entire city and towns and everybody got flooded so badly out

00:16:51.000 here nine years ago, people can be forgiven for being worried about it. And you know, I'm very

00:16:55.780 hard on Mayor Gondek a lot, and I will continue to be. But in this case, I, well, I can just see

00:17:02.400 politically and also, I guess, in a safety sense, why calling the state of emergency and just being

00:17:07.560 at the ready is important right now. I don't think anything's going to happen. Most of the reports

00:17:11.780 make it sound like we've got our preparations well underway. But you know, if things go out of

00:17:16.660 control, the river crests, the banks, we flood the downtown again, we, you know, if we suddenly have

00:17:20.220 thousands of houses flooded again, like we did nine years ago, everybody's gonna be screaming,

00:17:24.480 why didn't you do something about it in advance? Why didn't you prepare for this? Why weren't you

00:17:28.060 ready? So I'm not going to complain when I see the city making preparations and giving warnings,

00:17:34.480 even if it seems like perhaps they're going a little too far with it and overreacting. It's

00:17:41.100 better in this sort of case to overreact, do some of these things and, you know, catch the crap for

00:17:48.020 it later than to not take it seriously and suddenly find ourselves in a catastrophe like we did 10

00:17:53.760 years ago, nine years ago out here. So we'll see what happens. Hopefully the rain stays decent.

00:17:59.020 One of the things I'd heard is because, you know, most of what caught us the last time was the hot

00:18:01.940 weather hitting the mountains. So the snowpack melted so quickly, coupled with that rain that

00:18:06.540 it just overwhelmed, you know, the runoff, the flow, and it nailed us. What's happening this

00:18:10.540 time, though, is it's quite cool out in the mountains. So most of what's coming down out

00:18:14.100 there is still snow. And that means it's probably not going to come rushing down as heavily as it

00:18:20.000 did again back in 2013 when we got hit so hard and flooded so terribly that time. So, well,

00:18:26.380 just take care out there, though. If you live in High River, you live in those areas in Bowness

00:18:29.780 and Calgary, of course, you know, check your sump pumps. Make sure your drain pipes are pointed

00:18:34.280 away from the house. Jean came in all soaked yesterday doing it at our place. I think it was

00:18:37.260 one of those things she told me 10 times to do, and I never got around to, so get that water away

00:18:42.460 from your foundation, and we'll get through this, and on the bright side, like I said, brings down

00:18:46.680 that forest fire hazard. Okay, let's bring in my guest. This is something totally foreign to me,

00:18:52.380 so which is why I'm looking forward to it. I like learning here, and this is something I'm just not

00:18:56.300 familiar with, but it's definitely a growing field and area, and that's just virtual reality living,

00:19:01.580 So this is Aurora Townsend, and she has put together, what is that again?

00:19:09.380 Theta, Project Theta?

00:19:11.100 I don't know if I get that right. 0.89

00:19:12.080 So let's bring Aurora in so she can, yeah, Planet Theta, there we go.

00:19:14.720 I didn't say I got to keep up with my own notes.

00:19:16.660 So thank you very much for joining me today.

00:19:19.320 I've been looking forward to this.

00:19:20.500 It's quite interesting.

00:19:22.300 Thank you for having me.

00:19:23.560 I'm always excited for another opportunity to talk about Planet Theta.

00:19:27.520 It's kind of been my baby project since COVID has started.

00:19:30.840 So I'm really excited for this opportunity.

00:19:33.520 Thank you.

00:19:34.460 Yeah.

00:19:34.700 So this is an aspect of a virtual reality world.

00:19:37.800 And it's, I guess, very focused on the dating thing, right?

00:19:40.640 Like you can hold virtual dates.

00:19:42.200 I saw things such as a virtual coffee shop.

00:19:44.480 You would presumably hook up, meet somebody there and socialize within this virtual setting.

00:19:49.760 Yeah.

00:19:50.340 So in Planet Data, there's so many ways that you can meet people and date people.

00:19:54.060 You can do it the more old-fashioned way where you can go to like one of our bars or dance clubs.

00:19:58.700 And, you know, you can chat people and, you know, see if you have chemistry that way.

00:20:02.320 We have a thing called micro dating, which allows you to have three one on one, like 90 seconds or like speed dates with people.

00:20:10.560 And you can match people that way if you're not comfortable with just walking up to people in a bar.

00:20:15.840 But not only that, you get to actually go on dates with people.

00:20:19.920 So it's like you can have the experiences of going to the theater or playing mini golf.

00:20:25.060 So if you're long distance, it's a perfect opportunity for you to keep building connections

00:20:29.540 with one another. I would hope and imagine though, I mean, is the intent, well, I guess some people

00:20:34.340 will be content just to always have a virtual relationship, I guess, but maybe eventually

00:20:38.260 moving on to meeting in person. Like, I just worry that we're creating a lot of introverts sometimes

00:20:42.740 with some of these new ways of meeting. I completely agree, actually. I don't think

00:20:48.660 it's going to turn solely into VR relationships only. I mean, think about dating apps. The majority

00:20:54.980 people meet through dating apps and that's cool they continue to have relationships people get

00:20:59.540 married but they still have that blend of digital and the physical world and that's where i think

00:21:04.580 planet theta will be it'll kind of be not necessarily replacing dating apps but it'll allow

00:21:10.500 a new avenue for people to date yeah and i mean i met my wife quite some years ago and we met

00:21:16.740 actually online through through a dating app way back one of the ones that would be considered

00:21:20.100 primitive now but people at the time were even saying oh my god you can't meet people on there

00:21:23.940 and it can't be serious? Well, no, lots of people do now and it's commonplace. You know, how much

00:21:28.200 well, how much did you learn in the old days? You know, people as gray as me when you had to meet

00:21:32.440 somebody in a loud bar when you're half drunk and try and determine if it's an appropriate

00:21:35.380 relationship, a lot of fails. But something that was interesting, I guess some of the aspects of

00:21:40.540 reality and a bad aspect of reality that creeps in is there's been issues that you're addressing

00:21:45.940 with harassment and problematic people even in the virtual environment. So you can't necessarily

00:21:50.560 escape the creeps even when you go virtually sometimes. Well, for that reason, we have been

00:21:56.460 really focusing on security and supportment of minorities and women specifically because of all

00:22:02.080 the harassment that we've come to accept as part of our dating culture. And we're trying to provide

00:22:07.240 tools to women and just everyone in general so that they have a feeling of like being safe and

00:22:12.960 protected, whether that's being able to mute someone, being able to block someone in a public

00:22:17.200 settings so their avatar cannot interact with you ever again, to not being able to message

00:22:22.800 your partner until you guys like actually both match like consent to it. So that way it avoids

00:22:29.360 random messaging to people because I cannot tell you how many times random men messaged me and

00:22:34.480 harassed me and it's frankly annoying. So we want to prevent that. Yeah, and I can see the levels of

00:22:42.560 a, I guess it's a way a person can ease in carefully and feel safer. If you're starting

00:22:47.600 a relationship, I mean, through that aspect of things. Something else is you allow a lot more

00:22:52.000 diversity in relationships. It's open to LGBTQ community members, people such as that.

00:22:59.120 Yeah, actually, fun fact, the majority of VR users are in the LGBTQA space. We allow people a

00:23:07.040 safe avenue to express their true feelings for one another without you know being afraid of

00:23:13.280 whatever cultural traditions that are being put upon them it's it's a space for everyone to

00:23:19.840 experience love and i truly believe everyone deserves a chance to love and to be loved and

00:23:25.680 we don't have that across the whole world and in planet theta you you can do that and one of the

00:23:31.760 great things about that is too it's for adults only we are very strict on 18 plus if there's

00:23:38.640 any ounce of a kid kicked off immediately until we manually review the account yeah so and i mean

00:23:46.080 that's really good i mean there are people in different situations as you said whether it's

00:23:49.600 culturally or they might be in a rural area where it's there's just not many opportunities to get

00:23:53.680 out you know in a city a person could go out to different types of establishments where there's

00:23:57.040 There's more people in those communities so that they could get involved without having to travel.

00:24:03.780 And, you know, especially if they're exploring something new and they're younger, it's a safe environment to try and do such.

00:24:09.120 Exactly.

00:24:10.200 So when you were talking, though, about then establishing whether somebody is an adult, how can you do that?

00:24:17.400 Like, I imagine you've got to protect the elements of privacy at the same time as trying to find a way to confirm that these are appropriate people on there.

00:24:25.160 uh well in your account setup you know we ask for uh similar to tinder we have a you know photo

00:24:32.120 verification to make sure you are who you say you are we have um uh photo uh other types of photo

00:24:39.720 identification for like ais to determine your age we also have come up with different ideas of being

00:24:44.760 able to like scan the back of your id similar to like bars and anywhere where you need to be 21

00:24:50.520 plus at least here in the us we do that um and a lot of apps are kind of turning to that and we are

00:24:56.840 thinking about implementing that to just to make sure that you're over 18 because you know we don't

00:25:01.880 want to put any children at risk here and we also want adults to feel safe to talk to random

00:25:09.080 strangers yeah so is this uh like an independent app or is this integrated with another platform

00:25:15.080 Like, how does somebody get, I guess, into this virtual universe?

00:25:20.180 Well, we are on the headsets, VR headsets.

00:25:24.000 You can see here, my buddy over there, he's wearing one, for example.

00:25:28.880 You can get on there, and that's how you get into the planet data, into the VR world.

00:25:34.340 However, we do have an accompanied phone app where you can upload pictures,

00:25:38.420 add to your account, message with people you are in relationships with,

00:25:42.080 so you don't always have to be in VR and if you're not fully comfortable yet with releasing your

00:25:45.760 personal information you can talk to them through there. You can't really access the app through

00:25:52.320 the mobile app you have to have the headset on. We will be coming to like PC VR later this year

00:25:59.280 but at first we'll be releasing on the standalone headset itself. Okay so a person needs some degree

00:26:05.600 of hardware as well then to properly take part in this virtual world as well or you just you're

00:26:10.400 running the mobile laptop you won't quite be able to do it well i mean yes no like um it's not

00:26:16.400 necessarily out of reach for the majority of people because uh compare the oculus quest 2 for

00:26:22.560 example a quest 2 typically runs about 299 us dollars your phone costs about 1500 1200 gaming

00:26:30.720 consoles cost about 900 these days if you think about it it's really affordable to access it's

00:26:37.280 cheaper than your laptop and headsets are aiming to replace your work your laptop your phone within

00:26:44.480 the next five to ten years so it's kind of easier to jump on the bandwagon now and like i truly

00:26:50.960 believe too with the um new headsets coming out it's just going to keep getting cheaper and cheaper

00:26:57.040 and more accessible to people oh certainly and technology does and and uh you know a few nights

00:27:02.400 in the bar could cost upwards of what that equipment would cost you as well anyways with

00:27:06.000 the price of drinks and getting around and uber and all the rest of it exactly so is this uh

00:27:12.240 like does this tie into more though i guess then beyond the the um the dating aspect of it you

00:27:17.360 know there's whole virtual reality worlds being created out there and and themes and platforms

00:27:22.400 is this just sort of independent and focused on dating or or is it going to be kind of part of

00:27:26.720 a broader whole uh you know universe out there well right now our focus is on dating but one of

00:27:32.160 the main reasons why we chose the name planet theta was because we wanted to make a universe

00:27:37.040 to make a world like that you can access part of your life and your friends that are across the

00:27:43.840 world together in one space uh however our main focus is dating just because there's not really

00:27:50.320 a platform that supports this and um i still believe that people need a new way to connect

00:27:55.600 in dating compared to dating apps because frankly they're awful yeah so uh i guess i i just want to

00:28:02.960 i mean it all sounds fascinating i see a lot of benefits i i just worry about some of the

00:28:06.400 the drawbacks like if somebody has a negative self-image things like that and that's part of

00:28:09.920 what keeps them out and they've created a new one in a in a virtual world but you know could it help

00:28:15.840 unfortunately entrench some of their negative personal feelings you know outside of that world

00:28:19.520 like at what point do they they take off the mask if they've developed a relationship and let that

00:28:23.200 person see what you really look like or is it all based on an avatar like well it's a great thing

00:28:30.640 about it uh so fun fact our avatar um settings right now are really great in the sense of to

00:28:37.040 build your avatar you can just upload a selfie to yourself and an ai will build that avatar to look

00:28:43.440 as you do in that picture so you're it's kind of you uh but at the same time if you're dating

00:28:49.760 someone after so many like little dates and meetups in planet theta you do have the option

00:28:54.560 to share your pictures with them so you can be like hey i'm comfortable with you here's what i

00:28:59.920 actually look like and if you like that great if not oh i wasted a few days getting to know you

00:29:06.240 that sucked i mean like at least we had some chemistry and some fun times however i really

00:29:11.920 don't think that that will really happen i think people are going to connect with one another and

00:29:17.040 kind of feel the chemistry, if they really like connect with someone, the element of vainness is

00:29:23.380 a little less prevalent, I suppose. Okay, so is there ways that it can be separated regionally

00:29:31.340 though? Like if a person's intent, I guess, is to eventually perhaps meet somebody that they'll meet

00:29:36.100 in person and develop a broader relationship, it'll be more problematic if they're on the other

00:29:40.500 side of the continent or the planet. So can they kind of narrow who they're going to be meeting by

00:29:44.940 by regional basis oh yeah uh we actually give that opportunity to all users where you can either do

00:29:51.500 your state sort of like your region the whole country or the world uh really we'll be launching

00:29:57.340 worldwide so obviously there's going to be some language barriers because we are available in like

00:30:03.740 15 different languages or something like that a large number for my head to remember um but yeah

00:30:10.220 so you'll be able to base it off your location if you so choose if you want to keep your relationship

00:30:15.180 in vr sometimes it's a little better to do the whole worldwide thing or if you just want like

00:30:19.740 friends everywhere you can do that or if you actually like plan to meet this person you can

00:30:25.900 definitely set it for like your town your few towns your state because you know we want them

00:30:31.580 to bring that relationship in the real world too we're not trying to get people solely focused in

00:30:36.860 VR. We want you to live your life in the best way possible, and we want to provide that tool to

00:30:41.580 people. Yeah, and that's part of what I kind of keep poking at a little, is I hope that, you know,

00:30:45.100 it's still, it could still be a place people could continue to visit, you know, for a long time, but

00:30:50.140 you want them to develop eventually a broader and larger relationship. Well, it depends on the

00:30:54.380 individual what they want to do, I guess. Some people might just want to dip in and out of VR

00:30:57.980 rather than pursuing a full relationship, but just to, you know, you get those visions as somebody

00:31:03.260 who never leaves their home and has nothing but a cap on. And I don't know if it's a healthy

00:31:07.100 development for them. That's true. However, I don't think that's the majority of people

00:31:11.660 that are using VR. I mean, obviously, there are some but like, at least with like, my generation,

00:31:18.300 there's a lot of people that are super into VR that are as so outgoing in normal life where

00:31:24.140 they're just like, event after event. And then they're just like, I'm done. I just want to go

00:31:29.020 play some VR for a while. Yeah, it can be a break. And I mean, I know for people not familiar with it,

00:31:34.460 but things I liked even way back in the dating apps I used when I met my wife, but you could get

00:31:40.140 a lot of just deal breakers out of the way early too. It depends on what you're looking for. I mean,

00:31:44.140 you know, I wasn't looking for a casual relationship. So let's just get that out of

00:31:47.520 the way off to start. You know, I'm older. I've already had children from a past relationship.

00:31:51.560 I'm not having more. So let's just wipe that out because the people are looking. There's no sense

00:31:54.540 wasting each other's time. And I guess you could filter in a way that you didn't have prior. I

00:31:59.620 mean, you met somebody at the supermarket, you met somebody at the bar, or even at a workplace,

00:32:04.140 you don't necessarily know those details. You could be a lot more candid in a virtual environment.

00:32:08.740 Oh, yeah, it gives people the confidence that they probably didn't have before, which is why I think

00:32:14.980 that people will take that kind of confidence that they gain in VR into their life. At least

00:32:19.620 that's my hope, because it's a way to experience new things, you know, things that are a little

00:32:25.420 uncomfortable that give you confidence as a person. And I think that that's going to explode

00:32:30.600 a bit more as VR kind of takes over mainstream media. Yeah, I would hope, I guess. So, I mean,

00:32:36.980 if a person developed a relationship with somebody and the time came to meet, I'm sure it'd still be

00:32:40.580 a nerve wracking and exciting moment. But if they've already broken through and gotten good,

00:32:46.080 comfortable discourse and done that in the VR world a bit, it'd be easier to get it flowing,

00:32:50.880 you know, once they met in person, presumably, because they've realized that they've got a lot

00:32:55.040 in common or things they like to share. Yeah, exactly. And if you use our micro dating option

00:33:01.360 to meet people, the AI algorithm will kind of filter other people. So you'll fill out a

00:33:06.720 questionnaire, it's short, but if you want to do a longer one, more extensive to make sure that

00:33:10.480 you're matched with people you like, you can do that. And the AI will match you with people

00:33:15.920 that answer similarly or you know however you answered so then you guys will have a lot of

00:33:20.660 common so it's really it's much easier to filter as you were saying yeah so well it's it's really

00:33:26.880 easy to interesting to watch and I mean as as uh processing power and communication speeds rise and

00:33:33.380 everything I imagine this this world this environment is going to continue to grow in

00:33:36.500 the years to come as well with with more activities and regions you could do within it

00:33:40.980 oh yeah it's it's gonna be nuts i'm so excited to see where we grow like we already have so many

00:33:49.500 plans too after we launch just to keep growing worlds dates all these different fun opportunities

00:33:55.860 for people to grow and connect and not only just with your like partner like your romantic partner

00:34:00.120 but also with like your group of friends that you may be separated because i know so many people that

00:34:05.740 had friends but you know got a job or left college or something and moved across the world and it's

00:34:11.260 like i miss you wish we could hang out planet theta right on well so when is the uh formal

00:34:18.300 launch going to be or is it projected to be uh it is projected to be this fall uh we should be

00:34:25.580 up and going by november at the latest great so where can that before i let you go then where

00:34:30.780 can people find more information about Planet Theta and that whole VR world in general?

00:34:36.060 Well, you can find us at our website at planet-theta.com. We also have every social

00:34:41.420 media imaginable at just Planet Theta. You can also reach out to me on my LinkedIn,

00:34:46.460 Aurora Townsend. I try to respond as quickly as possible. And again, you can go to our website to

00:34:52.700 find all of our latest news and sign up for our future beta test that we'll be having before

00:34:57.580 launch. So if you want to sneak peek before everyone gets the cool stuff, you know, sign up

00:35:02.440 on our website. Oh, great. Well, thank you very much for joining us today to explain what that's

00:35:06.900 all about. I hope the launch goes excellently. Awesome. Thank you so much for having me. It

00:35:11.800 was so nice talking to you. Great. Perhaps we'll check in again once it's up and running and see

00:35:15.820 how everything's been developing. Awesome. Thank you. Thanks. That's Aurora Townsend of

00:35:21.360 Planet Theta. I got it right this time. It just only took 15 minutes of chatting. And again,

00:35:26.560 And, you know, as we're seeing from some of the comments, yeah, a lot of us are a little older, so it seems a little foreign to us, but it's something new and it's different.

00:35:32.960 And as I'd said as well, when people looked at Jane and I like we were crazy, you know, 20 years ago when we're using dating apps to meet online as it was so new and foreign at that time.

00:35:45.400 And now it's quite commonplace.

00:35:48.460 As I said, you know, there's the worries, though.

00:35:50.380 I mean, eventually I wouldn't want to see people turning into full out introverts.

00:35:54.580 But then you get other people who turn into introverts because they're just outright scared to develop relationships outside of the house.

00:36:00.520 And maybe something like this helps them break past that and meet somebody and get out.

00:36:05.100 I mean, there's a lot of people out there looking at different and safe ways to meet.

00:36:09.340 That was one of the scarier things, too, with, you know, online apps and meeting people was, you know, eventually your goal is to meet in person.

00:36:18.540 But it's quite a leap to meet somebody in a coffee shop.

00:36:21.340 I mean, that person could be a creep.

00:36:23.720 that person could be dangerous or could be just terribly inappropriate. So these newer means of a

00:36:28.360 virtual world, you can get a much better idea of each other before you get out to that level.

00:36:33.640 It's just fascinating to watch. I mean, I was a hardcore sci-fi reader and all of that. And

00:36:38.400 they wrote stories about this in the 80s on how we're going to get into VR worlds and travel

00:36:43.660 around and meet, whether it's dating or whether it's travel simulations or you name it, or even

00:36:50.360 Trekkies would remember the holodeck, of course, you know, it was a large part of every episode

00:36:54.260 with the next generation. So we're seeing some of this stuff come into reality. And it's really

00:36:59.800 developing. And I just find it very interesting to watch and see how this goes. And well, it's a

00:37:06.640 brave new world, guys. We're moving on to some interesting times. All right, let me talk about

00:37:11.280 our next sponsor before I get on to some more news items here. And that is the Canadian Shooting

00:37:16.920 sports association. So again, if you guys are into other hobbies, so this is something you can't do

00:37:24.160 in VR. If you like hunting, if you like target shooting, skeet shooting, things like that,

00:37:28.260 well, this is the association you want to be a part of. If you collect firearms,

00:37:31.600 the thing is, this is a, that's a pastime, a hobby, and an important one to a lot of people.

00:37:36.120 It's something I was talking with the other gentleman the other day. People actually have

00:37:39.480 their social networks sometimes built around the range or built around hunting organizations. Well,

00:37:43.480 it's under threat. There's a government that's trying to take away your right and ability to

00:37:48.540 use those firearms to enjoy them. And you have to stand up for yourselves, guys. That's the only way

00:37:53.720 we're going to protect those rights is to push back and stand up. And the way to do that is to

00:37:58.160 organize, and the association will give you that. They got all sorts of resources, by the way,

00:38:02.580 if you're a firearms owner for general use as well. But either way, it's the Canadian Shooting

00:38:09.020 Sports Association, and they're pushing back against the government mandates that are trying

00:38:12.720 to take away your right and ability to own property and firearms. So get on there, guys.

00:38:17.100 If you value your firearms and your ability to use them, take out a membership with them because

00:38:20.580 that's the only way they can help you. And, you know, protect your firearm rights, guys. We've

00:38:25.460 got to do it. No one's going to do it for you. So let's have a little bit of luck through the

00:38:29.160 comment scroll. As I said, well, I think some of it reflects the, yeah, I know I like to get a

00:38:33.920 diverse audience and we've got one, but you know, the age, a lot of them are middle-aged folks like

00:38:37.060 me and everything. This VR thing just doesn't sound quite right. And it's not for most of us.

00:38:41.140 I can't see myself plugging in at this point in my age, but for a lot of people, it is something

00:38:45.980 that's coming along and it's worth chatting about and examining. I used to play a text game. I used

00:38:51.860 to drive my ex-wife nuts because the amount of hours I would spend on it. And it was called 1.00

00:38:55.840 Gemstone 3. And it was actually all text in like a fantasy multi-level dungeon type of thing.

00:39:02.900 Thousands of users back in the nineties, way back, you know, this is the ancient internet. We didn't

00:39:06.120 have the type of data movement to be able to have graphics and things like that, but it was

00:39:10.580 interactive that was the main thing that was cool with that it was with real people on the other 0.94

00:39:14.400 side and I played actually similar to I do on Twitter a bit of a jerk and you know like poking

00:39:19.940 things and using poor humor and things such as that and otherwise just played the game but some

00:39:24.540 people really did develop relationships on that game through a text-based game with a scroll of

00:39:29.040 text going all the time and it depended on what they were looking for that was kind of a virtual

00:39:33.100 world as well though all the graphics were in your imagination rather than outright graphics as we're

00:39:38.040 seeing now. Um, how far a person wants to get involved and where they want to go is, is up to

00:39:43.460 the individual. But it was interesting to find out that, yes, there's still harassment issues.

00:39:47.900 Unfortunately, uh, creeps will be creeps and perverts will be perverts no matter where you

00:39:51.460 go. And they always try to find ways. So practicing safe relationships and dating, it just doesn't

00:39:56.180 matter where you go, whether it's in the virtual universe or outside is just always got to be on

00:40:01.460 guard. Uh, let's look at something with, uh, under the better late than never file. Uh, it looks

00:40:07.480 like a lot of the travel mandates, as Dave mentioned on his news check-in, have been

00:40:11.200 removed by the Liberal government. Of course, kicking and screaming, and not eagerly. I mean,

00:40:16.020 they only do it when they feel like they're forced to do so. I actually credit that Ryan Whitney

00:40:21.860 with Spittin' Chicklis. You know, this is what moves the government along, unfortunately. Not 0.95

00:40:26.100 good, nuanced policy discussions, but public pressure when they embarrass themselves,

00:40:31.320 which they do quite often. So he's a podcaster, a former hockey player, and mostly a sports

00:40:40.160 personality. But he really live tweeted and exposed just how ridiculous things are getting

00:40:45.280 in Canada's airports and the damage it's causing. Suddenly, the government just couldn't avoid it

00:40:50.740 anymore. And in the mainstream media, of course, they barely touched all those lineups and

00:40:53.560 everything, you know, those chicken shits. That's because they're relying on tax funding, 0.98

00:40:57.260 which we don't take and will never take, by the way. That shows that difference, you know.

00:41:01.320 They wouldn't talk about how people are languishing for 8, 10 hours at a time, 12 hours at a time

00:41:05.660 in Pearson International until somebody in alternative media exposes it and puts it in

00:41:09.960 their face because they didn't want to shake the government tree because suddenly you might not

00:41:12.780 get your subsidies. We're not afraid of those things. So it looks like you'll be able to get

00:41:17.640 on a plane finally domestically without a vaccination, trains, some of those other areas.

00:41:22.780 In Alberta, they're removing also some of the, there's some other thing too, suspend. That's a

00:41:29.060 word that is troublesome with it, right? Suspend, which gives that feeling like, well, we could

00:41:32.480 bring it back. And they'd like to, because they like control. But either way, let's celebrate

00:41:38.380 the little victories while we got them, guys. Some people will be able to travel again within

00:41:42.460 the country without having to drive. They can fly again if they're people who are non-vaccinated. 1.00

00:41:49.160 Again, you know, I'm vaccinated and I know I'll get all people worked up and I'll get the emails, 1.00

00:41:54.020 you know, I'm going to grow three heads or a second pair of nuts or something. But all the

00:41:58.400 same. I've got no problem with vaccination. My issue has always been with choice. Let people

00:42:01.700 choose. And the mandates are coercion. They are not choice and they don't make anybody safer. 0.97

00:42:06.720 So seeing those mandates being taken away is a good development. So let's be happy for it and

00:42:12.160 keep pushing them with every off, you know, possible last mandate there. As I said, in Alberta,

00:42:16.240 they're bringing off the masking crap. So if you ride public transit in Calgary, for example, 0.99

00:42:20.960 you won't have to wear a mask and then you can really, really fully smell the piss on those

00:42:26.240 trains from all of the addicts who are passed out all around on the seats and cars around you

00:42:30.740 and experience the city transit that Mayor Gondek has built for you all without it being hidden

00:42:36.700 behind a mask like that. So either way, let's see here. This was something that looks really good

00:42:44.680 and very promising. I'm going to talk more about that tomorrow, I think. But I'm going to talk

00:42:48.160 about it now as well. So in a Senate committee, and I've been talking about that, the Senate's

00:42:52.000 really suddenly starting to stand up for itself. It's starting to show itself as that proper

00:42:56.220 institution of pushing back. And the Canadian minister of BS, that's Marco Mendocino, who's

00:43:04.340 known for his chronic lying, he's been pushing that bill. He's been pushing Bill S-7. And this

00:43:11.300 was a bill that's supposed to allow customs agents to root through your private property and

00:43:17.480 search your personal files, just basically with what they feel is, I felt like it, I thought there

00:43:24.080 was a reasonable general concern. That's what the bill said. Well, nine out of 12 of the members of

00:43:28.300 the Senate committee said no. They said no. They shot it down. They said this isn't happening.

00:43:34.720 And he's either got a now Amanda redraft or something. But this bill looks like for the

00:43:40.560 moment, a portion of it is stopped in its tracks. It doesn't mean the bill's gone,

00:43:45.240 but they're not getting away with just ramming stuff through without debate, without amendment,

00:43:49.300 without change, at least not in this particular bill. So it's a really good development. You know,

00:43:55.060 the Senate is actually stopping things. And as Brenda commenters saying, you know, about time.

00:44:01.160 Yeah, I know, because the Senate's usually been, you know, a waste of time. It's been a patronage

00:44:06.300 pit. It's been a place to stick political buddies for an easy job to try and stay awake while, 0.98

00:44:10.960 you know, building up a massive pension. They're actually doing their job right now.

00:44:15.080 and they're standing up to the government on these bills.

00:44:18.940 And, you know, a lot of these senators are from the older liberal days.

00:44:22.480 And in the older liberal days, they were still liberals.

00:44:24.420 I wouldn't call myself a huge Chrétien fan, but they were a world better

00:44:27.380 than the liberals we have today, the ideological nutcases, 0.99

00:44:30.540 such as Trudeau and his cabinet of clowns. 0.98

00:44:33.720 And this Senate is shutting these things down. 0.98

00:44:36.420 Now, for example, C-11.

00:44:38.140 Now, that's a federal bill, and it's in the House of Commons.

00:44:39.840 It looks like it was, as Dave pointed out.

00:44:41.940 They're invoking closure, so they're ramming it through.

00:44:44.120 They want to get that thing stuffed through Parliament before they recess for the summer, so Trudeau's no surfing.

00:44:51.940 And that bill still has to go through the Senate too.

00:44:55.780 So just because they're shoving it through Parliament, they can't sleep at night confident that this thing is just going to get a quick, easy ride through the Senate.

00:45:04.600 If we actually have a Senate doing its job for the first time in generations, which is awesome, that bill might get thrown back to Parliament. 0.76

00:45:11.880 they might say hey no let's take this piece of crap and that's the bill like i said it's just

00:45:15.720 talking about regulating the internet and your information and control it's a scary bill c11 0.97

00:45:19.000 c18 every bill from the liberals these days is scary they're always about control always about

00:45:23.000 stepping on your rights including free speech free press free communication free uh exp you know

00:45:28.440 expression association travel and search and seizure which uh on uh s7 it's gone down so uh

00:45:36.600 yeah some of the stuff coming out of the trudeau government isn't a done deal he can cut all the

00:45:39.960 the deals with the NDP he likes. If he can't get it through the Senate, he's screwed. And I'm just

00:45:46.260 very happy to see that development. We'll see what happens. I mean, you know, there's still a whole

00:45:49.780 lot of political challenges we got to look forward to in this world. But we're seeing some things

00:45:55.660 where maybe it crossed too many lines and stuff's going to be rolled back. Let's see. Here's an area

00:46:03.100 I guess, again, reporting on the obvious. And actually, yeah, there's Brenda again, I just

00:46:08.720 one, she says, write your senators. It does make a difference. I think we forget them. Yes, it's a

00:46:12.640 good point to make. You know, it does matter if they get a lot of communication. It feels futile,

00:46:17.820 but it doesn't, the worst that'll happen is they ignore it. But if they get a whole lot, it's

00:46:21.880 always coming in. They don't read necessarily every one, but their assistant or somebody's

00:46:24.460 going to say, you know, we got a hundred emails in this. We got 50 emails in this. We got a thousand

00:46:27.300 emails in this. It does impact their decisions. I mean, C-69, that was the anti-pipeline bill,

00:46:33.540 69, 68, either way

00:46:35.900 it was the No More Pipelines bill

00:46:37.420 that one was Suits and Boots with Rick Peterson

00:46:40.000 did a fantastic job pushing back

00:46:42.240 and trying to engage the Senators

00:46:43.600 they still lost, but a lot of Senators

00:46:45.600 really put that bill to the question at least

00:46:47.340 and got some momentum

00:46:48.360 with some of these other bills

00:46:52.060 some other members might stand up

00:46:53.440 others, you know, ones like Paula Simons 0.99

00:46:55.500 has just been again a gross disappointment 1.00

00:46:57.060 claims to be an independent Senator in Alberta 0.86

00:46:58.880 but she just does whatever the Liberals tell her

00:47:00.560 she voted against Alberta on that anti-pipeline bill

00:47:03.780 And I doubt she would stand up for Canadians on some of these other bills either.

00:47:07.780 But some of those older liberal appointees actually are doing their job, standing up for rights.

00:47:12.140 And you know what?

00:47:12.800 Make sure to communicate them and not just demanding that they stand up to these things.

00:47:16.320 You know what?

00:47:16.620 Thank them now and then.

00:47:17.680 Tell them, hey, I really appreciate you guys actually getting up and doing a good job.

00:47:21.360 It's refreshing and we'd like to see more of it.

00:47:23.820 I mean, hey, I'm sure, you know, there are people like everyone else, very well-paid people in the Senate.

00:47:28.620 But they, you know, would appreciate a thumbs up now and then when they do something right.

00:47:32.060 It's like training a dog or anything else.

00:47:33.700 You've got to give some rewards when they do things the right way.

00:47:36.260 You might not want to write in the email that way for them.

00:47:38.320 Just say, hey, I appreciate your stance there.

00:47:40.580 Can you carry on now with C-18 and C-11?

00:47:44.000 Because we've got some problems with that, too.

00:47:46.760 So, yeah, getting back to foreign aid.

00:47:48.140 You know, public's cynical about $6 billion in aid.

00:47:51.040 Most Canadians are cynical about foreign aid.

00:47:52.980 It says in-house research by the Department of Foreign Affairs.

00:47:55.280 Really?

00:47:56.780 Is this really a shocker with the WE, you know, charity? 0.94

00:48:02.060 And seeing what these foreign, you know, NGOs and charities and companies do with the money, with the tax dollars.

00:48:09.820 And foreign aid, of course, that's always been notoriously abused over the years, often because it goes to dictators.

00:48:20.780 I mean, we've had foreign aid go out there and it ends up buying tanks. 0.97

00:48:23.120 It ends up buying, you know, another wing on a palace for some scumbag in a third world nation.

00:48:28.660 It's not to say we've got to end foreign aid, but it means we should be taking a lot of care to make sure it's actually getting to what we want it to get to. 0.98

00:48:35.960 I think we're a nation that's, for the time being, doing quite relatively well compared to a lot of the world.

00:48:42.080 We can spare a few bucks to help developing nations that are having a hard time, but let's make sure that money's going where it is.

00:48:48.780 And unfortunately, the United Nations and things like that are rife with corruption, as well as people on the other end.

00:48:54.840 but somehow they've just discovered this

00:48:56.740 at the Department of Foreign Affairs

00:48:58.220 with a study to realize that people

00:49:00.260 don't trust them with this.

00:49:02.140 Wow, there's a shocker.

00:49:04.180 You know, we send 6.6 billion on foreign aid every year.

00:49:09.040 Let's see, they were polled on this as well.

00:49:11.440 23% Canadians felt we should cut that.

00:49:14.660 14% in Quebec, 22% in BC, 24% in Ontario,

00:49:19.600 32% in Alberta, we're the high ones with that.

00:49:21.500 So as usual, it's heartless Albertans.

00:49:22.840 But we are also the ones who pay the most

00:49:24.160 into this country. We don't get it back. But still, here's something interesting though. I

00:49:30.420 mean, 58% felt that a lot of the international aid ends up in pockets of corrupt politicians

00:49:35.940 and that most international aid doesn't get to the recipients. This shows Canadians too,

00:49:40.440 though. Okay, so you realize it's not going where it is, but still only about 30% of you think we

00:49:45.020 should cut back on it. But I mean, you know what? It's not either or. I think some of those people

00:49:49.840 are saying, we still would like to put it out, but damn it, we need some assurances it's going 0.93

00:49:55.300 where it's supposed to. Then there's others. Kenny's saying it should be totally stopped there, 0.92

00:49:58.440 Kenny Benson, until our books are balanced. Yeah, I don't know. There's some areas I don't mind a

00:50:04.620 bit, but again, it has to go where it's bloody well going. We got a long ways to go get our

00:50:09.120 books balanced, but I mean, that's a chunk that could afford some cuts, I think for sure.

00:50:12.580 And let's see, they spent $74,000 for that study.

00:50:17.560 So again, I don't like to dismiss any amounts being spent, even if that sounds small by

00:50:23.840 government levels, sure, but it's still our money and it's spending money on something

00:50:30.600 they probably should have already known.

00:50:32.940 So, you know, how much do we spend on finding out the obvious?

00:50:38.080 So let's see here.

00:50:38.800 yeah, here's the gagging of debate on the web regulations. Even the Green Party saying that

00:50:47.060 this was beyond the pale with invoking closure on this. As Dave said, Elizabeth May, not doing

00:50:53.860 something crazy for a change, opposed closure on this. It was 174 to 146. So that's it. We're done

00:50:59.720 talking about Bill C-11. We're going to shove that through here. First, she used it in a liberal

00:51:05.480 sort of style to take a shot back at Stephen Harper while she was at it. But all the same,

00:51:12.660 at least, you know, it's showing how odious this bill is when somebody as troubled as Elizabeth

00:51:18.620 May can even recognize it for the dangerous bill that it is and that it needed more debate before

00:51:23.580 it could pass. Well, it shouldn't pass. It shouldn't. It's talking about changing the

00:51:27.320 Broadcasting Act and it's going to get the CRTC regulating commercial internet programs as if

00:51:33.460 their radio and TV shows. So us come after this show. And we'll

00:51:38.680 follow under their umbrella. And that would extend to Yeah,

00:51:41.840 YouTube content, all sorts of things is going to mess with the

00:51:44.620 providers, the platforms. A lot of what was found, of course,

00:51:48.040 shocker, who's going to benefit the most the big media outlets,

00:51:51.100 it's protecting the CBC, CTV global, the tax funded ones,

00:51:55.780 the ones who take the subsidies, the bailouts, and shoves us to

00:51:59.920 the side, they don't like us, they don't like independent

00:52:02.360 media. So they will do whatever they can to stop us. And that's what they're doing. You know,

00:52:08.620 conservative MPs are being open. This Blaine Kalkins of Red Deer saying they're censoring

00:52:12.080 the censorship of their own censorship bill. Yes, they won't even allow free speech on a bill

00:52:17.340 that is infringing on free speech. Boy, there's a vision. You know, I see the comments grow. You

00:52:24.120 get some beauties. Yes. Debbie McKenzie saying, wonder if May is riding her bike naked today. 0.98

00:52:27.440 uh well i don't know that would certainly uh liven up the hill somewhat i don't want to take

00:52:34.100 shots because as i said it is ride your bike naked day but uh i could not pretend to be uh

00:52:39.840 somebody who would put out a pretty sight riding my bike around naked like that either i would

00:52:43.240 probably knock the property values down and my whole uh region pretty badly if i did such a

00:52:48.700 thing so i won't shoot at others that way if they're going to do it either not till i can

00:52:51.680 present some muscle-bound body which probably isn't going to happen but one of those ways of

00:52:57.020 getting muscle bound in a good shape. I'll use it as a segue because I see our guest in the lobby

00:53:00.560 is eating good, healthy, single ingredient foods and beef is definitely one of them. Yet we've got

00:53:06.480 our federal regulators trying to tell people that ground beef is not a healthy thing and it's sort

00:53:12.340 of outrageous. So we have Ryder Lee from the Saskatchewan Cattlemen's Association and we'll

00:53:18.360 discuss this a little bit here. Hello, Mr. Lee. Thanks for joining us today. Yeah, I'm glad to.

00:53:23.580 So, yeah, I just sort of framed it before you came in.

00:53:26.280 I imagine you guys can't be very thrilled with this.

00:53:29.440 Health Canada is proposing labeling ground meat products of beef and pork with a health warning label.

00:53:35.640 I mean, they're treating a perfectly healthy domestically produced product as if it was cigarettes.

00:53:41.340 Yeah, it's frustrating to say the least, but that's why groups like ours exist to work on government when they head in directions like this

00:53:50.320 and help them make better informed decisions we hope yeah so what do you I mean I guess it's

00:53:56.500 speculative on your part but what would the motivation of such a label be I mean there are

00:54:00.140 I mean philosophically I don't think the government really should be there telling us and digging so

00:54:04.480 far into what's good or bad for us to eat we can kind of figure that out on our own but if you're

00:54:08.580 going to start picking on types of food items there's a long list of things that are a heck

00:54:12.600 of a lot more unhealthy than beef is why are they targeting beef well and things that will be exempt

00:54:19.260 from this like uh you know your halloween candy bars won't have this warning on them and even

00:54:25.340 though they are high in sugar so this is kind of an extension of what we already have with you know

00:54:31.980 your your information label that has you know there's so much of these different nutrients and

00:54:38.140 it's such a percent of your your daily allowances but it's on the back and you gotta go look for it

00:54:43.900 and so the the attempt here is to shove some of that information on on sodium on saturated fat

00:54:51.820 and on sugar if they're they're higher than a certain trigger then whammo this warning goes on

00:54:58.460 the front and and really aiming that at you know we we do have we don't have a calorie deficit here

00:55:04.620 in in canada we we've probably got too much being consumed especially in in highly processed foods

00:55:11.100 that really are only bringing calories and a few other things.

00:55:15.340 They're not bringing the nutrients that you need in a balanced diet.

00:55:20.060 We talked about it in COVID, slowing down, cooking more,

00:55:24.320 and ground beef's a big part of that.

00:55:27.060 Well, it goes into so many meals for us,

00:55:28.880 and it's a cost-effective way to consume beef.

00:55:31.300 And everything's about, I mean, if you listen to any reasonable dietician,

00:55:35.300 they talk about it's moderation is everything.

00:55:37.140 I mean, yeah, you don't want to eat a pound of regular ground beef every day.

00:55:40.500 you're going to have a problem.

00:55:42.000 But you don't want to eat a bucket of ice cream every day either.

00:55:45.100 It doesn't mean that the product was bad.

00:55:46.620 It's how you utilize it.

00:55:48.460 It is.

00:55:49.240 And balance is so important.

00:55:50.920 And we think that that protein along with other things is what beef is so great at providing.

00:56:01.120 Iron deficiency is a real thing, even here in Canada for certain parts of the population.

00:56:07.520 and and iron's available in different ways for from different food products and one of the most

00:56:13.540 available ways is from red meat so that's something that gets lost in this uh whether

00:56:20.020 you've got you know babies or or mothers in their in their childbearing able years

00:56:27.300 this is a real challenge so anything that gets in the way of people being able to to meet those

00:56:35.340 needs whether it's like i said iron vitamin b12 is also something that we're seeing shortages of

00:56:41.500 and you can fix it easily with a taco tuesday or or you know we call them dad burgers in my house

00:56:48.160 but you know cheeseburgers on the grill and in this season are huge simple and and kids will

00:56:55.160 eat it there's a lot of a lot of other things that are harder to get my kids comfortable with

00:57:00.340 But those two are home runs all the time, and we need to not get in the way of that.

00:57:08.120 And parents, I mean, they naturally want, of course, their children to be as healthy as possible.

00:57:12.680 So, I mean, they can be afraid if they see labeling saying, oh, my Lord, I've been feeding my kids something dangerous.

00:57:18.760 I mean, we don't want to take options.

00:57:19.880 These proteins, actually, particularly single-ingredient ones, non-processed stuff, with a growing family,

00:57:25.680 Plus, with the budgetary constraints right now, ground beef is a fantastic, cost-effective way to get that to the family.

00:57:31.800 And if you've got parents suddenly afraid that, oh, my Lord, have I been feeding them something bad, it puts more pressure on the family financially.

00:57:37.620 It stresses them, and it's taking a perfectly healthy, safe item out of their grocery list.

00:57:44.740 Healthy, simple, affordable.

00:57:47.220 You know, what so many parents are looking for when your time's stretched and if you're chasing after kids, you probably are,

00:57:53.680 along with you know work and everything else so it is big and you know dr sangita sharma out of

00:57:59.760 university of alberta was looking at this a few years back now and just looking at you know urban

00:58:05.840 at-risk populations and and she found that ground beef was the most affordable way to get the

00:58:12.580 nutrients that are most at shortage in in these at-risk populations so doing anything to get in

00:58:20.740 the way of of that is to me counter to helping our our whole population be healthier in the future

00:58:29.140 yeah and for what i've been hearing the reports that would if this happens it's if it's not done

00:58:33.460 yet so perhaps we can knock some some common sense back into them but canada would be the

00:58:38.040 only nation on the entire world that labels beef this way right that's my understanding yeah and

00:58:43.820 and so that's you know that's concerning for for several reasons but one of them is is trade as

00:58:50.400 well, we export about half of what we produce

00:58:53.400 and most of the places that we export our beef to,

00:58:56.920 we're competing with others and especially the locals

00:58:59.640 and they look for any way to get a leg up on our product

00:59:06.020 as we compete in their marketplace

00:59:08.100 and having our own domestic warning sign on there,

00:59:12.900 I can't see as anything but helpful to those protectionists

00:59:17.440 trying to say, well, look, even their own government thinks

00:59:20.260 This is not worth, you know, treating as good as our much superior product.

00:59:26.060 So it's it does worry me as, you know, kind of kicking us in the shin as we try to walk into other markets and compete.

00:59:34.240 Well, yeah, and I'm glad you brought that up. And it is very competitive.

00:59:37.300 I remember how eager some producers were in other markets when Mad Cow was going around just, you know, it was more market oriented than safety oriented and trying to point out how dangerous Canadian beef was.

00:59:48.120 And if they could find another excuse to say, look, they don't even trust their own meat.

00:59:51.620 We shouldn't be bringing it in.

00:59:52.700 We should just buy here.

00:59:54.240 And as you said, half of our meat gets exported.

00:59:56.560 So this employs a whole lot of Canadians.

00:59:59.280 I mean, this is a big industry for us.

01:00:00.780 It's important to us.

01:00:01.920 It is.

01:00:03.020 And it's not just in Saskatchewan.

01:00:05.180 It's across the country.

01:00:07.000 You know, we're proud of what cattle bring to the environment because they turn a lot of land that you can't grow crops on into food producing land.

01:00:16.520 and that's everywhere across the country so from pei to vancouver island there there's cattle out

01:00:23.240 there grazing and renewing that land and and employing people along the way it's um it's

01:00:29.560 it's important in every riding pretty much so that's that's an important part of why we're

01:00:35.240 you know we're talking to as many people as we can to to reach out to their mp and and especially

01:00:41.800 if they live in where a cabinet minister is to tell them that this is this is not a good road

01:00:47.400 to be going down it is there is some political need there and like i said that's why groups like

01:00:53.320 canadian cattlemen saskatchewan cattlemen the national cattle feeders are active on this file

01:00:58.900 to make sure they they know just what they're doing and what what's at risk yeah well and people

01:01:04.260 just don't want to you know can't let these initiatives slide under the radar i mean it's

01:01:07.980 incremental things that are motivated by, I don't know, perhaps an ideologically driven

01:01:11.860 individual within Health Canada? And maybe if enough members of parliament raise their heads

01:01:16.140 up and say, hey, wait a minute, my constituents aren't too thrilled with this. They might re-examine

01:01:21.460 it. It's exactly how it works. Yeah. You know, there's all kinds of ideas that get thrown forward

01:01:28.020 and don't see the light of day because just like you said, whether it's at the MP level or at the

01:01:34.700 advocacy level group that like we bring forward that the China light on maybe maybe that needs

01:01:41.240 to go back to the drawing board or to be done a little different because being the only only beef

01:01:47.740 around the world that has that and even the only single ingredient product in Canada just doesn't

01:01:54.820 make sense so we're we're hoping that some some cooler heads can prevail and we can move on to

01:02:00.740 growing and improving our competitiveness here in Canada.

01:02:05.740 Yeah, I mean, you've still got a very busy time and, you know,

01:02:09.500 a challenging industry to work within as it goes without having to battle your own local health regulators while you're at it.

01:02:15.560 So hopefully, you know, you get the pressure on, get them back off so you can focus more, again,

01:02:19.960 on marketing and better, you know, production techniques and all the rest of the stuff your associations typically deal with.

01:02:26.260 Indeed.

01:02:27.740 So what could people do then?

01:02:29.940 I mean, they can email their MPs, they can support associations.

01:02:34.860 Are there resources online that they can go towards to quickly be able to reach out

01:02:39.120 and bring attention to this?

01:02:42.840 Yeah, there is.

01:02:43.940 And it's something that's been interesting to see how it goes.

01:02:50.120 We've got, there is an online campaign going on as well.

01:02:55.820 That is a don't label my beef.

01:02:58.100 um oh shoot now i need to remember if it's if it's dot com um or i'm looking up my my links

01:03:08.280 to that and i'm i'm not finding it right off but i'll get that to you just in a moment yeah

01:03:13.160 well that's all right i did it on my opening monologue the other day and i entitled it get

01:03:16.840 your hands off my meat but i imagine you guys are going to be a little more uh restrained and

01:03:21.440 politically correct with uh how you're approaching it but just good memorable things so people can

01:03:25.580 all jump in and take part and help out and try to inject some common sense into this issue.

01:03:31.440 Well, that's right. And there's two things. I mean, there's, we like to provide people that,

01:03:37.560 that, that outlet and, and it's, it's a way that smooths it out and they can go to, yeah,

01:03:44.700 it's don't label my beef.ca. And it's a pretty slick way to, to fire off some, some feedback to

01:03:52.940 your MP, but a phone call and a personal outreach are probably more impactful. So there's lots of

01:04:01.360 people that do know their MP or do know their MLA, their Minister of Health. That direct outreach

01:04:09.020 makes it real to them. They sure do value feedback from their voters. You know, I'm one voice in

01:04:16.920 Capital City and they're like, yeah, yeah, Ryder, I hear from you, but I haven't been hearing this

01:04:21.000 from my constituents so maybe when i do then then i'll give you a call back and it'll be

01:04:28.440 more important to me so people thinking that no no it's being handled by our associations

01:04:35.640 it is but that local grassroots outreach turns up the the give a care factor by by politicians

01:04:45.080 a lot. So that's really helpful when people do step forward in those forums and do write letters

01:04:51.500 and do make phone calls. It's great to remind them. We talked a little bit about that actually

01:04:56.060 with the Senate just as prior to your coming on as well. Even senators, they respond to things as

01:05:00.320 well actually, and they've been more responsive lately. And we've got to remind them of that now

01:05:04.320 and then and let them know that we appreciate their efforts or when we don't appreciate. But

01:05:08.160 if you don't talk to them, they can live in a bubble and it's not associations that get them

01:05:12.740 reelected, it's voters. So if you're calling them up, you can have an impact. Absolutely.

01:05:17.860 So that's it. Don't label my meat.ca.

01:05:23.420 Don't label my beef. Don't label my beef. Oh, geez. Thank you. See, that's why I correct.

01:05:29.060 Don't label my beef.ca. Don't listen to everything I say, guys. Make sure we listen to these guests.

01:05:33.760 They know what they're talking about. Well, I appreciate that. And again, I think I had it

01:05:37.960 the old term way of saying Saskatchewan Cattlemen's Association, Saskatchewan Cattle

01:05:41.760 Association. Now we get less gender specific. I appreciate you coming on to talk to us about

01:05:48.860 that today and just, you know, to stand up for such an important industry and give us the means

01:05:52.520 and the direction to point us at so that we can head this one off at the pass before this

01:05:56.920 misguided initiative gets entrenched. Well, I appreciate coming on here. I think there's lots

01:06:04.180 of things that people hear a little bit about. And when we can have a conversation in front of

01:06:09.940 a bunch of them and to shine a little more light on it. Hopefully everybody's a little more informed

01:06:15.540 and going forward with some more information. That's it. And we got these great modern

01:06:20.680 communication means now, so we can reach a lot of people pretty fast. So hopefully this one's

01:06:24.900 far from a done deal and we can stop that and then get back to doing the business we'd rather

01:06:29.400 focus on. So thank you very much for joining us today on short notice like that too, and

01:06:33.720 talking about this and I wish you the best on this. Yeah, you bet, Corey. Thanks for having me

01:06:39.160 and right back at you.

01:06:40.340 Wish you all the best.

01:06:41.060 Take care.

01:06:41.580 Thank you.

01:06:42.820 That was Ryder Lee

01:06:43.880 with the Saskatchewan Cattle Association.

01:06:45.620 And of course, every cattle association,

01:06:47.340 whether provincially or nationally,

01:06:48.380 is not very happy 0.97

01:06:51.400 with this ridiculous initiative 0.86

01:06:53.400 to try and label meats. 0.79

01:06:56.340 And it's just bizarre.

01:06:57.360 And I understand

01:06:58.100 he didn't go into the political speculation.

01:07:00.120 And fair enough.

01:07:00.660 That's my job.

01:07:02.000 As to the motives,

01:07:03.280 I suspect it's politically motivated

01:07:06.500 on the part of a bureaucrat,

01:07:07.840 somebody within the health, Canadian Health Association, as opposed to particular politicians,

01:07:14.860 a lot of them, of course, have their ideological agendas as well. But when the elected members get

01:07:19.660 worked up or start getting those phone calls, start getting those emails and start phoning into

01:07:24.200 the health department and saying, hey, what are you doing? This is going to stop. They will back

01:07:30.300 off. It happens, guys. There are victories. So get on there. As we said, don't label my beef.ca

01:07:37.340 and spread that around.

01:07:39.340 Use that social media.

01:07:40.380 Get on there.

01:07:40.780 It makes it easy for you to reach out 1.00

01:07:42.120 because this is just stupid and ridiculous. 1.00

01:07:45.000 We've got enough economic challenges going on right now. 1.00

01:07:48.160 We don't need to be pressuring consumers,

01:07:50.040 making them afraid of good, healthy products.

01:07:52.220 We don't need prices going up on good, healthy products

01:07:55.000 when people are already having trouble making the bills.

01:07:56.700 And we don't need our cattle producers

01:07:57.980 getting more pressure and challenges.

01:08:01.600 They've got a tough industry to work within already

01:08:04.460 as it stands.

01:08:05.200 so let's not let Health Canada make a tough industry even tougher. So let's see okay I'm

01:08:13.320 going to speak one more time to our sponsor and then I'll get on to some more news stuff.

01:08:18.460 Cliff was saying where's the Alberta Beef Producer Organization? I'm sure they're speaking up as

01:08:22.880 well actually I just reached out to get somebody because it was really quick notice and I'm sure

01:08:26.960 as I said Cliff all of those organizations are quite upset with this and if you google it I'm

01:08:33.380 certain you'll find one. And then again, for this particular issue that don't label my beef.ca,

01:08:37.820 you can reach out on that one. So yes, let's talk quickly about Bitcoin. Well, again, one more time,

01:08:42.460 it's a good, again, Alberta based company with a look at that map with all of those ATMs all

01:08:47.700 across Canada. That's shows you this is a bricks and mortar company. This is the real thing. No,

01:08:53.480 it's not some ethereal distant thing. We were talking about virtual reality. Well, this isn't

01:08:56.960 virtual reality. Sure, it's digital currency, but it's real. It's you can pay your utility bills

01:09:02.520 with it. They'll help set you up for that. You can have automatic deposits going to your Bitcoin

01:09:06.060 savings account, just like a car payment and things like that. You set it up. That's what

01:09:10.340 these guys do. They help you set it up. They aren't hanging onto it. It's non-custodial. So

01:09:14.460 your money's always safe. It's in your hands. These guys facilitate it and show you how you

01:09:19.220 can do it. They've got payroll plans, savings plans, things like that we have at the Western

01:09:22.980 Standard. Every month, a portion of my check is voluntary for all staff. Comes off my check,

01:09:28.240 goes into a Bitcoin wallet and the Western Standard matches that to a maximum. But it's a

01:09:34.460 good deal. Your company could have that too, potentially. So check them out, bitcoinwell.com

01:09:38.660 and take control of your money. All right. I was just going through that C11 a bit when

01:09:42.960 the guest popped in there. So I'll finish up on this a little more. And that's that

01:09:48.120 here's somebody's quote. Oh, this is from the Internet Society. So this is the Canadian

01:09:55.320 chapters, you know, so some society that I guess stands up for the internet speaks for itself.

01:09:59.620 But it basically is saying, yeah, this bill is so broad, Parliament could declare email to be

01:10:03.900 broadcasting. They could get to the point if you have an email list, suddenly you are subject to

01:10:08.980 the controls of this bill with C-11. You know, when you have a hammer, everything looks like a

01:10:15.400 nail, wrote the internet society. It's a C-11 is based on the tragic illusion, all audio and audio

01:10:20.280 visual content on the internet is a program. And then any person who transmit a program on the

01:10:24.840 internet is a broadcaster rather than a communicator. I think it's fair enough that we're

01:10:28.960 considered a broadcaster, but still we don't need to be controlled. We don't need it. You don't need

01:10:33.140 this bill. We don't need more. We don't need it further. And as they wrote further, it says it

01:10:37.580 fails to differentiate between a podcast produced in a residential basement or a major released

01:10:43.380 motion picture on Netflix. Yeah. And those are two very big distinct things. And this bill doesn't

01:10:48.680 distinguish between them. The bottom line is it's control. And it's funny because we're finding out

01:10:52.160 and our government's finding out that the podcaster in his basement is actually managing to have

01:10:56.620 as much influence as Netflix sometimes. When something will go viral or they dig into an

01:11:00.720 issue that the mainstream media wouldn't touch, they can hold the government to account. So of

01:11:04.900 course the government doesn't like this. Of course they're trying to shove it through.

01:11:08.480 So as we're talking about all this engagement, talking about pushing on to our elected members,

01:11:14.540 members of parliament, senators, this is another one, guys, get on that Senate. You know, they're

01:11:19.160 going to ram it through Parliament, but the Senate still has to have a look at it. Let's see.

01:11:24.640 Speaking of debacles and unfit government and inefficient government. So they overlooked 36

01:11:30.940 million acres. Climate change benefits of federal tree planting will be slow at first. Yeah, no doubt.

01:11:38.260 So Canada has their own department just realized, oh, we have 36 million more acres of existing

01:11:45.140 trees than we originally thought. We have lots of trees. Not enough people have really gone out.

01:11:51.320 Like I mentioned occasionally, I spent 20 years working in the oil field surveying. I worked jobs

01:11:56.180 all over the place, Gulf of Mexico, all the way up to the four different horrible winters in the

01:12:01.660 Arctic. But I tell you, if someone will teach you just how much bush and untouched land there really

01:12:05.840 is out there, fly from Calgary to Inuvik and look down there and see that bush. And that strip of

01:12:13.220 brush goes all the way across to Newfoundland, all the way across back to BC. And all the amount

01:12:17.200 of mountains back there, all those ranges, all those people screaming because Camor is going to

01:12:20.660 have a new development. Oh my God, the last grizzly on earth is there? No, it's not. In fact,

01:12:24.380 if you look at a map, roads barely touch. You can barely get into the majority of the Rocky

01:12:30.520 Mountains. There's a few highways that pierce through and that's where you get those communities,

01:12:34.040 but there's go one range over and it's virtually untouched aside for a few backcountry hikers.

01:12:38.940 And urban dwelling people, liberal type voters often live under this illusion as if we're

01:12:44.500 running out of trees, as if we're low on them.

01:12:47.500 And we are not.

01:12:49.400 I mean, it's not saying we want to go out and wholesale grind them down, but let's not

01:12:52.820 pretend we don't have a massive carbon sink.

01:12:54.780 In fact, one of the biggest in the world.

01:12:57.360 So yeah, the Forest Service estimates that, what, something we got, 2 billion trees?

01:13:01.620 I don't know.

01:13:02.380 You can't count these things.

01:13:03.540 No, they're talking about planting 2 billion trees.

01:13:05.360 These twits won't be able to do that.

01:13:07.100 You want to see the healthiest woodlots you'll ever see?

01:13:09.140 See a privately run one, one where they actually plan and plant

01:13:12.280 and plan to harvest it down the road.

01:13:15.220 That is a healthy tree lot.

01:13:17.100 Or another area that's been logged and reseeded,

01:13:19.520 because otherwise it will burn.

01:13:21.680 There's that thing with these anti-logging nutcases

01:13:24.040 that we see all the time out there.

01:13:25.880 The natural progression of forest, it can't just keep growing.

01:13:29.740 It has to eventually either be cut down and rejuvenate,

01:13:32.920 or it has to burn.

01:13:34.000 There's no other ways about it.

01:13:35.160 And I tell you, it's a scary thing. And I hope it's as long as possible. And I know there's some efforts have been done for controlled burns and bush spacing and so on. But I worked areas like up and down the forestry trunk road in Alberta and Wipers and around there. And I tell you, the undergrowth is so choked with deadwood in the fire ladders. They blame global warming for the big forest fires when they happen, which by the way, we're not having any more than we used to. We just see it a lot more. You know, you can see it on the internet, you can see it on the news, you can see Twitter.

01:14:04.180 but there's no more than there used to be. In fact, there's less. We fight them. We stop them.

01:14:09.100 But we got a lot of areas that do burn a heck of a lot more intensely than they did because we

01:14:13.000 have deferred these fires. We've stopped the natural fire from happening. So the wood, the

01:14:16.640 fuel buildup has been massive. So when it does spark off, there's not a hell of a lot we can do

01:14:21.240 about it. And if we logged it, that's one of the things we could do in advance. Not saying we got

01:14:25.960 to log everything, but you know, this anti-logging lunacy. Trees are truly renewable, guys. Guess

01:14:30.720 what? They grow back. They really do. And it's kind of crazy that we pay as much as we do for

01:14:35.620 lumber in this country when we got the amount of bush that we have in this country, you know?

01:14:43.140 So yeah, government's forest management practices when they can misplace 32 million acres. 32

01:14:48.220 million acres. Oops, we misplaced that. And you got to trust these guys to control climate change

01:14:53.580 or plant trees efficiently. Here's the state of Canada's forests and said less than half a

01:15:00.580 percent of timberlands. And this is one of the terms I hate right off the bat. So the state of

01:15:05.380 Canada's forests said less than half a percent of timberlands have been lost to logging and farming.

01:15:11.640 What do you mean lost? What do you mean lost? It's not lost. They took the trees off it and you put

01:15:17.120 more trees on it and they grow again. Farming? It's not dead. They don't turn it into a desert.

01:15:22.680 They're planting stuff in it. And it's a half a percent. Talk about a block, a drop in the bucket.

01:15:28.480 And then the private industry plants.

01:15:30.740 This is the government trying to plant 2 billion trees.

01:15:32.420 They're incapable.

01:15:32.940 They can't figure it out.

01:15:34.080 The private industry has planted 547 million trees every year in Canada.

01:15:39.880 Let the private industry do their thing.

01:15:41.540 Get the hell out of the way. 0.93

01:15:42.520 They'll do a better job than government every time.

01:15:45.400 Man.

01:15:47.400 So where else are we going? 1.00

01:15:48.720 Ah, let's talk about another stupid program we can spend our money on 1.00

01:15:51.700 that's not doing us any good. 1.00

01:15:53.960 Catering to Canada's most insecure province, that being Quebec.

01:15:58.140 The bilingual cost was low-balled.

01:16:00.100 Because remember, we talked about how the government wants to impose bilingualism on the private sector.

01:16:03.880 Now, they want to make private companies forced to hire more Frenchmen.

01:16:09.140 And if they improve their personal hygiene, it could help with encouraging people to bring them on. 0.77

01:16:13.380 But for the time being, yes, it looks like the law is the way we're going to have to have it.

01:16:17.580 And they estimated a quarter billion cost was low-balled.

01:16:22.360 a quarter billion, 250 million already to be wasted trying to shove bilingualism down the

01:16:26.740 throats of private businesses where we don't need it. And that doesn't even account to any

01:16:31.040 initiatives east of New Brunswick or west of Ontario. So in other words, right in the center

01:16:35.780 where most, if there is any bilingualism, it's already there. So how much is it going to cost

01:16:39.620 when you try to shove it down our throats out here in Alberta and Saskatchewan, BC, where we

01:16:42.480 don't want it and don't need it? Where in Calgary, Hindi is far more spoken than French or Cantonese 0.96

01:16:49.060 is. Probably German even. So there's our money at work, guys. You know, massive deficits,

01:16:55.940 massive inflation, interest rates are going up. People are going to be driven from their houses.

01:16:59.840 One of the things the government never talks about to battle inflation is cutting their frigging

01:17:03.860 spending. Because yes, they're running up the printing presses. That's what's causing the

01:17:07.680 inflation. Unfortunately, we have the dumbest prime minister in Canadian history in power right 0.99

01:17:11.560 now. He's already said budgets balance themselves. He's already outright said he doesn't pay 1.00

01:17:16.040 attention to economic theory. He's got his hands on the purse strings of the entire country.

01:17:20.880 And that imbecile comes out and says, oh, pardon me if I don't pay attention to economic theory. 1.00

01:17:25.080 Yeah. Trust fund baby who's never had to worry about paying a bill in his life 1.00

01:17:28.320 is managing this country. And we're shocked why inflation is going mad

01:17:32.040 and they won't cut spending. Well, here's an area we don't need to spend

01:17:35.940 a quarter billion plus to try and shove French down the throats of people who don't want to

01:17:40.020 speak it in private industry. How about that? There's a start.

01:17:42.600 they won't do that though

01:17:44.800 so that's Bill C-13

01:17:47.580 there's another beauty

01:17:48.480 that one I don't expect the Senate to stand up to though

01:17:50.700 because it's just not one of their hot issues

01:17:53.500 right?

01:17:54.360 come on Quebec

01:17:54.980 you guys can't keep your own language 1.00

01:17:56.760 you don't deserve to have it 1.00

01:17:58.120 it's up to you

01:17:58.920 not me

01:17:59.620 for you guys to speak French 1.00

01:18:01.080 that's the thing with these 1.00

01:18:02.100 these insecure Quebecers 1.00

01:18:03.960 you're terrified of losing your language 0.88

01:18:05.780 okay fine

01:18:06.580 speak it then

01:18:08.000 breathe better

01:18:08.940 don't blame us

01:18:11.900 You know, if we got overwhelmed

01:18:13.740 and English-speaking people ran out in Alberta,

01:18:15.960 well, that's just the way it goes, I guess.

01:18:18.200 Not my problem.

01:18:19.400 Well, quit making it my problem.

01:18:20.560 I'm afraid it is.

01:18:22.180 All right, that's enough for today.

01:18:24.140 I've been going well.

01:18:25.720 Again, looking outside,

01:18:26.780 looks like it's not raining too hard right now.

01:18:28.300 So again, the worried floods look like

01:18:31.060 they might not be hitting us that hard in the future.

01:18:32.980 Let's hope it stays that way.

01:18:34.560 Tune in tomorrow.

01:18:35.140 I'm going to have Lindsay Seawalt from Alberta Proud 0.69

01:18:37.120 and probably another guest on as well to join me.

01:18:39.300 and of course I'll have something new to rant about

01:18:41.040 and get that vein pulsing

01:18:42.260 and well, I'll be installing those bees tonight too

01:18:46.360 so maybe I'll have some welts to show off, we'll see.

01:18:48.580 So see you tomorrow, thanks for tuning in

01:18:50.480 and yeah, I'll be here at 11.30 a.m. Mountain Standard Time.

01:19:09.300 Transcription by CastingWords

Western Standard - June 15, 2022

Triggered： UCP leadership rules show they still just don’t get it

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