Western Standard - Trump wins, what will the Democrats do？

00:00:00.000 good day i'm derek vildebrand publisher of the western standard and you're watching

00:00:28.000 the pipeline. Today is October, November 6th, the day after the United States is a big general

00:00:37.420 election. It's, it's all mega. So much mega. I'm joined as usual by Western Standard opinion

00:00:45.640 editor Nigel Hannaford. Good to be here. And Western Standard senior Alberta columnist

00:00:51.200 Corey Morgan. Always a pleasure. I don't know for late night. Yeah, that was a very late

00:00:57.180 night, gentlemen. We were here till 1230. We pulled the plug. We were waiting for Donald

00:01:05.000 Trump to come on. We finally just gave up and said, watch it on the TV, guys. We're not

00:01:09.420 going to stream it. Ten seconds after we pulled our stream, Donald Trump comes out. But yeah,

00:01:15.440 quite something. We're going to be talking today as well about the leadership, resounding

00:01:21.560 leadership review results of Alberta Premier Danielle Smith. But before we get to that,

00:01:26.280 We're going to have just a double segment of mega.

00:01:30.400 Trump won bigly.

00:01:32.980 So big.

00:01:33.840 So great.

00:01:34.660 I've even got my Make Mongolia Great Again hat today.

00:01:39.520 Not quite mega, but I await the return of the great con.

00:01:45.020 All right.

00:01:45.760 Well, before we get into it, let's just kind of look at the results.

00:01:49.120 We have a pretty clear idea, very clear idea now.

00:01:52.260 Here, let's bring up the map here, Nico.

00:01:56.280 So, here's where we're at, using 2702win.com.

00:02:02.680 Everything has been solidly called, with the sole exception, of course, of Arizona.

00:02:09.320 Now, Arizona's going to go Republican.

00:02:11.160 I have a hard time seeing how it doesn't.

00:02:12.900 But that's 11 electoral college votes.

00:02:14.800 It's the only one outstanding.

00:02:17.880 But right now, they're only 67% reporting.

00:02:22.480 What is wrong with these guys?

00:02:24.000 It's Nevada and Arizona.

00:02:25.800 It's always, you know, where all the casinos are and they can't seem to count.

00:02:29.540 They just get fried in the desert, I guess.

00:02:31.360 Yeah, but you see here, this is a Republican-leaning state in any case.

00:02:37.160 I would be, Trump won every single swing state.

00:02:40.560 So let's quickly run through the swing states.

00:02:42.640 So we've got Nevada, swing state, Trump won pretty decisively.

00:02:51.380 We've got Wisconsin.

00:02:53.260 So this is the blue wall. Trump won by one percentage, not by a huge margin, but he's got Wisconsin. We've got Michigan. Donald Trump takes Michigan just a little over a percentage. Again, not a lot, but these are the blue wall states. Democrats need to win them. If they don't win them, they're pretty toast.

00:03:18.380 Pennsylvania. Trump winning more convincingly there. Still not huge margins, but 50.5 to 48.5. And Ohio. We'll show you Ohio here. Big win.

00:03:38.460 Like, Ohio's starting to look like a red state almost, 55.2% to 53.9%.

00:03:43.460 Ohio should not be that red.

00:03:45.980 When we saw Ohio going that red and early, I was like, yeah, it's going to be a bad night for the Democrats.

00:03:51.720 Could be a favorite sun effect.

00:03:54.040 It could be a bit of J.D. Vance, perhaps.

00:03:56.920 You've got North Carolina, swing state, 51.1% Trump, 47, 47% Kamala Harris.

00:04:03.580 And Georgia used to be a solid Republican state, but it is now, it's now a switcher.

00:04:10.700 It moves around.

00:04:12.100 We got Trump 50.7 to 48.5.

00:04:18.740 Solid night for Trump.

00:04:19.800 He won every single swing state up there.

00:04:24.260 So, you know, we had a late night last night, gentlemen.

00:04:27.040 But it looked pretty early, like it was looking good for Trump.

00:04:30.380 And there was no back and forth at all.

00:04:33.200 No state went back and forth.

00:04:34.900 They went red, and they got redder throughout the night.

00:04:38.880 Initial thoughts?

00:04:40.940 That was actually one of the most fortifying things, watching this thing through.

00:04:45.420 And in terms of what's it going to be like when it's all over, the whole thing was very definite.

00:04:52.560 It was very much, there was a mood and it was being expressed and it was being revealed as the results came in.

00:05:01.280 And this was important to me, at least, because it meant there was far less excuse for argument after it was all over.

00:05:09.760 If there'd have been backwards and forwards and more boxes coming in and, oh, gosh, we've got another pile over here,

00:05:16.780 that's the kind of thing that would have made a very uncertain election.

00:05:20.660 But it wasn't like that.

00:05:22.560 there definitely was a mood that's not to say that the country is together clearly they're

00:05:30.640 pretty much 50 percent by 50 percent divided between those who like the way trump does things

00:05:36.480 and those who would have preferred just about anything else but trump did win and it's not

00:05:44.640 arguable he even had the popular vote so first time a republicans actually got popular vote

00:05:50.640 20 years since George W. Bush against John Kerry, 2004.

00:05:54.260 So it's a strong result, and it should resolve things.

00:05:56.780 I noticed the stock market this morning just went straight up.

00:06:00.300 I'd like to say that was a Trump effect, but I think it was a certainty effect.

00:06:04.360 Possibly.

00:06:05.120 Now we know what the deal is.

00:06:08.580 I mean, this was, this was, I was expecting Trump, I was without a lot of certainty leaning

00:06:16.340 towards a Trump win yesterday.

00:06:17.900 I did not have in the cards a decisive Trump win.

00:06:20.640 I thought he, in probability, he was going to eke it out.

00:06:24.600 The polls tend to always underrepresent conservatives and Republicans, particularly with Trump, because it's not very nice at a fancy cocktail party to say you support Trump.

00:06:35.680 So people tend to, I think Republicans, especially Trump voters, are underreported.

00:06:40.000 But he won decisively.

00:06:42.960 Most likely he's going to come out of 312 electoral votes over Harris's 216 popular vote.

00:06:50.640 It's actually continuing to go up. He's at 1.5% over Harris.

00:06:57.640 The way the Electoral College votes is, you know, if the two candidates are tied in electoral vote, the Republican wins.

00:07:02.640 And he outright won the Electoral College, the popular vote too.

00:07:07.640 He's carried the Senate. He is likely, but not positively, but likely carrying the House of Representatives as well.

00:07:14.640 And he's already got the Supreme Court. Did Biden get the nominee to single justice?

00:07:19.200 No, that's all I can remember.

00:07:20.640 Oh, it's still Trump's court.

00:07:23.240 This is the most resounding Republican control of the United States government probably ever, Corey.

00:07:32.740 At least since Reconstruction.

00:07:34.280 Yeah, I'm not going to start digging anyway.

00:07:35.640 So, I mean.

00:07:36.520 You didn't go after Reconstruction, that's it. 0.53

00:07:37.960 And the stability in itself, that's the other part that I think, as Nigel was saying,

00:07:42.140 that the stock market's responding to.

00:07:43.600 We've got something that's definitely going to be predictable as far as who's in power,

00:07:47.900 and we're not going to be scrapping in the courts and messing around

00:07:50.260 and dealing with months of that sort of thing.

00:07:52.880 Well, let's hope not.

00:07:53.740 No, and we're not seeing indications of it.

00:07:56.560 Kamala Harris is making it clear she's going to concede.

00:07:59.400 It's not going to be a battle in that far.

00:08:01.240 There will always be some other individuals, I guess, but it's not realistic.

00:08:05.100 I guess the big question now is let's hope that we've got a party

00:08:09.020 that has an incredible amount of power now.

00:08:11.640 Let's hope they use it wisely in this next couple of years

00:08:13.800 and we see some positive changes.

00:08:15.220 That's what we've got to hope for at this point.

00:08:17.900 So let's talk about Kamala Harris. I think it was a real disgrace last night that she did not have the intestinal fortitude to stand up and say anything. 1.00

00:08:32.320 You know, she didn't even need to necessarily concede last night if there was a small glimmer of hope. I mean, by the time we called, so we're done. I mean, it was very clear.

00:08:43.500 But even if she didn't concede, she should have at least gotten up and thanked the people who voted for her and worked for her.

00:08:50.620 The people who knocked on doors for months, hammered in signs.

00:08:56.140 You know, she didn't have to do it through the winter because she didn't face a Democratic primary process. 1.00

00:09:00.020 But people who worked for her, who volunteered for her, donated money to her, they show up at her headquarters.

00:09:07.940 Don't underestimate the difficulties of pounding a sign into the hard packed

00:09:14.740 soil you know it hasn't seen water for a month. As I said last night I've won an election and

00:09:19.460 I've lost an election. You got to speak both times one is a lot more fun than the other one is but

00:09:25.380 when you lose it's actually even more important to speak at the very least to thank the people

00:09:29.300 who busted their butts for you and she just couldn't do it and it was the same with Hillary 1.00

00:09:34.020 Clinton. And I think this, it's not helping the cause of America eventually having a woman president 0.93

00:09:41.540 that you've now had two, both got trounced and both didn't have, you know, not that Trump

00:09:49.560 particularly graceful he lost last time he didn't concede, but at least he stood up and talked to

00:09:54.380 his people. And you can argue if that was a good thing or bad things that he said, but at least he

00:09:57.620 had the guts to stand up, as has every single defeated presidential candidate in American

00:10:03.320 history except for Hillary Clinton and Kamala Harris. Neither of them as far as I know. I think

00:10:09.780 Gore never came out that night before. Okay but I don't know if he came out or not but that was

00:10:15.180 legitimately hanging in the air there was nothing. Oh I understand I'm just saying though he same

00:10:19.700 sort of thing as with Kamala though well I mean it was it was still technically could have been

00:10:24.040 he was not clearly defeated that night at all that was very much going to go to the courts that was

00:10:27.820 in the balance. We're saying the same thing he could have come out without conceding at least

00:10:30.780 I'm not sure.

00:10:31.780 Are you sure?

00:10:32.780 Because I was sitting up late that night.

00:10:33.780 I remember everybody, because everyone is waiting forever.

00:10:35.780 Is he going to come out?

00:10:36.780 And it was finally like an announcement.

00:10:37.780 Yeah, they decided they're not going to come out yet.

00:10:39.780 I don't remember.

00:10:40.780 Yeah.

00:10:41.780 Either way, it's very rare, though.

00:10:42.780 I don't want to understand.

00:10:44.780 So it's not a good look.

00:10:46.780 But Kamala Harris is going to be conceding.

00:10:49.780 I saw, oh, it was such a great, where is it?

00:10:54.780 I don't have it here.

00:10:55.780 It was such a great headline from the, I think was the onion. Trump calls Kamala Harris to congratulate himself. I thought it just summed up kind of both of them from last night very well. I don't know your thoughts, Corey on how she comes out of this and how the Democratic Party comes out of this.

00:11:19.340 I don't know. They've got a lot of introspection to do at this point.

00:11:22.460 They got four years to work on it. I mean, they're conceding. So

00:11:26.060 there's going to be a lot of changes. I mean, Kamala Harris is clearly a spent force. 1.00

00:11:30.780 She's not going to come out of the ashes like Trump, except which is a very exceptional case.

00:11:37.180 He is now the only the second non-consecutive two term president in American history,

00:11:42.620 the last being Grover Cleveland in the 1880s.

00:11:46.060 Yeah, so they've got to work on figuring out how they're going to be relevant in the next couple of years with such an overwhelming Republican control of every single part of the American system right now.

00:11:57.960 And just making a good showing for themselves as they figure out how they could change that circumstance four years from now.

00:12:06.760 So I'm fairly confident saying Kamala Harris will go down as the worst DEI hire in history.

00:12:13.100 Someone who was clearly never up to the task of the offices she held, who just managed by a combination of social grace and then checking off the right DEI boxes to be able to climb the ladder. 0.77

00:12:27.720 She didn't get a single delegate in the Democratic primaries when she ran for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2020.

00:12:36.860 Not a single delegate, but she checked the right boxes, so Joe Biden put her on the ticket.

00:12:40.900 Okay. And then you had the effective internal party coup, where she replaces Biden on the ticket. She faced no, she did not have to face the forge of a party nomination process. And she melted under the heat of a general election campaign, particularly against a ferocious opponent like Donald Trump.

00:13:03.500 But, you know, I think she did better than Joe Biden would have.

00:13:07.500 But that's because Joe Biden's brain doesn't work anymore.

00:13:10.500 The Democrats would have been so much better served having an open primary process.

00:13:14.500 DEI, you know, the idea of diversity hires is crumbling everywhere.

00:13:20.500 Major businesses that have been on board with it.

00:13:23.500 I think it's going to get a good press for a long time.

00:13:25.500 They're all getting out.

00:13:27.500 it is now the pendulum is swinging hard but Nigel do you think the Democratic Party

00:13:36.700 is going to maybe do serious reflection on the idea of constant identity politics that

00:13:42.620 everything is identity politics diversity hires uh Trump uh I think won the Latino vote.

00:13:50.700 Yeah he did and there there's some activists really shooting at I've seen some bizarre stuff

00:13:55.420 while it's online, we're going to see bizarre stuff, but some activists calling Latinos white

00:14:00.300 nationalists. And again, you guys, you haven't learned your lesson then if you're going to

00:14:05.100 pull these kinds of stunts. But I mean, this is just the day after 25% of blacks. 1.00

00:14:11.660 Trump did better with Latino voters than any Republican since Nixon in 1972, and better with

00:14:17.500 black voters than any Republican since the 1950s under Eisenhower. The great white nationalist Nazi 0.78

00:14:26.380 candidate seems to be doing better than any Republican in modern history with minority voters.

00:14:32.060 So do you think the Democratic Party is going to do a legitimate rethink on

00:14:38.300 their obsession with identity politics? Obviously, it did not work for them.

00:14:43.820 they will reflect on that and they will make changes the puzzle to me is that it took a defeat

00:14:51.700 like this to knock them off their high horse much as i deplore what the democratic party 0.99

00:15:00.180 has come to stand for i have never said that they were stupid people but now there is such a parade 1.00

00:15:08.320 of stupidity through this last four years but i'm starting to think well maybe i overestimated 1.00

00:15:16.080 their their intelligence and and their motivations because look at the things that they have done 0.99

00:15:23.040 never mind the dei just for a moment because i think that's actually a very big part of their

00:15:27.440 problem but how they managed to misunderstand what was on the hearts of what they thought

00:15:37.520 was their biggest pack of supporters, which was the women of America. 1.00

00:15:41.660 They thought abortion was the issue. 0.96

00:15:44.280 When you actually turn to the polls, abortion was, I think, about 14%.

00:15:50.420 What was the leading concern for American women was the economy, 1.00

00:15:54.960 because they're the ones who go to the grocery stores,

00:15:57.860 and they know what things cost, and they know that they don't bring as much home.

00:16:01.500 So the second thing was their habit of insulting their voters.

00:16:10.240 That comment made by one of their surrogates, I guess surrogate is the new buzz term for this.

00:16:17.900 If I go out and give a speech, I'm a surrogate for you, Derek, so there you go.

00:16:23.540 look it's um if you have somebody say there are no strong women around Donald Trump and then you

00:16:35.020 look at that stage last night when Trump came out and they all fell out and stood behind him

00:16:40.680 there were a bunch of women there who I would say were strong women and effective sure they 1.00

00:16:48.840 were beautiful that's expected but these are people that you can hand a big job to and say

00:16:53.320 willing to do it and expect it to get done. I mean, Melania, Trump speaks five languages and has a

00:16:59.220 little side business in high fashion, you know. It was a ridiculous thing to say, and you don't 0.96

00:17:05.480 bring people to yourself by shaming them, like Barack Obama. Okay, so with all those strikes 0.95

00:17:16.060 against them they then come in and and and emphasize that people are identified by this

00:17:22.700 marxist critique of of um it's all identity oppressors and oppressed you're you're not white 0.63

00:17:29.500 so you must by definition be oppressed uh then you have different degrees yeah because a latino

00:17:34.860 is still a white nationalist to a black uh and then jews who jews are now white nationalist nazis 0.95

00:17:40.940 yes so i i have a hard time keeping it straight if they don't rethink this they are doomed

00:17:45.980 to win let's uh beg your pardon they are doomed to lose again in 2028 you can't do this i i do

00:17:52.620 think that as you said there are many intelligent people in there i mean this is a shake up i i

00:17:57.660 suspect i mean right now we're seeing the hotheads speaking and and so on but the wise ones are being

00:18:02.220 quiet right now and they're thinking and i i think they're gonna they're gonna rebuild they're gonna

00:18:07.820 re-evaluate that approach i mean james carver will come on your show i was james carver was

00:18:13.420 The name I was thinking of is someone who was, he's been warning the Democrats that you're not going to win the votes of men by shaming men for being men.

00:18:22.660 You know, playing identity politics, maybe it'll work with those groups, but then you're going to alienate these other groups here.

00:18:30.760 In fact, but it didn't work with a lot of these minority groups.

00:18:33.980 Trump also nearly won with women.

00:18:37.140 I think Kamala had a minor edge, but Biden outperformed Kamala Harris with women compared to Harris here. 1.00

00:18:45.140 And, you know, both Kamala Harris and Hillary Clinton made making the first woman president of the United States such a key part of their campaign.

00:18:56.140 And that that appeals, I guess, to a certain segment of the Democratic Party, but it doesn't, I think, resonate with the broader American public.

00:19:04.140 And you'll see some of the hotheads in the Democratic Party right now saying, well, this just shows the American people aren't ready for a woman president. No, they weren't ready for Hillary Clinton, and they weren't ready for Kamala Harris. Those people were judged and found wanting. America surely will have a woman president at some point.

00:19:25.140 My best guess is that that person is likely to be a Republican, though, and we've seen this in other places.

00:19:32.140 We saw Margaret Thatcher in the United Kingdom.

00:19:35.140 Golda Meir in Israel.

00:19:38.140 Yep. What's her name in Italy? I can never remember her.

00:19:42.140 Georgia Maloney.

00:19:43.140 Yeah.

00:19:44.140 Indira Gandhi in India.

00:19:45.140 Yeah. Imperfect example, Angela Merkel in Germany.

00:19:49.140 She was a moderate conservative when she started. She left as a treasonous socialist by the time she was done.

00:19:54.140 the time she was done, but she started as a middling competent. She was competent, she's smart. Yeah, but she was a nominal nominally a conservative at least. The left doesn't tend to produce many. I mean, I guess New Zealand, what her name was, but for the most part, because I think they're making the argument, you have to elect this person because they're a woman. And that's not an appealing argument to a man. In fact, it's not an appealing argument to a lot of women either.

00:20:20.560 So I think America is going to eventually have a female president, but that is going to be a Republican. 0.95

00:20:27.400 The thing with DEI is that it is based on resentment.

00:20:31.440 You need resentment between classes and identities in order for any advantage to be conferred.

00:20:38.360 As a consequence, that's what the Democratic campaign projected was dourness. 1.00

00:20:46.080 Forget the joy stuff.

00:20:47.680 It wasn't much joy.

00:20:48.320 It wasn't much joy.

00:20:49.300 It was basically a complaint and a lament, whereas the Trump team certainly were pretty hard, but they knew how to have fun as well.

00:21:00.080 I mean, don't want to go back to talking about garbage trucks and McDonald's, but, you know, there's a playful side to that leadership team, which is very attractive.

00:21:12.720 And I think a lot of people said, oh, whatever, you know, they just kind of enjoyed it, voted for it.

00:21:19.300 D.I. is poison. Indeed. Okay, let's bring the map back up. I want to shift gears. It's not as exciting as the big headline Trump-Harris battle, but let's talk about Congress because it really matters. 0.99

00:21:35.700 So in addition to Trump's own win, Republicans have taken clear control of the Senate.

00:21:42.940 They were only down one seat, and they were defending a handful.

00:21:48.160 The Democrats were playing defense at a lot more.

00:21:51.220 For Canadians who aren't aware of how it works, only one-third of the Senate is elected every two years.

00:21:57.200 So it turns over roughly 33 seats at a time.

00:22:02.120 So it's not all up for election.

00:22:04.400 So, and just this cycle happened to be that the Democrats were on the playing defense a lot more.

00:22:10.720 And so the Republicans have easily taken control.

00:22:13.080 They're at 52 seats right now.

00:22:14.440 That could get up to 55.

00:22:17.940 It's going to be between 52 and 55.

00:22:19.980 Either way, they've got clear control of the Senate.

00:22:25.160 Then the House of Representatives, that one's a bit more complicated.

00:22:30.540 The Republicans already had a majority.

00:22:33.760 It'd be very odd for Trump to win on a Republican wave, the Senate to move on a Republican wave, then the House of Representatives to go the other way.

00:22:44.600 Now, local races, individual candidates matter a hell of a lot more in American politics than in Canada, because individual members of Congress and senators actually kind of get to vote as they want to.

00:22:55.160 There's pressure from their parties, but they can buck their party's trend because there's no party leader who takes your nomination away.

00:22:59.680 You have a primary instead, unless you're Kamala Harris. 0.99

00:23:03.380 The Republicans are at 210 seats in the House of Representatives right now. Democrats 194, 31 still up for grabs. Republicans are likely to maintain there. Although I would have thought they would have maybe made bigger gains in the House of Representatives. Doesn't look very likely that they will.

00:23:20.860 But and then Trump, as we said earlier, has the Supreme Court.

00:23:25.860 It's a pretty solidly conservative court at this point.

00:23:29.860 It looks at least for these two years before the next midterms, the Republicans can do anything they want.

00:23:37.860 They need to do it wisely.

00:23:41.860 And there is one of the strengths of the American system is that there is usually, even if you've lost the election, there is usually some place where you can take a little hope.

00:23:55.080 Well, we lost the presidency, but we got the House of Representatives.

00:23:58.500 Well, we lost the House of Representatives, but at least we managed to nominate a couple of Supreme Court judges.

00:24:05.400 And conservatives over the last four years have often found themselves thinking those kinds of compensatory thoughts, and it gives you hope, and it gives you confidence in the system.

00:24:17.980 Now, right now, if you are a Democrat, and if you're one of the kind of people who we like to caricature, where exactly do you take any hope and confidence in the system?

00:24:31.800 Well, the United States is a federation. They can still have some governor's mansions, some state houses.

00:24:36.440 But at the federal level, they're defeated.

00:24:39.700 They can move to New York or they can move to California.

00:24:42.700 But you see what I'm saying? Unless there is some place where you say, okay, that's a little bit of mine there.

00:24:48.560 And I'm holding on to it. And as long as it's there, the system is working for me.

00:24:52.740 Now, I wouldn't for a moment want to change any of the results that we reviewed last night.

00:24:57.020 But there is an onus on the governing party to remember that there are other people that they have to serve.

00:25:06.940 Not for a moment do I want them to take the eye off the ball and the things they promised to do.

00:25:12.540 But it's a matter of the style.

00:25:14.440 Like right now, I think a lot of us who were hoping for a Trump win, and I'm guilty of this myself,

00:25:21.040 are kind of taking the first 24 hours to gloat.

00:25:23.820 Okay, we have to go through that, and then we've got to put that on one side and say, what are the serious interests of everybody here?

00:25:34.020 Hopefully, that's all is already deeply embedded in the administration.

00:25:39.140 So, I'm not sure many Canadians know about this, but there's something called the Senate filibuster.

00:25:44.680 It applies particularly in the Senate, not so much in the House of Representatives, but it allows the minority party, as long as they've got more than 40 seats, I think,

00:25:53.820 And it's extremely rare that anyone's got more than 60 seats for a party in the Senate.

00:25:58.360 That just doesn't really happen much anymore.

00:26:01.240 But the minority party to stop the majority party from going too far and imposing its will.

00:26:08.600 The Democrats have been pretty hot about getting rid of Senate filibuster.

00:26:15.220 Because for a while they had the House of Representatives, the Senate, and the presidency.

00:26:18.940 They lost the House.

00:26:20.140 They still had the Senate.

00:26:20.880 They wanted to get rid of that.

00:26:21.820 I think they'll be quiet about that for a while.

00:26:23.820 I have a feeling that issue hits the back burner for now.

00:26:28.620 Now, the Republicans, to your point, Nigel, they could say, you know what?

00:26:33.080 Maybe you guys were right for the last four years.

00:26:35.720 Let's get rid of the filibuster.

00:26:37.540 But I think that would be quite un-magnanimous.

00:26:42.580 And it would be extremely short-sighted because no one gets to govern forever.

00:26:46.900 What was that great John Williamson quote that you had last night?

00:26:50.140 Someone else mentioned it.

00:26:51.780 And I was one who said with John Williams, it was, no defeat is permanent, no victory everlasting, or something like that.

00:26:59.500 You will eventually, now Oprah said that this could very possibly be the last election in America.

00:27:05.600 When I see the Enabling Act tabled, I'll reconsider her thoughts.

00:27:08.820 But until then, no, it's not.

00:27:12.600 Also, if you're going to set up a dictatorship, you should probably do it before you turn 80 years old.

00:27:16.880 There's not really much of a point in abolishing elections when he's not a spring chicken.

00:27:23.180 This is going to be his last term, obviously, constitutionally.

00:27:25.820 And it's just not going to come around. He's going to try and change it.

00:27:29.560 This is his term. But, yeah, I think it's the danger for the Republicans now is overconfidence.

00:27:39.040 They have a resounding mandate. They've got total control, but overconfidence now.

00:27:44.320 They probably should move aggressively.

00:27:46.860 They've got their two years before the midterms to make big, big changes, start deporting the illegals, cut the budget, build the wall, or finish building the wall.

00:27:58.980 I want your thoughts, Corey, though, on the unity ticket.

00:28:02.420 This was an interesting concept.

00:28:04.620 You had Kamala Harris.

00:28:06.360 She tried to balance her ticket by finding a frumpy white dude like Waltz.

00:28:09.740 Okay.

00:28:10.620 But then everyone at our rallies was just, it was Beyonce.

00:28:13.800 It's Taylor Swift is all celebrities, just a list celebrities.

00:28:18.800 Trump, by contrast, you know, he brings in RFK, Elon Musk, you know, these kinds of characters.

00:28:26.800 Do you want to speak first about how that involved the campaign?

00:28:33.800 But then I think more importantly, what role they're going to play in shaping this?

00:28:38.800 How is this going to be different from a previous Trump administration or other administrations in general?

00:28:44.560 Is it going to be a more decentralized hands-off?

00:28:47.660 Is Trump going to be the chairman president or is he going to be the CEO president?

00:28:52.160 Those are two different roles.

00:28:53.180 I hope he delegates because he's not a deep policy thinker, whatever he may be. 0.52

00:28:58.640 He's no fool, but he's a showman.

00:29:00.460 He's a politician. 0.99

00:29:01.420 He's a front man.

00:29:02.620 I don't like the thought of him drafting specific policy.

00:29:06.300 if you're going to talk about health care or cutting the civil service.

00:29:09.780 I hope, I mean, it was an interesting exercise, too,

00:29:13.060 of building different camps and bringing in support.

00:29:16.620 Likewise, RFK has some questionable views on medicine that I don't,

00:29:22.260 but since they don't have nationalized health care,

00:29:26.900 it's not as much of a concern.

00:29:29.160 He can promote the theories that he likes,

00:29:32.020 but it's not a control of what can or can't be done.

00:29:34.620 and it certainly would pacify the people with concerns about vaccinations.

00:29:38.720 What I'm most interested in is Elon Musk, though.

00:29:42.140 He showed how you can gut a large organization with a lot of bloat with Twitter.

00:29:47.700 And as much as everybody said, that's it, it's going to fall apart, it's going to die.

00:29:50.540 No, Twitter just proved itself more powerful than it's ever been.

00:29:54.580 Musk, whatever he might be, he gets things done.

00:29:57.880 He gets to the point, how much interest in time?

00:30:00.800 He's also an interesting character.

00:30:02.660 His interest is fleeting.

00:30:03.560 So if he wants to dedicate getting into and actually working on rebuilding that civil service, now is the opportunity.

00:30:10.260 You've got those two years before the midterms.

00:30:12.480 You've got the houses because it's going to be a battle.

00:30:16.200 So if you're going to take the knife to things, do it now.

00:30:20.020 Is he going to?

00:30:20.960 Is Trump going to give him the authority to?

00:30:22.660 Is he interested actually really in going further now that he's got better things to do?

00:30:26.900 He's making humanity interplanetary.

00:30:29.560 That's what I mean.

00:30:29.960 I mean, he's the picture of a genius kid with attention deficit disorder.

00:30:34.180 So, you know, the election is done.

00:30:35.340 I've got to work on my rockets now.

00:30:36.900 You know, we'll see.

00:30:39.020 But, I mean, it's going to be very interesting to see who he pulls around

00:30:41.660 and actually puts into those.

00:30:43.700 Because cabinets are different in the states.

00:30:45.380 Something to let our listeners realize as well.

00:30:48.440 We draw our cabinets exclusively, typically, from the elected individuals.

00:30:53.440 That's not the case in the United States.

00:30:55.200 You can pull some people into some powerful positions,

00:30:57.500 and they are not elected to them.

00:30:58.760 And that that's really where the opportunities are going to be good or bad for President Trump. So this next couple of months is going to tell a tale.

00:31:06.760 All right. All right, let's turn our attention closer to home here.

00:31:12.760 Bit of a smaller election or vote, but still, by far, it was the largest political convention in Canadian history in any province for any party, federal or provincial.

00:31:24.460 the Alberta United Conservative Party's convention in Red Deer.

00:31:29.100 Probably the biggest gathering ever in Red Deer.

00:31:31.700 I mean, maybe a concert thrived, but maybe.

00:31:34.240 I don't know.

00:31:36.400 And the big item on the agenda was her leadership review vote.

00:31:39.540 Now, all three of us were there.

00:31:41.500 A bunch of the Western Standard crew was there.

00:31:45.780 And I think we were all predicting she was going to be fine.

00:31:48.700 She was, I mean, you need, you know, 50% plus one is not enough to stay as leader. 1.00

00:31:54.840 It would open up, the knives come out hard for you then.

00:31:59.520 But I, you know, my prediction was 83.

00:32:03.160 She came in at 91.5, an absolutely triumphal result for Smith.

00:32:11.300 I'll start with you, Nigel.

00:32:13.600 I think at this point it's safe to say her leadership is unassailable short of an absolute atomic face plant on something.

00:32:22.520 So what we actually had was 50% plus 2,400 and what?

00:32:27.520 You know, I rest my case. That was enough.

00:32:31.920 So, you know, I sometimes wonder why we paid so much attention to those stories about the people who are there to undermine her.

00:32:42.580 I mean, there were people, there were 400 people who voted against her, yeah.

00:32:47.960 But, gosh, you know, did we fall for our own preconceptions?

00:32:55.780 It turned out there was nothing there, nothing to speak of.

00:33:01.400 Clearly, I mean, the wonderful thing about this, for the sake of all Albertans,

00:33:06.300 is that the Premier now is very clear that she has the total support of her party.

00:33:10.600 If there is any dissent within the caucus, they wouldn't dare raise their heads at the moment.

00:33:17.160 And she is about to go head-to-head with the federal government on their own lawsuit against the federal government,

00:33:28.040 telling them to back off on the emissions cap.

00:33:32.180 And also, we're heading into winter when this whole business of the secure supply of electricity is going to be on everybody's mind, even as the federal government continues to call for net zero by 2035.

00:33:49.180 So, it's good that whether you're a member of the NDP, whether you're a member of the UCP,

00:33:59.940 if you are living in Alberta, at this particular moment in Alberta's history, it is essential

00:34:08.120 that the leadership be strong in the face of what is really a predatory federal government.

00:34:15.500 I think we'll kind of continue with Nigel's point about, you know, why, why did we pay so much attention to those coming after her leadership? Those of us in the room, before you get in there, you never really know how many, how many people are they going to bust there? What are they going to do?

00:34:36.500 One of the groups was Take Back Alberta, David Parker, who, you know, and that organization, and he played a significant role in helping take down J.C. Kenney.

00:34:47.200 So there was some history there, thinking, okay, well, they were a part of it.

00:34:50.680 We know who these guys are.

00:34:54.440 You know, and, you know, then, you know, that organization played a role supporting Smith's election as UCP leader.

00:35:00.440 It's slate of candidates won in both the last two annual general meetings for their slate of candidates on the board.

00:35:07.440 So, you know, they had a track record.

00:35:10.440 But I just had a pretty strong feeling going into this that that train's run out of steam.

00:35:17.440 It doesn't have the heft anymore.

00:35:20.440 And then we saw the result. It had nothing. It was done.

00:35:25.440 It was done. And then there was also the so-called 1905 committee. There's really only two people publicly associated with it. I just wasn't seeing anything big around it. But, I mean, it is relatively unusual that you have organized groups trying to push a leader at a convention.

00:35:44.380 Normally these things are behind the scenes and it's kind of quiet and everyone smiles in public, but then quietly try to move people around.

00:35:52.380 That was not the case when Jason Kenney went down.

00:35:56.380 There was massive organized resistance against him and it won.

00:36:00.380 So I think maybe it was just kind of Jason Kenney syndrome from what happened last time that was projected on.

00:36:07.380 So, Corey, you know, we got the two organizations there, Take Back Alberta, 1905 committee.

00:36:14.760 They were absolutely destroyed by Smith's result.

00:36:20.020 Those of us watching things new, we really did.

00:36:22.920 I mean, I was confident before saying she's going to get 85% at least.

00:36:26.420 People watching from outside, they could point at and say, look how much impact Take Back Alberta had on Jason Kenney.

00:36:33.800 And that's absolutely true.

00:36:35.120 people saying conservatives are often pulled down by their own. Again, absolutely true. But they

00:36:39.780 haven't watched when that actually happens, or they're ignoring what was to be seen when that

00:36:45.300 happened. I mean, when you see the internal ones, those of us tied in, we'll still, we can smell the

00:36:50.720 whisper campaigns. We know what's going on. We don't necessarily know who, but you know what's

00:36:55.080 going on. And with Take Back Alberta, it was very transparent when they went after Premier Kenney.

00:36:59.600 There were dozens and dozens and dozens of well-attended meetings, a very aggressive

00:37:04.240 schedule, a very tightly organized get out the vote strategy to ensure that people voted against

00:37:12.840 Kenny. Absolutely none of that had happened. All we saw was David Parker speaking on social media

00:37:17.580 and a brochure campaign once the AGM hit. So that network just wasn't there. So there's no way they

00:37:24.520 could have been organizing to pull that together. There was no pile of 1905 meetings or even an

00:37:29.140 unknown group. You can't, especially when you've got a group of 6,000 people, you're trying to

00:37:33.120 influence, you're not going to do that in the dark. You're going to see the rumblings. You're

00:37:37.420 going to see these meetings. And I just didn't see, I just saw the usual characters and suspects who

00:37:42.260 like to organize around the peripheries, these things, you know, making noise, but never actually

00:37:46.400 getting anywhere. Smith should still take things seriously. I mean, the risk to a conservative

00:37:50.720 leader from within is always very real. She's gotten a pass and a strong mandate today. And

00:37:56.180 that can be very different two years from now. So she's still got, she's not going to face another

00:38:00.240 review before the next election. Well, no, she's not scheduled to, but let's remember Jason Kenney's

00:38:06.580 leadership review was not a scheduled one. It was effectively a recall. It can be. Constituencies

00:38:11.220 essentially called constituency associations had called a special general meeting, effectively

00:38:15.760 forcing a recall vote on them. Now these things are part of the UCP's constitution where they're

00:38:23.680 they're done every few years. But their strategy even at the event was strained. I mean,

00:38:32.620 they had these handouts with report cards claiming that Smith is weak on COVID stuff.

00:38:39.000 When in fact, she's probably the most radically anti-mandate leader of a head of government.

00:38:42.440 Good as they're going to get.

00:38:44.040 She's her only rival for the top spot is like Rhonda Santos. So I don't know what you're getting 1.00

00:38:50.380 at. These groups had, no, no one put their name on it. So we don't know who officially was behind

00:38:55.800 it. We have an idea. There was the one handout saying Danielle Smith is going to post Sharia law 0.78

00:38:59.980 on Alberta. You know, and I was like, how's that going to play? And I don't think, I think that

00:39:08.020 hurt them because it was so obviously over the top. And then they had no actual events there.

00:39:13.700 There was no visible, real presence of, we're the anti-Smith group, you know, here's a, we're having hospitality, come have a beer with us.

00:39:22.180 It was a flyer campaign is all it was.

00:39:24.080 Yeah, it was a paper tiger campaign, and it just had, there was no there there.

00:39:31.060 I guess the question, Nigel, is, is the media, and by media I mean Dwayne Bratt, going to continue to be quoted talking about people who they don't actually know ad nauseum here about this fake coup in the party that just never existed?

00:39:48.700 Well, the answer to that question specifically is yes, they will, because it is Dwayne Bratt's telephone number that they have.

00:39:56.900 If they were to ask around, they could probably get Barry Cooper's.

00:40:00.360 In fact, I would be pleased to forward it to my erstwhile colleagues at the Calgary Herald,

00:40:05.500 a bunch of telephone numbers for conservative academics and conservative thinkers

00:40:11.200 who would give them a different point of view than that offered by Dwayne Bratt.

00:40:16.080 But that's kind of, I don't mean any disrespect to Mr. Bratt either, Dr. Bratt.

00:40:22.320 He's entitled to his point of view, and when he's asked to give it,

00:40:25.620 sure he gives it but i do think that the the mainstream media would be doing everybody a favor

00:40:31.540 if they just asked a few more questions let me tell you one anecdote to that point the year was

00:40:38.580 2006 and at that time the premier premier daniel smith was still a columnist at the calvary herald

00:40:48.180 and both of us had to work late to comment on whatever was going to happen in the january

00:40:55.620 2006, federal election that was going to bring the Stephen Harper government to power.

00:41:04.680 And once the matter was settled, somebody came down to the caller and said, hey, guys,

00:41:09.220 do you have any conservative contacts?

00:41:11.580 We don't have anybody to ask for a call.

00:41:14.460 And obviously, we gave them what we had, and they went off and did their story.

00:41:20.040 That is very typical, unfortunately, of the media, that they have one point of view and one set of go-to people to support that point of view.

00:41:31.960 Selen do they get into the uncomfortable zone of where they get both sides of the story.

00:41:36.780 It's just these people, they don't actually know conservatives.

00:41:39.880 I try to be, you know, when we talk about internal NDP politics here, I try to be self-aware that I'm not a socialist.

00:41:48.840 I'm not a leftist progressive.

00:41:50.840 Now, I actually do know some and I can actually get along

00:41:55.840 and have a beer with these people, but I'm not one of them.

00:41:58.840 So while I might try to get in their brain, I'm very self-aware

00:42:03.840 that I'm not them, I do not think like them.

00:42:06.840 And I just don't think we see the same self-awareness on the other side.

00:42:11.840 We couldn't speak to the nuts and bolts that would go on in a union-backed sort of,

00:42:15.840 sort of organizing, I mean, organizing is organizing, but there's different intricacies

00:42:18.800 and things that they were immersed in for many years, and they would be able to speak to Gil

00:42:22.480 McGowan is as loony as he is, would be able to speak very well to what's going on behind the

00:42:26.720 scenes in the NDP. We're a lot more in tune to be able to speak to what happens in these

00:42:30.560 conservative organizations. But as Nigel saying, media doesn't call people like ourselves,

00:42:34.800 because they literally don't know who they are. Yes, they don't, they might know a couple of the

00:42:38.560 buzz name, you know, highlights, but they don't know the culture of it. They don't know who's

00:42:43.520 behind it. So yeah, you know, they had, there was a couple, there was TBA, and then there's two names

00:42:49.660 associated with 1905. And I just couldn't find anyone else involved. In fact, I knew a bunch of

00:42:56.220 TBA organizers who were aggressively handing out like pro Daniel Smith buttons and stuff at the

00:43:01.560 convention. I was like, yeah, you know, I'm just not smelling any rebellion. It was more of an

00:43:08.680 opposition for the sake of opposition at that point, I think. Yeah. On the TBA part, anyway.

00:43:13.800 Okay. Well, we're going to put a pin in it there and turn to our parting shots. Let's start with

00:43:19.280 you, Corey. Jeez, it was like a no huddle, you know, play between shows. I just came off mine

00:43:24.620 into here, so I hadn't dwelled on it. Parting shots, I just want to send my love in a sarcastic

00:43:31.120 way to Stephen Gilboa as he's gone and lobbed the nugget into the punch bowl out here with his

00:43:37.420 emissions cap, which is just clearly, I mean, again, modeled as a political play. I mean,

00:43:41.820 it's not, even if it came about, it's not going to come until after the next election.

00:43:45.820 I guess thanks for giving us lots of fodder to work on in the next few months, Mr. Gilbo,

00:43:49.800 and allowing regionalists like me to entrench even deeper in the West. Nigel.

00:43:54.720 As a longtime reader of Ayn Rand, I felt in the last few years that we were kind of living in

00:44:00.440 the last chapter of Atlas Shrubbed. I think something has changed there. Anyway,

00:44:05.440 There's something about the Trump team.

00:44:08.380 Musk is sending a man to Mars.

00:44:10.740 Ramaswamy built a high-tech empire,

00:44:12.600 and Trump himself changed the skyline of New York.

00:44:16.500 What did any of the Democrats ever do?

00:44:20.180 And it looks like Atlas is finally picking up the ball.

00:44:24.120 Maybe so.

00:44:25.520 For my parting shot, let's just bring up my screen here for a moment.

00:44:29.040 My favorite character of this election.

00:44:31.560 Peanut.

00:44:32.440 Peanut the squirrel.

00:44:35.440 I said it last night. I'll repeat it again. High school students in social studies are going to be taught 60 years from now how the government's execution of this poor, innocent, cute little squirrel changed America.

00:44:47.800 I don't know what degree he played a role, but it was a very last minute kind of cultural moment, emphasizing the excesses of the administrative state. And it's just the cutest little squirrel.

00:45:02.420 Here's another one. Peanut may have been executed by Democrats, but he lives on. He lives on in us, and I think there should be a memorial statue put up to him somewhere.

00:45:19.480 There's going to be a bust of Peanut the Squirrel in the White House in a few months. All right, that's it for me. Nigel, Corey, thank you for joining.

00:45:30.700 And thank all of you for joining us today.

00:45:32.780 Remember, if you're not yet a member of the Western Standard, you really need to be.

00:45:35.960 The Western Standard is one of just a tiny, tiny handful of media left in Canada that do not take Justin Trudeau's federal media bailout money.

00:45:44.060 That is very, very expensive to us to not take.

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00:46:10.300 Thank you very much for joining us today, and God bless.

Western Standard - November 07, 2024

Trump wins, what will the Democrats do？

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