Episode 1081: Patels and Poilievres

Zain 0:02

This is Strategist episode 1081. My name is Zain Velji. With me as always, Corey Hogan, Stephen Carter. Carter, you've got some breaking news for us. We

Carter 0:10

We have to record a podcast promotion where we promote ourselves for another podcast called The Loony Hour. And

Carter 0:18

And it's a business podcast where I imagine grown-up human beings listen. listen so i'd like us to be mature about it and actually focus on doing a a

Carter 0:28

a pro like how would you promo our podcast zane go well

Zain 0:31

well first of all i'm gonna ask some basic questions why and what is the loony hour let's start here and why are we doing this in the first place because what it

Corey 0:39

we're actually promoing them right now yeah we

Corey 0:41

isn't this mission accomplished

Carter 0:42

accomplished no we're recording them right

Carter 0:45

we're recording okay i'm gonna get you guys to focus we're We're recording a promo for ourselves to put on to the Looney Hour, right?

Carter 0:54

right? So that we can get some of their listeners. I feel like we just did

Corey 0:57

did that. Did we not just

Carter 0:59

just do that? I need you to focus. We need to get their listeners to come to our show. Well,

Corey 1:03

Well, that's just not going to happen. You said they were adults, right? Well,

Carter 1:06

Well, I'm assuming they're adults. I mean, they're going to a show called the Looney Hour.

Zain 1:10

Let's just do it right now. Let's just do it on the pod right now.

Zain 1:12

Can we just do it on the pod?

Zain 1:15

Listen to our show.

Zain 1:19

anything else i'm good i think that actually works let's

Zain 1:21

move are we done with the business portion of our meeting jesus fucking christ carter you know can we get on to some chutney conversation or

Carter 1:28

or you got more business to drag one of the highest rated canadian

Carter 1:32

canadian yeah are you still trying to do this

Corey 1:35

this or is this just like we are

Zain 1:37

fucking joke here's what we are here's what's gonna work here's that one no no this is where the community takes hold i asked you to do we're gonna do a crowd we're

Corey 1:45

we're gonna do a 30

Zain 1:48

many ideas too many ideas mine's the best okay here's what we're gonna do we're

Zain 1:51

we're gonna do the 30 second promo on this pod okay and then we're gonna ask every one of our listeners i just need

Carter 1:56

need a script to

Zain 1:57

to get a cassette player okay take

Zain 2:01

take your phone take your phone hit

Zain 2:03

hit record on the cassette player record a cassette give it to friends and family i feel like that's a really good idea to promote It even expands beyond the Looney Hour, Carter I just

Corey 2:15

just can't believe we have listeners On

Zain 2:17

On the Looney Hour

Zain 2:19

feel like we've promoted

Zain 2:20

promoted them a lot

Corey 2:21

No, it's us They owe us a good 2 minutes and 30 seconds At this point Can we

Carter 2:29

we start the show now? The

Zain 2:30

The show has started Where's

Zain 2:32

All in promo of this show Capturing both the flavor and the content That people who listen to

Carter 2:37

to the Looney Hour

Carter 2:38

would get I didn't even notice that it was recording.

Zain 2:40

Hey, Corey, does it matter if your name is Mark or Mohamed?

Zain 2:45

Not in Pierre Poliev's Canada. Can we get into this?

Corey 2:48

this? I don't understand what happened.

Corey 2:49

This is not a reference you're going to get. This

Zain 2:52

reference we're going to get. Let's get into our Stampede roundup. Corey, a lot of feedback coming from our last Stampede episode. I don't know if you guys got any feedback. I actually got feedback directly from some elected officials agreeing with a lot of our strategies we put out on the table. For those who missed last episode, we went into a deep dive on Stampede. But more specifically, we went into a deep dive on retail politics and how to kind of approach politicians in the summer festival and or barbecue circuit season. A lot of feedback, some disagreement, Carter, from certain politicians saying, you know what I prefer is people if they haven't asked, just fucking tell me. It's past day five of a 10 day festival. I don't need any niceties. I just need you to fucking tell me what you want, just so I can remember you.

Carter 3:29

you. I want you to tell them so that they can just say, yeah, I heard what you said and I'm never going to do what you asked me to do. That's what they want. like

Carter 3:36

like they're not we're talking about what's best for the for the people who listen not the fucking politicians so

Zain 3:41

so true carter so we're now i

Carter 3:43

i don't give a shit i mean i got i got feedback from amirjeet sohi too what did amirjeet sohi put him on blast on this show

Zain 3:49

show yeah marivan you

Carter 3:50

you know what he says to me here we go he says i i love your show but

Carter 3:53

but there's too much there's a buck

Zain 3:54

buck coming okay oh

Zain 3:55

yeah he's told me that multiple times and

Carter 3:58

told him like i'm like fuck you What the fuck,

Carter 4:03

Start your own show, buddy.

Zain 4:06

Here's what we can do. New Patreon subscription. It's called the SoHe Package. Okay? We give you the SoHe Package. It's $100 a month, Corey. He says, I'm just looking at you on this. We bleep out all the swearing. It's just for Amarjeet SoHe. He has to pay $100 a month. He says he can't

Carter 4:17

can't listen to it on his work phone because it's not... Wait, he can't listen to it on

Zain 4:21

on his work phone because there's cursing on the show?

Carter 4:23

show? Yeah, because there's cursing on the show. That's what he said. I

Carter 4:26

was like, if you can't break that level of complexity on your phone, you don't deserve to listen to us. You just don't deserve it. It's the city

Carter 4:37

I mean, how hard could it be to break this? I

Corey 4:39

I think non-cursing would be the kind of thing that you'd have trouble getting on a phone in Edmonton. Exactly. I mean,

Zain 4:44

swearing is the most exciting thing to happen in Edmonton. Ever

Zain 4:47

Ever since it was invented, people were like, oh my God. It's

Zain 4:50

It's the most Edmonton thing you can do. Fuck this place. Okay, are we good? Are we got that out of our system? uh cory no

Carter 4:56

no but there was a lot of feedback and all the politicians love us and

Carter 5:00

staffers love us here remember how they said the staffers wouldn't love us staffers love us here's

Zain 5:05

here's the thing well the staffer tip by the way whoever i think it was both of you tag teaming on the tip to talk to the staffers that's getting a lot of play that's getting a lot of play but we find ourselves let's keep this local for a second in a lot of in the middle of stampede cory you know know as we turn the bend for the first weekend a lot of big events a lot of name name brand politicians showing up to calgary as we said they would leader

Zain 5:28

leader of the liberal party and prime minister justin trudeau was in town you have the premier running around town you've got ministers from the federal government you also have the leader of the opposition in his new uh in his new look uh and cory we caught a glimpse of uh not just that look but a speech he was giving didn't we yeah

Zain 5:45

yeah we did you want to run a clip i i do i want to run a clip do i want to do i do i'm going to just do the clip i

Zain 5:52

mean you said we didn't have a clip we don't have a probably for the best i was just saying

Carter 5:56

saying when did we get professional and i think i think

Zain 5:58

think for his i think i think this is a big save for him that there's no clip that exists of this because i don't know if you what you thought of this speech but he gave a speech at the ismaili muslim stampede breakfast like an hour later beyond when the program was over people hunted around to hear Pierre Poliev. He gave a very interesting speech that I think you have a few thoughts on. So how about you get us started? And then I want to actually talk about a few strategy questions about Pierre and the barbecue circuit.

Corey 6:21

so yeah, he gave this speech. It was after the Prime Minister had left, the Prime Minister motorcade had gone out, people were kind of done, I think, with the main event. And there was some weak effort by the MC to bring everybody back around the crowd to listen to a politician speak, not a ton of takers. Like I would say that, That, for sure, it was a much more enthusiastic crowd for the prime minister, which is not necessarily what you would expect in Calgary if you're not in Calgary. But, you know, that's George Chahal territory and did very well. And who's a local liberal MP. The Pierre Poliev speech was short, which is the best thing I could say about it.

Corey 7:01

a lot of what he said was, you know, I don't know, I can't, I have a hard time introducing it without editorializing it. But it was pretty hackneyed. You know, it was this idea of like, yeah, I'm here. And, you know, I am all about opportunity. I was adopted by people, you know, opportunity. My wife is a refugee from Venezuelan socialism, opportunity. And, you know, in Canada, it doesn't matter if your name is Singh or Smith. I can't remember all of them. He used Pierre or Patel, I believe. No,

Zain 7:36

No, Polyev. Polyev or Patel. He used Polyev

Zain 7:39

Polyev or Patel, so there's a bit of a self

Zain 7:40

self-ref. Never use yourself

Corey 7:41

yourself in those examples, I think. Even Patel could rise to the ranks of a Polyev is how it comes off.

Corey 7:48

yeah, yeah, yeah. But, you know, anyways, it was like, I guess I would say it was a, I hope it was a pretty half-hearted effort because it wasn't very good. And the first thing I did was actually text you two and say, hey, Pierre Polyev, are we sure he's good? And Steven said, what? What's going on? I'm not there. Yeah, Carter left. And Zane said – I left with the prime minister.

Zain 8:05

minister. Well, I was – okay, so – Yeah, of course you did. Your one friend.

Zain 8:12

Your one friend took you. Yeah, he took

Zain 8:14

So for some context, this is a pretty big event in the Calgary Stampede. It's huge. It's become

Zain 8:20

become huge. Thousands of people. And it's one that I was part of organizing several years ago when we had a nighttime version of this event. It's become one of the more sort of common go-to dignitary events. I think that's like without without, you know, sort of prime

Corey 8:34

minister, the premier, the leader of the opposition, multiple

Zain 8:37

multiple ministers, one of

Corey 8:38

of those things. Yeah.

Zain 8:38

Yeah. Me, I was there. You know, Canadian Press article published about it, so to speak. Right. So it's one of those events. And, you know, what I wanted to get into is we can talk a little about Pierre Polyev, Carter, but I really wanted to get into it. And this might be a little bit of uncomfortable territory. But like, how do you in a 2023 world think about the rules of campaigning to racialized communities? communities because pure poly of speech was one of the ones that was a little hackneyed there was also like the

Corey 9:05

the prime minister was not the only one prime

Zain 9:07

prime minister's speech was a little forced to around you know business growth and like congratulating the community on like you don't have to choose between social impact and making a lot of fucking money like pretty much what he said i almost

Corey 9:20

almost became arnold schwarzenegger yeah

Corey 9:21

yeah i mean that's how that's how he sounds

Zain 9:22

sounds uh with the altitude here um carter tell me about your pure poly of and then i want to try to get into this conversation, which we've touched on in the past, but haven't really had a deeper dive on, on what maybe the new rules for campaigning look like in that sense, especially as it relates to this barbecue circuit conversation. Yeah.

Carter 9:42

Yeah. I mean, I think that there's a tendency to jump in on these different communities, quote unquote, different communities, communities that are in some fashion different, whether whether they're Jewish or they're a visible minority or they're young or they're old, and you try and make yourself really relevant to that group. But, of course, if you're not really connected to the group, you can come off sounding like you're just pandering or

Carter 10:09

or that you're really

Carter 10:11

really horrible. You go into the old age home and you say, this could be the most important election of your lifetime. It certainly is going to be the last. And you come across flat, right? Did you like that, Corey? That was good. I liked that. Yeah, you didn't laugh as loud as I expected. I don't think you were listening. Anyways, when you

Carter 10:29

you go in and you try and make this kind of you're part of us speech, I'm part of you, it does almost by necessity come across like we're not the same. We've never been the same. And now, you know, there's a wall between us. And I think that that's one of the great risks of going into racialized communities and visible

Carter 10:55

visible minority communities is that you go in and you say, essentially, you wind up in some fashion repeating the Velji rule. You know, I've always had great friends who were Jews, and here I am today speaking

Carter 11:06

speaking at this Jewish breakfast. Woo, aren't I ever so lucky?

Carter 11:09

You know, you want to make it sound like, frankly, this isn't that surprising for you. you've you know this isn't that different i mean i love going to the ismaili breakfast because it's the best breakfast i i see the most people i have the best time it's really replaced the hayes breakfast as the the go-to breakfast and i did all of that without saying anything about you know you people or you know bringing us all together or anything like that i actually managed to do it in such a fashion that i didn't come across you

Zain 11:40

you mean with your answer

Zain 11:41

just now like Yeah,

Carter 11:43

I think that's what the problem is, is that too

Carter 11:46

too often these, you know, did you know that your community has the highest rate of entrepreneurship in Calgary?

Carter 11:53

Yeah, they probably knew because that's probably the best way that they can make money. You know, like there's all kinds of bullshit happening. There's racism. There's all kinds of things that I don't have any connection with. So why the fuck am I up here spouting about it? So you got to be really careful, I think, when you go into those communities

Carter 12:08

communities that you're not necessarily from. And even when you are, you

Carter 12:12

you know, your guard goes up or your guard comes down in such a fashion that it may be really bad.

Zain 12:18

Corey, why is the Polyev, Patel, like, Mohammed, you know, Mark sort of like that refrain, right? Whatever it was. Yeah. Why is that hackneyed in 2023?

Corey 12:30

You know, I think for the

Corey 12:32

the hazard, the great hazard of the Calgary Stampede for all out-of-towners is that you look like a tourist, right? You don't really understand the community. And I think this was a great microcosm of that, right? And in the sense that, A, I

Corey 12:47

I think a little more intersectionally about, you know, the Ismaili community maybe putting on the breakfast, but it's a big diverse breakfast even beyond that. There's all sorts of Calgarians from all sorts of walks of life. and uh you know b it's

Corey 13:01

it's it's a lot more permeable like you know like it's just like it's it's a lot when somebody is standing up on that crowd the feeling i kept getting is they're standing up at the crowd and yes it is the the ismaili muslim community breakfast and so i appreciate that and i but you know they are assuming the crowd and the community are one they are assuming that this is a speech to like a certain section of calgary and they're not and they're they're both button buttonholing the community as they perceive it to be, and they are not seeing the wider, you know, audience that's in front of them there. And so I think that's fundamentally my problem with it, right? It's a view both of the Ismaili community, and it's also a view of the literal, physical audience that's in front of them that it seems to be somewhat missing on. And, you know, I think ultimately this

Corey 13:47

this very outdated, almost like 1980s United Colors of Benedict view of the world of like, oh, we've got this group here and we've got this group there and we've got this group over there and look at their different cultures and look at what they wear and all of this. And if you're familiar with the ad campaign in the 80s, you'll know what I'm talking about here. No, totally.

Corey 14:06

But that's just, that's not it. That's not modern Calgary. That's not modern day. Like the suggestion to me that I find – and I'm really curious your take here. Like what's your take on the breakfast, Zane? You were one of the organizers of the breakfast. In years past, yeah, and I'll take no credit for this year, but like – Not in this year. I know, but in years past as it was – Back when it was good.

Carter 14:23

good. Is that what you – Back

Corey 14:24

when it was good before it jumped the shark.

Zain 14:26

Well, you know what? I'll say before – to Corey's point, before it mainstreamed, and I think that's a really interesting thing, is that when politicians – your tourist example is very interesting when it comes to the point of politicians showing up. up to ethnic community or minority community events, thinking they've put on a really nice event, really surprising number of people for

Zain 14:49

for a minority community, versus thinking this is a community that happens to be a minority that's putting on a very fucking

Corey 14:56

fucking mainstream event. This is

Corey 14:57

is exactly the difference. Like, you have put your finger on it for me exactly. And

Zain 15:02

to Carter's point about

Corey 15:03

about- This is just a stampede event. This is a big stampede event in the city of

Zain 15:07

Calgary. I would say most corporate Calgary, most community Calgary, like this is the one, one of the few you put on your list, right? Like you get a few things done. Like if you're, if you're being like very crass, but hey, this is a bit of like community outreach. But this is also like, this is probably your best shot to have some time with the premier or a minister because you know they're going to be there, right? It's one of the ones where you can have a bit of community, a bit of like family, also a bit of ministerial time. But I think to the point, it's, it's, there's two concerns. The first one is exactly what you said, or

Zain 15:34

or the way I've kind of maybe expanded on that point around a community that happens to be a minority hosting a mainstream event. The other is really in the language of, and I was going to bring this up as a broader topic for both of you from a pure political risk perspective for this community. And there's probably folks in my religious community that are not going to love this line of questioning, but like singling out one community and being like, we owe a debt of gratitude to you. You guys are fucking amazing. Thank you so much. I think does two things. I want to talk about the political risk, which I'll get your thought on. But it also like perpetuates this minority myth model, right? That like, you know, why can't you just be like these guys? Like, aren't they exactly what you should be? And like, we should let more immigrants in because look at this one example, when we know that that is, I shouldn't say it's a fringe or a norm. I just want to go down that. But it's like it's perhaps using a pedestal and showcasing a narrow example while maybe trying to gloss over some of the other realities that immigrant and refugee communities face. So those are the two strands I always think of. What the harm is to the broader sort of community when you kind of single out one. I'd like to get your thoughts on that and the political risk. And the second one is really about how do our politicians and our politics start coping that at some point, and it's now, communities that happen to be minority communities and people that happen to be individuals from minority backgrounds are going to host the most fucking mainstream things because they are part of the mainstream. stream well

Corey 17:03

yeah this is like so maybe this is me just as a calgarian getting my back up a bit to calgary very diverse city big wild exciting place you know dynamic uh you know connected to the world and as a result of being connected to the world and in part connected to the world because of you know big diverse community and i always get the feeling of people marveling at the The diversity of Calgary, like George H.W. Bush looking at like a scanner at a grocery store. The Scantron.

Zain 17:34

Oh, yeah. No, no, no. The scanner. Yeah,

Corey 17:36

Yeah, exactly. Being like, oh, fuck, fuck. This is fucking amazing. Like, wow, look at this. Right. And, you know, it's just it's just sort of an outdated view. And to your point, Zane, I think that there's this sense of like, well, look, and now Calgary has these diverse communities. Not Calgary is a diverse community. Yeah, where the leaders of Calgary come from all walks of life. And, you know, there's all sorts of backgrounds. And, I mean, my God, how many, you know, how many times are we going to have to, you know, break that stereotype before Eastern Canada sees us a little bit differently? I don't know. We've talked about Mayor Sohi in Edmonton, of course, we've got Mayor Gondek in Calgary, right? Like this is, you know, we had Mayor Nenshi before, who was an Ismaili Muslim, is still to my knowledge. he

Corey 18:20

left right after the bear ship yeah yeah he's like let me let me get elected

Carter 18:25

elected that's what i mean yeah no

Corey 18:27

no no i so like i guess my point would be like yeah i just i find it really fascinating right like this idea of like oh and look and like look at this example and so to your idea of like this uh this uh you know model minority myth or what have you it's just like it's not a very textured view i think of either this maley community or of calgary i think that's what And

Zain 18:47

And I think as we see this going forward, and this is not just a Calgary context thing, Carter, this is like about rules of how politicians, regardless of frankly, where their background and lived experiences and what racial communities they

Zain 18:58

come from, or if they do at all, is how do they deal with this? Right? Like how do and this is kind of where I wanted to get into what is the new rulebook that we're talking about? Right? You guys have already put a few of these rules on the table. And I think they're really good. And I'd like to summarize them in a second. but Carter, keep adding to the list as I write down a few of these that you guys have already put down for us.

Carter 19:18

The first rule for me has always been to look at immigration with a much longer lens than immigrants in the last five years, 10 years, 15 years. We have to look at immigration going back to, you know, when Canada was settled, the colonial nature of our country. And that immigration created all kinds of different issues and the people who came at that time. So my great-grandfather came really early to Canada. On one side, I've got tons of Canadian, quote,

Carter 19:47

quote, roots. But he's

Carter 19:52

he's still an immigrant. He's in a country he doesn't understand, doing things he doesn't understand. And each

Carter 19:59

each generation becomes more and more integrated into this space. days and i think that if you start to look at immigration and say well you

Carter 20:07

know now we've got this type of immigrants and

Carter 20:09

and this type of immigrants is foundationally different than any other type of immigrants before you've

Carter 20:14

you've really missed the whole point of immigration immigrants

Carter 20:17

become any person any single person that chooses to uproot their lives and go to another country has a bravery that i can't express right and so i think that it's more important for us to look at the challenges faced within communities and minimizing those challenges, because that which we would wish for our forefathers, those people who came before, is that which we should be offering to those who come now. And I think that that kind of understanding also extends to the First Nations population, right? We don't treat people properly because we often, because we are ingrained to go to an us versus them model and

Carter 20:55

and that us versus them model is so easy for every human being to fall into and because we fall into that that means that when pierre polyev tries to step out of us versus them he inadvertently steps into us versus them and

Carter 21:10

and that's because that's the nature of human beings so how do we get out of that work

Carter 21:15

work consciousness being being a part of it

Carter 21:20

and you know also recognizing and this is one of my pet peeves Calgary isn't the stampede right

Carter 21:26

right we have the stampede it is a great 10-day festival but

Carter 21:30

but it ends and it ends next week and

Carter 21:33

I think that carrying this false history I always remind people this

Carter 21:37

this is a festival that was first sold to I think Winnipeg and then when it failed in Winnipeg they brought it to to uh to Calgary to try and sell it in calgary and we we were just dumb enough to buy it um the exact same festival so it's not really our history it's not really our culture um or i mean that kind of

Corey 21:56

of feels like it nailed our culture but yeah i

Carter 21:58

mean yeah exactly um sloppy seconds

Zain 22:02

seconds that's pretty much yeah

Zain 22:05

is get the act dead people on the line carter i got it we've

Carter 22:09

we've not gone with sloppy seconds as our as our tagline anyways

Carter 22:12

anyways um i've lost my point now thanks guys but it was it was basically great but there's good something you put down

Zain 22:19

down some good things you put down i always look at immigrants with a longer lens cory your point you know a city or a place is is diverse not that we'd have diverse communities a few of those things i i captured what else would you add to that list cory like as we think of top line maybe

Zain 22:33

maybe even just i'm almost looking at lens and directionality rather than even pure strategy yeah

Corey 22:39

yeah you know i think um so i want to preface this with a not particularly blinded insight that racism is real. But I think one of the challenges I had, I really wrapped my head around why Pierre Polyev's line of like, Patel or Polyev, you know, Smith or Singh, why it bothered me so fucking much. And I think, as I unpack it a little bit, and I'd be curious your two thoughts too, but like, it's because sort of built into it, baked into is this idea of almost like, this

Corey 23:09

this supremacy of the name Smith, of the supremacy of the name Polyev, like you too can Can have like, yeah, like the same privileges of somebody with the name Polyev, right? And I think that's wrong. And it's based on kind of this assumption or this foundational view of like, yeah, like everybody is trying to get to where I am. And you know, there's this idea of like, the

Corey 23:33

the name Polyev is the destination, right? Like not literally.

Zain 23:36

literally. Yeah, and don't

Zain 23:37

don't worry about it anymore, because your destination with your last name is now like, totally fine. Like, we're going to accept it with equal merit. That's

Corey 23:45

That's it, like, it's like, and then there's something about that, yeah, you've articulated it well there. That bothers me, right? Like, he's not saying, hey, we're all going to have the same kinds of opportunities. The subtext of his entire speech is, you can have the same kind of opportunities I have. Correct, which is

Zain 24:01

is different, Carter, than Nenshi's line, which you used in 2010, and and throughout his marriage trip which it doesn't matter what your last name is right this is a place where it does where that last age actually is irrelevant to your ability to do whatever

Carter 24:15

right i mean i've i've often i mean i i struggle with the line because i do think that currently it does matter what your last name is in this kind of white we do whitewash over a large portion of of calgary and canadian specific truth when we when we just you know when when nenshi would would pretend that line but i like the sentiment a hell of a lot more than you two could be a smith

Corey 24:42

yeah i mean we're not doing him total justice here but yeah like i think uh i yeah i think if there was even kind of a sense of balance in it it was like um i'm not even quite sure how he would have articulated it but you know uh the

Corey 24:57

the reality is yeah

Corey 25:00

yeah i can't i'm gonna i have another five minutes to put my fingers on no but i just don't think it's it is

Zain 25:06

interesting that you are struggling with this because it's like on the surface you

Zain 25:11

you know we could all hear that right and be like from a pure political level be like i think that speech was kind of weak and most of us would just leave it there and be like you know but like your deeper articulation and your thought process around like you too can have what smith has or pauliev has right or what johnson has right is really interesting when you dig deeper and be like even subconsciously is this what this person believes that like this one swim lane that like we'll do everything to preserve and keep pristine but this other swim lane that you guys have all been swimming in we'll grandfather it in as well like so if you clock it at the same time on either of these lanes we're not going to count it the same and like and i know that's not a great metaphor either but it's like it's it is interesting when you kind of like go a little bit deeper and you're like is that kind of problematic problematic and perhaps you know opens up question lines around is this is this just a belief in some ways well

Corey 26:04

well sure and it's it's i guess the the one wayness of that particular metaphor at least the way he presented yes yes it is partially what bothered me right he he wasn't saying like this is a place where you know a smith has access to all of the things that a singh has as well right like it was hey a singh can now have the things a smith has and there's a suggestion that like Like, those are the, you know, baked into it, the subtext. I'm clearly reading things into it he didn't intend, but I'll just say is you could kind of feel like you think that the Smith things are better, you know, at the bottom line. And I think that's part of what bothered me. It's like that Louis C.K. joke.

Zain 26:38

joke. He's like, if I ever come back, and no offense, I'm coming back white. Like,

Zain 26:43

Like, I am coming back white, right? Like, if I'm reincarnated, I would like to explore other choices, but white it is. And it kind of, like, plays into that same, it's like, I'm not saying it's the best, but it's clearly better. Like, I will. He's like, that's what I'm saying. But it is. And it kind of has that same sort of, you know, to be crass about it, Corey, it's kind of like that same sort of sub tone, right? Or subtext. Carter, respond to that. And then help us build a few more of these rules. I really like what you guys have put on the table. Well,

Carter 27:11

Well, I'm just, I'm throwing, I want to echo one of the things that Corey said, and that is that he, you know, Pierre Pelliev was not intending to come across as anything but genuine and anything but appealing to, to everybody who was there. Right. And I think that where we're jumping off on this is that this

Carter 27:30

this is part of the problem, right? This is part of how, when we intend, our

Carter 27:36

our intentions are, we try to make our intentions good. But just because we have good intentions doesn't necessarily mean that we've quite nailed it yet. And I think that we're, you know, we're picking on Pierre, but I could very easily pick

Corey 27:49

pick on many different politicians. We are, but, you know, Trudeau

Carter 27:49

Trudeau was just as bad

Carter 27:52

Exactly, because you get this, and even in these small group meetings, right? Right. So we've all done the small group meetings where we go into the Gurdwara, the temple, the, you

Carter 28:04

you know, whichever religious organization we're going into. And we sit down with the leaders, the elders, the whatever,

Carter 28:10

whatever leadership there is.

Carter 28:12

And we talked about the very special needs of that group. Right.

Carter 28:16

Right. And everybody talks about the special needs of that group. There

Carter 28:20

There is no real focus on the needs of Calgary in those moments. Right. Or the needs of Alberta in those moments. It is retail politics at a very transactional level. Or

Zain 28:30

Or thinking that those people wear multiple hats, right? That they're part of one group, but they also are part of other community groups, right? They're actually three-dimensional, not one-dimensional in that moment when you meet them. And just like that room of multiple people coming from one faith tradition, well, they're also a bunch of other things. They put on multiple hats. They

Carter 28:49

They do, but we go in and we trade on one level of transaction to try and gain another transaction, right? We go in on the transaction of you're

Carter 28:59

you're in this community, you're a leader in your religious community. We want you now to help us lead in this political community. And

Carter 29:09

And we trade on that. And

Carter 29:11

And that creates all kinds of problems, too. So we've all done that. And I can stand and throw my stones against Pierre. air um but that's you know faith minority status um all

Carter 29:30

all of these things are fraught there's so much there's so multiple level and all

Carter 29:36

all of us are guilty of taking advantage of different pieces and taking advantage of different people uh in order to try and get what we want and you

Carter 29:46

know on some levels i'm not going to apologize for that because

Carter 29:49

because that's the game that's what we're here to do we're here to win and we talk all the time about how you can try and play by some sort of different rule but ultimately the game is judged by whether you win at the end so

Carter 30:01

so i don't want to come across as too harsh but i also don't want to kind of i

Carter 30:06

i think that this is one of the problems of the game and we should be trying to figure out some of the solutions to it to well you

Zain 30:11

you know to your point there is a room cory and i'll let you kind of this is just more of a comment than a question i'll kind of say that if if there was a politician who kind of recognized the mainstreaming of certain things produced by groups that happen to be minority communities i think there's political value in that for them right to be like you have done something that is not just for you but is for everyone and then that is what is meant to be celebrated in some ways right like not just by people like me but like you know there is something something to that in that sense. And those are not the right words myself. But I want you to get your response because you also talked to you just mentioned Trudeau a bit as well. I don't know if there's anything that caught your attention with what he said, or if there's any other sort of rules you wanted to kind of add to our to our growing list. And then I do want to get to political risk in a second.

Corey 30:54

So I maybe I'll walk my way towards a rule. But the rough the rough outline of this rule is, you have to be thinking, would this be appropriate if I just mad libbed some of the context and and did it at say like a group that was put on by like a catholic faith group or a different organization maybe not a faith group at all and and is this how i would recognize the group would i go so all in on this and i'm gonna pick a a example here the haze breakfast that uh steven mentioned yeah calgarians uh of a certain vintage will know this was like the stampede breakfast for many many years you know you would go to heritage park there'd be be thousands of people there it was invite only but it wasn't that hard to get an invite yeah

Corey 31:36

and you would uh you know you'd go through the ceremony and politicians would often have their speeches and they would say things and if somebody at the hayes breakfast had spent literally the entire speech of the hayes breakfast talking about the contribution of the hayes family and of southwest calgary and heritage park and how important it was we would say that's fucking weird weird

Corey 31:56

weird all right you

Corey 31:57

you know that's really strange and uh yes they are the hosts and and yes they deserve acknowledgement for their support of the hayes family through there but like does this actually follow is this what this event wants

Corey 32:09

wants to be about purports to be about and i'm not saying it's a perfect parallel but i'm saying as a politician you should sit you should do that check and say okay if i just swapped out a few things and if i was at like say a catholic event at southwest calgary would this speech be talking about the things i'd want to be talking about or would somebody say this speech is fucking weird and and i think as we evolve as a yeah you know our understanding of kind of like the again i'll use the word intersectionality we all wear many hats right you you were just talking about that i think there's got to be more of an appreciation for that nuance by politicians and the words that they write and the words that they say should should reflect that.

Corey 32:47

And it doesn't always, especially when you're dealing with communities that they are not members of. Carter,

Zain 32:52

Carter, I remember you and I, I think, had lunch at one point, and we brought up something almost identical to what Corey mentioned here. So I'm glad you put it on the table, Corey. It was almost like, you know, we were commenting on how when politicians would go to certain communities, the entire speech would sound different from politician to politician. But But the real summary statement was, look what

Carter 33:14

what you were able to do.

Zain 33:17

Every single person would walk up and be like, look what you were able to do, right? Pat on the head. Look what you have done. Look what you were able to do. And we kind of still seem to have – and said not with that demeaning tone, right? But if you kind of boil it down to its core, it's like historically, 50 years, 100 years, however long you've been here, look what you're able to do. Today, this event, look what you're able to do. You know, today's breakfast, look what you're doing and you're going to be able to do what you did today. Look what you're going to do in the future. And it's just like, you

Zain 33:49

you know, to your point, Corey, if you just went to every event and be like, oh man, this is great. Look what you're able to do. Look

Corey 33:56

Look what you have done. What a great, like,

Zain 34:01

what you're able to do. And in some ways it's like, it's trying to signal like, you've

Zain 34:06

you've done it. Like, this is what success looks like in our eyes. And look what you've been able to do.

Zain 34:11

And Carter, in some ways, it was kind of like that. And listen, I don't want to get so philosophical. And but there is that undertone. And I'm just trying to think that from a pure political perspective, abandoning that undertone and choosing a different one. I just do wonder if there's political upside there that we that politicians are just missing out on from the you did it. Look what you're able to do.

Carter 34:34

mean, it'd be really interesting, wouldn't it? Wouldn't it be interesting to go in and do a speech like, I

Carter 34:40

I mean, something that doesn't sound like a high school commencement speech. You know, you're now embarking on the rest of your lives and we expect for you to do better. Yes, you're a grown-up minority

Carter 34:49

Yeah, look at you now. You know, there

Carter 34:52

were pancakes, and they were really well done.

Carter 34:56

Though, I mean, I think it'd be really interesting. I mean, there

Carter 34:59

there are challenges within every community, and I think that one of the challenge, you know, one of the hardships

Carter 35:05

hardships for politicians is that sometimes we don't want to say the hard things. um

Carter 35:09

and i know that when gondek spoke to some of her communities about um domestic abuse there were real

Carter 35:18

real consequences for her um

Carter 35:20

um because it just wasn't spoken of and

Zain 35:23

mean she went back to like her faith community in that in this in this

Carter 35:28

and because it is something that is is uh not

Carter 35:32

not spoken of enough and she used her her her platform and her ability to to speak to them i mean i'm not sure they want us any votes that day um but

Carter 35:43

but i think that you know some things are more important than votes um not many but a couple uh domestic violence i would put right near the top so

Corey 35:52

what you're describing though in some ways is the the inverse right you were talking about a member of a community talking to a community we're talking about yeah

Corey 36:01

yeah but what i'm

Carter 36:01

i'm saying wouldn't it be interesting if

Carter 36:04

if a non-member of a community it could try and do that i

Carter 36:09

it would be tough it'd

Carter 36:10

it'd be tough it

Corey 36:11

it would be murder like like also you're like you're but you should be able to bake it into no

Corey 36:17

no but like my

Corey 36:19

concern is not the subject matter it's that like you have defined like this audience hey i'm at this like now i'm going to talk about my view of what should change within these groups assuming a everybody this is going to be a relevant message to everybody in the group and be uh speaking as somebody who's not a member of the group and will not have kind of that nuance and picture i mean let's let's call a spade a spade here the reason why politicians do this yeah it's because they you know the look what you're able to do message is it's the shallowest form of political speech giving hey congratulations you know who else they do it to high school classes yeah it's not it's not that political right point

Carter 36:56

point it was a good point

Corey 36:56

point no i understand that's the point i'm saying it's the safest political speech to make just to praise the group that you are in front of rather other than saying anything, because you're worried that if you say anything beyond that, you might, you might be accused of not understanding

Corey 37:11

nuance. It might take

Carter 37:13

us to our JFK moment. Like, where is our JFK has been a question for a long, long time, right? Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country. I mean, sure, it was a big speech. It was a public speech. But at the core of it, it was, what are you going to do for us, fuckers? and no one's done that speech since no one's done that speech no one's interested in doing that speech why

Corey 37:40

feels a bit drifty from what you know the the thing but it's

Carter 37:44

it's not that drifty it's politicians don't it's about saying to people what are you doing to make the world better all the people all

Carter 37:51

all the people what are you doing today especially in today's society where we've got about 45 of the population in both canada and the united states tearing things things apart at the seams you

Carter 38:01

know it feels like there's a great opportunity to say okay forget about what we're all asking you know what we've all been offered but what what are we offering each other you

Zain 38:11

you you you're what i'm what i'm hearing you say carter is pose

Zain 38:16

pose a bit of a challenge pose a bit of a upscaling to like a bit of a thank you like a praising you and then asking you to do like take that energy and apply it all i'm saying is the greater good is that is that

Carter 38:31

is that what you're saying all i'm saying is every once in a while if we're going to walk into the easiest possible format which is the high school aren't you doing great yeah

Carter 38:40

once in a while once

Carter 38:42

once in a while wouldn't it be great

Corey 38:44

great to walk into

Carter 38:44

into the hardest format wouldn't it be interesting to challenge us as speech writers as speech writers to go in and say a, you know what, instead of shitting on the passport office, why

Carter 38:55

why don't we ask the question, why are people traveling?

Carter 38:59

That would have been an interesting speech to write.

Carter 39:01

No one wrote that speech.

Zain 39:03

So I'll get to the rules in a second. I'll summarize them. But this kind of opens up my question about political risk, right? So let me read you this quote. It's much more true that my father and I and Canada owe you a debt of gratitude, not just for what you've contributed to this country but for being a shining example of what welcoming of what welcoming people were fleeing violence persecution persecution and fear can do that's from the prime minister that's at that same breakfast we're discussing you talk about intersectionality right as a muslim and it's my like my whatsapps are going fucking nuts like everyone's forwarding this to me being like isn't this fucking amazing canadian press writes an article with that you know debt of gratitude owed to a smiling muslim community a part of me feels amazing like we're singled out like this This is great. Like, you know, all the work that we've all done collectively, putting these breakfasts on, all the community success, hey, they're all being celebrated. The other part of me talks about that model minority sort of thing. And we've kind of briefly touched on that. I don't want to talk about either of those two. I want to talk about the third stream, political

Zain 40:00

What's the political risk for Justin Trudeau to signal out or single out, I should say, a specific community like this so publicly, get the coverage that it did? Are you saying, ah, it's fine? like it's it's the you did it and he can do the you did it speech to anyone else or do you feel like there's political risk here when politicians go to and this is just you know one community within a sect of of a muslim sort of diaspora in canada just to be totally clear and then think about all the other faith groups other other groups split a different way like this is just a small group that we are um your your thoughts on political risk here in that sense well

Corey 40:35

well i so So, when you're speaking the most general of terms, I think your political risk is not like other groups say, hey – well, actually, it is. It's exactly this. So, I'm going to illustrate this with a story. When I worked for the government of Alberta, we had a person whose half of their job, half of an FTE, was

Corey 40:55

was just writing letters that were proclamations about the various days, weeks, and months that we had. Sure. Because we very quickly got to a point where it was, we got no credit for making the comment. We got abused if we forgot to

Corey 41:11

to make the comment.

Corey 41:12

so I think there's a bucket of political risk here where, okay, you've said that about this community. Now, are you going to say it about my community? Are you going to say about this community, this other community, this further community down the road? And then it becomes a game of your risk is a mission. Like, why didn't you say this about the sick community, right? Why didn't you say this about? and and people will start to look at that language and they'll put that language in front of people that's that's a challenge and that's a risk that politicians have when

Corey 41:40

when they go extra hard on the platitudes the the other one obviously and and i think that so many speeches about what politicians are going to do uh for the pursuit of uh reconciliation in this country is the perfect example is you dial your rhetoric up to 12 and your action is stuck at one okay that's that's fucking wonderful you said those nice things what are you going to do about the list of concerns that we have the challenges we have the rising racism in various contexts here what are you doing about if we want to do the uh the first nations went clean drinking water for christ's sake like how hard you

Corey 42:14

know that like you you say these nice things but i just want to be able to turn on a tap and not be poisoned and so the

Corey 42:22

you know the the rhetoric so outscaling action is also something to watch uh but you know that plus the idea that you are now setting a bar for for all future community conversations, those are the two risks, primary risks for a politician. Those are good ones to add.

Zain 42:36

Carter, Corey talks about rhetoric and this omission. And then he also talks about this sort of delta between action as well. What risk do you see? Do you actually see political risk when a leader signals out a community like this, puts it out so explicitly? If the political job was to get people to share this clip within my faith community, community it's happening but i think about this more broadly right like so from that sense yeah there's like a lot of love on the whatsapp right our chosen form of communication yeah uh mandated in the quran by the way uh it's a beautiful it is very few people realize very few people realize that um but carter talk

Zain 43:16

talk to me do you see risk well

Carter 43:19

you know you're dragging me into a space that i'm absolutely uncomfortable in but i'm going to be i'm just going to allow myself to be dragged in because i can't well i

Carter 43:26

think i have sat i've

Carter 43:28

i've sat in the back of a cab and

Carter 43:30

and i've and i've talked to people about you know this the cab driver happens to be sunni muslim and

Carter 43:36

i say to him what do you think of the job that nenshi's doing right just this back years

Carter 43:41

years ago we're in the nenshi days and

Carter 43:43

and he says i think he's a good mayor but

Carter 43:46

but he's not a muslim i

Carter 43:47

don't understand that comment that comment makes virtually no sense to me but

Carter 43:51

but here's what i do know i do know that not

Carter 43:54

not every group behaves the same way towards every other group within their within their organ you know you you talk about the diaspora of of of sects within within um a

Carter 44:06

faith yeah yeah i mean don't

Carter 44:09

don't even get me started on christianity i mean imagine going in and just saying you know singling out the The, you know, the United Church, you know, oh, thank God, the United Church, they really rescued us from all the shit the Catholics created, right? Like, there's

Carter 44:24

there's just nothing but trouble. And I think that this is the challenge

Carter 44:28

challenge of these types of decisions, of these types of speeches, is that it sounds all good. It sounds great until

Carter 44:34

until you start weighing out, you

Carter 44:37

know, what are you saying to others, right? Right. What are you what are you saying to the other groups that see themselves rightly or wrongly in some sort of competition with this group that you just singled out? And and I don't know if I'm using the right word in terms of competition. I don't know what words I'm supposed to be using. So I'm just not being particularly careful and I'm just blurting them out. But this

Carter 45:00

this is a complex issue. And the complexities aren't just, you

Carter 45:04

you know, oh, they'll get over it. you know they won't remember you know it's it's fine imagine what would happen if your faith group was singled out not in a positive way but you know they're the other group that you don't necessarily see eye to eye with this

Carter 45:19

this is what the prime minister was playing with and i

Carter 45:24

mean i think i think he's right i think that there is has been tremendous uh you

Carter 45:29

you know the ismaili population is is is is

Carter 45:33

is spectacular but so are so many other faiths right

Carter 45:36

right so we and it wasn't it was an ismaili breakfast but it wasn't an ismaili gathering yeah

Carter 45:42

that was also something and and so i've danced around all these different issues no i don't know maybe i'm canceled again no

Zain 45:48

think i think you're fine uh i think if anyone's getting a phone call after this episode it's me carter so don't worry about it uh for introducing what i'm worried about you'll get a text on whatsapp for what i thought would be a five minute conversation but i think this is interesting because one of the things I don't think political leaders are perhaps aware of is how zero-sum game their comments can be received as. It's almost like, where does daddy's love go today, right? And if we buy into this larger paternalistic and even colonial style of thinking about things, where if you can almost be like Smith, but up until recently, you had to be Smith to get those rights and privileges, right? And if that's how we're kind of treating these groups, many of them are going to view it as a zero-sum game. It's a power ranking. You're up one day, you're down another. And if you're up one day, that means someone else is down. And someone else is down, you have to climb on their shoulders, not to kind of thank them, but to trample them and get them lower. And frankly, if you think, if anyone thinks that there's not cultural communities or faith communities that are thinking about government relations or PR or where we fit in the overall psyche or our brand or positioning, kind of in the terms that we've been discussing over the series of our 1,081 episodes, Corey, you're mistaken. Those thoughts happen. Those conversations happen. They might be less or more strategic depending on which group you're a part of or which tables you're allowed to sit at. But to your point, Carter, I think it's a very interesting point. I think sometimes political leaders can can jump in or out of these things and say, you know, have, you know, fly by comments. And I don't think this was a fly by comment by the prime minister. But there are sort of ramifications of that and how they kind of sit. And if the overarching goal, Carter, is your challenge of people working together to produce a greater, more stitched together country or fabric or outcome. Some of these comments are actually more divisive, I would say, than they are unifying because of the the who's getting the love today vibe that that some of them bring that's

Zain 47:46

that's it nothing else to say yeah yeah

Carter 47:48

yeah i mean it's it's super tough because i i think that sometimes we think you know this community is all the same right they're all the same they are not they come from many different places they bring many different biases as we all have as we all have and each one of those you know we we talk about the rise of racism as though there's only one type or one focus of racism. Racism comes in all the different colors. I mean, everything. There is so much and there's so much to spread around, really. No one group owns it. And because of that, but I think that sometimes politicians just simplify to the point where they're like, well, we can go and say this and everything will be fine. And I just don't think it's fine.

Zain 48:31

Always look at immigration with a much longer lens, not a narrow one. Places are diverse. They don't just have diverse communities. Fully examine the truth and what it looks like. Don't trade off one community for another. Understand the ramifications. And Corey's last point, you have to be thinking that if your remarks mad lib to another community or a context that's more quote unquote mainstream, how would it be received? Don't do it. Don't necessarily jump into that pool. Anything else to add before we jump into one more segment?

Zain 49:01

We got another segment? We

Carter 49:02

We do have another segment. I'm going very quickly. Let's get on to our next segment. are you trying to kill us like oh i'm trying to kill you 49 minutes now that we've done religion and politics uh what do we want to do next like religion politics is

Zain 49:16

best sorry we have to do sponsors this episode brought to you by the city of edmonton the city of edmonton we fucking love our mayor amirjeet fucking so he uh carter let's move on to our next segment the prime ministerial

Zain 49:27

ministerial double down i want to talk about justin trudeau really quickly we've talked about on him in this multicultural setting. I want to talk to you about him on C-18. We're not backing down on this. This goes to the core of a free and informed society that is able to take responsible decisions in our democracy. This, of course, Carter, talking about the government now saying it is suspending its ads on Facebook and Instagram, not backing down, doubling down. Carter, do you like it or do you not like it?

Carter 49:58

Oh, I like it. I think it's a really good play. I think that it shows strength when we haven't seen much strength from this from this government. I still think that they have not properly defined the adversary in this particular case, but they're fighting a battle. And I like fighting a battle. I like them coming out and saying we're throwing some haymakers. I think that I

Carter 50:24

I do think that social media has become more and more of a threat. and it you know it feels like it shouldn't be it feels like you know it should be posts about your aunt's pictures but they're not posts about your aunt's pictures anymore um i'm afraid to see what my friends post on facebook when i get notifications um maybe

Carter 50:44

maybe that says more about my friends but nonetheless i i think that going i i think that there's a lot further to go but i i return to my point of a couple episodes ago um if they're going to keep doubling down then they best find find ways to double down with friends. And I think I saw some of that with them starting to talk more about the European Union and some of the activities that they're taking and tying Canada into those types of discussions. I think that that's where the real strength is. And I hope that they continue to fight this fight.

Zain 51:17

Corey, they're trying to position an angle or at least find a lane here. They're superpowers. They're huge. They're rich. They're powerful. full lots of big lawyers they can be intimidating we won't back down almost positioning the government as the underdog against scrappy

Zain 51:34

yeah it's the interesting frame that they have chosen and then you add on trudeau's comments about democracy and how these companies have flourished in democracies it's time that someone stand up to them so to speak banning the ads on on facebook uh banning the the ads uh on on google what

Corey 51:51

what do you think cory

Zain 51:52

do you do you like this play by the government that they've chosen elaine it's i i i i'm not sure what i feel about it but i'm curious to get your thoughts on on where they've kind of landed with this positioning right now um

Corey 52:04

okay well first off like we are one of the world's largest economies we're a multi-trillion dollar economy google and meta are big but they are very small compared to canada right so i think the underdog thing is a little funny like like in terms of like heft and who push who around and whatnot. I'm not undercutting the things I said last episode about like, yeah, like they're big dogs and they go all over the place. And I think we've got to acknowledge that here.

Corey 52:30

I think what the prime minister is doing with his setting the stakes language is just trying to reframe the issue. And it sounds like he's doing a pretty good job the way Stephen jumped on board with some of this social media. Like we're talking about meta and Google. We're not even talking about social media networks in the context of Google, at

Corey 52:46

at least not in the web 2.0 way we talk about it. We are saying the government said, You have to pay people to link to their content. And these people said, what? No, this is the internet. That's not how this works. And the way that these stakes have been reframed as this David and Goliath fight for the good of society, for humanity itself, how we won't be pushed around. This is about free people making free decisions. It's fucking ridiculous. Do you like it?

Corey 53:15

Do you like it?

Zain 53:16

I mean. I know you say it's ridiculous, but I'm kind of curious. it's like you're saying all this people can't see this with kind of a grin on your face the whole time so i mean

Corey 53:23

mean i like it

Corey 53:25

i don't hate it as a comics professional because like this is this is what you do right like you take it this is this is what spin is you're taking something you're turning it and you're looking at it from a different issue or from a different lens and yeah google and meta they

Corey 53:39

they they do not have a lot of friends in a lot of other contexts right like you like they they're trying to change who the the they're trying to change what this story is about out right because when you get down to it what the story is about is not what um donald trump i almost said justin trudeau is now saying the story is about and yeah this whole like we're going to stand up for uh you know democracies everywhere kind of language is just it's kind of nonsense but he's reframing it and he's reframing it pretty well garden do you like

Zain 54:06

like the david i didn't ask you this explicitly last round do you like this under you're a fan of the underdog political strategy but are you a fan of this cory's

Carter 54:14

cory's looking at the entire economy i mean I mean, just take a look at the government budget. I think that Apple's got more in cash than the entire operating budget for the country

Carter 54:24

These are not tiny little groups. These are enormous corporations that have worldwide power, that flex their muscles whenever they want. And frankly, they risk becoming much more powerful in the future. You know, I'm not to the point where I'm thinking, you

Carter 54:41

you know, Google and Meta become, you know, so strong that they replace world

Carter 54:45

world governments. But I

Carter 54:47

I will point out that there are lots of dictatorships where they have freedom of speech issues that

Carter 54:52

that these people seem to find ways to fit right into. to. So

Carter 54:55

So why wouldn't we ask them to fit into our societal norms of trying to support an

Carter 55:00

an important industry like news, especially given that they have fucking destroyed it over the last few years. And yeah, we got the internet for free. We got the internet for nothing. But

Carter 55:12

But that has changed. The internet is not free anymore. The internet costs us a fortune now. And the only people who who aren't paying for it, are the big companies. So let's go and take our pound of flesh from Mark Zuckerberg. Who's with me? Let's storm the castle.

Zain 55:30

Let's do it in the cage match, Carter. Corey, I'm going to go to you on this. Pierre Polyev, still with glasses on his Facebook profile page and still on his Twitter, still very friendly with the glasses, very attached to them. Not his new look, being profiled just yet on Twitter. He says this, if Trudeau really believes meta-threatening democracy, he

Zain 55:50

he must do a full boycott. No more posts or Liberal Party ads. Go cold turkey. Small price to pay to save our entire democracy. You like it?

Corey 56:00

also don't hate that, frankly. Because this is a thing. You've set stakes so high. You've set them as being about society itself. And then you're still going to be buying Facebook ads saying, come to the prime minister's pancake breakfast. Come on, man. Like, there's no consistency there. And so I don't hate it. And of course, the reason why we know the prime minister would be disinclined to do this is because these are channels that allow him to communicate politically across the board. You know, his various constituency associations, his MPs, his politicians

Corey 56:33

politicians more broadly. And to put away that gun, I mean, that's tough, right? Right. And just leave Pierre Poliev out there running around Facebook all by his lonesome. Like, I mean, that would be really tough. Pretty

Carter 56:47

Pretty much defines where we are currently, though, doesn't it? I mean, haven't

Carter 56:52

haven't we given Facebook up to the right wing freaks? I thought we did. I thought we all agreed on that. The

Corey 56:58

is Instagram and Facebook and WhatsApp. And

Zain 57:02

tool, Carter, right? Like, sorry, one key bucket of social media tools. Carter, start writing a response for Trudeau. Let's just say he has to respond to this, right? The media keep pestering him on this. Mr. Prime Minister, will you do a full boycott? Will you do a full boycott? You said this is about democracy. You said you've upped the stakes. How would you start constructing that answer? And Corey,

Carter 57:22

I'm going to tag

Zain 57:23

tag you in on the back end to help.

Carter 57:24

We don't need to do a boycott to protect democracy. We have to do regulations and laws to protect democracy. That's what we're doing. We're taking action, and that action will be seen through the laws that we put forward through the House of Commons. Boycotts aren't laws. So, if Pierre Polyev thinks that the government should be boycotting to achieve their governing ends, I think he's misunderstood his civics classes.

Zain 57:50

Not bad. Corey, take what you like, build on it.

Corey 57:54

Actually, I'm going to play hostile reporter for a minute here. Okay, go ahead. So, you're saying that the government should stop spending to make a political point, but you don't want politicians to stop spending to make a political point, Mr. Prime Minister? Minister?

Carter 58:07

I think that it's important for us not to spend money on someone. The government is the one currently trying to legislate this, not the Liberal Party of Canada. And if you can't see and understand that distinction, I don't even know how to help you, Corey.

Corey 58:20

I think you're going to have to help Canadians with that one, Mr. Prime Minister, because that sounds pretty absurd to me. There was no bill that was passed that said the Government of Canada was going to stop spending money on META. This was a political decision. Why wouldn't you make that political decision decision on your political channels as well because

Carter 58:36

because because politics are more important than government oh fuck that i see

Carter 58:43

see what i did wrong i see what i did wrong i'm gonna have to work on it i'm gonna have to work on that one yeah cory

Corey 58:48

uh take what you like this is why danielle smith doesn't have follow-up questions there's interesting nuggets

Corey 58:53

on what carter put down

Corey 58:54

down i like that um i mean it's like saying like a pile of turds has some interesting how

Carter 58:59

how dare you sir yeah

Corey 59:01

like that turd's kind of shaped like a unicorn you know i'll tell you something

Carter 59:04

my message is good i'm

Corey 59:06

i'm rajit so he man that guy's fucking awesome yeah yeah

Zain 59:12

take what you like if anything build your own response to uh being pestered with the question uh

Corey 59:18

uh so the question again is ultimately

Zain 59:21

you hey yeah go you're Corey's playing both. Sorry, Carter, this is a scene from Corey's one-man show.

Carter 59:29

get out of the way. That's where we go. Yeah.

Corey 59:34

suggestion here is that we are going to resolve meta pushing around the government of Canada by independent political actors trying to speak to their community being pushed around by Pierre Polyev. I don't think so. That's not what we're here doing today. And we're going to use the heft of the government to get the outcomes we want. we're not going to be forcing people to stop having conversations on channels this is the entire point the entire point is these channels have become part of the social fabric of this country and they need to be managed oh

Carter 1:00:01

oh that's good i

Zain 1:00:04

pretty good pretty good it's almost like he's a comms professional you

Carter 1:00:07

you know it's almost like he was on my side the whole time hey did you see that like he was pretending like he wasn't he

Zain 1:00:13

he was i know right he really was very very fickle um let's move it on to our final segment or over under our lightning round stephen we do this are you sure because we're only at the one hour yeah i think i managed this time extremely well i have to tell you uh are we

Carter 1:00:28

we cutting any of that stuff at the beginning or are we just gonna let that stay all

Zain 1:00:31

all the all the muslim stuff all that stuff that you didn't like all that all that muslim talk yeah

Zain 1:00:37

i'm gonna get rid of it it's gonna be a 10 minute episode who's

Carter 1:00:39

who's editing this hey carter yeah carter

Zain 1:00:43

carter overrated underrated cbc news News had to retract parts of the report alleging email interference by Alberta's Alberta Premier's office overrated or underrated as a political story in your mind the retraction by CBC I

Carter 1:00:57

I mean it was a really relatively specific retraction I don't think it was I think it's overrated

Carter 1:01:03

overrated I don't think that it's as big a deal as the the

Carter 1:01:06

the Premier's office will make it out to be quite

Zain 1:01:08

quite overrated underrated you know Daniel Smith getting a bit of a win here with CBC having to retract on the the specific claim of emails proving this interference, or emails coming from the Premier's office for this interference? What do you think?

Corey 1:01:22

I think it's underrated. The number of people I've talked to, politically savvy people, who have just sort of felt like the conflation of both the CBC reporting and the Ethics Commissioner report, and have said like, oh, like this looks like... Like the Ethics Commissioner report, just a little bit of background for people which said that the the actions the premier took were actions that would be a threat to democracy right so that was the bottom line it had three different sections section one had to do with the cbc uh you know whether these allegations that were made in cbc not by cbc but in cbc right uh saying that the premier's office had reached out to uh

Corey 1:02:03

uh prosecutors and the uh you

Corey 1:02:06

you know the ethics commissioner said i found no evidence of that i don't believe it actually happened just based on the fact i talked to literally every crown prosecutor and all this i just and

Corey 1:02:15

then the second two were on these other two issues that got dinged on in terms of like talking to palowski and did she intend to interfere in justice right so the reason why daniel smith at the debate was saying like i actually i was exonerated on one was because this this uh you know comment the ethics commissioner made about the cbc reporting and i think there's going to be a lot of people out there, and it will obviously be a narrative helped along by a premier's office that's much helped by this narrative, who are going to say, well, you know, there were these accusations made, but those accusations have now been retracted, so I think it's okay. That's not actually what was the threat to democracy. The threat to democracy was the stuff on tape, where Danielle Smith was saying, well, let me take that away. Let me see if I can intercede in the administration of justice.

Carter 1:03:00

Yeah, the stuff we actually heard.

Corey 1:03:03

there's a murkiness now and and that retraction is now the talking point danielle smith has in every avenue except a legal one yeah she says you know cbc actually had to retract that reporting and the ethics commissioner mentioned she doesn't believe it happened and and so i think it is actually a big deal i also think it means the next time there's reporting that is not like named source that the cbc puts out on an issue people

Corey 1:03:28

people will say yeah but can we trust it because of this retraction, even though, as Stephen said, the retraction was somewhat narrow and slow. Very narrow, yeah. That's not how people's memories work. And so I think it's a big deal. Yeah,

Carter 1:03:38

I changed my mind. Corey's right.

Corey 1:03:41

Okay, well, thank you, Carter.

Carter 1:03:42

What was that? You're right. That was a four. That was a four. Thank you, Zane. It was a four. Hey,

Zain 1:03:46

Hey, Corey, are you in or out on politicians engaging with celebrities? And I point here to Justin Trudeau inviting Taylor Swift, asking her to come to Canada. Now, of course, there was Matt Jenner, a conservative MP, kind of put a motion together. This is the prime minister using his official Twitter account, asking Taylor Swift to, you know, make some time, inserting a few, you know, T Swift lyrics in that tweet. Are you in or are you out on that strategy? It gets the headlines. It pierces through. It goes beyond our political bubble. Some people think it's cringe. I'm curious what you think. I

Corey 1:04:22

I think it's pretty cringe. I also think it is not a great way. like you are sort of reminding people that she didn't decide to come to canada right and i'm not really sure that's particularly useful either unless you happen to know there's going to be additional tour dates added in toronto and montreal and and vancouver and calgary yeah edmonton though i

Corey 1:04:42

i mean the mayor of edmonton fucking rules but like otherwise yeah what a fucking dump that guy fucking great though edmonton's

Corey 1:04:50

edmonton's great i've lived half my adult life in edmonton i'm not taking a round out of how old

Carter 1:04:54

old are you i'm

Corey 1:04:56

i'm pretty old man yeah i'm in my 40s yeah seriously yeah

Carter 1:05:00

look so young like really i know i got this young pierre

Corey 1:05:03

pierre polyev mentality yeah

Carter 1:05:05

yeah you got a pierre polyev and

Corey 1:05:07

and i are like the same age you gotta start lifting and wearing that white shirt from the bear that he now wears you

Corey 1:05:13

you see the bear is that a reference that anyone gets i got that yeah that's good i

Corey 1:05:19

i don't even watch the show and i got the reference uh you

Zain 1:05:22

you should grow his hair like that too that'd be good that'd be so great uh it just after yes yes chef carter uh in

Zain 1:05:30

in or out on justin trudeau tweeting out really yeah

Carter 1:05:33

yeah let me tell you why i'm out tell

Carter 1:05:35

tell me why because have you ever tweeted at someone that you wish would get back like that you want to get back to you like you just you put you put a mention in and you're like tweeting at like some giant celebrity and you're like tweeting at them oh i hope they see this one they you know it's pathetic if you don't have a direct mechanism contacting them it's

Carter 1:05:56

the prime minister of canada you know if you really wanted to have some fucking influence he calls her people or he has his people call her people and they all get together and they have an actual chat you don't yeah

Carter 1:06:07

all of a sudden there's

Corey 1:06:08

there's a 15 billion dollar subsidy for the taylor swift concert exactly

Corey 1:06:12

in uh you know southwestern ontario this

Carter 1:06:14

this was was embarrassing it's

Carter 1:06:15

it's embarrassing it would be embarrassing if zayn velji reached

Carter 1:06:18

reached well when before we started this show remember before we hired zayn cory and he tweeted at us incessantly

Corey 1:06:24

incessantly he would add us hey yeah perpetually and i

Carter 1:06:27

i really want to work with you and it worked at me and i like if

Zain 1:06:31

if if taylor swift played a concert stadium tour southwest ontario um over under 45 minutes it's uh francois philippe champagne's opening act would it be would it

Zain 1:06:41

be over 45 minutes or under for uh frankie bubbles and uh and his opening act carter i'd

Carter 1:06:49

i'd be over it

Zain 1:06:50

it would be over that is correct there's only one answer cory final question it goes to you um last week we discussed a bit of of twitter and its uh rivals that were available its alternatives you we talked about blue sky and then out of nowhere threads man thousand pound gorilla are you in or out on it

Corey 1:07:07

uh well it's certainly i think as of tonight there was the expectation that threads so this is if you haven't been following this in the last week meta via instagram which they own launched threads and it ties to your instagram account so you can log in and you immediately have the network and it does this thing where it basically tries to encourage those reconnections to occur on the threads app and 30

Corey 1:07:30

30 million people overnight looks like there's going to be 100 million people by the the end of the night tonight uh twitter i think only has about 250 million active users so just to give you like this is the first one at scale that's really come in interesting there's been um you know some analysis of web traffic showing that it's come it's coming down from twitter this does seem to be having a material effect uh and if you didn't even believe the metrics the fact that uh elon musk tweeted today zuck is a cuck i think is what he he said because he's an idiot and he's 12 uh would tell you that they're feeling a little sweat on here this might be the real deal it

Corey 1:08:09

it i don't think threads is necessarily good yet but

Corey 1:08:12

but let's be clear yeah

Corey 1:08:14

twitter is not good and

Corey 1:08:17

and threads has the connection it has the social network back in it through instagram the fact that it's pretty easy to get strapped onto that and move and it's a pretty good parallel to twitter so i can easily see it if not eating his entire lunch most of his lunch and that's going to be a real problem for elon musk because it's not like twitter was a runaway success story before threads came onto the picture carter

Zain 1:08:39

carter i'm going to get your take on this uh in in a second cory what do you think of the name what do you think of the name and

Zain 1:08:44

and the brand like in the reds

Corey 1:08:45

reds i mean it sounds like a generic clothing shop you know like uh i wanted to get like the good pants at the gap but my mom took me to threads instead like that

Carter 1:08:57

that oh it's a secondhand story it reminds me of uh it's a secondhand it's it's you know well secondhand

Zain 1:09:02

secondhand stories right it's like it's like it's the american sand remember sand it's

Carter 1:09:06

it's the secondhand story that used to be i love sand yeah

Zain 1:09:08

love sand too don't diminish sand sand sand was pretty great carter uh threads thousand pound gorilla is it is it the one i

Carter 1:09:17

mean i don't know if it's the one but i mean what are are we trying to do here are we trying to replicate twitter success or are we trying to see when twitter fails yeah

Carter 1:09:25

i think that this is mostly about you know i think it could be the thing that

Carter 1:09:29

that pushes twitter over the edge not because you

Carter 1:09:33

you know it's hugely successful but mostly because it just undermines um the people who are on twitter i mean ultimately it's about traffic and

Carter 1:09:42

and if advertisers aren't getting the return on investment they're not going to advertise and they were were barely getting return on investment before

Carter 1:09:48

before elon musk paid such a heavy hyped up price for it so i

Carter 1:09:53

think that musk is in real trouble we're

Zain 1:09:57

we're gonna leave it there that's a wrap on episode 10 81 of the strategy

Carter 1:10:00

strategy we're not gonna do more on on his style we're not we're gonna skip right over pierre pauliev's lifting phase is black t-shirts what do you want to talk

Zain 1:10:07

what do you want to talk about yes so he he yes he has

Carter 1:10:10

has all i wanted to say

Zain 1:10:12

he has a white t-shirt look it's from the a bear okay it's just find out

Carter 1:10:16

out that look i think he looks kind of like hey listen

Zain 1:10:19

listen i don't mind getting stds at stampede look okay we've seen

Carter 1:10:22

seen that look many

Carter 1:10:24

okay that's that's all i wanted to say thank you guys the std

Zain 1:10:26

std and stud that's that's pretty good i just thought of that oh

Zain 1:10:30

that's pretty good yeah it's not bad hey it's a good episode title core you want to talk about i don't want to talk about pure polyam anymore i'm done i

Corey 1:10:36

i don't want to talk about his choice of wearing a t-shirt and yeah not glasses

Zain 1:10:41

glasses but what if patel were to

Corey 1:10:42

to dress like like that

Zain 1:10:44

could it patel get away with that could patel dress that way yeah probably probably not probably

Carter 1:10:48

probably not a great job that patel would be doing good

Zain 1:10:50

good carter this died on the vine here we go that

Carter 1:10:54

that was a wrap on episode 10 anyone that was the best my name is

Zain 1:10:57

is zane belgium with me as always you

Carter 1:10:58

you guys did a great job

Zain 1:10:59

job carter we'll see you

Transcript