Episode 1301: Charitable reads

Zain 0:01

This is a strategist episode 1301. My name is Zain Velji. With me as always, Stephen Carter, and of course, Corey Hogan. Guys, we

Zain 0:10

we are here. Oh, thank you, Corey. Carter, share with us now that we're a larger group than just the three of us. Share with us what you were talking about. uh you i think that we should

Carter 0:21

should do shorter episodes for these fuckers that's what i said these

Corey 0:25

verbatim why i thought you were going to clean it up a bit when zane said save it for the show i thought yeah

Corey 0:30

maybe you wouldn't call them fuckers you

Carter 0:34

yeah i mean they do pay us you did on average eight dollars a month you did call

Zain 0:37

call them fucking idiots that that is true yeah

Zain 0:41

wait did he no

Zain 0:43

no i mean who's who's who will ever know No. Corey, we can get away with... This is just a rough start, guys. I don't like this. These are my friends. These are my people. Why

Zain 0:51

are they your people? They fucking record albums for you. Tell everyone what they're doing. What the actual fuck is going on? Can we take five minutes and give us the genesis of why we have

Zain 1:02

a Blues Guy City album. Blues Guy...

Corey 1:08

Blue Sky Blues Guy.

Zain 1:09

Why do we have an album on all of the major streaming platforms right now?

Corey 1:15

ambition the ambition of the strategist discord that's why give us more detail really i can't i can't really but you can i think you can see the track list if you go to um bluesguycity.ca is that the one we bought i can't remember i'm gonna check

Corey 1:30

i don't know you

Carter 1:31

you know what's wrong with you and these people do you guys not have jobs do you not have things to do do you not have 30 children to parent it

Corey 1:39

was a collab we all took a piece of it we all uh we all created a bit I just

Zain 1:44

just went to bluesguycity

Corey 1:45

bluesguycity.ca. It is all here.

Zain 1:47

This is a 1, 2, 3, 11-track epic, Ode to Calgary, blues cover, remix V2, EXT, V2.2.2. See, now,

Corey 1:57

this might not be the final list that's on the services. Oh, okay, so this is, you may need

Zain 2:02

need to, you may need to, well, get it. That's the draft, yeah.

Zain 2:04

Track 7, Blues Guy City.

Zain 2:07

Track 5, Saddle, Saddle on Blues Remix.

Zain 2:12

Where the Rockies Rise. That sounds pretty good.

Zain 2:14

uh and then 11 is bs city i don't think that's the uh

Corey 2:21

dairy queen blues i

Corey 2:22

could be into that when

Corey 2:24

when you've got when you got a blues guy city you

Corey 2:27

need a soundtrack okay let's let's jump into the real did cd let's

Zain 2:30

let's just jump into the real business i mean this wasn't the real thing no it's not the fucking real thing the real thing is how do we i'm

Carter 2:36

i'm saying that we can do a 30 to 45 minute show oh

Corey 2:38

oh we're way past that we got on

Carter 2:40

on we're way past

Corey 2:41

past that steven okay let me tell

Carter 2:43

tell you let me tell you why why because there's an album you can listen to on spotify you

Zain 2:47

you know what we should just honestly we should just fucking ditch and hit play on this album cory do you think that would take 35 minutes uh

Zain 2:54

uh no no no i don't it's it's

Corey 2:56

it's but we could loop it we could loop it we could loop it

Zain 2:59

better than some of the dead air episodes we've done that's for sure uh let's

Carter 3:03

let's carter remember the static episode that was a good one carter

Zain 3:06

carter before we jump into to our segment for today. Well, talk to me about this. How should we prepare when the Prime Minister comes on to host the show? Now, do you want me to swap into a panel seat? Do we want to reward Annalise's absence with a guest appearance? There's some details we need to figure out. And I mean, the patrons are the people to help us out with this. So if you've missed it, Prime Minister will be coming on our podcast to host it eventually. I think I missed this. A Prime Minister of a A country will be coming on to host this. We have put the offer out. No confirmation yet, Carter. But you know what they also say? No denial either. So, you know, Carter, it is still very much a open prospect. But we've got to figure out some details. Let's figure out these details now before we jump into our segment.

Carter 3:51

Well, I think it goes without saying that Corey and I are involved.

Corey 3:59

We're heart and soul, respectively.

Carter 4:00

respectively. Heart and soul. Heart and soul of the podcast. Yeah.

Carter 4:03

I mean, it is awkward for you that you're going to be replaced by the prime minister.

Carter 4:08

We've never really had a third strategist, hey, Corey? Prime minister is

Corey 4:13

is not a strategist. No,

Carter 4:15

No, he's not. That's evident.

Zain 4:19

really clear. Say it to his face. Say it to his face. Really clear.

Carter 4:23

Oh, I will. Oh, I will. You won't. You won't.

Zain 4:25

Oh, I will. Listen, last episode we discussed what or what not you'd say to his face. Most people don't believe you're going to say anything to his face. they feel like you're gonna turtle

Corey 4:34

that's that's probably true for different reasons

Zain 4:35

reasons you are such a turtle when have you ever spoken truth to power give

Zain 4:41

give me an example how many times

Carter 4:42

times have i been fired how many times that many times no you need something at stake like

Zain 4:48

like your job on the line this this this you have nothing at stake i feel like i feel what's the most you could lose i

Carter 4:53

i feel like i could i might lose the podcast like cory might muscle up the uh internal power to to finally fire my ass because

Carter 5:03

he's the president he's the guy he's the guy who's got the signing okay so

Zain 5:06

so the two of you will be involved uh do you need me involved do

Zain 5:11

we ever interesting question

Corey 5:12

do we ever loaded yeah yeah

Zain 5:14

yeah okay next question wait so you can you can hear that as do we ever yeah

Corey 5:18

yeah do we ever you you go with your heart oh

Zain 5:22

oh i am i'm goldie heidering this with the emphasis on the syllable how i want cory and

Corey 5:28

and there's four people is our least approachable opening in months i love it

Corey 5:33

it's a shout out

Zain 5:34

out to our old boss um yeah and also i believe john

Zain 5:39

uh okay that that that is uh settled uh what are we going to do with annalise um she has not been showing up to work consistently it's kind of an hr problem we've let steven on on the the the track here um he's done jack fucking

Carter 5:54

he's done return my calls yeah

Carter 5:57

you know what let's do it as an open invitation on

Carter 6:00

on the on the podcast because then we know that she'll never listen hey

Carter 6:03

hey annalise if you're listening to this podcast you're

Carter 6:07

you're more than welcome to join us for the prime minister's uh pod

Zain 6:11

um here's here's the most important question and i know this one we're gonna have to deal sensitively um do we want want to offer him a safety net in the form of a job on the show after he

Corey 6:23

that something oh that's that's awkward yeah it

Zain 6:26

it is it is but we did make we need to get it out of the way i don't want you guys fumbling this job offer okay and

Zain 6:31

and how many rounds of interviews does it need to go through well

Carter 6:35

well we did offer that one to the gian gomeshi and then we wound up with you so So, what's

Corey 6:42

what's the equivalent? Yeah, that's, come on, man. That felt a

Corey 6:47

a little offside. Yeah,

Carter 6:48

well, if it's only a little offside, I think we're doing really well.

Zain 6:52

He's already disengaged. Let's move it on to our first segment. Our first segment. Oh, are we done? Yes, we are done with that. Thank you for not landing the plane on that, Carter. Our first segment, Stephen Carter, Master

Zain 7:02

Master Craft or Master Stroke. We're going to talk about political strategies. We're going to talk about things that have happened in, yeah. Corey, are you distracted by the word stroke?

Zain 7:15

Yeah, you are. You're a child. You're a child,

Zain 7:17

Corey. Carter, same with you, okay?

Zain 7:21

would happen if the prime minister were to announce that segment, okay?

Carter 7:27

I mean, he's going to write for the prime minister. If you wrote for the prime minister, chances are he might be actually good. So

Carter 7:34

So let's try you writing that joke for the prime minister. Can

Zain 7:36

Can you do that segment intro? Can someone do that segment intro as the Prime Minister? Go. Which one of you wants to take a shot?

Corey 7:42

I don't think I've got a good Trudeau in my bank. Carter, do you have a good Trudeau?

Corey 7:47

Probably it starts a little bit with... Is

Carter 7:51

is it a Masterstroke?

Corey 7:55

How's that? That wasn't very good, no. But now I'm going to attempt it. It's not going to go ahead and do it again. You do yours.

Corey 8:01

uh and uh well frankly i think that it is going to come down to

Corey 8:08

to mastercraft or master stroke

Carter 8:11

that's pretty good i like that i like that but it wasn't the exact same intro i went word for word yeah these

Zain 8:17

i'm a little terrible um okay so here oh zane yeah zane why don't you do yours yeah

Corey 8:23

do your prime minister my prime

Carter 8:25

prime minister It doesn't have

Zain 8:26

have to be this Prime

Corey 8:27

Am I going to have to just spike this intro? We're at 8 minutes and 30 seconds. Why

Carter 8:32

do you have to spike it?

Carter 8:32

No, no, no, no, no. Hold on. I'll bet you $100 every

Carter 8:37

every single person who downloads this listens at least this far.

Zain 8:47

I got my truck and got my hat looking to get my mojo pack, but it's gone, man. It's gone. Got the Dairy Queen blues.

Corey 8:56

so good okay i just need you to know that

Zain 8:59

that is available at blue sky city uh dot ca um

Corey 9:03

um is it uh uh master craft or

Zain 9:07

or uh is it uh master uh stroke i

Corey 9:11

just think your prime minister sounds a little bit like uh gian gomeshi no no no i'll do

Zain 9:18

do a gomeshi for

Zain 9:23

is it a master craft or

Corey 9:32

it's genetic i gotta keep um

Zain 9:32

um okay guys here's what we're gonna do we're gonna talk about some of the things that have happened politically political strategies tactics uh played out by different political parties individuals and you're gonna tell me is

Zain 9:44

is it master craft as in the famous Canadian tire brand, and it needs a lot of work. It needs a lot of tooling. Wade, is Mastercraft

Corey 9:52

Mastercraft taking strays here? Like, why are you going after them? Yeah,

Corey 9:55

Yeah, they're good stuff.

Corey 9:56

literally are tools that help you

Corey 10:00

so they're tools. I thought you were saying they were low quality. No, no, no. I thought that's why you

Corey 10:05

you were saying it needs some work. You're

Zain 10:06

You're going to have to use your Mastercraft tools

Zain 10:08

to make these things better. Or,

Zain 10:10

Or, it's a Masterstroke, and we can move on. You might just tell me, well, fuck it. This is perfect. It doesn't get better than this. and we just move on from it. And Carter, let me start with this one. We talked about this very briefly. In fact, we've been talking about it, one would say, for the last 10 minutes. Justin Trudeau doing a bunch of human interest interview me on policy, but you don't really have a good sense of my policy because you're probably from America and or you have no idea why my office called you to interview me, so you're going to give me a softball interview. As a political strategy, Carter, you're going to bust out some mastercraft tools and make it better? Or is this a master stroke and it actually makes a lot of sense, it's cogent, and you would do the same if you were in the PMO shoes? Mastercraft, master stroke, what is it?

Carter 10:55

I actually think it was a master stroke. I think that getting onto shows where they're not going to ask you difficult questions in an environment where you're facing a lot of difficult questions, that's pretty good PR. Then getting a lot of attention, being seen, that's some pretty good stuff. i'm going to go with master stroke i liked it i thought it was uh are you being i cannot even tell if

Zain 11:18

if you're being facetious right now are you solid tactic no

Carter 11:21

no i'm not being i think it was good cory you don't think it was good zane i never offer my opinion

Zain 11:26

opinion on the show why

Carter 11:27

why would oh why would that

Carter 11:28

that be why would i why would you do why would i start now cory

Carter 11:32

cory if it's not in the question then we have to assume you don't have one okay i remember cory

Zain 11:37

cory sorry the pm is is is doing he's trying to harken back on some of the vibes that that made him pm the the persona the personality the wonky nerdishness the earnestness he's doing it through these podcast episodes uh across various outlets uh ours of course uh imminent uh cory you're gonna bust out some tools mastercraft masterstroke what is it i

Corey 12:01

don't i don't hate it but let's just be clear there's a bit of a um A

Corey 12:06

bit of a bias here, perhaps three people with a podcast might be convinced of the wisdom of podcasts. But here, let's just unpack it a tiny bit, right? The pros are you get to talk to people for longer than a soundbite. So you get to expose some of your personality, you get to have a conversation with folks, you get to remind them probably why they liked you in the first place. I think one of the things about politicians that get a little bit longer in the tooth is we start to – it's just like they're so well-formed. All we can see is their brand and the caricature of that brand in many cases, and this allows it to break through. And so I get that, and I get the appeal of that. I also think it's part of an overall trend, which is super fascinating.

Corey 12:53

Pierre-Paul Heveson, too, which is this return of long-form political argument.

Corey 12:58

We are no longer doing the brochure with five bullets. We're doing the 20-minute explainer video. We're doing the sit down on the podcast and talk to anybody about anything kind

Corey 13:09

kind of argument. And I

Corey 13:13

I don't know. It seems to be what people are looking for. I really appreciate it in a general sense. I think we had gotten pretty shallow in our conversation. But let's be clear.

Corey 13:24

These conversations are not necessarily robust simply because they're long. And we are, of course, the proof of

Corey 13:31

Yeah, you heard our first 10 minutes, right? And so I think that you just, you have to know that while the medium might be smart, you

Corey 13:40

you do need to deliver in that medium as well. You can't just, the novelty of being in

Corey 13:45

in the medium will only carry you so far. And by the way, not

Corey 13:48

not that novel in 2024 to go on a podcast or do a bit of a podcast tour.

Corey 13:55

know, better late than never. Carter,

Carter 13:56

Carter, here's my pushback. We

Zain 14:00

pushback, Carter. And this

Zain 14:03

this is not my pushback. I'm quoting, I believe, Justin Ling on this when he says, you know, he's

Zain 14:07

he's trying to re

Zain 14:10

-engineer. That changes everything.

Zain 14:11

Excellent Walrus piece on

Zain 14:13

PM, by the way. He's trying to re-engineer vibes that people do not want, that he's not—he's trying to become 2015 Justin Trudeau, and people are living in a very different reality where they don't want that.

Zain 14:27

Your thoughts on that as, like, a pushback? Like, he's doing these softball-style interviews to showcase personality and all these other things that I've mentioned. People aren't in it for that shit, man. like it's it's you're not reading the room could it backfire because you've given this a master stroke keep defending it or switch

Zain 14:46

switch switch sides carter just get a

Carter 14:48

a couple of backfire i mean he got a ton of press he got a ton of attention um he was able to get softball questions instead of the the nightmarish ones cory's made a good point about long form all of a sudden he's able to talk about issues in an in-depth way to an audience that's already engaged i mean podcast podcast advertising is fantastic why wouldn't being on podcasts be fantastic if you do want a podcast to advertise reach out to the strategist dot gca um but you know podcast where was that that they were yeah i don't yeah i fuck off is where we're going to reach out to well great we've

Zain 15:23

advertisers because of that poor read carter yeah

Carter 15:26

yeah i blew that uh what a mess what a mess anyways my point is this you actually don't you think

Zain 15:32

think it's fine you're

Carter 15:33

you're just please just play i think it's beyond fine i think that well it's it's right

Carter 15:38

right now that's what he needs he needs to show up in in in unique venues and and not get asked the most difficult questions that he's been getting asked to

Zain 15:47

to find is it

Carter 15:48

it got him away from the uh it

Carter 15:51

it got him it wasn't a tactic to introduce us to his personality it was a tactic to get him away from the nightmare that is the parliamentary press gallery fair

Carter 15:59

trying to get it which justin ling is about and that's why justin ling's like it's not gonna work it absolutely worked justin justin stay out of our lane cory is there is there a merit here you haven't and i

Zain 16:10

i i will note that the the rules of this game are this segment are

Zain 16:15

are very specific you have not chosen mastercraft

Zain 16:17

mastercraft or masterstroke you've you've selected and i quote yeah i don't hate it i don't hate it that is not either of those choices that's so so choose a lane gets fast you know very

Zain 16:27

few things get past me uh choose one and then tell tell me what your reaction is to carter's retort um

Corey 16:37

i'll go mastercraft but i have no problem with the tactic look

Corey 16:41

i think one of the benefits of long form and this is even true of pierre polyev

Corey 16:47

okay there's a lot of people i think who listen to our podcast who just really can't stand the guy but if you actually listen to him for 20 25 minutes he's gonna start making some sort of sense maybe it's it's just the reality of being stuck with somebody's thoughts for a certain length of time they're going to start to imprint on you right it's

Carter 17:03

it's a random chimp theory too like if you if you stay long enough with him at some point he's going to say something sensible just like a random chimp would you know a million an infinite number of chimps that's an uncharitable

Corey 17:15

uncharitable read but i think that but it is an one of the things that i actually yeah

Corey 17:19

yeah it is not bad but now that you've said it would be an excellent episode title remember back in the day

Zain 17:24

day when i used to say it on the pod and he used to use them but now he's so high on himself that's a long time time ago zayn but he goes with a long time ago fucking stupid title that only made up new rules he's

Carter 17:33

he's done up a whole set of new rules all about him he's changed and this is an

Zain 17:38

an intervention cory yeah

Zain 17:40

you've changed cory yeah you've

Zain 17:44

but i know you've changed yeah

Corey 17:48

you think you don't like you probably like if you spent a little bit of time with them it's It's so much easier to dislike somebody who's not in your face than in person. And most people you can get along with on kind of a human level. And I'm sure if you sort of mine your own memories of people, rivals at work, you know, people you didn't get along with at school, neighbors you hated, you'll

Corey 18:13

there's time. Well, Zane's all three of those to some people, I'm sure. Sure.

Corey 18:18

You will probably find that when you were in the same conversation with them, same room, the conversation was shockingly pleasant, maybe even fun. Maybe you even enjoyed their company, right? And there's something to that. And I think that that's what Justin Trudeau is ultimately trying to recreate this sense of like, he's not just this fatigued politician, but he's not such a bad guy. And he's been fighting the good fight, blah, blah, blah. But where I take exception with with what Steven said and where I think Steven's commentary actually pushed me to Mastercraft in my answer is he said, he's getting tons of press. He's getting tons of attention. Do you know what he's not getting Zane? Movement in said polls. Movement in the polls. I mean, you have a budget, you have a bit of a media blitz with him going out. This is weeks now that he's been doing this podcast thing and you're not seeing movement. In fact, just today we saw new abacus numbers, biggest, biggest spread between the conservatives and the liberals that there's been 20

Zain 19:14

20 some points right 20 21 21 i believe

Corey 19:16

believe uh just going from memory here and so you

Corey 19:20

you know if results matter it

Corey 19:22

kind of matters he's not getting results and i think ultimately the problem that he's facing is

Corey 19:28

is is maybe not surmountable with podcasts and maybe i'm jumping into a hundred different sections or maybe even a different podcast here but you

Corey 19:37

you got to read the room you said laura like he's not reading the room is what justin link yeah paraphrasing what he said exactly yeah yeah

Corey 19:44

but you read the room and and there's actually it's not go on a podcast it's go that that's what the room is telling you yeah

Corey 19:53

when it's when it's over it's over and this happens with every politician and there's no amount of good they can do at that point that's going to reverse things people just say that's great fuck you even if they like the policy and i i do think that But there's a growing body of evidence that Justin Trudeau may have passed that point, that point of no return, that every politician eventually hits.

Zain 20:15

which, Carter, excellent episode title.

Carter 20:19

Excellent episode title. And I think that we're going to ask him that question right when he joins us on the podcast. That'll be his first question. It's going to be pretty great.

Zain 20:28

You're just going to answer his first question with that's great, fuck you? Is that what you're going to do? Is that what you're committing to

Carter 20:32

to do if the prime minister

Zain 20:33

minister does show up on our podcast?

Carter 20:34

podcast? I'm going to ask him that question. Do I now actually need

Zain 20:37

need to put in some work to get him on this show?

Carter 20:40

Yeah, you have to make some calls. I just want to see you fucking melt.

Zain 20:43

melt. You're going to have no spine whatsoever. It is going to be a colossal... We're going to meme-ify that episode. How dare

Carter 20:52

dare you? Oh, my God.

Zain 20:53

God. You are going to be an abysmal failure in front of the prime minister.

Carter 20:59

Thanks, Mom. Oh, my God.

Zain 21:02

Jesus Christ. Christ, so much, so much hubris, Carter, so much. Hey, Carter, we'll get back to some elements of what Corey's talking about, but I want to move on to the next one.

Zain 21:11

Chrystia Freeland. Let's talk about that. Let's keep it with the federal liberals. Oh, cool. Her capital gains change is not included in the Budget Implementation Act. In fact, it'll be included as a standalone vote to arguably, if we're having a charitable read, and I will give her a charitable read, to arguably have a standalone vote on this particular item to wedge the conservatives.

Zain 21:46

What is it? does it need some tools and fixing and if so what fixes or is it perfect and i can turn it over to cory my

Carter 21:56

my answer yes or is cory i asked you carter here's

Carter 21:59

here's my problem that

Carter 22:01

that you could give this would be the equivalent of giving me tools and telling me to stand in front of an engine i

Carter 22:06

don't know how to fix an engine i

Carter 22:09

don't know where how to use the tool to fix the engine and in this particular case i don't know what the fuck freeland's up to i it doesn't make sense to me it doesn't on any level uh you know what

Carter 22:22

what are we trapping the conservatives is this some sort of trick it's not a trick they're gonna vote against it the same way they're gonna vote against the budget is this like what

Carter 22:34

what the fuck i'm standing with my tools my engine's not working and i don't know why I don't know why it isn't so what what am I supposed to do I called Doug I called Doug Wong in finance he's not answering my calls anymore I have no capacity to figure this out so

Carter 22:49

so I'm so confused I don't know what the hell is going on anymore

Zain 22:54

Corey uh Carter's confused um not a not

Zain 22:58

not a handyman of sorts um not

Carter 23:01

not an unusual but we

Zain 23:02

you you you like you've built your house from the ground up is what I'm going to tell people that's true True. And do you see this as a as a mastercraft, something that needs some work from a strategic perspective? Or is this a masterstroke as a as a charitable read for a political wedge against the conservatives?

Corey 23:19

So it's a mastercraft. I agree with everything Stephen said. I think like this is not very clever. You announced it in the budget and they're voting against the budget. And you're going to say it's an independent vote. Yeah, sure. So is an amendment. No one gives a shit. Has this tactic ever actually carried any water in this country? No, we voted against the budget. It was a confidence measure. We have no confidence in this government. We voted against it. Next question, are we confused about this? Okay, maybe it shows up in a liberal attack. And the

Carter 23:47

the conservatives voted not to

Corey 23:51

to raise the capital gains tax. What the

Zain 23:55

that mean? Who gives a shit?

Corey 23:57

It's all wrong. It's all wrong. It's not even like they refuse to lower your taxes. It's just, it's wrong. wrong but

Corey 24:04

i want to go a little bit further than that and maybe make a broader point that i've made to you two on text in the last week but i want to share it with with our friends the patrons here yeah

Zain 24:15

yeah these are our friends and family which is why we speak so openly and freely that's

Corey 24:20

that's right yeah exactly

Corey 24:22

when you look at the polls since last summer you'll recall last summer when there was the a big cabinet

Corey 24:31

cabinet shuffle and all of a sudden we were going to have a real focus on the economy and this was big reset and you know you me steven we were all on this podcast and we were saying things like hmm

Corey 24:44

hmm you only get to do that once and if that doesn't work you know if the poll numbers are down in december it's probably gonna be a lot of pressure for him to go and then we had a similar conversation in november december saying well you know if he doesn't turn it around in the next couple of months probably gonna be a lot of pressure for him to go if you look at it from from that point on, from his cabinet shuffle on, late July last year on, the gap has moved from three or four points to 21 points in a pretty steady line, a pretty consistent decline over all of those months. So yes, I will point you back to my previous comment about he may just be cooked. People just want him gone. They're not hearing him anymore. Even the things they like, they don't like. But there's a more fundamental point I want to make here.

Corey 25:27

Where has that vote vote all gone, Zane.

Corey 25:31

Has it gone to the NDP? Has not. It has not gone to the NDP.

Corey 25:35

It has not gone to the NDP. He is losing this vote to the conservatives. And his solution seems to be to run more to the left and make stronger left wing attacks. And just on a base, like super simple, I learned about this thing called politics today kind of thing. You are losing votes to conservatives and your solution is to go further to the left does this seem like a pretty solid strategy to you like do you really want to start fighting about the capital gains tax do you really think canadians are that confident about your management of the economy and kind of the business ventures that exist in this country can

Carter 26:09

can i interject because

Carter 26:10

because it feels like you're no longer trying to fix the engine but you're trying to buy this car which

Zain 26:15

which carter has arguably

Zain 26:17

right right on this carter you've been trying to do that for what like two years now

Carter 26:25

has not been able to find the

Zain 26:26

the charging you have a point

Zain 26:27

yeah carter's not been able to find the charging network which

Zain 26:30

which is a i

Carter 26:31

i can charge i'm charging right now no i'm not talking about your carter jesus once again

Carter 26:34

again just doesn't understand the metaphor but

Zain 26:37

but i'll leave i'll leave it there's enough razzing of you today okay so no

Carter 26:41

no there's never enough it's never enough um

Zain 26:42

um um okay so i do want to talk so you both of you are are saying that that this is needing a lot of work, right? This would need a ton of work. It doesn't make sense to you what this carve-out is. And I'm actually giving it a charitable read. The other read is they

Corey 26:57

they just don't even have it ready,

Zain 26:58

ready, right? Like, they just don't have it done, is like another sort of way of looking at it. But I want to give them a charitable read that this is a political wedge, and they're trying to put one

Carter 27:10

You know what happened?

Carter 27:11

I think that Doug got toasted after our podcast, podcast and things fell behind in finance and uh they had to separate this out because it wasn't it was

Corey 27:20

was doug's file i

Carter 27:22

i think it was doug's file and then when we went hard on doug things

Carter 27:25

things didn't go well you

Corey 27:27

you can make an argument that it's not ready they want to consult more they want to make sure it's not done in a way that antagonizes physicians lots of talk about what this means for how physicians structure their compensation lots of talk about what it means for i don't know You know, like the grandmother who sells their house and moves to like a different location, like just a lot of talk about this. And maybe they're saying, oh, we got to take a beat. Maybe this wasn't the wisest thing, right?

Corey 27:53

That's possible. I think it's more likely they're trying to get the conservatives on the record with this vote, which is, you know, the reason I gave the answer that I gave. But I

Corey 28:02

I just don't, if that's true, I see what you're trying to do. I just don't, I don't see the utility, right? And again, I go back to the core, you're bleeding votes to the conservatives, presumably because people want a more conservative alternative to what you're providing.

Corey 28:18

And you're doing this, right?

Corey 28:19

right? Brand new car.

Zain 28:21

Yeah, Carter, I know you've wanted one for a long time.

Zain 28:25

I got a Tesla, I'm fine

Zain 28:26

now. I don't even have an engine.

Zain 28:32

that's what you've wanted didn't you or

Zain 28:34

or did you want the did you want the five billion dollars subsidized champagne honda

Zain 28:39

honda c honda v champagne is that what you wanted i mean i'm

Carter 28:41

i'm in for the subsidy i'm in for the quebec politics because that's my favorite oh

Zain 28:47

it is carter hey let me let me jump from the federal scene to our province and i'm going to split this one issue up in three different versions of the the question mastercraft or masterstroke um

Zain 28:58

um okay the province made a total bullshit stupid decision that they've reversed they reversed their decision to cut funding for low-income bus passes in calgary and edmonton this was all the rage for some 21 hours when city hall uh primarily the mayors of both cities announced the fact that uh the province had cut this funding a program that you know clearly has a lot of emotional residents helps a lot of people on on the margins a lot of of people in poverty, etc. Huge uproar with all the NDP leadership candidates, with folks wearing all jersey colors, so to speak, on city council. And then the province comes out saying we're reversing course. The minister gives a statement saying, oh, turns out that, you know, the need to support low-income Albertans, and it's clear that the cities can't pay for it. That's a paraphrasing of his statement. I want to split this question up in three ways. I almost want to take the issue and neutralize it for a second maybe like leave our charge on the issue aside i want to talk about like political principles here political strategy principles carter and the first principle is

Zain 30:01

way you announce a shitty sort of news

Zain 30:07

situation like this in this case the province doesn't even announce it they

Zain 30:12

they let the order of government that is receiving the money announce it and

Zain 30:17

and i wanted to get your sense on just that that one simple element, that it's bad news and they don't carry it.

Zain 30:24

Okay? It's just as simple as that for now. Mastercraft or masterstroke? Talk to me about the political strategy principle here, where if you're giving shitty news, do you have to deliver it? Or in this case, you didn't really get involved until you cleaned up your mess 24 hours later. And you can probably predict what my next question is, the mastercraft and the masterstroke on their cleanup strategy. But first, talk to me about handing down responsibility of delivering shitty news. use master craft or master stroke carter i

Carter 30:48

i happened to be at city hall that day and uh it was a

Carter 30:54

gong show everybody was up in arms and the way that the information was going to be released was released by the city governments and leaked

Carter 31:03

leaked through the media and they got to frame the issue

Carter 31:08

framing the issue is the number one thing that you that you want to do that's why you control Control how information is released. If you have control, then that immediate frame becomes the most important thing. This isn't us cutting $6.7 million in low-income transit passes. This is us stabilizing the revenue sources that go to cities by making sure that we're giving fewer grants and we're focusing instead on one major grant. That

Carter 31:34

That is how we're going to address this. The city can decide how the monies from the province are going to be allocated. You're speaking

Zain 31:40

speaking as if the province would

Zain 31:41

have taken control of the situation and framed it, right? Just to be clear. Just

Carter 31:45

a totally random framing, right? Like, just there had to be a framing for why they chose to do this. It wasn't a mistake. It wasn't a misunderstanding. There had to be some sort of a reason or rationale behind this. And when they chose not to do it,

Carter 32:07

of—or when they chose to do it and when they chose to give up control, that's when they actually lost the argument.

Zain 32:14

Corey, mastercraft or masterstroke from the province in terms of letting the city deliver the bad news? Carter talks about what they missed out on, which

Zain 32:22

which was their ability to frame the issue, but they also didn't have to deliver the bad news themselves. What do you think as we talk about political strategy and principles here?

Corey 32:31

way you framed it off to

Corey 32:33

to Carter, I like a little bit better, which is let's just talk about in general, getting somebody else to do it. And I would say, in

Corey 32:40

in a general sense, it's a masterstroke if the person's willing to carry your water for the reasons I think you were trying to tease out of me, right? right? Which is, you're not the messenger. You don't have to take the abuse. Somebody else can stand up and take the slings and arrows and justify it on your behalf. Justify it on your behalf.

Corey 32:59

If they're willing to carry your water, it's a master's.

Corey 33:02

It's a reason why we never make the premier or the prime minister give bad news. You give it to the ministers or you give it to somebody else down the line, right? But they're carrying your water and you're still controlling the message it's mastercraft if they won't for all of the reasons steven said you are you're surrendering the framing of it i actually think it would have been rocky no matter what you do but you might have been able to sustain your position if you had actually been the people who got to frame it out to say you know um we're providing just kind of blanket funding over here which was also meant for this and this was targeted and just short-term bridge funding to allow the city to find their own sources for income or whatever bullshit you want to come up up with right yeah and

Corey 33:42

and you could have run that down um but

Corey 33:46

but you gave that up and you gave the people who were losing the money the megaphone and the stage and you said yeah please let everybody know how this is all going down and that's a mistake that's that's a significant mistake it

Corey 33:58

it does sort of lead to what i suspect is your next question which is like was this actually kind of like a a clever ploy or what the hell was happening here i don't know maybe i'll no

Zain 34:08

no no i do I do want to understand, like, from your perspective, when it first came down, when you were viewing it with a critical

Zain 34:14

strategy eye, what your initial thought was, like, and I've used the word charitable a few times, but let me use it once again, in like the most charitable sense being like, what are they trying to do here?

Zain 34:25

Right? Like, what's the 3D chess? Like, what's the play? What were you guys thinking in that moment? And I see Carter smiling. I almost know what he's going to say in a second. But Corey, I'll go to you first, in terms of what you thought the play was, because we do have a bit of a, their side of the story that's come out today. And I'll talk about that in the next question. And then Carter, I want to get your thoughts on this too. you well

Corey 34:47

well you know my i generally think occam's razor applies here we have a provincial government that has said the municipalities are doing a bunch of things they shouldn't and then they stopped giving municipalities money for what's effectively a social program right so i don't know i didn't have to think too deeply to think oh well within the government somewhere somebody wanted to get rid of this but even then there's like a spectrum right there's this was a conscious conscious decision.

Corey 35:11

We wanted to do this. I

Corey 35:13

I got to tell you, like, I had to do this for the government. I had to do this for New Democrats. I had to do this for conservatives.

Corey 35:20

Whenever there was a budget, we would sit down with like this big ass spreadsheet of literally everything that was in the budget, all of the budget implications, stuff you're not even going to get unless you're a stakeholder, right? Like not going to be put out to the meeting.

Corey 35:33

And, you know, there would be these meetings that would include like myself and the premier's head of communications and, you know political voices and department voices and i would have sent and you know adms who worked within my department too and and we would sit there and we'd say basically

Corey 35:48

basically here's what you can expect to be the communications challenge with this if you go forward with this and

Corey 35:53

both types of governments generally tended to listen to those things and i'll tell you

Corey 35:58

if it was a situation where someone said well this will save us a million dollars and this is who it's going to affect we would have killed that every

Corey 36:04

every single time and what is it what do you We'd be killed. Yeah, okay, you're explaining. To kill, what do you mean by kill that?

Corey 36:09

Yeah, like, it just wouldn't end up in the budget. Right, right, right. Like, you know, some combination of people in the room would say, yeah, that's a no-brainer. Like, that's just not worth it on a risk-reward kind of perspective. And, you

Corey 36:21

you know, there were things that I just can't even tell you about, because they never ended up happening, right?

Corey 36:25

But lots of stuff got killed that way. Certainly anything of that magnitude of cost that would affect this many people, cooler

Corey 36:32

cooler heads would have prevailed, at least in my day. And that's not because of me. That's because everybody else in the room, when you raise it to their attention, would say, oh, yeah, that's a dumb idea. Let's not do that. Keep

Zain 36:43

Keep that thought in your mind for a second. I want to get Carter to react to this, and then I want to come back to this question, if that's okay. Carter, give me your initial take. What were you thinking when you saw this news come down from it? What are they trying to do strategy-wise?

Carter 36:56

well i was thinking how stupid could you possibly be because um but

Carter 37:01

but at the same time i was thinking

Carter 37:06

i can actually make a case for this i can make a case for this that the city of calgary shouldn't be in the business of social programs um and i think that bill 20 if it continues with with pushing the provinces, as Corey has articulated in the previous podcasts, as the owner of all the problems, I'd be really on

Carter 37:30

on board with pushing back all the social programs to the provincial government. But this felt like it was a mistake because it literally was in the ministerial

Carter 37:42

ministerial letter, the mandate letter, to do the opposite of this and to ensure that there was enough funding in uh in the funnel to to make to make sure that these these programs were properly funded so i i thought this is a mistake someone

Carter 37:59

someone has decided to get pretty excited about where they think they can cut some money and uh this thing's going to uh this is going to be a fantastic issue there was all kinds of chatter on council about how they they could make a a significant

Carter 38:14

significant issue out of this this was a going to be a heyday and uh because it was just such a clearly an own goal so i i i saw it as an own goal and here

Carter 38:26

here we are cory

Corey 38:29

well and so this is where i was walking to he he got there a little bit ahead of me here the problem is with those big lists and that kind of analysis i was just talking about is they are are only as good as what you're told about. And the hardest part of that exercise was not the judgment calls that had to do on these million dollar programs. It was actually getting the department to tell you about these million dollar programs. And so we would work with the DMs and effectively, you know, the battery of questions, I couldn't remember exactly, but they were pretty standard. They were like, okay, who's

Corey 39:00

who's losing money? Who might be mad because of budget decisions that are being made? Where

Corey 39:05

Where are budgets going down just in general? And these these were the things that then fueled the list. And basically, if

Corey 39:12

if there were puts and takes, it all had to balance with what we knew the overall number was. And if there was any kind of gap, we would try to reconcile that with the department. But it was a very difficult exercise, and things kind of didn't

Corey 39:22

didn't get noticed fairly often. Not like this, but there were small things that were like, oh, well, we didn't think that was big enough, or we didn't think that was a problem. And in governments, you

Corey 39:35

you have two different problems at the department level. One is you have ministers who are, you

Corey 39:40

you know, cowboys, you know, of both genders, of all genders here. It's like this idea that you're going to just go and do it and you're going to do it better. They told you to cut 5%, you're going to find 10, right? Yeah.

Corey 39:51

You find them, you know, Drees shouldn't very much fit that mold earlier in tenure, you just had to look at his budgets. And then you also have departments who think they're being helpful, but actually aren't particularly politically attenuated. And so they propose things that they think the government will like, because they have kind of this, you know, chalk

Corey 40:12

chalk on chalkboard view of politics. And they're like, well, conservatives like these things and conservatives don't like these things. And, you know, I always get such a kick about this, like, you know, deep state that's purported to exist and all of these, like, you know, bureaucrats who are running around with their agendas. I

Corey 40:29

I think it would shock you how unpolitically attenuated the average bureaucrat is, right? Like, they don't live and die politics the way political operatives do. And so they're like, you know, I found a little money and they probably don't like this program. I'm just going to do it. No, you know what? When the modern day equivalent of Corey Hogan calls and says, what the hell is in this budget that might be scary? I didn't even think it was scary and I didn't even put it forward. Like that, I think to me is the most likely thing that happened. So I think to go where I started, it was intentional, but I don't think it was intentional from the Premier's office. Can

Zain 41:02

Can we spend a second on exactly what Corey talked about here, Carter, which is what would be the lesson that you would educate a poli-sci 101 or 102 class on around not expensive but emotionally resonant things, right?

Zain 41:16

right? Like, you know, we talk about if this was a billion-dollar program for infrastructure, you could cut it and no one would care. This was a $6 million program for the vulnerable. So what – elementally, what was it here? Is it just what I've said in the sentence, which is the small dollar amount relative, and the target population? Or how would you kind of, what made this such a uproar, like a 24-hour uproar? Was it the population and just a so, like, paltry sum of it? Or was it more than that? Break it down elementally for me in terms of what ingredients went into creating something that created that software, but more so what lesson could be replicated or what sort of checklist should folks think about when we think about chopping $3, $4, $5, $10 million programs in multi-billion dollar budgets in terms of this as being perhaps a bit of a case study?

Carter 42:13

yeah don't punch down is

Carter 42:15

is the is the answer that i'd like to give you know one of the like for example we we subsidize breweries right

Carter 42:24

i want to cut subsidizing breweries i want to cut uh

Carter 42:28

uh horse racing because

Carter 42:30

because i think that those aren't punching down when

Carter 42:32

when you start cutting low

Carter 42:34

low income transit passes you're

Carter 42:36

you're punching down on a group that cannot protect themselves and

Carter 42:40

and when you do it for only 6.2 million

Carter 42:44

the you know the health care system has spent more than 6.2 million dollars since before i you know since i began my answer to your question like there's just it's just such a massive or such a small amount of money in in a massive morass of a budget that there's a hundred different ways to solve that particular budgeting problem um so i'm i I think that it was the size of the amount and the punching down that absolutely did this program in. And the credit to the premier's office for changing their positioning so fucking fast. My head spun when it actually happened. Yeah,

Zain 43:26

Yeah, I'm going to talk about the positioning. Corey, give me your take here. Give me the elemental sort of pieces here and what lessons would be transportable next time someone is in an office making these calls.

Corey 43:38

Yeah. I mean, I wish I had the

Corey 43:41

the questionnaires and the spreadsheets that we had to address these very questions that we built over the years. But generally speaking, we

Corey 43:47

we ask, you know, who's affected? How are they affected?

Corey 43:50

Certainly, we try to pull out details about how vulnerable that population is, how sympathetic that population is, how vocal that population is, how defensible the action is. you just try to get all of the information on the table because that allows you to that informs messaging and that also informs mitigations that might be available so things you could do that you know offset either different programs that exist for them or or what have you right another thing that we were always on the lookout for is

Corey 44:17

is what it says about your choices easy comps so if you're spending five million here and you're cutting five million there you are handing to the opposition on a silver platter, if it's something like, just to make a simple, you know,

Corey 44:33

adulterated real world version, you're spending $50 million on energy war room. At the same time, you're taking $50 million out of supports for children in the classroom. Wow, like that's a communications challenge, right? And that shows choices and that shows priorities. So, one of the funny things we're always on the lookout for is like numbers that were very similar or simple Simple multiples of each other as well. And you got to watch out for that shit. And that's actually, I think, part of the problem that the government has right now. When you bring out a budget, and you're sprinkling money all over the place, and you say, I'm going to cut 6 million over here.

Corey 45:09

Not a great look. Look, yeah,

Zain 45:11

yeah, that's fascinating. Corey, they

Zain 45:13

they walked it back 21 hours. The minister in this file, Nixon, says, listen, when we make a mistake, we own up to it. Better to recognize you're making mistakes and make the adjustments before the damage is done. And they reverse course. They have a very straightforward statement. They don't try to gaslight a ton. They explain, but they don't try to, you know, go after City Hall or something that was available to them if they wanted it. they don't as it

Zain 45:34

it relates to the backtrack and recognizing the political ops of a backtrack was that a master stroke or was it a master craft and it did need some work uh in your mind

Corey 45:48

think it's a master stroke you

Corey 45:50

you want to fail fast right if you if no matter which of the scenarios we've talked about happens the fact is the backlash came quick people like rick bell Hell, we're writing columns about how crazy this was, how stupid this was, how mean-spirited it was.

Corey 46:04

You didn't really have any other choice. You don't want to defend the indefensible for two weeks just to end up exactly where you're going to end up. So in

Corey 46:11

some ways, you could say 21 hours, that's pretty quick, and it is in government land. In another sense, you could say, well, if it was that kind of a stake, why

Corey 46:20

why did it take more than two hours once everybody started losing their minds over it? Totally. That's a good question you could ask, too.

Zain 46:27

in your mind? would it be a master stroke or is it master craft did it need some work their backtrack one thing they didn't do carter is they didn't double down they actually backtracked so we can talk about that a bit in terms of when you make that call but they did backtrack and

Zain 46:43

and i want to get your take on it was it perfect or did it need some work master

Carter 46:47

master stroke i i thought that it was just about as good as you can do uh of getting out of the way of your own mistakes um if if trudeau's government had figured this out uh

Carter 46:58

uh on the multitude of errors that they'd made uh how many times has cory said you if you're going to wind up somewhere get there fast this

Carter 47:08

this is a government that saw exactly where they were going to wind up and they got there fast um i don't believe that it was possible to do it in shorter period of time than 21 hours you know um it

Carter 47:22

happened as as quickly as possible.

Carter 47:25

And I would have loved to have been in the meetings that evening when it was being reversed. Because I'll tell you something, there

Carter 47:32

there were some cabinet ministers and some bureaucrats who

Carter 47:36

who were picking their insides up and

Carter 47:37

and putting them back into their bodies during those meetings. That would have been pretty spectacular to have watched.

Corey 47:45

Carter, I agree with that. That was not going to be comfortable, I

Zain 47:49

Let me throw another player into the mix, Carter. this is a three of three part question on this city hall what did you think of their performance on this they they had the communications challenge to announce this and frame it then they then had to issue some sort of relatively coordinated and reactive response now let's just talk about calgary for a second we're based there and we can talk about edmonton as well yeah

Zain 48:10

they ended the night with a 14 to nothing unanimous vote to to tell the the province to go fuck themselves sort of thing, right? And that they had a mechanism to remit less of the taxes that they would owe. And I'm giving a very simplistic, reductive sort of explanation of what their mechanism was.

Carter 48:28

Simplistic and reductive to describe this city council. Yes, continue. What

Zain 48:31

What did you think of their performance as

Zain 48:35

Was it a master stroke?

Zain 48:37

Or was it a master craft? Did it need some tools and tweaking? You would have done things differently if you're coordinating things over that course of that 21 hours. I'm curious to get your take on this.

Carter 48:47

There was a rumor that there was going to be some opposition to the motion. There was no opposition to the motion. That was a master stroke. Everybody being on board, even the people who were ideologically inclined to work with the province, and even in the face of this legislation that says we can make you change any bylaw that you do, they still passed this motion the day that they found out about the change. It was about as close to a masterstroke as you're going to see at a city government level. I thought it was fantastic. And to get everybody to agree, I mean, we haven't had a unanimous decision out of this council since the time that they spent hundreds of millions of dollars on an arena for millionaires. So good for them. Yeah.

Zain 49:36

Corey, what's your City Hall response here? Could they have done with some tweaking and you would have busted out some Mastercraft tools? Or did they also nail it in terms of how they dealt with the 21 hours with the unanimous vote? Which Carter's right, you know, we have not seen in a long time in Calgary City Hall.

Zain 49:56

Well, certainly not on a big

Corey 49:58

big vote. Correct, correct. To be fair, yes, you're

Corey 50:01

Yeah. Well, I think you've got to say it's a masterstroke. One of the things that people have been saying out there that I tend not to believe is that this was an intentional channel changer by the provincial government. But the reason I tend not to believe it is because I think that the entire incident was fairly

Corey 50:18

fairly damaging for the provincial government's credibility at the time they are trying to take these powers away from municipal governments. So look at what the municipal governments were handed, right? They were effectively handed an issue that says, we

Corey 50:32

we can do this so much better than the provincial government that's trying to make themselves the competent authority in this particular space. And I actually think it's not 100% uncoupled

Corey 50:43

uncoupled from the fact that we saw Rick McIver do a tiny bit of a climb down, at least rhetorically today, and say he was open to amendments to clarify that, you know, this ability to amend legislation is just like a last resort thing. the ability to remove councillors, last resort thing. I think it's all part of like a gumbo here, which is cities looked pretty good this week. And the provincial government had a few pretty serious errors when it came to municipal affairs. And so, yeah, they were handed not just something where they could take a stance against the province in a united front, you know, in terms of getting the left and the right of council together, they were also handed a shield with which to protect the very idea of municipal sovereignty. It's really fascinating. And I mean, you got to be good to be lucky, and they were very lucky this week.

Zain 51:36

This kind of brings me to my final question, Carter. Let's just call this the over-under in the lightning round, just for the sake of it, because... For sure, sure. Yeah, you know, and... Who gives a fuck

Carter 51:43

fuck about these guys, right? We

Zain 51:45

We do it for you, Carter. It's just Patreon.

Zain 51:47

Double down. Classic double down. Fuck these average $8 a month folks. Hey, Carter, here's a question for you.

Zain 51:55

Do we know yet whether this Daniel Smith UCP has gained the political superpower of being able to change course without penalty?

Zain 52:06

You know, we've heard of these Teflon governments and these Teflon politicians in the past. And I look at this backtrack. I look at Bill 20. There are just a few examples. I look at some of the things they've announced in the past, which are in and out of public consciousness and will probably reemerge in public consciousness. Have you determined from your strategy brain, your ops practitioner brain, whether they have actually gained this superpower with the public yet? And there's a handful of politicians across our Canadian history that we can look to and be like, oh yeah, Harper was Teflon on many things. Doug Ford, a great Teflon-like politician. Are you seeing that yet? Like, converge the tea leaves for me. Just using these two examples we've been talking about right now with low-income transit and Bill 20, are they a government that may not pay penalties for backtracking and reversing course slash apologizing?

Carter 52:59

I think that they're going to pay penalties at some point. I don't think they're paying penalties yet. And one of the reasons is that Danielle Smith is an excellent communicator. Every time she steps up to the microphone, she does a great job of communicating her position. Even if it's factually challenged, she's

Carter 53:19

she's able to get the information out that she wants out and people listen to her. So

Carter 53:25

So it looks to me like she's got the makings of a government that understands how to communicate with their primary audience. And the primary practitioner of the communications in Danielle Smith is so strong right now. I mean, I don't like giving praise to this government because they're doing some rather

Carter 53:44

rather horrific things. But if

Carter 53:47

if they're not Teflon yet, Zane, they're certainly on their way.

Corey 53:52

Corey, do you agree with that?

Corey 53:56

She certainly has the ability to bounce back. We've seen that in a macro sense, obviously. Sure. And I do think part of her redemption tour really taught her the merits of just saying, hey, shit, got it wrong. going to move on right and that people generally speaking are willing to accept that and she knows it she's internalized it and she's made a part of her political bag of tricks and you know all the power to her for that right um does

Corey 54:23

she have that power the polls suggest it polls are not always the easiest thing to move when people aren't very keyed into things it'll be interesting to see how this particular session affects them or not if at the end of this session we've got a bunch of polls here in Alberta that show that the UCP is the same or better, you know, especially once the coronation of Nahed Nenshi is complete, it's absolutely over.

Zain 54:46

There's an ongoing competitive race. I don't know why you guys make me dependent, and my voice is such that I always sound like a sarcastic prick about it. I do not mean it that way.

Zain 54:57

over. No, you always sound like a sarcastic

Carter 55:00

it's just the norm. We're going to leave it there.

Zain 55:01

there. That's a wrap on episode 1301 of The Strategist. My name is Zane Velgey. With me as always, Corey Hogan. Stephen Carter, and we'll see you next time.

Transcript