Episode 1822: Threesome

Zain 0:02

This is a Strategist episode 1822. My name is Zain Velji. With me as always, Stephen Carter, Corey Hogan. Guys, what is going on?

Corey 0:09

Nothing. Not a thing. Do you want to talk about Dairy Queen? Dairy Queen!

Zain 0:14

I want to talk about why Warren Buffett still invests in Dairy Queen. What do you think? What's the Berkshire Hathaway— He's a value

Corey 0:20

value investor. He's a value investor. He looks for undervalued things that have long-term returns. He loves things that have steady returns. and that is what he's put his fortune in and that's what he's made his fortune on. You just got to respect the man for what he did. He's made one bad decision his entire investment career. Let me guess,

Zain 0:41

Suffocating Munger with a pillow at the tender age of 90-something. Is that it? Did I get

Corey 0:46

No, it was actually buying Berkshire Hathaway, which was a furniture company and it lost a lot of money and he believes that set him back on his path to be a billionaire by years.

Carter 0:57

It's a good story. Do we have a live fade-out? We could do... Now I

Zain 1:02

I just want to do Buffett facts and trivia. Do you know his number two is actually in Albertan?

Zain 1:08

As I did. He's

Zain 1:09

He went to the U of

Zain 1:11

he's got like a Bachelor of Commerce in Accounting. Seems like a smart dude.

Zain 1:16

Could have been us, Carter. Could have been you and me.

Carter 1:18

Could have been. Had we had that kind of intelligence, instead we hooked up with Corey. Who

Zain 1:22

Who probably has that type of intelligence, but but just an unchecked ego.

Zain 1:27

And this is actually a performance review, Corey.

Zain 1:31

just so you know. Oh, okay. Have we moved on? By the way, I have moved on a long time ago. I'm actually, I've told Carter before the recording, I'm not paying attention. I'm actually watching football this whole episode. So we'll take this wherever you guys want to take it. Is this what we

Corey 1:44

we can expect for Thursdays for like ever

Zain 1:48

More than likely. Yes,

Corey 1:49

Yes, more than likely. Probably we should look into Wednesdays. Yeah, okay.

Zain 1:51

okay. You should probably look into different days or this is fine. I mean, so far, it's going okay. So far, it's working for you. It's working fine for me. It

Carter 1:59

It has huge breaks. Carter,

Zain 2:00

why haven't you gotten us a betting sponsor yet? It's actually quite upsetting.

Carter 2:04

Listen, hey, big news. Sponsor's starting next week. Next week, guys. Going to be exciting.

Zain 2:10

Why bet on the game when you can bet on your life, Flair Airlines?

Carter 2:16

thought we talked about that. Set up

Zain 2:18

up punchline. I thought I nailed it. Corey, we've got here. Let me set the table. Let me actually focus on this podcast for a second. We've got three quite interesting stories that we can choose

Zain 2:27

choose from. I want to hit all three of them in some way, shape, or form, okay? We

Zain 2:32

Jagmeet Singh, okay, asking Katie Telford for a PDF of the confidence and supply agreement, hitting Control-P, and then ripping it up and telling people he ripped it up. Okay, we've got that story. We've got Jeremy Broadhurst, who was outed by Althea Raj of the Toronto Star as having told the prime minister he's quit. Quit as

Corey 2:50

as national director of the Liberal campaign. Correct.

Zain 2:52

Correct. correct uh a gig he took on just a year ago uh and then confirming he has quit in a twitter post um there on after

Corey 3:01

after not confirming all of the reporting but kind of confirming the reporting we can get into the reporting altia's

Corey 3:09

ultimately says he quit because he doesn't believe trudeau can win right that was

Corey 3:12

that was you know what was missing from his two-page statement quitting uh that uh trudeau can win that

Zain 3:17

that yeah oh that's so interesting oh my goodness And, Corey, you just

Corey 3:23

just want to jump into that story? I mean,

Corey 3:26

mean, I was about to. I'm really excited about it.

Corey 3:28

it. No, I'm going to put the third one. The

Zain 3:30

third one's also quite interesting.

Zain 3:32

It's a little bit more local, but it's also not. Because in some ways, it's fascinating politics. The Green Line. The province, 34 days after promising funding for the current version of the Green Line, if we can call it that. It's an LRT

Corey 3:46

LRT project in Calgary.

Zain 3:48

transit project, a public works project, the largest one. In the city's history, pretty much, speaking of ripping agreements up, it tells the city that they're ripping the agreement up and they can go fuck themselves, that this is a boondoggle sponsored by the former mayor that is now the current leader of the opposition. I don't know, may have a small part to do with the politics. It doesn't

Corey 4:10

doesn't actually say, go fuck yourself to the current council. I'm going to read this. This is a quote from the letter. He's just setting the table for us, Carter.

Zain 4:17

Carter. Okay, good. He's

Zain 4:18

drawing the intrigue. Maybe we should go to the phones and ask people which one they want for us to talk about.

Corey 4:24

To be clear, we recognize you and the current council's efforts to try and salvage the untenable position you've been placed in by the former mayor and his utter failure to competently oversee the planning.

Corey 4:35

The former mayor, Nayat Nenshi, now leader of the opposition.

Carter 4:41

want to do? Well,

Zain 4:41

Well, there's two of you, and we need to reach broad consensus. Okay. I, like I said, do not care, because I'm watching this Royale commercial right now. Let's talk about that.

Zain 4:53

it just ended. So, I thought it just started, but it ended. Now Shaq is trying to sell me printer cartridges.

Carter 5:01

Well, I mean, he's got to do something. He's got to diversify.

Zain 5:05

He's the Warren Buffett of

Zain 5:09

Yeah, he is. Carter, do we want to talk about Shaq? That's also on the list.

Carter 5:15

uh no actually i i'd rather talk about something that is relevant to the listeners just this one time why why

Zain 5:23

between sing broadhurst or or the the transit uh greenline lrt in calgary what are you taking your vote on i

Carter 5:29

i i gotta start with uh jeremy that's my my call is to start with jeremy i

Zain 5:33

i feel like other shows will be focusing on number one and number three let's start with jeremy broadhurst can we do that okay

Corey 5:39

okay i mean i guess so there's probably a reason other shows are focusing on those other two but yeah because

Zain 5:46

they're lesser shows where

Zain 5:47

hosts pay attention uh to to the actual content at heart carter how big of a blow is this to the liberal let's start here before we before we get into the how and why and the in the in the pitches that each of us have to replace jeremy uh how big of a deal is this for the liberals i

Carter 6:06

think it's a a really big deal i think that uh uh there was a couple of reasons why it's a big deal first and foremost uh the circumstances of him leaving i mean jeremy seems to have suddenly found out that he's got a family uh he didn't realize for the last 20 years people often do

Carter 6:22

sometimes it sometimes happens in politics where you discover after 20 30 years of doing something that you have a family um

Carter 6:30

um but jeremy kind

Carter 6:31

of suddenly discovered that he's got a family and it happened to correspond to the same time Althea Raj is out there saying that he's resigned because

Carter 6:40

he can't guarantee or he can't see a way, a path to victory. I

Corey 6:46

I think what she said was, that is fundamentally true, but I think it was framed more as the prime minister deserves a campaign director who believes he can win the next election.

Carter 6:57

Yeah, that must make it a really small circle.

Carter 7:04

who are you picking from to get to that level like it's it's justin and katie is that it doesn't

Carter 7:09

doesn't necessarily sound who's gonna run it so

Corey 7:12

so in the reporting because the reporting came out a couple of hours before before his statement his

Corey 7:16

page before his statement yeah yeah

Corey 7:18

yeah so the story came out and said effectively i'm

Corey 7:22

i'm hearing he quit i'm hearing this is why he quit uh and And then goes to Telford for comment in the prime minister's office, who basically doesn't deny the story, apparently, but says your sources don't know what they're talking about. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Corey 7:35

And then lo and behold, I'm skipping over a little bit, but fast forward a couple of hours and this statement comes out that says, hey, you know, this next election, I sure hope young people use their voice and get the change they want. Anyways, I'm quitting. Like, this is me paraphrasing, right? Right. And and so

Corey 7:53

so it does seem to me that

Corey 7:55

that at least part of that initial reporting was pretty solid. And if it is, in fact, the case that they already knew he was leaving, what I find fascinating about that is it suggests and this goes to how big of a deal it is. It suggests they tried to not make that the case. Right. Because she reported on what were rumors the day before, like people in Ottawa were talking about this, like Jihir brought her sleeping. Right. Yeah.

Corey 8:22

seems like – let's

Corey 8:24

let's put it this way. If they knew he was leaving for 100% certainty and they get that call and they know it's happening, there's

Corey 8:30

there's only one competent play, right, Stephen?

Carter 8:33

Absolutely. Yes. They're on their way. He's on his way out. They're on their way out. We love him. Yeah. He's leaving amicably. Manage that exit in that way. Do you do a classic got

Zain 8:43

got quit? Do we do a got quit? No,

Corey 8:45

So what I'm saying is this is the exact opposite. it they

Corey 8:48

they basically refused to admit it and the reporting actually

Zain 8:51

alludes to that actually says they were trying to

Zain 8:54

many senior staff had no idea that's right that's right well

Corey 8:57

well i it sounds like they were maybe trying to get them to reconsider or stick around or do something a little bit different than leave today right so do you think that yeah

Corey 9:05

that is fucking fascinating because you know a stronger campaign i

Corey 9:10

don't care how good you are once

Corey 9:11

once you get to the point where the reporter is calling like that you manage it very differently because you have options so

Zain 9:17

so let's talk about the strategy of managing it, because that is what I think we can add perhaps some insight to. Carter, were you surprised that, okay,

Zain 9:25

okay, so there's a few elements to this. Let me pick up on this one.

Zain 9:29

The fact is, he's probably told the Prime Minister and Katie weeks ago, that much seemed to be clear, that

Zain 9:35

that the announcement today by him on Twitter was not just a coincidence that it was on the heels of that Althea Rush Toronto Star reporting. It was directly a reaction to it, right, to settle the rumors, to make clear of the situation.

Zain 9:48

Talk to me about if you are surprised, not if they didn't handle it with a proactive nature, because we can, yeah, I don't want to go down the shit road on taking a shit on liberals and them being, you know, flabby and not necessarily being proactive on things, although you may have other commentary in addition to that. However, I am surprised that there was no immediate replacement, that this thing is a vehicle bigger than Jeremy Broadhurst, we've got someone in the seat right away, like, don't even worry about it, like, this thing is humming along. Are you surprised by that, considering the weeks of planning, let alone whenever the announcement were to come out, in this case, today?

Carter 10:24

Well, I return to, I suspect that the list of people who are actually qualified for this job is relatively small. I mean, so they did flummox the messaging, they did sound, Corey's point about about them sounding like they were going to try and convince Jeremy to stay. And while he

Carter 10:41

he may have resigned, they were not accepting the resignation.

Carter 10:46

That certainly seems true. What also seems true is that they were completely flummoxed

Carter 10:52

flummoxed by the situation that they found themselves in. They didn't have a plan. They didn't have a communication strategy. And for Katie, just to simply say your sources don't know what they're talking about, out, went

Carter 11:03

went so clearly that they did, continues to show that the liberals' communication strategies and communication tactics are rotten from the top down. But nonetheless, I mean,

Carter 11:16

when Jeremy Broadhurst leaves, this is leaving a giant hole. And there's just not that many people who can fill that hole, especially when you have, you

Carter 11:25

you know, not expanded your circle over the last uh number of the last 10 years cory

Zain 11:31

cory what's fascinating to you about this you you use the term the liberals trying to get him to stay is fascinating why well

Corey 11:38

well lack of plan b but also lack of ability to pivot so it talks about both a planning and a tactical uh shortcoming that the liberals had there and listen i i can i'm

Corey 11:49

i'm not saying they were saying like only you can do this jeremy you've got to be here for the next year but i'm saying they're like whoa not maybe maybe now is not the time. Can we talk about this after the Montreal by-election? We

Corey 12:00

We can't bring in a new campaign director just to get shellacked by the new Democrats in Quebec and whatever

Corey 12:06

whatever it is. If they think that's going to happen, I don't even know. But my point is, they obviously thought that they could control this information coming out in a more orderly fashion, and they had no plan B, right? Or at least they had no ability to pivot to a plan B when it was coming. So that is fascinating to me. Because while I can understand not wanting to necessarily introduce a national campaign director, it's

Corey 12:28

it's quite possible that the person who's going to be the next national campaign director has been selected and

Corey 12:34

just doesn't have the kind of job where you can announce on a random Thursday that, hey, actually, this is my new job now. But that

Corey 12:43

doesn't mean they had to approach it the way that they did. And I think it's quite telling about the state of of the liberal party and i mean obviously that's pretty easy pretty lazy analysis but you get these moments sometimes and it really hits it home for you like to have you don't know what you're talking about in the morning and by afternoon he resigns like i

Corey 13:06

i i mean let's put it this way we're

Corey 13:09

we're talking about from the prime minister's point of view now yeah why could the message if you don't know what you're talking about not even hold for a fucking day if it was was still surprising staff and the PMO. Yeah.

Corey 13:20

Like, how tenuous was that situation? That's

Corey 13:23

That's crazy. I mean, that is pretty telling about the nature of that situation, don't you think? Carter,

Zain 13:28

Carter, I've got questions for you guys that I actually, one of my favorite sort of sub genres of our podcast is when we talk about strategy from the eyes of the practitioner and their future, not so much the principle. And so I've got a couple of questions for you regarding this.

Zain 13:48

would the cost have been to broadhurst if he ran this campaign let's say the family stuff let's just let's just take it at face value we get it like we accept that thanks man let's just say that's bullshit for a second right let's just say the whole no i know clearly

Corey 14:00

clearly brought the family um

Zain 14:02

okay let's just say he's like fuck it i'm trying to protect myself we're gonna lose as a big l i've had a sterling reputation with just w's across the board since 15 carter

Corey 14:12

carter what's the the cost of an L today? Is

Zain 14:14

Is its market value actually less damaging to a practitioner and someone with Jeremy's level of exposure than it would be a decade, two decades ago? I'm really curious about that. What is actually the cost of a loss today to someone like Jeremy when the entire ship looks like it's heading in one direction?

Carter 14:33

It's not about the cost of a loss. It's about the pain of the loss.

Carter 14:38

When you are marching, like, you know how hard campaigns are. Campaigns are super difficult.

Carter 14:44

When you're going through those campaigns and you do not have confidence in your own decisions that it's going to result in something positive, it's just exhausting being there. The first, I don't know, three or four months in the 2012 campaign when everything was was going wrong.

Carter 15:01

You know, we couldn't get out of our own way. We were continuing to destroy ourselves. That was an exhausting campaign because you couldn't get out of your own way. And I suspect that what Jeremy was trying to say is, I've got ideas. I want us to do things and I want us to recognize the hole that we're in. And if we don't recognize the hole that we're in, we're not in a position where we can we can perform and if the subtext of what i'm hearing from that uh we were going to lose it's not just that they're going to lose it's not just the l it's that no one around me is hearing me when i say you're going to lose no one is listening to me when i say if we do not change certain things we are losing this government and we are losing it to pierre polyev so there is a consequence to this that is beyond taking an l right when When you're a campaign strategist or you're devising, you know, campaign director, you are responsible in some fashion for the fate of the nation. And I suspect that he was feeling that pressure and thought to himself, if no one's going to hear me when I stand up and pull the fire alarm, then I'm not going to be here to pull the fire alarm anymore.

Zain 16:10

Corey, like Carter's talking about the pain being the driving factor potentially here. I get that, Carter. I still want to talk about, like, if an L is worth less of a downgrade than it would have been in a previous political generation. McCrory, react to what you heard from Carter, and perhaps even the heart of my question, which is, is a political loss no longer the blemish it used to be?

Corey 16:33

i i'll get to that but i do want to say i i do a hundred percent agree with steven's point there is a human element to this too and if you've got to wake up every day and do something you think is not going to succeed like there's nobody doing your task and then like this is still a year away in theory this

Corey 16:48

election right like that's a long time and

Corey 16:52

and carter talked about the 2012 election in alberta those first three months and how they were tough for him i ran the fucking in alberta liberal party campaign in that i was campaign director for the then official opposition liberals and it was a slog before that uh we had we had elected a new leader in october september uh raj sherman and i had already given notice like when the campaign started i'm like i'm not i'm done like i didn't really i was way past enjoying that job anyhow but i gave notice like with the leader changing i'm going to go and then uh at the time there was a sense that um um,

Corey 17:28

uh, that Gary Marr was going to win and that we'd be in a snap election in late October, early November in Alberta. And so there was a bit of panic.

Corey 17:37

The leader that was elected, Ross Sherman, didn't come with a very big team. He came with basically no team. There's stories there, but, uh, I was asked to be the campaign director for this, having just been the executive director of the party. And I

Corey 17:50

I agreed to do it.

Corey 17:53

on one level, I enjoyed doing it. On one level, i learned a lot it there you learn a lot from resource scarcity and you learn a lot from failure because you can't kind of gloss over it right but

Corey 18:02

but i also regret deeply doing it like i didn't want to do it and that election didn't end up happening until the spring and it was fucking miserable i

Corey 18:12

i i felt i had to i felt like i mean it was the liberal party in alberta but i felt a lot of that same like if i go away this thing is just in really terrible shape people will lose their elected positions People could lose their jobs in the supporting caucus and all of that. Like, I felt this, like, need and pressure to stick around.

Corey 18:30

With the benefit of, you know, another 10 years of life plus after that, though, a little bit more life perspective, that's

Corey 18:36

that's bullshit. Like, there will be a replacement for Broadhurst at some point. This will be a blip. And

Corey 18:41

And I actually do believe it's better for him and the party that he had that honest reflection with himself and made the decisions that he made at this particular moment. Because to march forward as though it's through the snow to Russia in wartime is crazy. And no organization can or should depend on one person that deeply. And if they find themselves defending so deeply that they're in a deeper hole because Jeremy left, that's

Corey 19:09

that's on them. That's on a liberal party. It's also revelatory.

Corey 19:12

Yeah. Listen, it's in a liberal party that, to Stephen's point, has narrowed the circle and narrowed the support base to a point of ineffectuality.

Corey 19:22

He could have won the lottery. He could have been hit by a bus. He actually just had a moment of clarity. But the end result is the same. He leaves. It can't throw people into chaos, like even the short-term chaos we've seen, the

Corey 19:33

the way that it did.

Zain 19:35

Answer my question. I know you said you would. Oh, that was a lie, Zane. Yeah, we don't do

Zain 19:41

do that. It's a good question, though, but one of you should try to answer it. Okay, what was the question? I

Zain 19:44

Is a political loss just not as much of a blemish today as it was a while ago? Is Jeremy Broadhurst, with an L on the 20, let's call it 25 campaign, worth different on the open market, reputationally and otherwise, than he would be walking away today? That's a different way of asking the question. Yeah,

Corey 20:01

Yeah, I mean, I think that's predicated. There's a premise there that it was ever disqualifying. I just don't think that's true. There are campaign organizers who go through life winning some, losing some. The reality is most Canadian elections have three or four candidates that are credible. Not

Corey 20:21

saying that they're all deep in it and running it, but they're incredible. And you're just going to lose more than you win. And so I

Corey 20:29

I guess I'm just not sure it was ever that huge of a mark. The wins matter more than the losses. The wins are the aberration, not the losses. And so if you stack up a bunch of wins, like, hey, our pal Stephen Carter here, a bunch of improbable wins, that's pretty significant. But all things being equal, even a very good campaign manager is going to lose more than they win.

Carter 20:52

Carter, do you... Yeah, and it's also how you lose. It's how you lose. And Jeremy's aware of how he's going to lose. And he's visualizing how he's going to lose. And he can't see another way out

Carter 21:02

out of how he's going to lose. And he probably knows how the by-elections are going to end next week, too,

Carter 21:07

too, right? This is not somebody who's going to be deeply surprised by any of the outcome. Do you think his

Zain 21:12

is a bit of a preview to the Liberals kind of losing some ground there?

Carter 21:16

Well, I mean, his timing is interesting, isn't it?

Carter 21:19

mean, his timing, he could have waited two more weeks. And maybe he was supposed to wait two more weeks. Maybe Althea Raj, you know, pumped up the pressure and pumped up the timeline a little bit. But who leaked that?

Carter 21:33

Corey. Who leaked that? Again, it's a really small pool of people who are going to be able to leak that story. And have that knowledge

Zain 21:40

knowledge that that happened. Yeah. Yeah.

Carter 21:41

Yeah. People are going to be shocked to find out how stories

Zain 21:45

stories leak. Especially when the rest of the story effectively says most of the senior people, or most of the PMO and many senior people had no idea about this.

Carter 21:53

This is what I'm saying. Yeah,

Zain 21:54

Yeah, including speculation by Althea saying that the party director may not have known.

Zain 22:05

does this prove, no, that's not right. Does this give an example of

Zain 22:10

of why we shouldn't know who these people are to begin with? If people didn't have any idea who Jeremy Broadhurst was, this wouldn't be a story. The liberals would have lost a campaign director. Maybe that would have been a sub-headline somewhere. But the fact that he's a known person, we know Katie, we know Jerry, we know this orbit, right? Even if Jerry's not actively in there. It's been years. But we know who Jerry Butts is. We know Katie Telford is. We know who Jeremy Broadhurst is. Is

Zain 22:33

Is this another point to prove that we've gotten too far into the idolatry of the practitioner and the strategist in some ways? I mean, it's ironic talking about it on this podcast, but let's do it nonetheless.

Corey 22:44

Well, look, I think it's certainly on the ledger of the consequences of when it goes bad. But you've got to look at the whole ledger. Obviously, I come down, we've had this conversation, I come down on the side of, I think that practitioners should just work in the background and not be personalities. personalities.

Corey 22:58

Stephen is on the other side. There is logic to Stephen's point of view. I'll let him articulate it, but I'll say having more personalities that can deliver messages in more way that are not the principle has some merit too. And the fact that you can build up a personality has some cachet in bringing other organizers who say, man, I'd love to work with Broadhurst. I'd love to work with Telford. I'd love to work with the new national campaign director, Stephen Carter. He just can't announce that he's coming yet, but I've heard the rumors, heard him on a podcast. and uh i

Corey 23:26

i i just can't wait to do it i can't wait to work with the guy you're

Carter 23:29

you're just killing my announcement at

Carter 23:31

at the end of the pod i

Corey 23:32

could see just killing

Zain 23:34

it the question was have we gotten too far and carter's now planning an announcement and there's a draft campaign uh for him so here we go carter

Carter 23:41

carter have we gone

Zain 23:41

gone too far down this track steven no

Carter 23:43

no we haven't i mean jeremy broadhurst was amongst the most anonymous of the campaign directors um fair you know he in

Zain 23:50

in terms of who Yeah,

Carter 23:51

Yeah, I mean, he was no Jerry

Carter 23:53

Jerry Butts jumping out at every, you know, at every camera. I mean, he, I don't know if Jerry

Zain 23:58

Jerry would jumping out. And I just think the Jerry thing was fascinating simply because of the relationship with the PM and the Braintrust.

Carter 24:05

Braintrust. He often found himself having discussions and being quoted.

Carter 24:09

And Jeremy Broadhurst, I think, was quoted when required, but nothing more. So I don't think that Jeremy Broadhurst was one of the Stephen Carter acolytes that jumps out in front of a camera every opportunity he gets. yeah

Carter 24:23

but jeremy had you know um we we know who these people are because they're important

Carter 24:28

because they're devising the strategies that will determine the outcome of these elections fair enough i

Carter 24:33

actually agree with you

Carter 24:37

jeremy had a huge job and uh you know i just keep coming back to your earlier question he knew he couldn't do his job i mean when you're in that situation and you're a grown-ass person who knows that they can't do the job Getting out of the job is the only real logical outcome sometimes. And I think that he made

Carter 24:58

made the exact right choice, perhaps not at the exact right time.

Zain 25:02

Talk to me, Corey, about the strategy for the liberals going forward. Let's just say they haven't chosen a national campaign director. We've talked about their shrinking orbit. We've talked about the fact that it's nearly a decade of the same group kind of running things. And electorally, you can't argue they've had success on three different occasions. Asians. Yeah, for sure. That being said,

Zain 25:21

would you, how would you think about this? I'm not even going to pose it as a binary to you in terms of someone from the outside or the inside. I'll kind of let you get into that if you want. How would you think about the replacement here, both in terms of profile, maybe inside and outside, other factors that you would consider?

Corey 25:35

Yeah, I mean, I'd go to draftzane.com first and measure that particular candidate's efficacy. And then I would would go to draft carter dot my enormous wood table dot com yeah

Corey 25:48

yeah and look at that candidates i

Carter 25:49

i don't even get my own fucking do

Zain 25:50

i have a theme song this time on draftsane.com for this i

Zain 25:54

think it's just been reused

Zain 25:55

reused you know oh fantastic no it's a theme song for everything it is excellent you

Corey 25:59

you know the line about you loving calgary hits a little bit different for this particular one but hey no i mean so down on

Corey 26:05

on calgary when you think about i mean it's so it's such an interesting thing because there are obviously the technical competencies you need um trust is usually a significant component for a role like that and there

Corey 26:17

there are hired guns who can come in from out of town and assist with those things but carter

Corey 26:23

carter talks about small orbits like it's the your circles within circles here right who's got the chops who's got the relationships who's got the time who's got the inclination as you so it's a list of like

Zain 26:35

like it's a single page list it's maybe a list that's you know very very small yeah

Corey 26:40

yeah quite likely so you'll you'll have people within the campaign this is a real political party right you're gonna have people within the infrastructure working there full-time directors of various functions maybe one of them can come in yeah

Corey 26:52

you might be looking at people within the prime minister's office who have had some of those skill sets in the past maybe one of them can do it i mean hell maybe the plan here is to take some of of the heat off yourself from the summer uh jeremy goes katie goes to run the campaign and there's a new chief of staff like we don't actually know like i think what's most interesting is just the chaos of it not like what ends up happening but what

Zain 27:14

what the plays are here or what the potential

Corey 27:16

but that is that is quite often i mean steven knows that chief of staff to campaign you know strategist or whatnot is is a thing that can happen and um and

Corey 27:27

and so there's those people and And then there's probably that next circle out, which is they've been involved in some way, shape or form. They're now working at a consulting firm. They have some sort of life that would allow them, even if it wouldn't be that comfortable to come back in.

Corey 27:40

That's a possibility. And then like the like

Corey 27:43

like real, I'm going to say bottom of the barrel, but I actually don't mean that quality wise. But I mean, the next group you go out are

Zain 27:53

It's the Stephen and Saints, the outsider insider. I mean, explicitly. explicitly oh he's explicitly us too oh okay yeah

Carter 28:01

no i took it that way thank you cory uh

Zain 28:04

i'm actually so dense um that i didn't take it that way which actually makes me perfect for the gig um

Zain 28:09

um carter here's a question for you um

Zain 28:15

would you advocate for the 2015 conservative strategy which is bring a heavy hitter from abroad no

Zain 28:23

shake that shit up to to the point that it gets people talking steer

Zain 28:27

steer into the skid whatever

Zain 28:29

whatever that may look and i forget the guy's name but you know you guys know who i'm referring dead cat guy right yeah um that was a and i know i know in that case he wasn't running the campaign he was he wasn't doing the work that jeremy would but do

Corey 28:41

use this as an opportunity

Zain 28:43

opportunity to be like fuck it we're shaking things up in a major way we can't change the chief the principal staying but fuck it we're actually going with a really we're sending a message to the political class on how we run the campaign would

Carter 28:55

would you lean into that at all carter well

Carter 28:57

well i mean let's let's let's play the game right let's say i'm actually curious just

Zain 29:01

just do the exercise the

Carter 29:02

the you could pick someone up from labor in in great britain you could uh pick someone up from labor in australia um you could pick someone up from the democrats in the united states the democrats aren't going to come available for two months for a few months they're probably going to need a couple months off after this uh nightmarish cycle um but

Carter 29:23

but you know i mean do you do get an ax on tap and and get a axle rod right or do you bring in david pluff um i mean those are viable options but the truth of the matter is that david pluff is only going to be as as good as the right hand person that's beside him because canada is different than the the united states you're going to need some people who really understand like maybe you partner dan arnold with uh with david pluff because dan arnold knows every statistic and every uh demographic in canada better than anybody else in the country maybe that's how you do it but you certainly don't just bring in david pluff to uh write the campaign strategy because he's just not gonna he's just not gonna know uh he's just not gonna know the big plate pieces you

Carter 30:11

you know the big pieces aren't there for him yeah

Corey 30:15

yeah the regional stuff here is of course even

Corey 30:18

compared to the united states it's wild yeah

Carter 30:21

yeah i mean the difference between you know between quebec and alberta staggering even though they're the most alike in in many other respects like it's it's just amazing how hard it is to run politics in canada stability

Zain 30:35

stability cory or do you need a splash do you use this an an opportunity to to make a statement because you can't change many other things or do you just go for a stability face people know face that the party and the membership and the the the mps and the candidates either know or respect or i've heard of and and feel fine with oh

Corey 30:53

oh it's interesting especially in the context of one of the other stories we're going to talk about here which is the end of the confidence and supply agreement so if

Corey 31:01

if that still existed and

Corey 31:03

and maybe you could still make the argument irrespective if that still existed i would say what does stability matter you got a year like you can you can figure out what you need and you can get it and you can run that horse for a while so i don't know why you would battlefield promote somebody within the organization unless you found them truly exceptional and ready for the job right if

Corey 31:25

if this were the week before a rip drop and

Corey 31:29

and of course it's got to be someone internal you're not going to be to get anybody else up to speed right you might bring somebody in almost as like a media play to say oh yeah we've got steven carter here you know advising the mastermind of all of these various campaigns and uh you know he's joined the campaign but like practically speaking um you're you're gonna have to have most of that operation just running on pre-existing plans and the people who built those plans and have familiarity with it are going to be are

Corey 31:57

are we going to be the ones you look Okay.

Zain 31:59

Let's move on. That's enough about Jeremy. I think we hit on quite a few topics. Carter, is it going to be Jagmeet Singh ripping up the agreement, CASA, or

Zain 32:08

or is it going to be the green line? I'm going to give you the Stephen Carter Security Council vote, the one vote. Where's it going? I

Carter 32:17

I think we go with Jagmeet Singh ripping up the agreement. Let's

Zain 32:21

Let's talk about it.

Carter 32:22

Yeah, it's an opportunity.

Zain 32:24

Corey, where are we going? He gets to choose a topic, you get to choose the angle. There's so many parts to the angle. There's the politics of what happened. There's the comms of what happened, his hardline rhetoric around Justin Trudeau being weak and a corporate greed bastard and son of Satan sort of thing. He went pretty hard in the paint. Then

Zain 32:43

there's the press conference, and then there's the ramification. Pick an angle. It doesn't even have to be any of the four I put on the table. Get it started.

Corey 32:50

Okay, how about I throw this on as an angle?

Corey 32:54

this a huge mistake?

Zain 32:59

i make the case which case do you want to make and do you actually believe it start

Corey 33:03

start i'm not a hundred okay well yeah

Corey 33:06

i mean i half believe it let's put it that way i'm still i'm still processing whether i think this is a good idea or a bad idea for the ndp um i

Corey 33:14

i think that they may have painted themselves into a very strange corner though by doing this there's a couple of things right off the bat that if i was a new democrat like partisan for the federal new democrats i i think i would be very concerned first of all is singh's seeming inability to answer like what the trigger for this was yes

Corey 33:32

the best guess most people can have is it was the uh you know the labor action uh with rails yeah and then teamsters exactly and then uh the federal government basically ordering it to end right yeah but singh doesn't really seem that keen to say that or lead with that i suppose i should say right it you know at best maybe it's in a list of complaints but it's not there never on super strong ground when your reason for doing something you feel like you can't communicate very strongly um

Corey 34:01

the other honest about yeah like the less the less concrete trigger is we just know the ndp caucus for a long time has not been super enthused about this and has felt that they have they've

Corey 34:11

they've kind of become a junior partner in a coalition obviously the conservatives have had a huge

Corey 34:16

huge part in doing that you know in the way they've defined this you know this used to be the trudeau notley singh alliance back in back in the day but now it's just the trudeau singh alliance you know rachel notley's been rejected from the alliance and um and so they just they want it out they didn't want to be walking into the next election arm and arm with the liberals and so let's do it now we don't even have to bring the liberals down we got a year we can define ourselves and we could say oh you know it's it's issue by issue maybe i'll support you maybe i won't and they feel that they can reassert themselves and get the power back yeah

Corey 34:56

this gets to uh you know the main reason why i think did they just paint themselves a fucking trap i

Corey 35:02

i i don't understand how this is going to work for them because you've already got pierre polyev saying are

Corey 35:08

you serious if you're serious about it let's call an election let's vote no confidence in this fucker right now. And they're not going to do that. It seems pretty clear right now, at least the NDP have no interest in voting non-confidence. And so I think it's just, it's really tough for

Corey 35:24

for the average person watching all of this to hear end of confidence and supply agreement. And then the next week or whatever here, oh,

Corey 35:33

oh, but they're still voting with the liberals on confidence motions. Like people just don't have that strong of a a grasp of parliamentary activity and it's going to confuse people and it's going to make them look weak and polyev's going to be able to hit them with this all of the bloody time and

Corey 35:47

and at the end of the day unless you want to go to an election you are going to end up voting with the liberals every single time and now you don't even have the excuse of saying ah what do you do it's part of the thing it's part of the deal now like every single one is a conscious decision to vote with the liberals and they're just going to get tortured over it just absolutely fucking tortured over it Carter,

Zain 36:06

Carter, let's take Corey's frame. Was it a mistake?

Carter 36:09

Yes, it absolutely was a mistake. First of all, it was a mistake to enter into the agreement. It should have been from the very beginning. Every decision is going to be made on what's in the best interest of Canadians. Then you have power for every decision that you're making. And maybe you don't support a couple. Maybe you make sure that the Bloc Quebecois doesn't bring down the government on Tuesday instead of you not bringing down the government on tuesday but you make sure that you've got fucking power and this is where we where we're really pushing because he doesn't actually have any power um

Carter 36:45

um he he has made it so his power level has declined through the agreement and now there was only one way to end the supply and confidence agreement and that one way was the force of to fuck an election and

Carter 36:59

and now he hasn't done that he hasn't forced an election that is utterly ridiculous to me and even even if he threatened to force an election and then the bloc quebec was saved the uh the liberals ass that would have been far more powerful he

Carter 37:17

he seems to have forgotten that politics is a game about power who has it and who doesn't have it and if you don't have power you're irrelevant and jagmeet singh has no power therefore he is irrelevant yeah

Corey 37:28

yeah like if i'm the block i'm not sure like of the three parties that are not the conservatives obviously the block would rather have a minority government than a conservative majority all

Corey 37:41

all other things being equal in like a working relationship perspective but i don't think they actually care who the government of canada is by and large yes in terms of their overall agenda and

Corey 37:52

they seem to be less likely to get taken

Corey 37:55

taken down a peg in the next federal election i mean like quebec very dynamic polling

Corey 38:00

yeah they're doing okay polling wise so yeah very dynamic that can always change in a heartbeat in quebec but there certainly seem to be in the mix and so if i were the bq i would just i would basically from now on to the end just vote no on every no confidence agreement absolutely every single one because that just puts the ndp in a box every single time tough

Zain 38:22

tough for them every

Zain 38:23

every single time and

Corey 38:24

and it allows uh you to sort of say as you're going about quebec like hey no like we're the only option you probably have a little bit in your mind 2011 where the ndp came out of nowhere right and so it just it helps put them on the same side as the liberals and so So maybe

Corey 38:38

maybe a little bit of longer term. It's so different now, like that's a gross simplification. But I think that that's, you know, why not, I guess would be my answer there.

Zain 38:46

Let me throw out two strategy

Zain 38:49

strategy sort of points to you and just get you guys to chew on them, agree or disagree sort of thing. Corey, I'll start with you.

Zain 38:55

Disagreement had to end at some point before the next election.

Zain 38:58

Strategically, do you kind of agree with that? No. That like there had to be an expiry

Corey 39:03

I mean, it had an expiry date. They could have just let it naturally expire.

Corey 39:08

But if they wanted to do it before, to Stephen's point, there's one strong way to do that, right? Which is

Zain 39:13

is to trigger the election. Which

Corey 39:14

Which is just to trigger an election. And I think that people are probably underestimating the confusion that this will cause with kind of a lay voter and maybe overestimating the ability of people to work through this and thread the same needle that Singh is trying to thread, right? and say wait a minute so you no longer support the liberals but you are going to vote with them but maybe only sometimes but you're not going to bring down the government like the longer this goes on and the more you are the person who's clearly proper right let's

Zain 39:43

let's put it with overarching why are you doing this again still being part of the the the question line like

Corey 39:49

like so what was the fucking point of all of this let's put it this way if they're the ones who saved the liberals

Corey 39:53

seven times in a row over the fall of just making up a number here yeah yeah

Corey 39:58

they're gonna look like fucking fools they're gonna look like fools at a certain point they then just have to pull the trigger so i i think it does actually increase the risk of an election a certain amount because by time three they're just gonna be they're

Corey 40:09

they're like they're gonna feel like they have to and so

Zain 40:11

so at sometimes fuck your buddy turns into fuck yourself and they may have done that in the sense of just like not looking weak themselves to your point they may just have to be like fuck it this is okay like we're getting raked over the coals by the conservatives this our own base is being like Like, what the fuck are we doing? Like, hey, let's just go for the poll. Do we have enough money? Can we leverage the building again? Fuck it. Well,

Corey 40:32

Well, and that's just really nihilist, right? To say, okay, so we had this confidence in supply agreement. We got tortured for three months.

Corey 40:40

We're going to end up in the same place but worse and without any of the legislative upside.

Zain 40:45

Carter is, okay, this is a question that, let's just explore the, let's just agree with this, okay? This was a mistake.

Zain 40:52

Rather than going to my next question, let's just agree with this is a mistake.

Corey 40:57

The next thing is not going to be possible.

Zain 40:58

No, no, it may not be. It may not be. No,

Zain 41:00

no, no, it may not be. But I actually want to explore this.

Carter 41:06

There's no takesy-backsies. I

Zain 41:09

look weaker. Right, so if you could get out of an agreement, how would, is there any strategic way to get back into one with better terms? Let's say he realizes in the next 12 hours, let's say he goes to his caucus retreat, which I know is on the calendar for him. He

Corey 41:23

Stephen Carter to run their campaign.

Corey 41:25

I might have fucked

Zain 41:25

fucked up. Yeah, right. Let's just say that's what it is. It's Stephen Carter, and he's doing it for free.

Carter 41:35

sure he is. No, I mean, there's

Carter 41:40

there's no takesies-backsies. I mean, his only option now is to push to an election. Now, there's a case to be made. What if he doesn't want to, though? Help him out here. There's a case to be made that the fundamentals just changed when Broadhurst left.

Carter 41:56

There's a case to be made... You could connect those

Carter 41:59

You get an opportunity to

Carter 42:01

to force the Liberals into an incredibly uncomfortable position. And you could, you know, extract something from them not to bring the government down. And that something is going to be... Has to be something you can put in the window for the next election. I just brought every Canadian actual dental care. I brought every Canadian actual pharma care, you

Carter 42:25

you know, instead of these half-assed things that have been brought by the Liberals to this point. So there is a chance. There is no party that wants an election less than the New Democrats right now, except maybe with Jeremy leaving the

Carter 42:42

the federal Liberals. well

Corey 42:45

i so if i was going to make in shorthand the argument this wasn't a mistake it wasn't a mistake if we're wrong and they are actually willing to go to the election like very first day with a confidence vote right just sort of shock everybody any indication

Zain 42:58

indication in the presser today that that's where we're headed

Corey 43:01

i don't at all but i will say it

Corey 43:05

it is not impossible that after this election with the current state of polling that the ndp while still in a like a majority conservative government the NDP could be official opposition at the end of this right so they might say it's gonna fucking happen anyway right now we might end up official opposition and so we'll get out of the confidence supply agreement we'll let this back and forth happen for a bit and we'll shock the world when um when we just drop the government or arrange to vote against and maybe we let it drop or not depending on what the bloc does in this uh you know confidence uh vote that That occurs at the start of the legislative session.

Zain 43:42

Carter, let me throw something else out. Let's take a step back for a second, which is another sort of strategic thing I wanted you to chew on before I get into the comms, before I get into how he did it, what this means for Pierre, should the liberals call an election? There's a lot of things to explore because, you know, they can force shit too if they wanted to. Jeremy question aside, perhaps.

Zain 44:01

Talk to me about this line of thinking that

Zain 44:04

that the NDP needed a... Carter, what are you doing? is going on? Why are balloons flying by you?

Carter 44:12

you? I don't know why balloons are floating by my face. I'm doing nothing.

Zain 44:18

Okay, well, good work. This is, of course, very illustrative that a mediocre white man does nothing and gets celebrated. So, thank you, Squadcast, for continuing the patriarchy. Carter, talk to me about this.

Zain 44:34

Another sort of strategic thought that's been out there is that the NDP needed to do this at some point. They needed to have this split so they could spend time to define themselves so they can win the progressive primary, so to speak. Grapple on that thought. It's similar to the first one that I threw at Corey, which is that this had an expiry date. But grapple on that thought, Carter, and then I'll go to Corey on it, which is that the NDP needed a runway in order to be their own thing so that they could beat the liberals in a progressive primary so they could become opposition and then have a chance to take down Pierre.

Zain 45:05

There's that line of thinking.

Carter 45:06

Let's go back in time two and a half years and then don't enter into the supply and confidence agreement, because

Carter 45:11

because that's how you would actually do that. You would actually hold their feet to the fire and actually get some progressive things passed and then claim victory instead of being in the supply and confidence agreement, which which just took away all of that opportunity for you. you so this is a uh

Carter 45:30

uh you know if by there was only i returned to this there was only one way to leave the supply and confidence agreement and that was with a bang enforcing an election uh even now like let's just say for shits and giggles they decide to force the election in in a week right why

Carter 45:48

why do it 10 days in advance why not literally make the biggest fucking splash you can make it's because Because they don't have a strategy, and that strategy does not have an exit for them. You keep saying that there was an exit opportunity. They did not script or understand what the exit looked like, and it has never been more clear than it was in Jagmeet Singh's presser today.

Zain 46:14

What do you think, Corey, of this strategic thought, that they needed their own time and space to become their own thing again, so Canadians remembered who they were on their terms after this like conscious uncoupling with the liberals sort of thing yeah

Corey 46:28

accept that i do uh but to steven's point you're not it's not really going to work now like let assumes a field with no competitors right that the liberals are going to let you do that the conservatives are going to let you do that the block are going to let you do that none of them are going to fucking let you do that and and different ways and for different reasons but let's just let's just assume that that hypothesis is correct right let's start with the liberals because i did want want to talk a bit about this yeah let's assume the hypothesis is correct that it benefits the ndp to have a year of distance from the liberals so

Corey 47:01

so if you're trudeau isn't there appeal in like today dropping the rent i'm

Corey 47:06

i'm just gonna throw it on the table you avoid the montreal by-election you get to be in the middle of the u.s election cycle which seems to have been a liberal wet dream for a while like oh i'd love to run against trump so let's just call polyev trump hey maybe maybe you just run against Trump because Trump's next door, right? You keep the NDP away from that goal. You stop growing discontent in the liberal caucus, like it can't grow anymore. All of a sudden you've got an election. And it's not like time has increased your polling performance. So you do this, you call an election for mid late October, you get a nice turkey dinner where everybody can talk about whether they think Pierre Polyev is a weirdo just before it. and um and you just fucking let it ride no obviously that didn't really work well in the uk or france but but

Corey 47:51

but if the ndp actually benefit from a year why

Corey 47:56

why give it to them yeah

Corey 47:57

yeah why give it to them if

Corey 48:01

well also that you're the ndp is not your main opponent but would you think the election's kind of would

Zain 48:05

would you try to make the case today to the

Zain 48:12

they should be headed to the polls?

Zain 48:14

Tough enough to campaign

Zain 48:17

mean... Well, I mean, would you make the case and then volunteer yourself? Sorry for not connecting all the fucking dots for you. Yeah,

Carter 48:23

so when I get the telephone call... No, no, no, you

Zain 48:26

When you make the telephone call.

Carter 48:28

When I make the telephone call, my pitch is not going to be, you know what, this is the way to win, is to

Carter 48:34

self-immolate in an actual election, I would suggest that the strength still lies with Pierre Polyev. There has to be some means to reduce that strength. And if you can't reduce that strength, then I still think that the changing of the leader is the best way to go. And apparently Jeremy Broadhurst agrees with me now. So I have that going for me. Jeez.

Zain 48:58

Corey, can Polyev overplay his call an election squawking every single day to can he oh can he just can he like tire people out and annoy the shit out of people with his carbon

Zain 49:11

tax election call a carbon tax

Corey 49:13

tax of course he can he could he could tire them out and make them annoyed on literally any topic but but

Zain 49:17

but this one in particular because you assume this is now going to be

Zain 49:22

his new front of the window

Corey 49:25

window sort of like when

Corey 49:27

this is the thing so

Zain 49:28

so maybe that's why it sounds tired to me you can hear that my statement in the question yeah

Corey 49:32

yeah well i mean there's like there's again canadian elections lots of parties competing interests aligning interests varying bedfellows all of them strange right but pierre

Corey 49:43

pierre polyev has been hammering for years the well not you know call a carbon tax election basically not years would be an exaggeration but you know

Corey 49:51

this election no not

Carter 49:52

not really but almost from the first day he was elected yeah yeah

Corey 49:57

so uh because you know this government's not there for you Now you've got the NDP saying the same thing. They've jumped right on board that particular message, but for the actual calling of the election. But they validated so much of what Pierre Polyev said. Justin Trudeau's not in it for you. He's beholden to these interests. Sure, it's corporate interests to the NDP, but it's interests that are not your interests for the conservatives. Conservatives, this is not a government that deserves your support or credibility. Even the fucking NDP have walked away from them now. Let's call this election. Let's go. Everything's changed. And so that seems great, if you're him, because instead of just being the guy saying the same thing over and over again, you now get to point to this new proof point that even the NDP are not there anymore. I don't really think that this is going to hurt him that much. Carter,

Zain 50:45

Carter, you said yes, that this could annoy people, that

Zain 50:47

that he could overplay his hand. Annoy is actually not—I don't care about annoy. Could

Zain 50:52

Could he overplay his hand strategically?

Carter 50:53

strategically? I find him extremely annoying. So do I, but I pungent strategy here.

Carter 50:59

Yeah, I think he can overplay his hand. I mean, there's something about being on

Carter 51:05

on message and repeating your message over and over again that is effective.

Carter 51:09

But then there also becomes one note. out. And I think that Pierre Polyev is at risk of becoming a one note candidate.

Carter 51:19

That risk doesn't appear to be very high, though. It doesn't seem to be coming with much in the way of confidence or consequence. So, you know, Pierre Polyev could annoy Canadians, but he does not appear to be in a place where he will annoy Canadians as much as Justin Trudeau is.

Zain 51:38

Corey, talk to me about, let's go back to Singh for a second.

Zain 51:42

One thing that's still, maybe unlike you guys, I could see this perhaps having a natural expiry date. I could see this make this argument that they needed to have their own lane carved out for themselves to try to make way and do their own thing and represent who they are on their own. And maybe this is why he needed to do it now right um i could see that one

Zain 52:03

one thing i can't see is why the communications were so like hard-edged why they were so um and and i'm really curious from like a strategic perspective should he have just gone with the truth like

Zain 52:15

like should he have just gone with the these were our partners we believed in a lot of shit they just aren't able to execute they don't have the depth of conviction they have no ability to execute they just guys these guys are fucking flabby and lazy crazy they don't know what they're doing all the good ideas were ours and we need to go do this on our own like i'm not saying exactly what i'm saying is domestic no i

Corey 52:33

i kind of love that for what it's worth i think that would have been quite

Corey 52:37

quite a strong way to accident because it's like you rob them of all this power because right now it's they're beholding the corporate interest they're doing things their way right and you're basically taking it you're flipping it you'll be like

Corey 52:50

they can't fuck their way out of a paper bag like they don't know what they're doing they don't know why they're there

Zain 52:54

there they have no purpose we're the ones who gave them purpose for the last couple years it's time for us to just like fucking do

Corey 52:59

do our own thing

Corey 52:59

like you know i'm moving out of your shadow old man i'm the boss now like there's something to that to what you said that really appeals to me in a way that like what the sing ndp message came out does not i i think that's quite inspired as

Carter 53:13

you should you should call sing and

Carter 53:15

and offer yourself but you just said there's no takesie

Zain 53:18

takesie backsies you said uh

Zain 53:19

uh hey tell me about that carter though what do you think they they were going for with that weak like they've exposed themselves as corporate interests like what do you think like that that music in that video the almost the attack style

Carter 53:34

style you're asking me to explain lunacy you

Carter 53:38

know i thought i don't know if it was i don't know if it was i think i have a voice here and i say it was lunacy explain to us why it was it didn't make make any sense at all first of all the produced video made no sense at all i mean i

Carter 53:55

literally did not in

Corey 53:56

in french they had to kind of subtitle it differently yeah yeah

Carter 53:59

yeah i mean it was it was an absolute gong show of of of a uh of the video that you know didn't want to be a video it needed to be a press conference i had no idea what the fuck i was watching and it was difficult to watch It was uncomfortable to watch. So I have no idea what he was actually thinking. It was, in fact, lunacy. It put the ball in the other guy's court instead of in your court. Your messaging is 100 times smarter than their messaging. I have no idea what they were thinking, Zane. It was a bad idea to get into it. It was a worse idea to get out of it. And then the way that they got out of it, using the tactics that they chose, made them look weaker than anybody could have possibly imagined. imagined so yes it was absolute lunacy because now what's their next play what's

Carter 54:47

what's their next move well

Corey 54:48

well yeah i just want to say one more thing that i haven't brought up on this particular uh the

Corey 54:54

the ndp going to an election one of their challenges with the fall election is

Corey 54:58

is that the nd like do they have the horses to run a bc election a saskatchewan election and a federal election this

Zain 55:04

resource share that they have that

Corey 55:05

that formalized this did like the way the ndp works like they float from election to election their their organizer class ass. I'm skeptical, I guess I'll say, which is just another reason they don't actually want an election this fall, which everybody knows is not a brilliant, unique insight here. So they're going to get pushed around this fall. And I just don't see how that works out for them.

Zain 55:27

Speaking of, you know, being pushed around a bit, one thing I found funny in all of this, like there's a humor element to this, which is the liberals boasting that Jagmeet Singh leaving leaving the ripping up the agreement was the best 24 hours and we did the best 24 hours in 12 hours folks the best 12 hours of fundraising that they've had through email in a long time i'm paraphrasing a literal tweet from the party which had a graphic explaining this and it was

Zain 55:57

being like we had the best email that we had in a long time so there you go i don't know what point they were trying to prove but cory like was

Zain 56:04

was that a strategic move on their part or Or was that just people just letting out some steam, being like, oh, my God, there's a sign of life, maybe? I

Corey 56:11

I don't know. Like, I actually, I would love to have been in the room when somebody pitched that idea. And you see all this, like, fist bump. Yeah, we're going to fucking show them we got all this money, right?

Corey 56:21

And just say, like, okay, what's the objective? Who's the audience? Like, who's this for? Right? Because it actually feels like it's for the people who work for the Liberal Party, if I'm being frank. Like, just to be

Zain 56:31

be like, fuck yeah. I'm not even

Corey 56:32

even saying supporters. reporters i'm saying the people who work for the liberal party who say right we still got it guys we can still make this happen because you know it's not it's

Corey 56:41

it's not content that's targeted towards like a donor right because you'd want to be like we got all this money you'd say we need all this money that's donor communications right yes yes and um it's not targeted towards a median voter

Corey 56:55

because all you're doing is is i don't know i mean it's so baffling to me but like the uh the The other thing is, is

Corey 57:02

is it even surprising that when the risk of an election heightens like that, that partisans would give a little bit more money? Like, I don't, I

Corey 57:09

don't know. What are they bragging about? I want to know what the actual number is. Don't give me this bullshit, the most in a 12 hour period. Fucking put the number out there, you cowards. And let's decide if it's impressive or not.

Zain 57:20

Yeah, like, was it a million dollar email or not? Or was it, you know, like, maybe that's a number that's too high, too low. I don't know. I don't know. Right? Carter, tragic, strategic, letting

Zain 57:31

letting off some steam, fueling people with hopes, allowing people to say, hey, let's actually maybe pay my salary next month. This is good. Give me a sense of what you saw

Carter 57:42

saw there. Jeremy, come back. The check won't bounce. Let me take the contrary argument to Corey and let me articulate it this way.

Zain 57:53

Nailed it. Thank you, Carter.

Zain 57:55

Thank you. I appreciate that. What do we want to do, gents? I'm watching a commercial where Peter Mansbridge is at a press conference answering questions from other Peter Mansbridges.

Carter 58:05

I'm not even joking. You really are living the life.

Zain 58:07

One of the Mansbridges, it's about a chip reverse mortgage, actually. I'm not even joking. That is what's going on right now. Okay. Well, it's nice that Peter's still got that. With two minutes left and Lamar with the ball. Okay. Do we want to talk about the green line or are we going to

Corey 58:20

to save that until Sunday? No, we got to talk about the green line. Okay, let's

Zain 58:23

let's get into it. Let's fuck the over, under, and lightning round. John Carter, we don't do it for you. Let's just jump into the Green Line conversation.

Zain 58:32

Does the province have an upper hand here? Do they have a strategic play that you see that is actually wise or smart? Or is this screwing over business, screwing over voters, and all for petty politics? Or do you actually see, oh, man, I think they're doing something here, and we should recognize it? Give me your honest take.

Carter 58:52

You want my honest take? Corey probably jumped in with yes. Yes, absolutely not. I mean, they have the upper hand. They have all the power. They've got the money. They can do anything. They could build the whole green line just on last year's surplus. You know, like this isn't a big deal for them. They have the ability to do all of this. But, you

Carter 59:11

you know, is this the right play for them? Is it wise? We're talking pure

Carter 59:16

pure politics and strategy.

Carter 59:18

Is it wise to remove something that people want? want and people wanted it in the 75th to 80th percentile depending on how you calculated the numbers in fact some polls are saying something like 93 percent of calgarians wanted this now i argue with the methodology of that but nonetheless this was a very popular project and now they're pulling it away and it's not a victory for them it is a it is a failure because they're They're going to wear the

Carter 59:48

the well, if there was competent communications from the city of Calgary, they would wear the removal of the of this project. But, of course, they're relying on the lack of competent communications from the city. So it's worked out pretty well for the province so far. Yeah,

Zain 1:00:06

Yeah, I'll jump in on that last point. I myself was surprised to see many of the headlines kind of say, like, city of Calgary or mayor confirms Green Line is dead. had you know and if you're a headline reader or like a peruser of like the news even if you're an engaged person you'd be like oh did the city just back out of the green light i don't know what happened oh that's interesting i heard it was like it wasn't necessarily clear in that regard cory

Carter 1:00:26

cory was the worst communications ever since we last since we're still in the middle of another fucking water crisis god terrible communications what's

Carter 1:00:34

what's the strategic play you see something here you

Zain 1:00:37

you see what they're doing and you think it's you think it's wise answer me both of those questions Yes,

Corey 1:00:40

Yes, I do. And I do think it's wise. It's actually something we proposed to them a couple of months ago, which is, you

Corey 1:00:48

you don't need to kill the green line. You just take the project over, you dust it off, you change three things, say we fixed Nahed Nenshi's mistake, and it's now our green line. And it's like getting a hot dog off the ground and rinsing it under a hose, you know? They'll fucking figure it out. And there's actually enough things that I think reasonable people will entertain.

Corey 1:01:09

Maybe this wasn't actually going so good, right? The cost overruns were very significant. We were talking over $6 billion. The actual amount of track we were getting, the number of stations, had declined significantly. Compromises had already been made that were pretty

Corey 1:01:24

pretty real. And, you know, when you get right down to it, we were spending, man,

Corey 1:01:29

man, I don't know, what were you spending? Almost three times as much per kilometer than Edmonton, which has like the River Valley and also has underground components. And it's apples to oranges. And a lot of their surface stuff is brutal and just crosses streets away. We would never have done it here in Calgary. but you can look at it and say yeah

Corey 1:01:47

yeah maybe this project wasn't going that well right and there are a couple of things that the that the uh you know government of alberta did that makes me think that's exactly what they're i mean they basically said as much we're going to get another review we're going to get some people pulled in and we're going to do it i

Corey 1:02:02

i think it would be a tragic mistake to make it through the surface downtown but they also had elevated as a potential opportunity like like this is 2024 the next election is not until 2027 in alberta yeah they have a ton of time to do their review get shovels in the ground on a project where they can say we saved you billions like they'll be able to find that number right doesn't matter if it gets blown out the door on the back end because you got to think about the timeline for building these things and then they get to declare victory and danielle smith gets a really nice thing in the debate where if this even comes up she says your project sucked it was going to cost over six billion dollars we took it over it's four billion we can't afford to be spending 50 percent more on everything like we would if you were the premier of this province and by the way did you know that property taxes in alberta went up 87 percent under this man do you want him running the province like it's it's fucking it all plays into the story they're trying to tell about the guy so i think there is actually a pretty savvy play here carter

Carter 1:03:03

i still think that you're taking away something from the citizens. And if you're up against a competent opposition, then you'd really be struggling.

Carter 1:03:10

I do think that they are able to take advantage of an incompetent opposition. And because of that, they're doing fairly well. The best opposition is coming from the nonprofit sector and places like LRT on the green that are putting forward really well-reasoned and well-rational arguments. Whereas the city of Calgary continues to, you know,

Carter 1:03:34

know, shoot themselves in the foot. By

Corey 1:03:37

way, I want to be really clear.

Corey 1:03:38

Not Nahed Nenshi's fault, quote-unquote fault. I'm not even sure that there's fault. Like, it's just things have gotten more expensive. The project is

Carter 1:03:45

is not the same. Everywhere has gotten more expensive.

Corey 1:03:47

You know, the price per kilometer can't be compared between cities and projects like that. I'm saying pretty compelling communications track.

Zain 1:03:55

Right. Do you feel like this is a scenario where if Nenshi tries to explain the delays under kenny under under uh smith under conservative governments brings the receipts that explaining is losing ultimately and that doesn't matter it's kenny on the first

Carter 1:04:09

first rule of politics explaining is losing so

Zain 1:04:12

so then so tell me carter what's the what's the winning track for for nancy on this is this is this the is the green line actually

Zain 1:04:19

actually an issue if you were advising him that you'd want him to play on yes or no i'd

Carter 1:04:23

i'd play on it in

Carter 1:04:25

in the immediate right now if if if if i were the premier this thing would be done

Carter 1:04:30

if i were the premier this thing would be done period end of sentence don't try and explain it away just simply say if i was the premier this this would be done don't tell me why don't tell me how don't tell me any of those types of uh nenshi isms instead just simply tell me that it would be done that's

Carter 1:04:47

that's all i'm really looking for if i'm a calgarian and i wouldn't have done a stupid arena deal that costs a billion dollars um i would have just done uh you know an lrt that actually serves the constituents although i will tell you the arena deal is polling very positively as well cory

Zain 1:05:05

cory what do you think what's what's the play for for the nenshi ndp here i

Corey 1:05:11

mean i i agree you've got to attack it what he needs to be careful he doesn't do though is try to defend his tenures and like he's losing if he's sitting there saying i made the right decisions as mayor right right if the argument is did you make good decisions that's the trap that's

Corey 1:05:25

that's absolutely the trap right and so steven's right you can't you can't even go there right it's like you got to be a little more dismissive you you've got to actually avoid in my opinion the politics and long sentences on there don't fucking try to explain it just say i

Corey 1:05:39

mean that's nonsense i haven't been mayor for years uh this government dragged its feet so long we

Corey 1:05:45

would just get it done this is just we would have built this is silly games by the people who brought you turkish style and all nobody believes they're going to make this thing cheaper or better carter

Zain 1:05:55

to me about where

Zain 1:05:57

where this project goes and like what this like not just where this project goes and i'm not asking you to be prescient like because there's people out there already speculating on like you know i'm not saying cory what you said was speculation i asked you for a strategic take and you said you know dust off coming with their own version that's interesting other people are saying oh the city will find the money uh others are saying finding the money right right i'm

Zain 1:06:18

i'm just I'm giving you some of the—others are saying, to your point, this is dead. There's actually no UCP version of this thing. This thing is dead, and they want it dead, and there's no 2.0. Others are saying, ah, Trudeau swoops in.

Carter 1:06:33

There's no Trudeau swooping. I'm

Zain 1:06:34

I'm just giving you a few of the—I'm not even talking to you about the viability of any of the options or even the possibility.

Corey 1:06:41

Where does this go? Where does it

Zain 1:06:43

it go? Where does it go and where should it go for the UCP to be most successful with the strategy you think they are playing? Because I think that also matters here.

Carter 1:06:53

Where it goes is where we have seen for quite some time. If this is not popular with a small subsection of Danielle Smith's audience, then she goes against it. And that small subsection is the group of people that are going to wind up voting in November to see whether or not she remains the leader. so the you know providing a couple billion dollars for the city of calgary for infrastructure simply wasn't tenable so they ended that then in a

Carter 1:07:23

a couple of months i think cory's scenario is probably bang on we will have something vaguely resembling a green line it's just not going to be it i mean we're supposed to have underground subway you know lrt service uh on the red and the and the blue lines we don't because we got cheap at the last minute in uh in the 1980s in the 1990s in the 2000s and instead we we created a blight of a downtown now we're going to do the exact same thing again except the blight isn't going to be 7th avenue it's going to be third street well i

Carter 1:07:58

mean what are you going to do these people we will have a green line it just isn't going to be a green line that anybody would have wanted to have. And it's going to happen

Carter 1:08:09

probably five years longer than the plan that we had in hand.

Zain 1:08:13

Corey, where does this end up? Give me that. And then give me a, where should this end up if the UCP are finishing the play on their strategy?

Corey 1:08:22

know- And we're speculating

Zain 1:08:22

speculating on what their strategy is, to be clear. Of course. Yeah.

Corey 1:08:25

Yeah. So in the 1980s, when Calgary built LRT and Edmonton built LRT, going from memory but i think for the same amount of money calgary got three

Corey 1:08:33

three times the amount of kilometers than edmonton by going above grade instead of below grade right and that was a strategic decision made at the time which you

Corey 1:08:42

you know at the time i i think i actually worked out pretty well like yes at seventh avenue in downtown calgary for those who don't know calgary is is a wasteland right it's a it's a transit street and you get all sorts of down yeah you get all all sorts of weird dodgy stuff going on as a result there and it's by the way totally at capacity so if they're intending to share lanes for a bit our

Corey 1:09:03

our cars can only be so long because they've got to fit within a city block during rush hour there's only so many that can go through because there's throughput challenges because it's fighting with traffic all of the time too right um

Corey 1:09:14

um but there are a lot of people who see that as as kind of the pragmatic solution that worked in the 1980s that's going to work in the 2020s if i'm being frank and like we know them they're the they're the old like uh you know stampede mafia the boosters who say oh this is how we did it before we just need common sense back to it calgary

Corey 1:09:33

calgary of 1985 is not calgary of 2024 and

Corey 1:09:37

and i think the tragedy here is we're going to end up with something that's built for a city that's a third of the size and it's not going to work and unfortunately we're going to have to deal with it and probably pick up the pieces of it for many years to come and i bet you at the end of the day end up paying more because we're going to have to rebuild what we needed to build in the first place and that sucks but i do believe we will ultimately end up with mass transit that is going to address some of this in particular probably bringing back the north line i think that's the obvious win for the provincial government because

Corey 1:10:08

because they have made signals about the ridership and they get massive ridership numbers if they go north so so we'll get something and maybe Maybe that's

Corey 1:10:17

that's what victory looks like in Alberta. It doesn't 100% suck.

Zain 1:10:24

Corey, can I just tell you something that's going on right now?

Zain 1:10:28

I think Lamar Jackson literally just threw a touchdown to tie the game with zero seconds on the clock. That's

Corey 1:10:34

That's really exciting. It's fucking

Corey 1:10:36

So whatever you said, great.

Zain 1:10:39

Carter, let's not make this a bash to city

Zain 1:10:44

Why? But what does a effective fight look like when you don't have the levers? That's what I'm curious about here, right? Like, you are subservient to the province's money. They guaranteed it at 100% 34 days ago. They no longer are because they're picking a fight. They're doing a thing. Ooh, it may not be in. However, Carter, what

Zain 1:11:05

what does an effective campaign on their part need to look like right now?

Carter 1:11:09

You broke it. You bought it.

Carter 1:11:11

do think that this is the best way for them to get the project you broke it

Carter 1:11:16

you broke it you bought it we're not going to work on this anymore we're handing it over to the province because they're the ones who broke this we were nearing a contract we put in a billion dollars worth of work it's

Carter 1:11:27

it's now their responsibility to fix it and make sure that this actually gets done they broke it they bought it that's the actual strategy cory

Zain 1:11:37

cory what do you think of that

Corey 1:11:39

i think it is i think it is the only short-term strategy that's likely to have any kind of effect um i do think long term they do that and they're probably never going to like lrt is just going to be provincialized like it's all going to go up to that order of government which is not terrible not a

Carter 1:11:56

a bad idea actually it's actually how it

Corey 1:11:58

it works in most other provinces that have have these kinds of projects because they are the order of government that can actually afford to to pay for those things. But considered

Corey 1:12:06

considered in the context of Bill 18 and all of these other assaults on city power, I do think they need to be mindful and just say, okay, we're not going to do this anymore, which I actually, again, not terrible idea, but

Corey 1:12:18

but what do they want cities to do? And they better figure out what actually matters to them, carve that out and hold onto it if they're going to start doing things like you broke it, you buy it.

Zain 1:12:27

Corey, the touchdown was overturned. Let's talk about this. Let's talk about the NDP strategy here. here. The Nenshi message today that got clipped and put out was about investor confidence, was about no one's going to want to invest here in Alberta anymore. There's a premium that's going to be applied to Alberta projects for political uncertainty, that this really shatters investor confidence. There's proof points available to that. Construction Association or Alliance today kind of coming out, others kind of talking through that. What do you think of that message track? I'm not saying it's a singular one, to be fair to them, but it is one that was highlighted today. I am curious to hear what you think of that track being applied today and going forward.

Corey 1:13:07

mean, I think that the argument that the provincial government is affecting investor confidence has a lot of proof points. I think this might be the weakest of them, frankly.

Corey 1:13:17

The cost overruns are significant. It's not as though the government didn't agree to fund it at the level that they originally agreed to fund it. And the

Corey 1:13:27

the provincial government rejoinder can can just be investor

Corey 1:13:31

investor confidence is not a suicide pact we agreed to fund it at a certain level it was going to be 50 more with 40 less ridership or not 50 more you know i'm i'm i'm kind of expanding to the start of the project and yeah no we're out like we're you know there's also a thing that investors understand called sunk cost and we're done we're going to go back and we're going to try to get this done and we're going to try to clean up your mess now head but we can't proceed with the shoddy planning that you provided us with we'll try to salvage this we will try to salvage the things you are worried about this

Corey 1:14:02

this is not about investor confidence investors appreciate a government that understands the value of a dollar and is willing to hold the line you

Zain 1:14:09

you think that's going to be the response carter what do you think you were shaking your head when i when i was kind of paraphrasing that that current message track dude

Carter 1:14:15

dude how does it impact me right

Carter 1:14:18

investor confidence was lost in the city of calgary well i don't have any confidence in the city of calgary agree either how

Carter 1:14:24

how does it impact me what

Zain 1:14:26

you what would what would your humanistic or like more sort of focused message be if you're the official opposition here this

Carter 1:14:32

this is a we need this to uh

Carter 1:14:35

uh alleviate the pressures on on uh on

Carter 1:14:38

on deerfoot trail we need it going north we need it going south this is the only way that we're going to ensure the lowest price is to start today we've put a billion billion and a half dollars into this thing to make sure that it's actually viable. Let's get going. The lowest price is yesterday. The next lowest price is today. Let's get it started.

Zain 1:14:59

Corey, if you're the official opposition here, how do you politically kill the

Zain 1:15:04

the fact that if the UCP were to come back with their salvaged version of it, that it is not amenable,

Zain 1:15:10

amenable, that it is not successful, that it doesn't get the traction that Carter was mentioning of 80% popularity here? Not to say that that's your job, but that's kind of your job, right? That even if they're coming back with their own proposal, you know, that you're making sure that, you know, there is something to be said about this one being dead and that the government, you never let people forget that they killed this version of it.

Corey 1:15:33

mean, people will forget the minute there's shovels in the ground and real work happening. And the timeline is 2027. So look, I'm not saying you can't do anything because things change, right? They'll look at the situation at the moment and say, well, how can we gain advantage at this particular moment?

Corey 1:15:50

But the reality is you're not going to be able to pull that investor confidence line into that election. I mean, you will probably on eight other things, but that's not even going to be one that's there, right? If I'm the NDP, I'm thinking about it on different lines, right? I'm thinking about it in terms of Calgary

Corey 1:16:06

Calgary got something taken from it, because Calgarians can be small as fuck. And I say that as a proud Calgarian who's lived here, you know, basically my whole life, love this town. But the idea that we're going to get that money taken from us. Meanwhile, money is being spent on LRT projects in Edmonton. What the fuck are you talking about? Edmonton's going to have a larger LRT system than Calgary soon? What the fuck are you talking about? This is unfair. This is unright. Let's just get moving here. This is bullshit. And, you know, you're playing these silly political games instead of building the things that Calgary is owed as the major economic engine of this province.

Zain 1:16:45

Carter, final thoughts here as we wrap up. I'm sure there's a lot more to discuss as this thing involves here, but final strategic thought here as we wrap up.

Carter 1:16:54

34 days passed between when Devin Dreeschen said, don't worry, you can take this to the bank. It's 100% guaranteed.

Zain 1:17:01

That's the minister for folks not initiated.

Carter 1:17:05

fuck you, you don't get anything. What

Carter 1:17:07

What happened in those 34 days?

Carter 1:17:09

That's what I'd really like. They

Corey 1:17:10

They got an update on August 14th from the city. so

Carter 1:17:13

actually had that they had that of course they

Corey 1:17:16

they did steven of

Carter 1:17:16

of course they did but

Corey 1:17:18

if you're asking like

Corey 1:17:20

from a comms perspective they

Corey 1:17:22

they got an update dated august 14th well

Corey 1:17:25

well that update wasn't very good that's the end is

Carter 1:17:27

the exact update that they were signed off on fuck

Zain 1:17:30

fuck it let's let's do it over under in our lightning round steven carter um let's jump into it how

Carter 1:17:35

how long do we want to make the episodes now let's just make this five minutes i've

Zain 1:17:38

i've actually actually want to just like clarify a lot of things we've talked about about winners and losers here Okay.

Zain 1:17:43

Biggest winner from Jagmeet

Zain 1:17:45

Jagmeet Singh tearing up the confidence

Zain 1:17:47

confidence and supply agreement. Biggest winner?

Corey 1:17:55

Corey, do you agree? I agree. It's Pierre Polyev.

Corey 1:18:01

think the biggest loser is the

Corey 1:18:04

the Saskatchewan NDP, because that's the marginal provincial one. And now everyone's going to go work on the federal campaign when... Oh,

Zain 1:18:11

Oh, interesting. So I'll get into the election speculation and election timing question in a second. Corey, Justin Trudeau, net

Zain 1:18:19

net gain or net loss for him based

Zain 1:18:23

on Jagmeet Singh's actions to tear up disagreement? Is this net good,

Zain 1:18:27

good, net bad for him?

Corey 1:18:30

it's not bad um you you want time to try to reverse your slide against pierre polliev i'm not sure you were ever going to do anything with that time so maybe this is one of those things that's got a bit of a silver lining in it it will be what it will be and you can move forward and hey maybe you can move on uh afterwards but you

Corey 1:18:51

you could spin yourself into saying hey there's some opportunities here yeah

Zain 1:18:55

yeah we've divorced from him we don't have to do his agenda we can be who we you want to be i'm just throwing around yeah exactly right to your earlier point about pushing an election perhaps or even pushing him around as you just said carter trudeau net

Zain 1:19:07

net good net bad what jagmeet singh did to to the agreement how

Carter 1:19:11

how do you look at he's just

Carter 1:19:12

lost some control on when the election is going to be called and it happened during the by-election too uh which is going to you know put additional focus on the opposition parties at a time that you really don't want that that to happen so i'd say not bad carter

Zain 1:19:28

carter from the green line perspective the province pulling the funding who's

Zain 1:19:31

who's the biggest loser city

Zain 1:19:33

city from the political players i don't want the answer to be citizens or calgarians that you know that's

Zain 1:19:38

a different show um that's softer and not as good as ours um nenshi

Zain 1:19:43

nenshi and the ndp this gondek in the city um

Zain 1:19:47

um mayoral candidates who are running or is Is this a UCP fuck themselves, biggest loser from the UCP pulling the – oh,

Zain 1:19:56

oh, killing the current version of the Green Line. Let's put it that way.

Carter 1:20:00

It should be the UCP. It will be the Gondek mayor and council because they're fumbling the ball on the communication side.

Zain 1:20:12

Corey, who do you think? Biggest loser here, at

Zain 1:20:15

at least from like the preliminary days of what we can see. Yeah,

Corey 1:20:17

Yeah, I mean, I think it could easily end up being the UCP if the NDP stick to a tight message track and don't allow themselves to get distracted and defend the past and get on tangents, I suppose. But I do believe right now it's the NDP. I think the UCP has been pretty tight on their messaging.

Corey 1:20:37

I at least feel there's a pretty clear path for them to reduce

Corey 1:20:41

reduce the cost, blame those costs on NAHED, have a situation where NAHED

Corey 1:20:45

NAHED has spent a month or two defending the project that the UCP says, oh, you thought it was so great? We just saved a billion dollars or something to that effect. So that would be the risk. And I think that's the most likely outcome.

Corey 1:20:57

cory the final thought here has

Zain 1:20:59

has to be um do

Zain 1:21:01

do we see the center street dairy queen and now uh seeing a second life now that the green line has been killed officially by the province

Corey 1:21:13

it's the most important question you've asked all episode yeah for sure zane so which

Corey 1:21:18

which is why i ask it in

Zain 1:21:18

in such a somber and important tone yeah

Corey 1:21:20

yeah an update for those of you who have been waiting for a few years for an update on the Center Street Dairy Queen is they

Corey 1:21:25

they did ultimately decide not to proceed with the rebuild. It has been an empty lot just north of the, it's called the Beacon Hill Safeway, interestingly. It's not in Beacon Hill, but that's- Not even close to being in Beacon Hill, no. Not even close. Not even close.

Corey 1:21:40

It's just sitting there, mocking us, mocking us good citizens of Che. I

Zain 1:21:44

use it as a grave site, actually. I don't know if you guys do this as well, but I take some incense and some flowers. I

Corey 1:21:49

I put a single rose there every time I walk by. So

Corey 1:21:51

So it's you. Okay, that makes sense. Yeah, that's me. Those are the other flowers that you see. Okay, good. But this gives me hope. This, you know, I haven't felt hope in a long time, but today I feel hope that there might be a Dairy Queen again in my neighborhood.

Carter 1:22:04

Is that why my insides are all messed up today is because I'm actually feeling something called hope?

Corey 1:22:11

Yeah, you might be able to get those dilly bars again, man.

Zain 1:22:17

We're going to leave it there. That's a wrap on episode 1822 of The Strategist. My name is Zane Veldt, you're with me as always, Corey Hogan, Stephen Carter, and we'll see you next time.

Transcript