Transcript
Zain
0:03
This is The Strategist, episode 934. My name is Zain Velji. With me, as always, Corey Hogan, Stephen Carter. Guys, what's going on?
Corey
0:10
We're not going to talk about Amos. We're going to go straight to the headlines. Straight to the headlines,
Zain
0:13
headlines, Zain. Let's go. We can't let this guy distract us. We can't let him win. This is take four.
Corey
0:18
This is take four, audience.
Zain
0:20
audience. We can't let him win. This is a one-take podcast. We're going to do it. Stephen Carter, the headlines. lines bbc the cdc is encouraging americans not to kiss chickens amid the outbreak the u.s center for disease control has urged people to refrain from kissing live poultry amid an outbreak of salmonella don't kiss or snuggle the birds the health agency said stephen carter this sounds un-american to me does it sound un-american to you listen feel free to answer with yes no
Carter
0:45
no kissing chickens is bad all of my jokes failed i'm not even going to try anymore so kissing chickens bad mad i agree with the cdc if
Zain
0:53
if this has to be our fourth episode it has to be your fourth episode too and we are just gonna sand it down cory
Zain
1:05
are not talking about it we're not talking about okay we're not gonna talk about it we're not gonna talk about it talk
Zain
1:12
about the fucking chickens that's it that's all you get to talk about i
Corey
1:16
just think they're a bunch of prudes you know what it's It's, don't tell me what I can and can't do with my dinner.
Zain
1:31
Pull it back together, Zane. Pull it back together. Our next headline comes to us from Global News. Boris Johnson considered being injected with COVID-19 on live TV, says his ex-advisor. In a blistering attack on the British state, Dominic Cummings told lawmakers that the government was completely unprepared for the worst public health crisis in decades and that ministers, including the prime minister, were on holidays in February 2020. Such was the skepticism of Prime Minister Johnson about COVID-19. He told health officials that he was being considered getting the COVID-19, getting COVID-19 injected into him by the government's chief medical advisor. Corey, would this have been the best British reality television show since Weakest slink there's
Corey
2:15
there's so many crazy stories coming out about johnson about how he missed cabinet
Zain
2:20
from cummings but others too like yeah
Corey
2:22
cabinet meetings to uh to work on a book because he needed the money to pay for his divorce like uh we've kind of reached peak clown with this guy but uh i still think there's more to come and i just love dominic cummings there's something about him that uh that reminds me of a another angry bald strategist i know just can't say steven
Zain
2:42
steven Stephen Carter, are you conflicted out of this one?
Carter
2:44
No, I'm not conflicted.
Carter
2:48
There's no truth that I am Dominic Cummings.
Zain
2:52
what... What's your best British accent? Can you just do your best British...
Carter
2:56
British... Go ahead. No, it very, very quickly becomes racist. We can't do it. How does it become racist? Every accent I've ever done immediately becomes East Indian. I don't know how it happens, but it just migrates. Here's the thing, okay?
Carter
3:11
okay? Here's the thing. You elect a stupid person, you get a stupid government. And I just want
Corey
3:17
want to hear this accent. No,
Carter
3:18
No, I'm not doing the accent. Okay,
Corey
3:20
Okay, just do an
Carter
3:20
an East Indian accent,
Carter
3:22
No, because it's highly inappropriate. Don't
Corey
3:25
Don't do that. No,
Carter
3:26
No, it would be British if you tried
Carter
3:28
I was in a play, and I tried to do a Scottish accent.
Carter
3:31
And I turned it into an East Indian accent by Act 3. And it's just not something that we can do. So we have to move right past it. We have to move right past it.
Zain
3:43
headline zane at some point we're gonna need to hear it our next headline comes to us from cnn in new film kevin spacey plays detective probing artist who is wrongly accused of being a pedophile that is right kevin
Zain
3:58
kevin spacey is doing movies again um many are speculating and wondering if he's doing this film just so if anyone googles kevin spacey pedophile this is the movie that will come up rather than the uh organic searches that have been uh embedded on said internet cory carter you want to jump on anything uh
Carter
4:16
do i want to jump on anything i think that typecasting is alive and well in hollywood as usual no oh he's not the pedophile no okay i'm sorry um he's really making this stretch then that's good for kevin
Zain
4:29
i'm not even going to you cory i don't think you can stop it uh our next headline comes to us from the cbc the good old cbc quebec needs its own emoji as soon as possible say legislators in unanimous vote that's right quebec's legislator continued this past wednesday in its quest for more widespread recognition of the province's nationhood passing a unanimous motion calling calling for an emoji of the Quebec flag. Quote, Quebec has the same right as several other nations around the world, the right to be proud and display that pride on social media. The wording of the non-binding motion invokes the importance of having a, quote, distinct visual identity on the Internet. Stephen Carter, Quebec is making moves. They're making them quick, and they're now entering the emoji wars. Does Quebec deserve its own emoji, and does it need to be the Quebec flag? Two questions.
Carter
5:21
Well, I was going to make a joke about Quebec deserving a French eggplant, but I don't think that that's appropriate when we're talking about the actual flags, so I don't think I'm going to make that joke. No, I'm glad you didn't.
Carter
5:32
It would have killed.
Zain
5:33
No, I'm glad you've explained
Zain
5:36
that away and didn't go down
Carter
5:37
I mean, Premier Kenney is really looking forward to the opportunity to say that he also would like a unique flag and be very proud of the fact that Quebec is fighting for one. So it's perfect. Perfect. It gives Premier Kenney a really good opportunity to get some headlines.
Zain
5:52
Corey, the Quebec emoji, the need for a Quebec emoji as soon as possible, the urgent need, is it a valid one?
Corey
6:01
I think that there are probably more pressing matters in the world, but it's not as though there's not precedent for this. I think to the point, Scotland's got an emoji. I think England's got an emoji. United Kingdom has an emoji. So if they can be part of a United Kingdom, perhaps the Quebec emoji can be part of a United Canada.
Corey
6:18
I just don't I don't I don't know why anybody is too worried about that. And I think there is like a fleur-de-lis emoji, isn't there? Am
Corey
6:24
Am I wrong on that? I don't know. I'm
Carter
6:26
I'm not really that versed in the tens of thousands of emojis. But they're
Corey
6:31
they're chasing yesterday's trend. There is a Flirtily emoji.
Corey
6:35
I've looked this up. But they're chasing yesterday's trends because everybody knows it's assy art that they should be making their flag in. Or just kind of like weird memes with Slenderman. Look where Gen Z is. Get there. Don't chase emojis. Yeah, come on. That's millennial thinking. Yeah,
Zain
6:50
Yeah, no, I agree. I agree. They should create an NFT emoji that only they can use amongst their distinct population. Have we talked
Corey
6:56
talked about the fact that we're going to sell The Strategist as an NFT to
Corey
7:01
haven't. No, but go ahead, Corey. You've just introduced it here. No, we're going to sell The Strategist as an NFT to the highest bidder.
Carter
7:07
This is actually how we're going to fund... What you just said
Carter
7:10
Isn't that how we decided we were going to fund Zane's campaign?
Corey
7:15
think so, yeah. Yeah,
Carter
7:16
Yeah, because I'm not taking any of my own money to fund it. I just think that we should, if we sell the NFT, we can guarantee that 100% of the funds will go into Zayn's leadership. I
Corey
7:27
I mean, I hesitate because of the election laws that may be in play here. Do you think they're
Zain
7:31
they're updated to account for NFTs and cryptocurrency? I don't think they
Corey
7:34
they are. I actually don't. I was thinking about this the other day. What if you just like, you know, were begging for Bitcoin and Ethereum there?
Zain
7:44
will do it at some point. Yeah,
Corey
7:46
Yeah, the Zayn Belji
Zain
7:47
Some campaign is going to be really interested to see where that campaign goes. OK, let's move it on to our next headline. Our next headline comes to us from the CBC. I want to spend some time on this because we're getting serious, Corey. OK, we're getting serious. We're going to we're going to put our strategy caps back on. OK, we're going to put them back on, Stephen. Dozens of MPs stand to lose access to pensions if they're defeated in an early election. I want to talk about this a bit more. The almost a selfish side of politics, kind of what we don't talk about. But here's some substantiation. Dozens of members of parliament could lose access to generous MP pension plans if they lose their seats in an early election because they would not have the required six years of service. Speculation is running hot in Ottawa about the exact date of the next general election call. For 142 MPs, a few weeks either way could decide whether they retire with tens of thousands of dollars in pension benefits or not. Nobody talks about it, but everyone thinks about it. And I think it's one of those things that we should discuss. I shouldn't even look up. I think there's quite a significant number of cabinet ministers. Don't quote me on this number. I think it might be in the order of 20 cabinet ministers might be also kind of in play for these specific pensions. I feel like this is a topic we should discuss, both from the side of politics in terms of how much something like this could influence an election call, what conversations in caucus around these could look like. Are they honest? Do people talk about this stuff, honestly. Carter, maybe I want to go to you first. When you
Zain
9:17
you read this story, do you feel like something like this is a useful input for those that are prognosticating about a future election date in terms of when it might be called, considering how many people in the current liberal government it might impact?
Carter
9:33
Yeah, I mean, it's a big deal for a lot of people because this is their retirement, right? When you work for an MP and they only get one term, They don't get the pension. It's a significant loss for them as a person. And to lose out after winning the second election, to lose out by a period of weeks, that
Carter
9:55
that would be very upsetting for MPs. Now, the good news there is that the prime minister wouldn't have to worry about those individual MPs. They're out of his caucus. They don't exist anymore. So it's a problem for the individuals. I'm not sure it's a problem for the party, and I'm not sure it's a problem for the prime minister, but I'm sure that people would be keenly
Carter
10:15
keenly aware of it. I mean, this is
Carter
10:19
is an important financial benefit of being a member of parliament, and for jurisdictions that have done away with pensions, it does
Carter
10:27
does have a significant impact for people who run for office. us. So I would imagine that MPs, especially for a couple weeks, and I'm not sure, is it targeted based on the election day or is it targeted based on the dissolution of parliament for the election? Because it's October the 15th. And either way, if they do a fall election, I don't think that it's going to come after the 15th of October, given the Quebec municipal elections are in early November.
Zain
10:54
Yeah. So a couple of things to add there, Carter. There's more than 90 liberal MPs, including 23 cabinet ministers or ministers that could lose access to the pension by an early election call. And then for the 142 MPs elected for their first time on October 19, 2015, defeat in an election taking place before October 19, 2021 would deprive them of that access to the MP pension, which at minimum, they could lose a retirement allowance of just over $32,000 a year, starting at age 65. So that kind of lays out some of the facts. Corey, how useful of an input is is this for prognosticators and tea-leave readers to look at in terms of when this election might be called? Do you feel like, maybe not the PMO, but a caucus, like this is something that could be vocalized in caucus by a large swath of your MPs to be like, hey, this is my livelihood you're talking about here when you think about an election? Or do you think that's too selfish to kind of bring up in that broader context?
Corey
11:50
Well, I don't know. I mean, I think that's certainly something that they would be talking about. Obviously, we've got a CBC story that suggests that people are aware of this point. It's not as though they're not aware of that. Anybody who's got a pension can probably quote
Corey
12:02
quote the day that they're allowed to retire and get their full pension benefits. The thing is, though, I think it would be really tough for anybody to stand up and say, whoa, whoa, whoa, what are you doing? We can't go to the polls. I've got a pension to worry about because it's kind of suggests you think you're going to be defeated. So there's kind kind of like this social pressure beyond, you know, it would be very weird for a governing party with a spring in its step. In a funny way, this is a problem that isn't, at least writ large, because if you are a governing party and you're thinking of pulling the trigger on yourself and going to the polls, you obviously think you're in a position to gain seats, right? And if you think you're going to gain seats, then you've probably not got too, too much to worry about in most cases. And it means that the anxiety will be somewhat limited to people who are in the most swingy of swing ridings and yes the liberals have an awful lot of people more than half their caucus 23 ministers who have not uh have not gotten to the point where they get the pension yet but that's because uh 2011 was a historically bad election for the liberals they only got 34 seats and unless you were returned from an earlier time in the 2015 election this is anybody in the class of 2015 now who's looking down those pension barrel where i think it's probably most interesting zane is not in the inter party or intra party dynamics but the inter party dynamics because if you are uh members of the ndp elected in that class in 2015 if you're the bloc quebecois this is just yet another reason to pull this thing forward a bit uh to allow to allow um you know to allow that uh that pension money to vest obviously almost by definition anybody who thinks they're in a position to lose seats is going to be more worried about that than somebody in the position to win seats of course but you know as much as we talk about half the caucus 23 ministers even
Corey
13:47
even if the liberals lose it's not like they're all gonna lose yeah
Zain
13:51
yeah sure i mean it would be quite
Corey
13:52
quite a shocking election i shouldn't say it won't happen obviously in 2011 we saw results like that but it would be quite a shocking election based on where we are right now carter
Zain
14:00
carter you're on the election readiness committee for the liberals you're getting geared up Is this 5
Zain
14:06
5% of your calculation? 10%? 0% of your calculation? Or is all that matters is what Corey said, when's the best time for us as a collective? Who cares about the specific individuals, per se? How are you kind of thinking about this, knowing that you've been in that position to kind of balance, right, like the caucus and their needs and sometimes very selfish individual needs with the larger electoral outcome as well? And Corey, I want to come to you thereafter as well. Well,
Carter
14:33
Well, what you say is, you know, this is the decision that's going to make sure that most people are able to stick in caucus longer, right? This is the decision that gives us the best possible chance to remain in government. You remember that we lost a number of people only two years ago because we weren't able to call it at a time when it was most advantageous for us. So we're calling it now when it is most advantageous. And, you
Carter
14:56
you know, I hope that we we don't lose anybody. And we won't lose anybody if everybody works really hard.
Carter
15:02
So that's probably the messaging that I would take forward to the caucus. We're going to work really hard to make sure that we protect every seat, and we pick up those that we need. And if you lose a couple,
Carter
15:14
worse things happen to better people.
Corey
15:20
elected officials, I guess I'll say, are kind of known for risk seeking behavior, Because that's almost a prerequisite of the job. If you want to be an elected official, you've got to put yourself out there. And they do tend to be subject to the optimism bias that we all are, but more so, right? right? Politicians are just like us, but more so. And as a result, I think it's probably one of those things that's as annoying anxiety. But when you talk about like, is this 5%? Is this 10%? I doubt it's any of those percents. Because to Stephen's point, if you lose, you're not in caucus, it's not going to be, you know, the biggest deal in the world. And frankly, from
Corey
15:55
from a leader standpoint, and a caucus management standpoint, and frankly, you're not going to get a ton of sympathy from the public, you had $185,000 a year job. Now, I believe we should pay pay our politicians well i believe they should
Corey
16:06
pensions because i think that compensating politicians is a good way to get better politicians we believe that in basically every other walk of life we we pay people more when it's a skill that's in demand and we get better quality candidates when we offer more money but
Corey
16:19
but um people don't like to hear that about their elected officials so if you go out there as an elected official and say well or a former elected official and say well i mean i kind of got screwed because the prime minister didn't think about the fact that i don't vest for two months who the fuck is gonna care for you and so um and so you know honestly though it becomes more of a more of a staticky noise the closer you get to that date just another reason i would go now ish like i i think it's just another reason i think a spring summer election makes more sense than the fall election because you just don't need that noise as you're getting ready and if it's this far out it's like well we didn't get there yeah
Zain
16:55
yeah right it was it wasn't even close it was it was not like we missed it by a couple of weeks it It was just like – Well,
Corey
17:00
Well, and if you game it so that it's like you get your six years plus a day or whatever it is, I guess seven, then that's something that you can be hit with, too, by the
Zain
17:13
the opposition. Of course, pretty hard, despite the fact that some folks on their side will also be in that same position. Oh, sure,
Zain
17:19
but like – Yeah. Yeah, but that doesn't matter. Right,
Zain
17:22
Right, right. You did it for yourself. You're the
Corey
17:23
got the most of these people.
Corey
17:24
You did it for them. Well, not the majority, but yeah.
Zain
17:26
Right, right. You're the government. Right, right. You did it for them. Carter, any final thoughts on this? You know, I know you've had the chance, the rare chance to caucus manage. I know you've had the chance to deal with MLAs, not MPs specifically, but MLAs and their individual demands and reconciling that. Any final capstone thoughts before we jump on to our next section? I'm
Carter
17:46
I'm just thinking of Arno Dirksen, who ran for us in 2012, who was implicated in the no meat committee thing. And he did the right thing. He
Carter
17:54
He paid back some 30,000 plus dollars because he was paid to serve on a committee. He paid it back to the government, and he lost. and uh you
Carter
18:08
those types of hits are something that happens in elections but frankly you can never let them weigh upon you you have to make the decision that you feel is in the best interest of your retaining government so individuals may fall but the uh the party must survive thankless
Zain
18:27
thankless sport in many ways let's move it on to our next segment our first segment i should should say. One dose summer and one dose stampede. Guys, it is happening. One dose summer. The brand has a cousin. It has a cousin brand. Hashtag open for summer. Corey, we'll talk about the brand in a second. The Alberta government has unveiled its three-stage open for summer plan, a strategy tied directly to vaccination and hospitalization numbers that could see all public health restrictions lifted by. Drum roll, Stephen Carter, please.
Zain
18:58
July. Thank you, Stephen Carter. The province will enter stage one on June 1st, i.e. this Tuesday, and expect to be fully open by the beginning of July or earlier, as according to Premier Kenney, which is stage three, that optimistic stage three. Corey, this is a different strategy than other provinces. I can start that in a very basic way, for a few reasons. Number one, probably, and you guys can correct me if I'm wrong, the most aggressive lifting of all restrictions strategy that I have heard thus far in the country. country. Secondly, different from the sense that it's a bit of a hybrid model, I don't know if I can call it that, between having roughed out dates that things are going to happen, but still tethering to vaccinations and also adding hospitalizations into that mix. Corey, what was your overall sort of take when you saw this? You know, when you saw stage one, when you saw stage three, and then I think when you saw that more ambitious stage three, give me your initial, you know whoa this was my reaction and then we'll kind of take it from there and tease out what this could mean politically and maybe do a bit of compare and contrast and of course discuss the stampede question so i'll go to you first in terms of your your gut check first take from when you saw this rollout by the premier yeah
Corey
20:10
yeah and let me just preface this by saying that i i believe that and as i've said on this show that the day where things go back to quote-unquote normal or as close to normal as possible is closer than many people appreciate vaccines are are really changing the the game in a lot of jurisdictions although a little bit of a caveat on that came this week with some data from the united kingdom but my first reaction zane was oh like wow i mean that's that's a wild fucking swing because to your point this is this is much more aggressive in both a timeline sense and also a lifting of restriction sense than than other jurisdictions and i'll point to two differences in particular well
Corey
20:48
well let's let's say three one is that's just there's three And stage three
Corey
20:52
there's nothing left. That's fewer stages than we've seen in other jurisdictions. The other is the time between the stages is shorter. So whereas Ontario has three weeks, once you hit those vaccination targets, I believe, if
Corey
21:05
if I'm not mistaken, Alberta's gone for two, like really just the bare minimum to say, yeah, you're kind of vaccinated, go with God. And then the third one is it
Corey
21:16
it stepped away from that PHAC target of X percent one dose, X percent two dose, which is, I guess, where your title came from. Right.
Corey
21:24
And it's all about first doses. If we get to 70 percent of
Corey
21:28
of the 12 plus age group in first doses, that's it, baby. Alberta's back. It's reopened. And that's really wild because when you consider the fact that we're moving into stage one on Monday and stage two could happen two weeks after that and stage three two weeks after that, we're
Corey
21:47
we're talking about like five weeks, five weeks from announcement to Alberta being entirely reopened just two weeks after we hit the worst we've seen of COVID cases in the province of Alberta. So, I mean, if you get whiplash in this province, you're forgiven. And when you look at the contrast with other provinces, it's significant, right? It's not a small difference. And it
Corey
22:10
it all seems to be driven to get in front of festival season, specifically the Calgary Stampede, the greatest outdoor show on earth, you know, the million visitors that will go through the gates. That's – I think that's all weighing on Albertans as they process this plan and think about it. And I'll tell you, for
Corey
22:27
for me, and I've used this metaphor in a few different places, this feels like driving too fast down a winding mountain road.
Corey
22:33
You know, it sounds like fun, but it's definitely not the smartest idea. And while you'll probably get there okay, that doesn't mean that the risk was worth it. And that's how I feel right now. I actually think that – I suspect that in a month and change, Alberta will be relatively open and everything will be kind of okay. But it's not destiny.
Corey
22:54
And the fact that we're playing so fast and loose with this after just a brutal third wave, to me, is more than a little wild, both from a health standpoint, but from a politics standpoint, too.
Zain
23:04
Carter, I don't want to put my thumb on the scale from your perspective, though there has been a lot of talk by doctors around, you know, this is risky, you know, full vaccination is two doses. is, Corey, thank you for more explicitly teasing out that this is all based on one dose requirements. The PHAC requirement or the PHAC suggestion slash recommendation was a 75-20 split. This is explicitly on a 70% threshold combined with the hospitalization caseload to open up in phase three. But Carter, same question to you. When you first saw this stage one, stage two, stage three, what
Zain
23:38
what was going on in your mind when you digested this information? Well,
Carter
23:42
Well, let's start off by saying that I was really hoping that we would have very clear rules, right? We would say this is what's going to happen in stage one. We have that. It's pretty clear. Don't have a problem with stage one. Stage two, you know what? Pretty good. Outdoor social gatherings of up to 20 people with distancing. Indoor social gatherings not permitted. I think that's actually pretty good. I mean, outdoor social gatherings of up to 20 people, that feels pretty great. Great. Stage three, let's have a 70,000 person festival.
Carter
24:16
Right. We're missing a step. We're missing a step. And what we've done is we've inserted the old standby in Alberta. The standby is let's hope things don't get worse. And you'll recall that we wound up having the worst phase three or stage three because we had hope as our primary strategy. We would ask people to please behave responsibly. That's okay. I mean, we didn't, it didn't work. We didn't learn a fucking thing. So now what we're going to do is we're going to launch into the most permissive stage three in the country at
Carter
24:48
a time when we're going to not only have the most permissive stage three, we are literally going to have the largest event in the country. The largest event that anybody has staged in Canada in the last 18 months is going to happen in Calgary in July, come hell or high water. And I use the phrase hell or high skywater, you know, with emphasis because of the 2013 floods. This is a plan
Carter
25:10
plan that is designed to only succeed if things go exactly the way we hope that they do. And this is where I'm finding myself. I certainly I'm with Corey, I want to get back to normal. I want to I want to do things this summer. I want to travel this summer. I want to, you know, ride my bike in fun places. I don't want to be trapped in my house anymore. We have to get out of this situation. But I also don't want to get out of this situation or be told I'm out of this situation and have something bad happen again. And we're starting to see bad things happening in Great Britain. We're starting to see that people with a single dose of this vaccination are not more susceptible because they're not more susceptible. They're less protected against certain strains of the virus. This is a problem. And keep in mind that if we have 70 percent vaccination rates and we've got, say, 2,000 kids picking up trash on the Midway grounds over the course of the stampede, that's 600 children that aren't protected at all. That's
Carter
26:09
That's 600 kids picking up our trash that we're just hoping aren't getting exposed because that's that's what we're dealing with here. You got 75 kids on the Young Canadians all up on the stage. 25 of them don't don't have a vaccination. That's what we're talking about when we say 70% vaccination rates. So we're putting kids, we're putting people who have to do these jobs at real risk. And on top of that, there's this 70% province-wide vaccination rate and no acknowledgement that there are certain segments of the population that aren't vaccinated nearly as much as the higher income, more affluent areas of the city where people can sit on their computers for two and a half hours at a time and book. cook um one of those elusive vaccinations uh and there's no plan there's no plan none
Carter
26:57
barely a plan today there was barely a plan introduced cory
Zain
27:00
cory uh let's talk about the politics for jason kenney uh you know you guys have both mentioned the calgary stampede festival season i want to stress test that a bit is that is that what you genuinely think he's trying to do here maybe kind of go in his mind a bit is it is it to you know really live up to his greatest summer ever promise, I should say, to really kind of, you know, take the last 18 months, but make that a wash by being the first and only leader in the country to kind of open up and knock on wood, not have any, you know, big case, kind of like be that sort of personal responsibility premium. Give me like your sort of etch it out from you knowing and having, you know, been around his government, perhaps how he thinks, what his political aims here are with this open for summer plan that's the most ambitious in the country.
Corey
27:47
well i'm not going to pretend that i i know what he's thinking here but i i will take some guesses as to what potentially could could be here yeah sure one of them look here's the thing this has been pretty brutal and he's taken a lot of political hits on this on covid uh relative to other premiers even this has not not been great and not been fun i'm sure and i i think there's something to be said to what you were just talking about there which is why not end big and hope the last memory people have is alberta having a great summer while everybody else is in relative lockdown and and try to make this like you're a genius but i i worry i worry that this is um this is like somebody who's lost a lot of money at the track and now they've got a horse that they think is a sure thing like it's a really really good horse and i'm gonna win back everything i lost on this fucking horse uh does it actually
Zain
28:36
actually feel like that to you right like it does it does
Corey
28:39
and like i think this horse is like like
Corey
28:41
like such a solid favorite you're not even going to win very much money if you bet on them it's like a 10 to 9 or i don't even know whatever right so uh but the problem here is um the problem here is that you're still betting a lot of money that you might actually end up losing real hard on your way out there and your attempt to chase your losses and get past it here even if it does look like a pretty sure bet and just imagine a scenario where just like in the uk all of a sudden we've got variants all of a sudden we're in a fourth wave all of
Corey
29:15
of a sudden we've got a lockdown again all of a sudden other provinces are opening up because they were more prudent and we're in lockdown again going into the fall and everything's in disarray all of a sudden what are you doing with schools what are you doing with work what about all of these promises that life was going to go back to normal and fuck fuck america going going back to normal and having sport events, look at Ontario, look at BC, look at what they're able to do that we're not able to do because we were so goddamn impatient, we decided to move forward. And even if I think that's not likely, I think the fact that that's possible makes it not a very smart bet because the downside is, it's too down. It's too down. And, you know, there's this, I was talking to my friend Scott on Twitter today, and he was saying it reminded him of Patton's Third Army speech in the movie Patton, where he's like, I don't like to pay for the same real estate twice. Well, how many fucking times are we going to pay for this real estate? How many lockdowns are we going to have to endure here, where if we had just been a bit more sensible coming out of them, we
Corey
30:12
we wouldn't have had to pay this cost. So that's the risk. And that's why I think politically, it's quite a dangerous move. And I do think it's part of a broader pattern of behavior of trying to win the day with too little regard for the future and the the probabilities that come just outside of the horizon. So,
Zain
30:27
So, Carter, I want to come to you. Actually, I'll go to you, and then I've got the same question. I want to loop around for both of you. So, Carter, your take here, the political calculus that Jason Kenney perhaps is conducting with his office and his advisors, what do you think it is?
Carter
30:43
I think the political calculus is just very simple. This is very positive. People are very popular. People want to be out. They don't want the restrictions anymore. more that is that is universal but um it
Carter
30:57
it it's it's a one-sided question right um if
Carter
31:02
if you say to people do you want to go outside they say yeah yeah we want to we want to have a festival we want to have this happen um but if you you know i think he's gone too far i mean he said today this is 80 or plus uh positive polling there's no way this is an 80 plus positive polling not unless unless you're only presenting the pot, you know, the, the, the upside, um, the downside of this is, is significant and we'll see how it pulls at the end. And I find myself very conflicted because of course, of course, I want this to work. Of course, I want this to be safe. Of course, I don't want anybody to get sick. And I certainly don't want anybody to
Carter
31:36
to potentially die as a result of having a stampede, you know? I mean, but
Carter
31:41
but on the other hand, you
Carter
31:44
if he skates on this, It's like wearing, you know, Corey's analogy about taking the windy road down the hill at top speed without a seatbelt on. You know, most times you'll be okay. Most times you'll be fine. But that one time you're not okay, you know, geez,
Carter
32:02
geez, you know, like this
Carter
32:03
this government only learns from the accident. This government only learns from the accident. incident
Zain
32:08
i want to pick up on that because i think one of the things that might be um part of jason kenney's calculation that you guys might disagree with is the size of the prize i want to talk to you guys about that because you know for him cory to your point i really like your analogy of the racetrack right you lost a bunch of money you bet big you go home and then the the question is blank. You go home in the black, you go home a big winner, you make up for all the money you lost. For Jason Kenney, it seems like, and I'm kind of curious to get your guys' take on this, that this is not just go back in the black. You literally make a bunch of money on this and you're riding high. This can undo all of the past mistakes. Corey, in your perspective, what is the size of the prize here? Let's just say, let's frankly hope this works, right? Because Because the cost of not hoping this works is morbid in many ways, right? When you think about it, what it could be. Let's hope this works. What is the size of the political prize in your mind for Jason Kenney on the back end? Does this wash away everything? Does this kind of forgive all that sort of stuff? Do you feel like this kind of heralds him a hero? Just, you know, project for me a bit. What does it look like to you?
Corey
33:19
What the prize is, is he is able to say to everybody who said, why did you do these lockdowns? What are you doing? That, hey, I have never been enthusiastic about lockdowns. I did them because they were necessary. I am all about freedom. I wanted to be the first back to normal, and I did it. Because of my steady leadership, you know, this is him talking here in this hypothetical scenario, I was able to make Alberta the most free jurisdiction the soonest. And that's what I got. And I know it was awkward, but now's the time for us to put that behind us. And that's how he mends the bridge with kind of the quote-unquote far right of his party, the Freedom Caucus, the people who – this is the hope, right, that you're able to just reset that relationship. And from there, once you've got your rear flank dealt with, you can start dealing with the NDP and the fact that you're losing in polls for many, many months at this point, right? That's the prize. It's a big prize. prize um i just i have to believe there are other ways to get there but i i believe that he just didn't want to be not just last he didn't want to be second he wanted to be the first to open
Corey
34:28
and um and by doing it in this fashion he basically guaranteed that he will be the first to open up right
Zain
34:34
right and and carter do you agree with the size of the prize that cory's laid out in his analysis or do you think it's different no
Carter
34:40
no i think that's right i think that the
Carter
34:45
upside of being able to say that you were the one who did this the best i mean keep in mind nothing he's done to this point is the best everything that he's done to this point has turned into a shit sandwich can i
Zain
34:56
i ask that question carter so you think there is the actual sort of metal being handed out across the the province territory wants to
Corey
35:03
to win the race And first
Zain
35:04
first place for opening up the best. If that was the competition, that's the medal he's after, just so I'm clear? Yeah.
Carter
35:10
Yeah. And he's not looking at the most recent data. He's not looking at what's coming out of Australia. He's not looking at what's coming out of Great Britain. I mean, Australia is a little bit different because they don't have the vaccination rates yet. But I think that it goes to the point that if you try and do too much without having complete vaccination, you know, bad things happen. And and the Australians have have taken a very dim, you know, a very strict view towards their their close closures because they want to have people in their stands for their football games the same way that we want to have people in their stands for. I hear the Oval
Corey
35:40
Oval was packed last week. It
Carter
35:43
the game. I'll tell you, Adelaide, who one point pulled it off. Unbelievable. believable um stop
Carter
35:51
stop it because you're distracting me but the point is he wants to be able to say see i had the right ideas all along i had the right ideas all along you just simply couldn't implement them people of alberta but i always had the right right ideas now he'd probably leave the you couldn't implement them people of alberta part off but he wants to people to think that his ideas were the right ideas and and in this particular case they might work they
Carter
36:16
they might work I fear they're not going to, but they might. And I think that that's the strongest statement that anybody can make at this point, is that they may in fact work.
Zain
36:27
I don't want to make this a semantics conversation, but you said he is trying to win this race. Is the race to open first or open best? I just want to make clear from your perspective, because I think it matters. And because if it is first, he very well may win that and he may just parade that around and say look at this fucking medal i got as as the best premier the for the end of the first to open up like you know alberta like that's just what we do uh or is or do you think it's going to be you know nuanced a bit with so for
Corey
36:59
for a good chunk of the population not just in alberta but in in many of the provinces if not all of the provinces a good chunk of the population believes first is best the first to remove all of these restrictions and get back to normal that's what you got to be doing uh that's why they've branded themselves this freedom caucus right and um obviously the risk is if you've got to go then introduce other restrictions down the road because you open too quickly you weren't first you went from being on the podium gold medal around your neck to somebody yanking you down and saying finish the fucking race dummy you're not it's not over and so that's that's the risk which is why i just don't like the risk benefit calculation myself i i will i will go further I think this will probably be fine. That still doesn't mean it was a smart play, right? You know, just imagine what you're willing to bet on something that's less than 100% sure. Would you bet your children on, I don't know, the fact that there will be more than 100 cars on Deerfoot tomorrow? That seems like a really – Deerfoot's a highway here in Calgary to our non-Calgary listeners. Seems like a really good bet, right? Seems like you're going to get 100 cars in 30 seconds on the average day. You're going to bet your children on it?
Corey
38:11
I don't know. I don't like that risk-benefit reward. And I think that's ultimately what I am saying here. here
Zain
38:19
carter i want to talk very quickly about his communications here for a second um he went on a facebook live one of those impromptu facebook lives where he wants to skip the liberal mainstream media and go directly to to the listeners for night or to the viewers and his base for 90 minutes or so uh his line of attack against the ndp is very interesting it's it's almost you know we use it in the modern social media landscape as what we'd call like gaslighting being like Like these folks don't believe in the power of vaccines. They don't believe that, you know, that their approach of locking down will actually breed vaccine hesitancy. You know, putting the politics aside, per se, you know, your personal politics, effective message by Kenny in terms of trying to play a bit of jujitsu in that regard? Or do you feel like too muddled and not going to work?
Carter
39:06
I mean, I don't know. I mean, is the promise of early opening enough to get people vaccinated? I don't think it worked in Texas. I mean, I don't have the vaccination rates in Texas right in front of me, but I know they have a higher second dose, but I don't believe they have a higher first dose than we're going to have. We, in fact, might be higher than them right now.
Carter
39:26
The idea of reopening doesn't seem to be motivation enough. I mean, Ohio's lottery
Carter
39:34
lottery seems to be working. It's working well enough that California is now copying it. So I think that there are ways to encourage people to get vaccinated. The premier continues his habit of making shit up to justify the actions that he wants to take. And, you know, does that make him a liar? I suppose. But he thinks that it's in his best interest to behave this way.
Zain
40:00
Corey, the premier said that the NDP understate the protective effects of vaccines. They just don't understand the power of these vaccines, which is funny.
Zain
40:10
funny. But, you know, effective message from your perspective in terms of him just going on the offensive and doubling down on vaccine potential and vaccine power, with the irony, of course, being, you know, Trudeau is that for? Yeah.
Corey
40:23
Yeah. Who is that message for? I have
Zain
40:25
have no idea, which is why I'm turning to you to kind of detangle this for us.
Corey
40:30
Yeah, because any kind of moderate Albertan, any Albertan who's a swing voter, so to speak, is not going to believe that the NDP is more vaccine hesitant than the UCP. What a joke.
Corey
40:40
That's really kind of ridiculous. We've had a fair bit of reporting in this province. The NDP have all been vaccinated, all of the MLAs, and the UCP, a good chunk of them won't say and are presumed unvaccinated. So who is this for? Who would this appeal to by saying like, oh, look at them. They're a bunch of anti-vaxxers. Well, your base. But how does your base feel about that issue? Because last I checked, your base was the most likely to think you should be anti-vaxxed. So who is this message for? I mean, this is kind of just kind of petulant, petty politics stuff. And it doesn't – I don't think it actually moves any meters. And it has the chance of commentary like this, almost as eye-rolling commentary that says this was – to get really meta, who is this for? You know, people start asking, what is the guy thinking when he starts putting out messages like this? So I think he's just shelf messaging like this. I don't think that it's a particularly fruitful area. If you want to say, hey, the NDP doesn't just have confidence in the science, we've had a lot of scientists on it, that's one message. But to suggest that they're, you know, lacking a faith in science is, it's just absurd, right? I
Zain
41:51
want to talk about the NDP here and how they need to respond. Their main message put out by Rachel Notley was, did Jason Kenney just arbitrarily reverse engineer the dates of the stampede and just assemble a plan? Which many people have supported that that was his theory here. Do you feel like that's the right message for them? Do you feel like they have to be careful here on tone? Don't, Carter, I'll go to you first on this. Or do you feel like they're okay to kind of be like, hey, this, we need to be, this is, you know, what is the premier doing here? Or, you know, I'm trying to like balance between like, or maybe they don't need to, between them saying, you know, we hope this works versus being like, this is crazy. This is batshit. As some doctors and the former chief medical officer of health has kind of said, this is aggressive to the point of reckless. Where should the NDP line be here on this? And is there any special nuance they need to add to their messaging in this particular situation? I
Carter
42:45
I think the NDP line is absolutely reflecting what people want, and that is we hope that this is the best thing. But by
Carter
42:51
by saying, yeah, this is being reverse engineered to the stampede, I mean, obviously, they're setting up for the potential that things could go horribly wrong. But they're not being overly critical of the decision. I mean, for me, the
Carter
43:05
the easiest thing in the world is to point out how we go from 20 people at an outdoor gathering to 75,000. And I don't understand why that hasn't been a more central talking
Carter
43:14
talking point. I think what people want is a stage three that actually makes sense, that isn't designed around the stampede. And I think that the NDP would be more effective if they did that, if they said, you know what, we're
Carter
43:27
we're all for reopening. But here's how we're going to do it. 70% first dose vaccination. We're good, you know, like patios,
Carter
43:34
patios, restaurants, let's get all of those businesses operating. But we're not going to engineer this for a festival. We're going to engineer this for entrepreneurs. Like
Carter
43:42
Like I think that if you did that type of language, I think it would be really, really strong. And then stage four in August, if you know what, move the stampede for four weeks, four
Carter
43:53
four weeks more, and I think we'll be ready.
Carter
43:55
Like they could take that type of nuance, But instead, they've taken, I think they've hedged, and they probably hedged far too much.
Zain
44:03
Corey, talk to me about the nuance needed, and if you see it within the official opposition's messaging here.
Corey
44:10
Yeah, so what Carter suggested there, no, don't do that. We do X, not Y. People aren't voting on X versus Y. We are going to do what the government is doing. And just as we talked about, it's more likely to work than not, or maybe even you just think it's 50-50, or maybe you think it's 30-70. The same logic applies, and if you think it's likely to work, even more so. So you can't say, like, this is a bad plan, because even if it is a bad plan because it's not particularly prudent, right, it's too risky, the math is still on the side that things will be okay. Well, let's just say it is, right, for the sake of argument. So let's say math is still on the side of things being okay.
Corey
44:49
what do you do when Stampede comes and it goes off relatively without a hitch? What do you do then? Then as the NDP, you look wrong because you presented a plan that was more prudent but ultimately was not necessary because it turns out that the vaccinations were able to cover us there. So there's no point in proposing counterplans at this point. That is making the same mistake the government is making. You've got to keep this thing on kind of process and say, this is a bit wild. I think it was likely to work out, but I think it's a bit risky. And that is largely what the messaging has been here.
Corey
45:26
But I think it's got to be more about that. And I do agree with Stephen in the sense that it would have made more sense to go slowly. But you have to be careful. You're not saying like this will get a better result. You're saying this provides better insurance and this is what everybody else is doing. And there's logic in following what other jurisdictions that have come out of this successfully have done. We don't want Alberta to be a COVID experiment. We want to do this right. I
Zain
45:50
I want to end on two final things here. One, Corey, I'm going to stick with you here. The brand. This is another, we just had Stop the Spike in caution tape colors. We now have Open for Summer in, what would you call this, like a magenta and blue sort of like Hawaiian punch style vibe. talk to me about the branding here like i it's obviously the most visually vibrant branding that we've seen during a pandemic from any province uh clearly try to illustrate something any i don't really have a question for you other than to let you go off if you've got any brand related comments as someone who's well extremely familiar with this space yeah
Corey
46:28
yeah i will say that um this is this is kind of a profligation of brands that is totally unnecessary one of the things that governments sort of spin themselves up on is we got to have a logo for this we got to have a brand and it takes an awful lot of discipline to say no you don't you got a logo it's the government logo and by the way most people in alberta probably couldn't identify that right people don't tend to think about these brands that you're creating as much as you do and they might be in front of your face all of the time but the reality is we're at a point where the average citizen has probably seen each of these brands once and that's not a brand at that point that's just a bunch of crazy crazy crap that's happening on a lectern sign so
Corey
47:05
they they just need to kind of cool it and i get the logic i guess here's what i would say i understand the pressure that would lead them to do these things like it's very easy to understand they had their covid brand all of a sudden we're in a bigger situation more urgent why not say it's more urgent through branding stop the spike right but the problem is if then two weeks later you're like well we've stopped the spike but we want to tell them it's the best summer ever let's just create that brand that's not that's not the right play ultimately brand is not about logos brand is not about colors brand is about a feeling that you have and the feeling that you want to have from your government is one of kind of stability and assurance and you've got this in hand not that they're ping-ponging from solution to solution and the fact that they've had so many covid brands at this point just sort of reinforces this merry-go-round that we're on which is exactly why you don't play with these brands so much because it just creates this sense of chaos So, you know, it's easy for me to be critical of that. It's super easy to just sort of throw stones at it because I don't think fundamentally it's good brand foundation to keep changing these things up so quickly. I understand that the pressures are there to do this. I just don't think it makes an awful lot of sense. And at the end of the day, you
Corey
48:16
you are more likely to be mocked
Corey
48:19
mocked for brand than you are cheered for brand. It's very rare for somebody to see a government brand and say, that's awesome. so it's best to stick with the generic and not let your brand be a distraction i
Zain
48:28
i have i have one more follow-up for you cory i'm sorry for icing you out carter do you feel like the i mean i know it does um do you feel when you go on your long tirades to fill time uh cory do you feel like i'm joking steve i'm sure it's yeah uh cory do you feel like the audience for this brand was different perhaps why in some ways that this was less albertans and this is me just speculating And more so everyone else being like Alberta's open for summer, almost inserting the Alberta in front of it, projecting as part of Jason Kenney wanting to win his medal, so to speak, to the rest of the country that this is something that he wants to communicate beyond the four walls of this place. Is there some merit in that?
Corey
49:09
I don't think. Well, yeah, I mean, there's merit to it. I'm not going to try to be totally shitty to you about it. I don't think that's what he was planning to do. I think this is very much an Alberta-focused brand. And sun's out, gun's out, man. You know, he's trying to create this sense that everything's going to be great. And in many ways, I think either subconsciously or consciously, they're also trying to clean up the much maligned Jason Kenney's gone from great Alberta summer to a pretty good Alberta summer. A
Corey
49:37
A summer. And it's like, no, we're open for summer. This is what we mean. And recapture that concept of the Alberta branded summer.
Zain
49:46
Carter, final question. I'm going to go to you and then we'll close off with Corey. um do
Zain
49:51
you feel like in some ways being the premier to have the aggressive plan with you know let's be charitable to jason kenney it is tethered to some targets right hospitalizations and vaccinations do you feel like just announcing that gets him a political win that even if we're sitting here july 1st and we're like fuck we're at 63 hospitalizations are through the roof guys i told you we could have this but we can't because of you do you feel like there's still a political win for Jason Kenney to have this ambitious plan alone out there for his for the for the politics of it strictly? Or do you feel like that's a moot point in your mind from a political upside and opportunity perspective?
Carter
50:31
No one wins on an announcement, they win on implementation. So you have to implement and it actually has to work if we're at 63% vaccination on July the first and he's in some fashion trying to backtrack away from this thing. I mean, first First of all, he set himself a level where he's going to attain these goals. This is not something that he's not going to be able to do. This is going to actually happen. And I'm a little disappointed that I don't get to answer the brand question. Can I go back and answer the brand? You
Zain
50:59
You can jump in. Yeah, of course you can.
Carter
51:00
You know, Corey and I were working recently on a leadership brand, and the leadership brand has an optimism. It has an enthusiasm and an optimism to it. And I think that that, you know, that kind of, you know, summer fun, summer festival lineup type of
Carter
51:14
feel like posters and stuff like you've got this kind of you know young youngish feel to it um young youthful energy leader type of thing optimism um that type of leadership campaign is exactly what jason kenney is emulating uh so i
Carter
51:32
mean i think that i understand why he did the brand structure that he did i'm a little bit more charitable than than cory i think cory's points were right i'm just i'm putting it in the context of how cory and i ourselves ourselves we're thinking about our own leadership opportunity with uh with the candidate that we've selected so i don't want to i don't want to get too far ahead on that but um i think it's a real opportunity for optimism uh
Zain
51:55
uh cory last question to you does kenny get any semblance of a win just by being the premier that announces this aggressive plan yeah
Corey
52:04
yeah you get the same type of win you get when your rent is late and you tell your landlord i just sent you the rent it should It should be there in three days. It's just going through the bank.
Corey
52:12
You get the fucking win. But if the money's not there in three days, you don't get the fucking win. So I think Stephen's point about implementation mattering here is very important.
Zain
52:22
Let's move on to our final segment. Our over, under, and our lightning round. Stephen Carter, are you ready?
Carter
52:27
I'm totally ready. I've always been ready. It's what I focus on. Lightning round speed. That's what I'm all about. I don't just fill time, Zane. I like to be very short and to the point. I like to be ready. That's why I like the lightning round, because it forces me into shorter answers.
Zain
52:43
Thank you, Stephen Carter. Stephen Carter, I'm going back to my stock game. You have to buy some stock or sell some stock today in Jason Kenney, and you cannot sell it until the second week of July.
Zain
52:57
OK, are you buying or are you selling stock in Jason Kenney?
Carter
53:00
I'm selling. I mean, I don't like to play that kind of risk. And I'm sorry. Corey, I just don't believe that we can have the largest festival in Canada this summer, the
Carter
53:08
the fastest and the earliest, coming
Carter
53:11
coming off of the largest third wave and have it be successful. I think it's just too big a risk. I'm selling.
Zain
53:17
Corey, you can only offload in the second week of July or you're buying or selling stock in Jason Kenney today.
Corey
53:22
I'm thinking back to what my finance professor told me, Dr. Stephen Forrester. And he had a saying. He said, growth is good and risk is rotten. rotten and this to me feels pretty rotten because the risk is too significant and and where jason kenney is priced at right now i just don't think the market is reflecting the risk cory
Zain
53:41
cory i'm going to stick with you yes or no question very simple is stephen carter dominic cummings absolutely
Corey
53:45
absolutely there's no doubt in my mind if you're not aware of this google stephen carter google dominic Cummings.
Zain
53:51
Stephen Carter, are you Dominic Cummings? In a British accent, please.
Zain
54:00
Carter, I'm going to stick with you. Overrated or underrated? Carter, there's only one right answer. This one you cannot screw up. The Calgary Stampede.
Zain
54:11
You fucking idiot. Corey, overrated or underrated? The Calgary Stampede.
Corey
54:17
Every Calgarian lives in a superposition between feeling it's overrated and underrated it just depends on where you are at any given moment um it's it's fun and it's exhausting at the exact same time two
Zain
54:29
two wrong answers cory i'm sticking with you the politics for jason kenney on the open for summer plan the politics for jason kenney on the open for summer plan we've talked about you know the analogies of what it's like the past sins of the last 14 15 months but the politics of this open for summer plan all things considered on a a scale of one to ten what are you giving it cory i
Corey
54:52
i'm just too risk averse to think this is a particularly good plan i am really torn zane because i think that in a month we may look back and say well that landed fucking great yeah doesn't mean it was worth the risk i'm giving this a three carter
Zain
55:03
carter same question to you all things considered all past sins considered for this premiere the politics for the open for summer plan what are you giving it on a one to ten oh
Carter
55:11
oh it's a d minus i mean i mean you're basically it's the equivalent of having a chimpanzee run run through a Scantron exam, it may turn out great, but it may turn out horribly.
Zain
55:26
That's not a bad analogy. Pretty good. You really pulled it together there at the end. It was
Carter
55:30
was hard to get to. It was hard to get to, but I got there.
Zain
55:33
Wasn't sure where you're going with all those district points. Strong
Carter
55:34
finish, Zane. Strong finish to
Carter
55:36
to the pod. Thank you, Stephen. Thank
Zain
55:37
Thank you, Carter. We'll leave it there. That's a wrap on episode 934 of The Strategist. My name is Zane Velgey. With me, as always, Corey Hogan, Dominic Cummings, and we'll see you next time.
Zain
55:55
is a strategist episode 934 my name is zane velgey with me as always steven carter cory hogan guys happy thursday what's going on well
Carter
56:05
well i was outside again today you guys will be happy and i went bike riding it was fantastic great little oasis we never
Zain
56:12
never ask you if you have have a job i
Corey
56:17
episode 934 something like that i'm gonna do some quick math
Zain
56:20
math yes it's about 9 934 so we're
Corey
56:22
we're at episode 934 i think maybe this is an opportunity for us to get whole new personalities like just change it oh we're just gonna change it up oh yeah like give carter something something
Corey
56:31
work with here the
Carter
56:31
the people want me to take zane outside though the people want me to take zane on a mountain bike trail i think it's gonna be it's gonna be good radio that's what i'm thinking adult
Corey
56:39
adult pokemon enthusiast i
Zain
56:41
i had a fucking fantastic meeting with mothers against drunk driving now let me tell you what they told me
Corey
56:47
they told me they said steven wait
Corey
56:50
wait did you just steal his entire personality i
Zain
56:52
i literally i co-opted the entire thing yeah i said i can't talk to you i gotta go outside i gotta go ride a bike and i gotta go do some legislation and then i gotta leave i'm just
Corey
57:03
just saying carter you're like the first person who's is going to be replaced by an AI. They are not going to have to work hard.
Corey
57:09
There's no nuance there. No depth.
Carter
57:12
You know, that's a little upsetting. You say that to me. For
Corey
57:15
For all our listeners know, you are the AI on this show.
Carter
57:19
Well, you know what? I'm just going to take the fact that you've said that I'm intelligent and I'm going to run with that. Artificial.
Corey
57:23
Artificial. But yes, go on.
Zain
57:27
Are you guys done?
Corey
57:29
no, no. My new personality is a guy who finally holds him to account for his bullshit. shit so listen
Carter
57:40
guys i i hate to break this but um will amos member of parliament uh has just issued a statement uh apologizing for urinating on camera while in a parliamentary committee meeting so what
Zain
57:57
no i don't okay wait are you serious i
Carter
57:58
i am yeah it's a great statement uh 14 minutes ago go um okay
Zain
58:04
you jump in there let's move into the headlines steven carter with our first headline go ahead carter last night
Carter
58:10
night yeah will amos uh it's just a statement by a member of parliament will amos last night while attending house of commons proceedings virtually in a non public setting i urinated without realizing i was on camera i'm deeply embarrassed by my actions and the distress they may have caused anybody who witnessed them while accidental and not visible to the public this was completely unacceptable and i apologize reservedly so
Carter
58:35
so he's stepping aside from his parliamentary secretary and committee duties now so that he can seek assistance the
Zain
58:41
the same this is the same guy right yeah just so
Carter
58:44
yeah this is a this is uh
Carter
58:48
in the world are you yeah like he's seeking assistance so this is not i
Carter
58:53
mean i'm waiting for the photographs personally but this
Corey
58:57
is a weird one man yeah it's really really weird i bring
Carter
58:59
bring you the headlines so they happen so
Carter
59:01
statement sort of implies he's
Corey
59:02
he's seeking assistance so he's got like a thing for being on camera exposing himself is that what we're supposed to
Carter
59:08
to take it would appear that there's some sort of uh problem
Zain
59:13
this is gonna age really well this
Zain
59:15
this is gonna i just want to let you know this will age really well this commentary of ours no
Carter
59:19
no no we're we're confused confusion i say
Carter
59:22
age as well i
Zain
59:23
i think so yeah Yeah,
Carter
59:25
us to the headline, Zane. Take us to the headline. Let's move it
Zain
59:26
it on to our next headline coming to us for the – Corey's going to Google this the whole show, I know. I know. Let's move it on to us by the BBC.
Zain
59:33
CDC urges Americans not to kiss chickens amid outbreak. Stephen Carter, the U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention, has urged people to refrain from kissing live poultry amid an outbreak of salmonella. Do not kiss or snuggle the birds as they can spread germs to your mouth and make you sick, the health agency said. said. Stephen Carter, good advice or bad advice by the left-wing, liberal, chummy CDC?
Carter
1:00:01
You know what? I mean, I think it's good advice, but I think it's terrible messaging. How they missed out on, please don't kiss the cock, is beyond me. I don't understand how they missed that. So, you
Carter
1:00:10
you know, I'll tell you something. Corey would have laughed if he wasn't Googling the Will Amos thing.
Corey
1:00:16
I urinated without realizing I was on camera. I am deeply embarrassed by my actions. While accidental and not visible to the public, this was unacceptable. I apologize unreservedly. I
Corey
1:00:27
I will be stepping aside
Corey
1:00:28
temporarily. I just read this. I read this aloud. So I need to read it again so that I can seek assistance. So it was accidental and he's seeking assistance. This statement doesn't hold together within two sentences. I know.
Carter
1:00:38
know. What is the story here? But you missed my whole kiss the cock thing and it was pretty funny. No? Just me? Okay.
Zain
1:00:46
Corey, do you want to comment on the kissing of the birds? So
Corey
1:00:53
i'm now reading the french version because i'm trying to see if this is like a translation accident and well
Corey
1:01:00
no it's it's it's the same so
Corey
1:01:07
and it obtain appropriate
Corey
1:01:11
like it's i i'm i'm okay
Carter
1:01:15
okay so your your confusion is amusing for me
Zain
1:01:28
what's the what's the next headline zane cory uh i'm going to global news are you cory's just now he's gonna be gone for the whole you're brewing the show he's
Zain
1:01:38
for the whole entire
Carter
1:01:38
entire show what happened to cory episode 934 cory just fucking disappeared yeah
Carter
1:01:44
yeah he came in
Carter
1:01:45
he came in hot and then
Zain
1:01:46
then we lost him and then we lost him all over
Zain
1:01:49
next headline zane let's go first through what would you i i can be professional but now i'm also intrigued by cory's response it's the most interesting thing going on now cory what would you have rather said if you were him because i feel like you've got some alternative messaging or are you just trying to unpack uh
Zain
1:02:06
uh no pun intended what exactly he
Zain
1:02:10
he meant or he's trying to say with seeking assistance is this seeking assistance seeking help whatever the phrasing well
Corey
1:02:15
well so in english he says so i can seek assistance and in french it really comes down to so i can seek appropriate support but
Corey
1:02:23
the the same basic concept the
Carter
1:02:24
the the premise is that he's got a problem he he needs in some fashion to
Carter
1:02:30
to be on camera doing inappropriate things
Corey
1:02:33
yeah but the way the rest of the scent this thing reads as though like his
Corey
1:02:36
is he's got an it problem like i'm gonna go i'm gonna go call tech support uh because this was embarrassing and accidental but i'm stepping down to find appropriate
Corey
1:02:46
appropriate help you know yeah
Carter
1:02:50
i i don't know what you're going to do with this section i mean because no i mean we're
Corey
1:02:54
we're clearly gonna we're gonna hit stop and we'll re-record here and then we'll release this as a strategist subscriber exclusive no
Carter
1:03:02
no that's that's totally fine because uh
Zain
1:03:04
uh the rest of the show is all all about Jeffrey Toobin. The whole show is just a whole Jeffrey Toobin special, how to resuscitate the tube. Let's move on to our next headline. This one comes to us from global news and everywhere across the world. Boris Johnson considered being injected with COVID-19 on live TV, says ex-advisor. In a blistering attack on the British state, Dominic Cummings, Corey, I'm going to you first for an obvious reason, told lawmakers that the government was completely unprepared for the worst public health crisis in decades, and that ministers, including the prime minister, were on holiday in February 2020. Such was Johnson's skepticism about COVID-19, even told officials he was considering getting the government's chief medical advisor to inject him with the novel coronavirus to show the public it was not a threat, Cummings said. Corey, did you watch this, I don't know, takedown, rant, diatribe, I don't know what you would use to describe this Stephen Carter, i mean dominic cummings uh hey take which which is perhaps why i want to go to you first wait
Corey
1:04:09
wait stephen carter's uh obviously one of a type he has a clone in the united kingdom uh so he's conflicted out of this question i think that's what we're saying here so
Corey
1:04:21
i mean amos just sent that statement out
Zain
1:04:27
the actual fuck it
Zain
1:04:30
takes me like it takes me like a good five minutes to construct the show oh
Carter
1:04:35
was drinking i was drinking some water i almost died you almost fucking killed me listen
Zain
1:04:42
got a kevin spacey headline i've got a whole thing about quebec wanting its own emoji okay i've
Zain
1:04:50
i've got a bunch of other stuff good
Carter
1:04:53
pushing keep pushing for me i think don't
Carter
1:04:55
let don't let cory derail us okay
Zain
1:04:57
good show cory get it out of your system
Zain
1:05:01
pun intended yes get it out of your system go ahead
Zain
1:05:12
next headline anything anything no not anything on dominic cummings
Corey
1:05:19
just like the statement wasn't even very long how did it contradict itself so quickly
Zain
1:05:33
God. We're going to either gain a lot of subscribers or lose a lot of them on this episode. Stephen Carter, how about I just give you guys the entire suite? Stephen Carter, Dominic Cummings saying that the prime minister of the United Kingdom wanted to be injected with COVID-19. I give you either that. I give you Kevin Spacey starring in a new movie where he's playing a detective probing an artist who is accused of being a pedophile, which is also up for comment. Or also that Quebec is now demanding its own emoji. do you want to just hit
Carter
1:06:03
hit on anything yeah i'm gonna i'm gonna take offense really to the comparisons to me uh i've never urinated on camera
Zain
1:06:17
oh my god you guys are fucking impossible