Episode 968: Nothing's fine, nothing's fabulous

Zain 0:02

This is The Strategist, episode 968. My name is Zain Velji. With me, as always, Corey Hogan, Stephen Carter. Guys, what is going on? What isn't going on?

Carter 0:12

There's nothing going on, Zain. Literally nothing going on. So, happy to be here with you two.

Zain 0:20

to have you, Stephen. Thank you for making time for the show. Welcome back.

Carter 0:24

back. I don't know how

Carter 0:29

I'm sorry I couldn't be here yesterday, but we got stuck in BC.

Carter 0:33

It was like Alberta didn't want me back. It was weird, but

Carter 0:37

but I got here. Look

Zain 0:38

Look at that. You're a convoy of one. Corey, you're doing good, or do you just want me to get started?

Corey 0:44

I had COVID last week.

Zain 0:47

Let's get on with our... Okay.

Corey 0:50

Fine. Tell us. Tell us your story. No, it was fine. Honestly, it was fine. I was triple vaxxed. I've got three kids. Two of them tested positive. None of them really had symptoms at all. You know, fever one day, cough the next day. I was back on my feet and fully recovered within like three days. It's not a miracle. It's science, folks. Get vaccinated.

Carter 1:13

Here's the thing. It sounds like three kids is one too many kids. You have to move from a man-on-man defense to zone, and that just makes it hard. I mean,

Zain 1:21

mean, is three kids enough for the triangle offense, Corey?

Corey 1:26

mean, technically, yes. Technically, yes. This

Zain 1:28

This is excellent news. Let's not waste any more time. Not to say that your life is a waste of time, but it kind of is. We'll move on to our first segment. Our first segment, Fine, Fabulous, or Fucked. That is right. We have got a lot to catch up on. If you're new to the show, this is a very easy, simple segment. I throw out a political item of the day, a strategy, strategy a move a speech uh an incident cory and steven tell me if it's fine if it's fabulous or if it is fucked and there's only one way to get started it's to get started oh cory you think there's a second way to get started

Corey 2:03

started i'm gonna go out on a limb and say we're gonna have a shortage of fine and fabulous this week yeah i predict

Carter 2:08

this no i'm feeling good another

Carter 2:11

i am nothing but optimistic yeah i'm nothing but optimistic this is gonna be i mean

Zain 2:17

can you be at this point steven what nothing but optimistic baby let's

Zain 2:23

let's yeah no it's that's that's good that's good turn it a quarter let's let's start with our

Zain 2:29

our first one steven carter we start with you fine fabulous or fucked flair

Zain 2:34

flair airlines offering free flights all of february you should be going making a trip folks to abbotsford is that fine fabulous or fucked it's

Carter 2:41

it's fucked i'd hope that cory was gonna have to spend real money real money out of his giant nest egg of all the money he's made in all his life but nothing it's absolutely fucked i'm very disappointed cory

Zain 2:52

cory fine fabulous or fucked the tremendous deals offered by our sponsor flare

Corey 2:56

flare airlines it's it's fucked think of the poor accountants think of the business that could go under to your benefit they love you too much people you get to fly for free that's

Zain 3:07

fly for free fuck

Zain 3:08

fuck over flare airlines our sponsor i

Corey 3:12

true quotes around fly that's

Zain 3:14

that's true fly for free we put that in quotes that's good we're working out we're working out the uh the rust i like our first one cory i'm gonna go to you for our second one let's get started here and let's get serious we'll talk about the big stuff cory fine fabulous or fucked aaron o'toole booted as the leader yeah it seems like a year ago aaron o'toole booted as the leader of the conservative party of canada what in a roof in a roof this happened you missed a few things there

Corey 3:39

there was this day where a bunch of bald white guys lost their jobs yeah you

Zain 3:45

may have missed it oh

Zain 3:53

corey i'll get erin o'toole is gone after a reform act vote within his caucus it wasn't even close fine fabulous or fucked for the conservative party of canada erin o'toole is no longer their leader?

Corey 4:07

You know what? I think you got to say fucked because of what comes next. You know, here be dragons sort of stuff. It's not as though Aaron O'Toole was lighting the world afire. And certainly in the last couple of weeks, as he kind of limply swung from moderate to I'm going to be whatever you want me to be. And in that case, it's kind of weird and crazy. It was pretty bad to see and certainly was damaging to the real estate values on O'Toole Island. Are we

Zain 4:35

property owners or are we just – I

Corey 4:36

I don't think anyone is picking it up now. I'm just

Corey 4:40

just hoping that people can go on like nice undersea adventures and see where it sank. Like Atlantis.

Corey 4:50

we might talk about it as legend like Atlantis in 10 years if the Conservative Party continues

Corey 4:55

continues its heel turn And really leans into some of the uglier elements that have driven it to this point. And I guess that's why I would give the answer that I gave. It's pretty troubling to think about why Aaron O'Toole was dropped, because it's not that he was necessarily dropped because of an inept election performance. That was true a month ago, right? That was true when the Reform Act was first brought on. But it would appear to any outside observer that he was dropped because he was unwilling to go far enough on things like meeting with the convoy on on, you know, there was some reporting, take it all with a grain of salt, because the reporting at the at the end of Rome is always a little questionable, but that it was it had to do with some of his votes on social issues. And if that is true, if really he lost his job because he couldn't hit the test that the party put for him, well, that's very problematic because it suggests that the next leader is probably going to be further outside of the Canadian mainstream. And, you know, I've said this up and down, you know, any venue I could in the last week, but people

Corey 5:58

just change governments sometimes, you know, even if they don't have major problems with the government or even if their problems are, you know, legitimate, but the solution is worse. And if we're in a situation in this country where you have a

Corey 6:11

a really radicalized conservative party and a liberal party, eventually you're going to have a really, really radical conservative government in this country. I think that feels almost inevitable, and that's pretty troubling. We'll

Zain 6:24

We'll save the Pierre Palliot truck, and I want to get into it too because there's a lot to untangle there if, for example, he is one of the standard bearers for potentially that movement you're mentioning, Corey. Carter, I want to ask you, for the Conservatives, Aaron O'Toole gone. Fine, fabulous, or fucked? Give me your top line and let's discuss this a bit more after that.

Carter 6:41

Well, I think it's fucked. I think that, you know, Aaron O'Toole didn't do that badly in the election and he was trying to appeal to the larger electorate. But the problem is when you're trying to appeal to the larger electorate in a party that has no desire to appeal to the larger electorate, you wind up getting screwed. So this has been the problem with leaders all the way through. I mean, even Harper, you know, did suffer from having two caucuses. He just managed it better because it was newer. He was able to hold it together because he'd brought it together. So this is this is something we've talked about a few times. You know, the only person who can hold these these two things together seems to be the person who found it. And in the case of Jason Kenney, for example, that doesn't even appear to be the case. So I think that right now we've got Aaron O'Toole suffering this blow that isn't a result of his performance, but as a result of the situation that he's in, running a caucus that is fundamentally different than the Canadian electorate. I mean, what did we say today? 87% of people in Ottawa, Ottawaans,

Carter 7:46

Ottawaans, I don't even care, people from Ottawa don't even want these protesters gone. And the Conservative Party, I mean, I don't know what they did today, but they basically embraced them for the last eight days. And it's only recently that they've started to push away from it because the caucus wants to embrace these people. The conservative movement wants to be more MAGA and less Aaron O'Toole.

Zain 8:13

Corey, talk to me about this, this broader appeal that Carter is mentioning, right? You try to be broad, you try to move to the middle, you embrace the Brian Mulroney, you take the true blue and you put on the PC jersey color to try to win the election, O'Toole leaves space. Is that just a rule now? Is that just a lesson that doing that leaves tremendous cleavages within your political party if you're the Conservative Party of Canada? Yeah,

Corey 8:35

Yeah, well, the central tension of O'Toole's leadership just ended up being too much. It's exactly what Stevens described. I thought for what it's worth, I'm not going to sit here and Monday morning quarterback. I thought he did what the conservatives needed. I thought he took control of a party that was already too beholden to its more fringe elements by saying the things that would get him the job. And then he hard tacked towards the center when the election came. Now, two problems. One is people

Corey 9:03

people are going to have a hard time trusting your word at that point, right? The other problem is that if the election doesn't happen right away, you're sitting there and you're playing footsie with the right of your party for too long. So, you know, ultimately, how do we sum up Aaron O'Toole's leadership here? He ran to the right to become leader. He ran to the center for the election. He lost the election because of the stuff on the right, and he lost the leadership because of the stuff in the center. And, and that is the final word on Aaron O'Toole. It was just it was too clever by half. And, and unfortunately, I think his party perceives his loss in the election as a failure because he ran to the center. Whereas I think many observers, including myself would say it was because of the things on the right. It was the gun stuff. It was some of the healthcare stuff. It was how close he seemed to Jason Kenney at a time when Alberta was going through a fourth wave. And, you know, people take the lessons they want. Election debriefs are always kind of Rorschach tests. And the Conservative Party has made it really clear what their particular psychosis is. I

Zain 10:04

I want to move on to our next question. Carter, I want to ask you this, you know, our mutual friend for all three of us, Kyle Olson posted a really interesting analysis on the fundraising apparatus that is the Conservative Party of Canada and how money, especially the micro dollar money that the party in the country with the largest membership, the Conservative Conservative Party of Canada, how it has almost a power base outside of the leader's office, responding to key moments with your dollar, sensationalizing the fundraising. Talk to me about what that looks like and that power dynamic within the Conservative Party of Canada. It might lead to the conclusion that Corey was talking about, which potentially favors folks like Pierre Polyevera. But talk to me about fundraising in the conservative circles and whether that could have been part of the downfall, or if you agree that could have been part of the downfall for one Aaron O'Toole who tried to pick or tried to code switch certainly, but then tried to pick more reasonable lanes when it related to mainstream Canadians, which may not have been what the base wanted.

Carter 11:00

So when we all worked together, we used to do seven point Likert tests. And we always used to talk about the ones and twos and the sixes and sevens. And the ones and twos and sixes. And sorry, explain to people what a seven point

Carter 11:10

point Likert is. So a seven point Likert is like if you're, do you support the oil and gas industry? Pick seven if If you do pick one, if you don't, and the ones and twos are on one side, the sixes and sevens are on the other side. And, and in Canadian politics, you can, you can do anything on a, on a seven point likelihood scale, but we always just seven, you can do five, you can do three. It doesn't really matter. But we

Carter 11:29

we used to do sevens and we talked about the sixes and the sevens, and we talked about the ones and the twos. And the thing with the sixes and the sevens, ones and twos is they are hyper engaged. They know their issues. They know what they care about. They know, and they know their talking points, right? They know, and if it's oil and gas, they can say what they love about oil and gas. If it's environmentalism, they can say what they love about environmentalism. It does not matter the issue. But what happens if you're always talking to the sixes and sevens and ones and twos, you are missing out on the three, fours and fives. And the distribution in general of people in these Likerts is that more people are in the middle because more people don't care as much. So the people who are on the far right that are giving all this money to the conservative movement are watching their Fox News, are watching their MAGA signals, are watching and listening to their religious affiliations or whatever there might be. And they are getting their talking points and they are then funding their money through to these activities.

Carter 12:31

The problem is if you consistently tailor your communications to sixes and sevens, you forget how to communicate to three, fours and fives. and three fours and fives are where the election is won and lost so we have pushed ourselves into money getting situations so the conservative party can get as much money as they want why does rebel news excited it's not because ezra levant's good it's because ezra levant has tailored his stuff to people in the sixes and sevens he knows where those people are and he knows that they send money these also are the same people that were taken advantage of by evangelical evangelical

Carter 13:04

pre you know preachers in the united states that that has turned into the maga movement these people speak with their money and they have more money than you would ever think that they would have you know the money that was raised by the truckers you know the nine million dollars in the gofundme that now two million dollars in the whatever the new gofundme is you know these millions of dollars are yes some of it's coming from the u.s but there is a tremendous amount of money coming from people who are listening and are seeing themselves represented in those sixes and sevens and ones and twos.

Zain 13:36

And Corey, you know, to Carter's point, the analysis that our friend Kyle did was ultimately saying that the liberals don't have the same structure of fundraising. A lot of it's directed within and by the direction of the leader's office. But this has kind of created a power base outside of it to almost bring to the leader saying, hey, what you're saying isn't resonating with the people who are giving us this money. Your thoughts on the dollars and cents and what that, it's a larger problem than O'Toole, but whether that you feel like that was a contributory factor to his downfall. Yeah,

Corey 14:01

Yeah, I mean, I absolutely do. I think it's a bigger story. And I actually think it's a bit, I'm not calling Kyle naive, Kyle's a smart guy, but it's naive to think that it's limited to the Conservative Party. In the 90s, in the early 2000s, we were so desperate to get big money out of politics. We

Corey 14:17

We kind of failed to understand what would happen when we were so reliant on small all money exclusively right and the thing is most people don't walk around their life most people are three fours and fives to steven's point right they don't walk around thinking about politics all of the time and thinking about how they can engage in politics in any way shape or form so political parties became addicted to the ones and the sevens on basically every issue uh and that's you know in many ways the conservatives are a little further ahead on this they were the first ones to follow this game that you know this based on their reform party roots and and the grassroots movement that they had built there and um what you find is that it does create this this feedback loop for a party and over time it changes the conversation in the party as a whole it scares out the people who are in the middle right because they're going to select saying like i don't want too much to do with this and i'm kind of sick of these mad emails or they are going to to drift into one of those categories here in

Corey 15:18

in um 2015 i did some work for the government of alberta and

Corey 15:22

and this was when i was a consultant it was before i joined the government and

Corey 15:25

and it was on um

Corey 15:26

um climate change and what should happen it was part of the panel on climate change that was led by economist andrew andrew

Corey 15:33

andrew leach and so they uh you know one of the things that i i showed them was we had a survey that was just open to all albertans you know anybody could go and they could give their opinion. And then there was one that was a demographically representative sample of Albertans done by a polling firm. We just bought the sample and we ran them through the exact same thing. And it was this really interesting thing that happened where if you looked at just the demographic sample, it was kind of a bulge if you looked at that one to five scale in this case from left to right. And you saw that most people lived in the middle. Like, do you feel strongly about this on one side? Do you feel strongly on this other side? Nah, really, I'm sort of in the the middle. But when you looked at the one that was the anybody could do it, opt in one, it was self-select. Yeah. And all of a sudden it was everybody with intense opinions at ones and sevens. And they sort of dipped towards the middle there.

Corey 16:23

But one of the things I think you have to observe about that particular conversation is that at the end of the day, the public conversation looked an awful lot more like the you than it did the hill, right? There was a lot more intense opinions driving it. And that's because when it comes to these matters, people open

Corey 16:39

open their their pocketbooks, they get their megaphones about the things that really drive them. And they get out there, and they have very, very loud conversations about them. And so we find ourselves in a bit of that feedback loop I was talking about here, where the

Corey 16:53

the rage has taken over the conversation, which is driving further rage. And we got to think about how we get ourselves out of this. And we got to think about the effect that the system we've set up has had on all of this.

Zain 17:05

Okay, well, that's our first question. I think we're gonna be here for three hours. Corey,

Corey 17:08

I'm going to stick with you for our next one.

Zain 17:10

Fine, fabulous or fucked the way O'Toole left. He did a Facebook Live video, five minutes or so, nicely produced, talked about what happened that afternoon or that morning, I should say, how he was voted out, how he'd be resigning as the leader of the Conservative Party by extension. And then his main takeaway was lessons to his party, as well as the prime minister that said, listen to the other side. I'm curious what you thought of that message. Was that exit that he's staying on as an MP? He did this video and that was his key message. Fine, fabulous or fucked? How Aaron O'Toole left as leader of the Conservative Party of Canada and his caucus? is uh

Corey 17:48

uh i think it was fabulous the the thing

Corey 17:50

thing about these farewell speeches right is is it's when the leader they got not to lose who gives a fuck this is what he actually believes i'm sure he's obviously thinking about his legacy too and how he wants to be remembered but but if you think about it even in that context if you truly believe you should be a right-wing demagogue you're going to think about your legacy and you're going to be a right-wing demagogue at that moment right but he he wasn't. And he talked about kind of this need to look across and see all of Canada. And, you know, I think that's the Aaron O'Toole that there were signs of that, you know, encouraged some of us to purchase real estate on O'Toole Island thinking, hey,

Corey 18:25

look, this, you know, this real estate's a steal right now. He might not be my cup of tea, but, you know, he could really make something happen.

Zain 18:32

happen. There's a path to viability, exactly. Yeah, there's

Corey 18:33

path to viability here.

Corey 18:36

it was really nice, but it does make you wonder, where was this guy?

Corey 18:41

Where was this guy guy before. And it did make me wonder, and I'm curious your thoughts as well.

Corey 18:46

Could that guy have done a lot better? I kind of think he might have if he had not tried to play the game so hard. If

Zain 18:51

If he didn't try to mix that guy with doses of the other guy. Carter, the exit for O'Toole, fine, fabulous or fucked in your mind?

Carter 18:58

It was fine. I mean, it's not fabulous, because again, who is this guy? Right? Is he the guy that did the farewell speech? Is he the guy that did the election campaign? Is he the guy that ran for the leadership? I mean, I'd like to think to you is the guy at the end but i don't know who he is i mean and this is one of the problems i mean in what 2010 2010 to 2015 everybody was talking about you know people who are authentic we were looking for authentic politicians we seem to have walked away from looking for authentic politicians and now we're just accepting the politician that that that you

Carter 19:33

sounds our bell the best right which which bell frequency do i want to hear what is the what is the thing that i'm looking to hear the whistle that i need to hear the dog whistle oh that's my whistle oh yeah we're against the anti-vaxxers yay ding-a-ling-a-ling right or we're for the anti-vaxxers yay ding-a-ling-a-ling right those dog whistle bell

Carter 19:52

bell things i don't know i've mixed up all my fucking analogies what do you want from me you

Zain 19:56

know what um what's a dog bell whistle this

Carter 20:00

is technical shit zane this is technical shit okay

Carter 20:03

okay i can't always stop and explain it to you okay so

Carter 20:08

but but here's the the thing who is he you

Carter 20:11

you know you guys bought your out your your real estate on O'Toole Island which guy's real estate were you buying which guy do you think you know which guy do you think could win I don't know who this guy is he's been in Canadian politics for quite a while now I don't know who he is because I thought one thing before he ran for the leadership I thought another thing in the leadership I thought another thing in the election and now I see his his farewell video and And I don't know who he is. So it's fine.

Carter 20:37

No, you know what? It's fucked.

Corey 20:40

You know what? I think it's fucked too. I've changed my answer. Okay, well, thank you. You know why I think it's fucked though? I think it's fucked that this is the moment he decided to be that guy. And, you know, as we talk this out more and more, I wonder if his big problem after the election was he then tried to flip back to party Aaron O'Toole. Yeah, the true blue style. Yeah, but that box was shut the minute you ran as a more moderate conservative. you probably should have just owned it carter

Zain 21:05

carter fine fabulous or fucked from a political strategy and execution level the way the rebels executed the oust of aaron o'toole the leaked letter that says the the one-third we're ready for the reform act out by leaked by monday out by wednesday the execution fine fabulous or fucked in your mind i'll start with carter then to you cory it's

Carter 21:26

it's fucked i mean it's this it's this um you

Carter 21:30

know who wants to be the leader of this shit who wants to to be the leader of this unwieldy caucus that doesn't know what they want from moment to moment i mean who are these guys who are these women that are men and women that are standing up that are just trashing the hell out of everybody and then like seconds later paliev launches

Carter 21:48

launches his leadership and 13 mms line up behind him like some sort of fucking lemmings no it's fucked it's fucked that they they went after him so publicly it's fucked that you know if you're gonna like there should should be a bit of decorum to take these people out right like there should be respect for what he has done for the party are

Zain 22:07

are you saying that as like a commentator or are you saying that as a strategist because i'm trying to wonder is there no part of you as a strategist that like appreciates what they were able to do no

Carter 22:17

no i never like i don't like this i don't like the i don't like the public declarations of taking people out if you're going to take them out take them out quietly and move them aside and allow them to do the dignified thing the the way i would have done it is i would would have gone to him and said i got the votes why

Carter 22:33

why don't you just why don't we do it this way we're not gonna we're not gonna go to the votes on wednesday yeah

Carter 22:38

you're gonna step down we've got the votes they're locked you're

Carter 22:41

you're gonna step out uh let's

Carter 22:44

let's do it a different time that's what i would have done i mean i would have said to him we've got the votes we can do the votes if you want that's interesting

Zain 22:50

interesting cory i want to

Carter 22:51

to do them we'll do it i

Zain 22:52

i want to get you on this cory fine fabulous or fuck the tactical execution execution of the rebels which turns out to be the majority supporting the caucus in this case. So I don't know if it was a small rebel

Zain 23:01

faction, but your thoughts? Well,

Corey 23:03

Well, when you define it as tactics, I think I have to say it was fabulous. They did it in 72 hours. That makes it look excellently well done. If you step back and you look at it from a more strategic, long-term view, though, a lot of what Stephen says, I'd agree with. And I want to add, there is always a next leader. And you've created an environment where this is your go-to And this is your response. I mean, just look at just look at Australia. Look at the United Kingdom. If you want to see what these like perpetual leadership spills look like. By the way, just as a total aside here, Boris Johnson having like Theresa May stick the knife in on some of the comments

Carter 23:39

comments last week. That's beautiful.

Corey 23:42

But there's always an ex-leader. And you have set the standard for how you treat the leader by how you treat the leader. And that's something you've got to be aware of if you're a rebel who has ambitions to be anything more than a rebel. Okay,

Zain 23:54

Okay, we're going to leave that one there. Corey, before the next leader, there's an interim leader. And the conservatives, that very evening, after the body was still warm and knifing Aaron O'Toole, they selected Candace Bergen as their interim leader. Fine, fabulous, or fucked. the choice of candace bergen as her interim leader for the conservative party candidate when she could be there for as many as six months or so depending on how this race rolls out i mean

Corey 24:18

mean it's it's fine they

Corey 24:19

they they could have picked worse they could have picked better in my opinion but what they did is they picked somebody who would be a consensus candidate uh that would work for a bunch of these different demographics that the conservative party is trying to hold together at all times i mean she uh she she can sort of play in in multiple time zones here obviously her support of the uh convoy yeah

Zain 24:43

yeah i mean real

Corey 24:44

real big tbd on all how have we not actually talked about the convoy oh we'll get to it it's coming yeah it's coming it's pretext

Corey 24:50

um and the fact that there's a photo of her wearing a mega camo hat is a little cringeworthy for me but it probably plays with a fair bit of the base there as they're trying to consider and calm waters is over there and

Corey 25:03

it's an interim leadership having having a very you know kind of forceful competent woman standing against uh justin trudeau i i does does them no harm and um and ultimately i i i feel better about her interim leadership than i do about the interim team she's assembled around her so carter

Zain 25:26

carter same question to you bergen interim leader fine fabulous or fucked in your mind it's

Carter 25:31

fucked i mean i'm old enough to remember candace bergen was playing murphy brown that's the only candace bergen that we should be talking about this one is a lunatic how corey hasn't recognized that the maga hat wasn't an anomaly that is who she is that is what she stands for she is the far right of the far right and she represents this small-minded type of conservatism that now she gets to define the conservative party for the leadership this is is a terrible situation for the conservatives. Explain that

Zain 26:01

that to listeners. What do you mean define it for the leadership? I understand what you mean, but explain that because there's

Carter 26:05

there's an important function she plays. Yeah, she gets to stand in the House of Commons. She gets to determine who's going to ask which questions. It's her and her team that are writing the questions. Take a look at what's being asked in the House. I mean, today's exhibition of parliamentary moronic tendencies is exactly what the conservatives are going to be faced with. They don't know which side of the coin they're on in any given day. One day they're going after, they love the convoy. The next day they're going after the prime minister for not getting rid of the convoy. Which is it? Pick a lane. And Candace Bergen doesn't have the capacity to pick a lane. She has, the only lane that she can pick is the lane that leads straight to Donald Trump land in Canada. And that is where we're heading with the Conservative Party of Canada. It is fucked.

Corey 26:54

I'm less of the view that interim leaders matter. You're a soft,

Carter 26:58

oh my God, they all matter. Because

Carter 27:00

Because it defines the party. Who are these MPs choosing? These 72 MPs that decided to jettison O'Toole and sell off your property on O'Toole Island? Those are the people who are choosing Candace Bergen. And Candace Bergen is not just, you know, another female MP. She's a lunatic.

Zain 27:24

i'm gonna i'm gonna move on because i want to get to skippy in

Carter 27:27

in a second because you know i'm right

Zain 27:28

it's okay before i do that carter fine fabulous or fuck the ousting

Zain 27:31

ousting of erin o'toole for jason kenny if i'm jason kenny is this fine that's not a big deal is this fabulous doubt it or is this fucked for my own leadership woes as i head into my leadership review in early april it's fucked

Carter 27:46

fucked you do not want to see a a a group of

Carter 27:50

of people throwing leaders overboard thinking hey hey, that's the way we're going to see electoral success. You needed O'Toole to survive just so you could point to O'Toole and say, look, he's rebuilding. He's putting it all together. This is the Conservatives. We're on the way up, right? O'Toole's doing better. I'm doing better. We're back on track. And throwing over O'Toole sends a signal to your base, your crazies, that says, you know what? If they can do it, we can do it. We have time. And I think that that's the message that people are going to hear. Corey,

Zain 28:22

Corey, fine, fabulous, or fuck for Jason Kenney, the O'Toole ousting?

Corey 28:26

Well, look, leadership changes can be contagious in Alberta. We'll remember, for example, Ed Stelmack resigning and then David Swan resigning leader of the official opposition at the time, basically within days, right?

Corey 28:39

So you got to watch out for that. And change begets change in these situations. But I ultimately think it's fine. I just it wasn't a comparable ousting. This was a caucus coup in the case of Aaron O'Toole. And coup's not accurate. Like, they used the Reform Act. They followed all of the rules, right? But when you talk about Jason Kenney's leadership contest, it's a very different kind of vote. It's that we've discussed it on this show before, but ultimately you're going to go to Red Deer. You're going to cast ballot as a member if you pay a fee, and then you're going to see the yeas or the nays there. I don't think it makes it more likely he survives the leadership contest. test, I don't think it seriously damages it. And in many ways, it could be a bit of a release or a relief valve if people sort of say, okay, we've had our pound of flesh here.

Zain 29:30

Oh, interesting. So you think there's a bit of O'Toole leaving could, in some strange way, benefit Kenny in that sense? Is that what

Corey 29:38

I'm hearing? I do, for a couple of different reasons. One of them is whenever these things happen and people look at the reaction, there's the possibility they say, okay, maybe that won't work out very very well, right? Because the consequences are so abstract until you actually see it. And then the other reason is simple bandwidth distraction. There is now a federal conservative leadership contest going on. The same people that you would be counting on to organize against Jason Kenney all of a sudden have something different to do. And that could have serious effects on what comes next. Carter,

Zain 30:08

Carter, what do you think of that analysis of folks dealing with this in abstractions and then the resourcing challenge? I think Corey makes a compelling point. What do do you think? Nah,

Carter 30:17

I think that there's tons of time for, you know, the conservatives to, conservatives love campaigning. If you go back to my discussion about sixes and sevens, right? These are the people who love to volunteer and they, you know, leaderships, having leaderships one on top of the other isn't such a big deal for them in Alberta. I think that it's relatively common when you keep throwing your leaders overboard every two years.

Corey 30:40

Corey? Well, look, to be clear, I'm not saying it makes, and I did say it doesn't make it more likely that jason kenney survives his leadership race i just don't know that it's going to have a huge effect i'm not sure it would be measurable take

Carter 30:51

take take a position cory come on yeah

Carter 30:53

it's the podcast we're

Carter 30:54

we're off o'toole island yeah we're looking for you now come on yeah

Zain 30:58

yeah this is sweaty what are you running for what are you running for cory uh cory i'm gonna stick with you fine fabulous or fucked pierre polly ever going out first over the weekend as tensions of the convoy escalates. The weekday in Ottawa seemed pretty calm-ish, seemed like we're about to end it. Nope. We head into the weekend and the convoy's back in full force. We'll talk about all that. But Pierre Polyever decides to put out a two-minute video announcing that he's running for prime minister. We'll talk about that too. But him getting out early. Let's start here. Fine, fabulous, or fucked if you're Pierre Polyever of the Conservative Party.

Corey 31:35

Party. For him, it's fabulous. It makes perfect sense. There's a couple of things going on here. One, you have decided, you've made the tactical decision, the strategic decision, that you are just going to try to scare all of the other fish out of the pond, right? You're going to come in, you're going to come in big, and

Corey 31:50

and you're going to do it in such a way that everybody says, well, it looks like it's his to lose, which is certainly the

Corey 31:55

the theme of the commentary that's come so far. The other thing is, think about the particular moment that we are in slash were in when he made this conversation. You've got these convoys in downtown Ottawa, which he has now tied himself to fairly closely, and there will ultimately be some

Corey 32:14

some retrospective on that. And if it ends kind of messy, you have a situation where all of a sudden, if that's the moment he decides to go in, some of those MPs who immediately jump to him right now might say, well, let's just see how this plays out a little bit. So he chose a moment where he had maximum kind of right-wing media darling cred, and he locked up as many of those early endorsements as he could. So it makes an awful lot of sense to me. It was probably the best moment for the next several weeks for sure, maybe even going on month for him to do it, and he did it. So if he was planning to run for leader, this was a very sensible way to do it. The other thing is he tied himself into a broader international conversation, and it's tough to sit there and look at an Instagram post with 460,000 views on a Sunday night and say, are those 460,000 Canadian views? Have right-wing nutjobs in Texas really jumped onto this? but it

Corey 33:08

allows you just to look big and impressive because you've captured a moment a media moment not just in this country but across the western world that well honestly again it just sort of feeds this thing of he looks like he'll be near impossible to beat carter

Zain 33:22

carter cory thinks it's fabulous do you agree from a strategy level if you were pure polyamory would you have launched over the weekend is this fine is this fabulous or is this fucked i

Carter 33:31

think it's fucked actually i I mean, I can see Corey's points, and I think that his points aren't wrong. And this is where we differ from every other point he's made tonight where I thought he was wrong.

Carter 33:42

But I see what he's trying to do. But I think that the problem is that he's tied himself to a particularly heavy anvil. And that particularly heavy anvil could be thrown into a lake, and he could be dragged down with it. And

Zain 33:55

And you're talking about the convoy. The

Carter 33:56

The convoy is fundamentally unpopular with huge swaths of Canadians. And if I were running a leadership

Carter 34:05

leadership against him, I would start putting up major pressure just within his own riding. I mean, there's not a nomination race or anything like that. But Ottawa is going to be very, very upset with Pierre Polyev for taking, you know, taking his position pro-convoy, pro-trucker, pro-anti-vax, pro-anti-mask. People want this shit to be over. over um it doesn't mean that they want it to be over on the truckers terms which i'm sure you're going to take us to here at some point but i i think that this hour two we'll

Zain 34:36

we'll do that an hour two hour

Carter 34:37

hour two yeah thanks hour three is going to be really good um but but but i think that in general he had he

Carter 34:45

had the ability just to wait a little bit he still is the darling of the right the right's not going to go away i would just wait till this truck thing is over and then i would would go back out. That's when I would have advised him to launch. So to

Zain 34:56

to paraphrase then, Carter, you're saying you would have waited so you don't tie yourself to this media moment, this data mining moment, this international conversation, which could have domestic cred for you? Am I putting words in your mouth by saying that? To broaden your base of people that you could appeal to?

Carter 35:13

There are two things. So everybody's always evaluating what is the upside, right? So the upside is X, Y, and Z, right? What is the the downside downside a b and c and i think that the downside risks of

Carter 35:26

of of being tied to this trucker convoy for the entire leadership and that's what i'd make sure that he's tied to if i was running a campaign against him he's going to be this far right candidate that tries to appeal to 13 of the electorate we can no longer appeal to 13 of the electorate we are the canadian conservative party or the Conservative Party of Canada. We must appeal across the country. Pierre Palliev can't. That's what I'd be tying him to. And I think that that's the risk that he took. So I think the risks outweigh the very real benefits that Corey articulated. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I don't think

Corey 36:01

think we're saying different things. I think his support of the convoy is fucked, and it could be an anvil around him for this leadership contest and certainly for any general election to follow. I sort of viewed that in the context of this question as baked in. He had made his decision to support that convoy before Aaron

Corey 36:18

Aaron O'Toole went down, before he ran for leader. But in that context, are things going to get better for him? Part of the reason why I think it was smart of him to go when he did is we

Corey 36:28

we will all view this convoy differently with time, right? And if people are very negative about that convoy and that's when he chooses to announce, you're not getting those endorsements he got on day one. He

Corey 36:39

the crest, but he picked it with the support of the convoy already baked in. The other thing is, Stephen's exactly right. People forget that in the 2015 election, which was a wave election, Polyev didn't win by a ton. It's not inconceivable to me that he could go down if he becomes this flashpoint of far-right conservatism in his Ottawa riding. So it's kind of not a smart move, I think, on a base survival level for a politician. But what's done is done on that front. run. And in that context, he's decided he's going to try to ride himself to the leadership and the prime ministership by being that guy. And if you're going to be that guy, that was the moment to get maximum benefit out of being that guy. I

Zain 37:22

I want to talk about this for a second. I've got a few tactical questions about his launch. I'll ask you guys in a sec. But let's talk about being that guy, to use your words, Corey. How do you de-risk, if you're working on Team Pierre, how do you de-risk that you're not just that guy, that you don't become 13% Pierre, that you don't just become someone defined by uh your your far right tendencies that you actually want to win the leadership and show a pathway to viability how do you win the leadership by um by ensuring you're not just that yeah

Corey 37:55

i don't think that's a prerequisite to winning the leadership sorry

Zain 37:58

sorry i thought we're going okay good you know it's harder it's so frustrating because this is exactly what i where i want to go about is the pc flank still viable for anyone but carter your thoughts first Maxime Bernier

Carter 38:08

Bernier got 49%, right?

Carter 38:11

right? You can win. Theoretically, you can win the leadership by being the right-wing darling. In fact, it's probably, given the behavior of Aaron O'Toole and Peter McKay, both trying to show their right-wing bona fides to the entire country as they were seeking the Conservative Party leadership, it might be the only way to fund a leadership and it might be the only way to actually win a leadership. The problem is if he does what he thinks, you know, if he wins the leadership, I think he faces real trouble in his home riding. And I think, you know, this idea that the liberals will, you know, Ottawa will just elect him after this convoy, after this after this situation. I mean, I don't know. I mean, we've I've said it a thousand times. Attention spans are short. Right. Every story is three to four days. This is an 11-day convoy. It's going to be remembered in a way that the January 6th riots in Washington is going to be remembered, right? Like these are going to be things that stick around for a long, long time, in my opinion. I could be wrong. I predicted O'Toole would survive. So what do I know?

Zain 39:23

You literally were like, he's fine. He's safe. He's safe. There's no issue.

Carter 39:26

issue. and then he was gone like seconds later it

Zain 39:30

was just the day it

Corey 39:32

it was just the

Corey 39:32

the day man just the day

Corey 39:37

uh if the election was next month he'd have a big problem but steven's drawn a parallel to january 6th in the united states and let's look at that one do we see republicans going down as a result of that is

Corey 39:50

is that anybody's view at this moment no

Carter 39:52

no republicans aren't going down as a result of that now now

Carter 39:55

now they're not going down as a result of it but but history changes the way we perceive events right and people may find themselves they may i mean shit five years from here now in the united states january 6th might be viewed as the the beginning of the ultimate revolution we don't know right you know that i'm true you know that that could happen yeah yeah yeah

Carter 40:18

you know that that that could happen so if if you

Carter 40:22

you know we don't know how it plays five years from now january 6th could be the the worst thing that ever happened in american politics and every one of those republicans who was standing up there sucking at the teat of that particular nightmare could be gone and a brand new republican party could be in place in the same way that the tea party took over the republicans once and now the tea party is nothing but a fond memory summary um this is this is crazy to me that we are uh that

Carter 40:50

that this these types of events aren't being immediately denounced by both political parties these are crazy to me but who

Carter 40:59

who knows may you know two three years it could be an anvil or could be the thing that lifts them up i

Zain 41:04

i want to go there and i promise i will let you guys go there but give me one more on pure polyamory oh

Carter 41:11

i've got many more hot takes carter fine fabulous or

Zain 41:14

or fucked his video

Zain 41:19

could go with a one-word answer and we can move on but if you got more if you got more ammo in that musket that you want to fire it's skippy's direction because

Carter 41:29

because you're not running to be the prime minister that's

Carter 41:32

wanted to go today this is the thing that bugs me the most when you're running you know and and people running running to be the leader of the Liberal Party in British Columbia, running to be the leader of the Alberta Party in Alberta, whatever, right? Like, run

Carter 41:45

run for the job. We got work to do before I can be the prime minister of Canada. And the work starts with me getting elected leader.

Carter 41:52

And then we start the hard work. Then we start the really hard work of rebuilding the party so that it appeals to the majority of Canadians. Already, we're getting more votes, but we're not winning elections. And that means that we have to do a better job, blah, blah, blah. But this I'm going to be prime minister stuff, especially coming from him, it puts a metallic taste

Carter 42:12

taste in my mouth. I think I'm going to have a stroke every time I hear it.

Zain 42:17

Corey, Fine Fablister fucked his video where he says he's running to be prime minister of Canada.

Corey 42:22

It's fine because he's running to be leader of the Conservative Party of Canada. And what he's saying is all subtext. What he's saying is we would have won if we were more true to our values. I'm going to be running on those values, ergo my victory is a given. He's saying exactly what they want to hear, and that's what you need to do to win a membership election, as he's trying to do.

Zain 42:43

Let's move it on to the convoy. Where do we begin, Corey? Where do we begin? Let's just start with the top line. We got a mighty

Zain 42:51

Fine, fabulous, or fucked, what we saw over this past weekend. Let's focus it on Ottawa. I'll get to the politics of the convoy and other parts of the country. Fine, fabulous, or fucked, the escalation in Ottawa over the weekend.

Corey 43:04

well i think it'd be hard to pick anything but fucked right this is great

Zain 43:08

great episode title i mean

Corey 43:11

mean it's so baked in it it's it's wild to me when we last recorded a week ago and we were talking about this thing on the weekend i'll be honest i thought there'd be a couple of stragglers but this shit would be over in a couple of days that the police would take the opportunity to say it's a work week now there's fewer people the moment of maximum tension is dialed down uh you You come in when the tension is going down, and that's when you start sweeping up the streets and taking care of business. The fact that this continued through the weekend, the utterly ineffectual response by the Ottawa Police Service, it was just befuddling, befuddling to me. And then we end up into the weekend, and more of this nonsense bullshit goes on. I mean, they're literally building goddamn saunas in the middle of parking lots. This is bullshit. shit and for a long time they were stockpiling gasoline diesel fuel like we

Corey 44:02

are aware that this is a government district we are aware that these things are flammable right yeah like does anybody think this is a good idea does anybody think it's a good idea like if somebody just said hey i'm gonna just have like an open air lot where i'm just gonna store this shit what do you think the reaction of people would be but no no no let's also add people who are furious at the government and want to have a coup and basically override it and like that's okay that doesn't require any intervention. No, I mean, it's absolutely top of the line fucked. The whole situation is crazy, and it never should have gone on as long as it has. I can't believe that it's still going on to this day. Like, there just needs to be a sweeping clear out here. And that's

Corey 44:42

that's that. I mean, this is our capital city, and we kind of look like clowns. And I am not one who leans it on Justin Trudeau. I'm not. I think there's an awful lot of people I hold more responsible at this this point and it's i

Corey 44:58

could just sputter on this forever so i'm

Corey 44:59

i'm just gonna hand

Zain 45:00

hand it over to steven i'll add more structure to to who who's responsible here but carter top line thoughts what we've seen this weekend actually to cory's point what we're seeing on this monday evening when we record fine fabulous or fucked in your mind it's

Carter 45:10

it's fucked i mean there's no way around it it's absolutely completely fucked uh why is it fucked well it's fucked because this This is a minority, a very small group of people behaving completely lawlessly and trying to make their point. Here's the thing. We allow peaceful protests in this country. What is peaceful, right? What is peaceful? Peaceful is not just the absence of violence. It is the absence of the threat of violence. And the threat of violence exists in these protests. And I'm saying these protests because it's not just the protest on Parliament Hill. The protest on Parliament Hill, yes, is the one that we're all focused on. But these protests have been occurring in every major Canadian city for weeks and months, right? In Inglewood, in our own little city, every Thursday for far too long, protesters have been setting bonfires to Corey's part about it being flammable. Inglewood is Calgary's oldest community. It is built of wood, right? And these people are setting up bonfires. They are shutting down businesses and they are behaving in a lawless fashion that threatens people's livelihoods and it threatens people's safety and people aren't intervening. And I'm going to leave that there, Zane, and I'm going to make sure that you ask me about who do we hold responsible because we're going to come back. You have to make sure we come back to that because I have a whole thing on

Zain 46:41

on who do we hold responsible. It's where we go next. Let's just go here. We've got many players, right? So we've got the federal government. We've got city council. We've got the police service. Talk to me about the response of police service. Let's start here. Fine, fabulous, or fucked, Ottawa police service. you know uh now saying this is a mob it's chaos encouraging city council to declare a state of emergency which they have others are blaming the prime minister for not showing up we'll get to that let's start with the police service fine fabulous or fucked their performance in what you saw and talk about ottawa specific we'll talk about the other regional protests in a second second um stephen

Zain 47:22

stephen carter to you fucked

Carter 47:25

fucked fuck fuck fucked because when

Carter 47:28

when the police say we're not going to intervene because we are afraid that it's going to get worse it gets worse invariably okay so back in the day so i i we didn't

Carter 47:40

didn't like when riot police came in with their shields and their and their batons and they would you know bang on the front of it and And then but we developed a new kind of way of policing. And the World Petroleum Congress here in Calgary, I think, was a really good example of that number of years ago. Maybe it was the World Petroleum Congress or Global Petroleum Congress or something like that. But basically, everybody and their dog came and they wanted to protest. And the police were very well prepared. And they had their bikes and they put their bikes out and they allowed people to do peaceful protests within specific zones. Right. So if you stayed within your zone, no problem. and and the police had a excellent response plan it was all mapped out everything worked the way it was supposed to work because the protesters did what they were supposed to do and the police did what they were supposed to do and now that same game plan exists from the one side right from the police side the police side is we're not going to intervene we're not going to get in the way of these protesters lest we make a bad situation worse and so what they do is they they make a bad situation worse because now the protesters are allowed to occupy. They're allowed to march down the street. So whether it's a simple march where they're walking down 17th Avenue in Calgary or a parked protest in front of Parliament Hill, those

Carter 48:57

those people are allowed to take space that isn't theirs to take, right? They are allowed to take their protest from that designated spot where we wanted them to be to a new spot their freedom to protest has now impinged upon my my freedom to move around in my city my freedom to sleep at night without the horns going off my freedoms are infringed by this other group that is coming after us and they are coming after us um in a violent fashion and the police because they have taken this we will not respond because things are going going to get worse tactic allow things to get worse and then the canadian public blames the politicians well here's a surprise for you politicians can't direct the police force in ottawa or in calgary right it's not like the the the mayor picks up the telephone and calls the police service and says you guys got to start enforcing this shit it's civilian oversight and it is weak leadership across the board because the police chiefs are so afraid of the negative publicity. They care more about the negative publicity than what their civilian oversight wants them to do. And they do not act. And so we have police chiefs that are weak-kneed and not leading their actual police forces. And we wind up with a situation where the police are impotent and the protesters are godlike. And that is not the society in which we should live.

Zain 50:21

Corey, I want to get to you in one second. I want one point of clarification from you, Carter, in terms of explaining to our listeners. Talk to me about civilian oversight. Talk to me about what that looks like. And you talked about how it's weak. Is that the point of breakdown in your mind? And if it is, at least at the very least, explain to folks what the civilian oversight of police looks

Zain 50:41

looks like and commissions, et cetera, is where I'm leading to, right?

Carter 50:44

Police are afraid, right? Is that OK if we say that police are afraid? They are afraid to be taken. They are afraid to act in an aggressive fashion. and they are afraid that the sins of their past will color the potential, their actions of the future. And that should be the case, right? I think that it is good that the police are reflecting on their actions in the past and whether or not they have been too harsh, especially in things like shutting down peaceful protests or, you know, like the 1960s civil rights movements or even the Black Lives Matter movements. in the united states we haven't seen that though in canada and the reason is in canada our protests were much more civilized and our police were far we're much more civilized but these are uncivilized protests and we're still using the civilized response and the police chiefs are looking for strong leadership that says this is okay this is what our community expects expects our community expects that if people are are are putting up piles of gas that are moving in a sauna and a hot tub that you should get them the hell out of there that this is not the type of protest that we want to see our community should be saying that's too much and that's where it comes to the civilian boards these unpaid volunteer boards that are scared of their own shadows and they're not leaders it's like asking a non-profit society board to take action with a 400 or 600 million dollar police force it just will never happen demand better from the volunteer we these people shouldn't be volunteers they should be paid they should be experts they should know what they're talking about and they shouldn't be afraid to take a stance and direct their police chief to take action when action is appropriate i appreciate

Zain 52:35

appreciate that carter that breakdown of governance i think is quite important in terms of when we talk about where where the pain points Corey, fine, fabulous, or fucked? Ottawa police response over the last week or so that we've seen leading up to this past weekend.

Corey 52:49

So, I mean, I listened to what Stephen said. I'm not where he is. Look, I don't think protests are required to be comfortable. I don't want police services to default to forceful action, that's for sure. But I don't think that you are required to sit in a box when you're protesting. I think the whole point of a protest is to raise some noise and raise some action. And there are many examples of people doing positive change through protest. I think this is dreadful change were they ever to be successful. I don't want to create a false equivalency between good things and bad things here. But the fact of the matter is, people are going to view that question differently. All of that said, though, it

Corey 53:27

it doesn't excuse the Ottawa Police Service in this moment. I mean, what was the plan here? What was the plan here? That is the question that I think should be on everybody's tongue for the next bit.

Corey 53:38

You knew these people were coming in. This actually ended up being a smaller protest, smaller protest. Because of the frigid temperatures, other reasons, et cetera. They would see.

Corey 53:47

And it was out of your control instantly.

Corey 53:49

instantly. Instantly out of your control. What was your fucking plan? Why

Corey 53:53

Why didn't you have the Ontario police, provincial police there sooner? Why didn't you have the RCMP there sooner? Why weren't you having those difficult conversations about declaring an emergency sooner? Because if you look at what happened, none of it happened to worst case scenario, and you were still utterly incapable of dealing with it. Utterly incapable. capable.

Corey 54:12

So ask some tough questions, I think, of your Ottawa Police Service here, if you happen to live in that city.

Corey 54:19

The other thing I'll say is, is there is a line, right? Like, as much as I don't think a protest is required to be comfortable, at the end of the day, we are a country that's governed by laws, not by the whims of the angriest, right? And things can't get so out of control and so overboard that it causes serious damage to other people and property and all of those other There are other things that people are, I think, rightly anxious about at this point. You know, it's like that old, so in the United States, there was a Supreme Court justice named Stewart. His test for obscenity was, I know it when I see it, right? And there is kind of a similar test here. The fact that everybody is so freaked out in

Corey 54:56

in downtown Ottawa by the behavior on their streets and the fact that, you know, there are these random moments of violence and there's almost this like verbal violence that's occurring and there's just this lack of safety that Stephen talked to really

Corey 55:09

really says like there is a moment where you just say, OK, enough, enough.

Corey 55:13

enough. I don't give a shit. Enough.

Corey 55:14

Enough. And we're going to deal with this because we are ultimately a nation of laws. And it feels to me that moment's passed. It feels to me that it would be passed and the amount of people that would come was so foreseeable. And I'll tell you another thing. It's a lot harder to tear down a sauna and take away gasoline than not allow those things to be put there in the first place. Carter?

Carter 55:38

Well, I just think that, you know, Corey makes a good point about protests should be, you know, it doesn't need to be peaceful. It doesn't need to be, you know, without pain. You know, I'd be allowed, I would allow, like, I think that sometimes it might be better just to let them go for their little march, right? Personally, I'd like them to get a permit and pay for it, but whatever, they're not going to do that. But

Carter 55:59

But let them go on their little march. But where I draw the line is when people's lives are impacted. And when I see businesses having to shut down because week after week after week, people are coming and protesting and fighting and attacking these businesses because they're doing the right thing and following the law. And then I see, you know, the residents in Ottawa getting impacted in such a foul way and businesses being impacted in a foul way. All of those people who couldn't go to work at Rideau Center, they didn't get paid. They didn't get any money. They're not, they're worse off today day because some other some assholes impacted their lives and uh not only that you know we

Carter 56:42

we shouldn't govern the speech we shouldn't say you know your speech is good or your speech is bad but when they're bringing hateful rhetoric to it when they're bringing racist rhetoric when they're bringing uh the these pieces that are that are just going too far like you you

Carter 56:57

gotta put a stop to it because it only amplifies and it only ends in violence. You must, must, must end it. And I would argue this is in violence now. It has been in violence in Ottawa for far too long, and it has kept people away from their livelihoods and away from their homes and away from their businesses for far too long.

Zain 57:19

Corey, you wanted to jump in here before I move on to the next bit.

Corey 57:22

Yeah. Stephen said something about inconveniencing people. Again, I would say a certain amount of of inconvenience. That's kind of what a protest is all about, right? You're trying to draw attention and all of that.

Corey 57:33

But again, like, it's all about extremities and balances here. You have a right to protest. You also have a right to a livelihood, and rights need to be balanced. And, you know, I would say in general, and maybe one of these things we need to be talking about more, is that absolutely, literally any action can be described as a right. Anything can be described as a freedom. You could say, I have the freedom to drive as fast as I want. I have the right to punch people people with bad opinions in the face. I mean, you can describe anything in those terms. It doesn't necessarily make it true.

Corey 58:03

But when we actually get beyond kind of the pedantry of that and kind of the word games of that, the way we actually test this is we say, well, no rights absolute. And generally, the limit of your rights is when they unreasonably infringe on mine. And it's that balancing act that you've got to consider here. And so a couple of hours, deeply inconveniencing Ottawa, maybe even a day or two, deeply inconveniencing Ottawa.

Corey 58:25

That's something I'd here. But when you start moving into multiple weeks in our nation's capital, and you have people who have just been afraid and unable to sleep and on edge for 200

Corey 58:35

200 hours, well, I got a real problem with that. And I think that that, you know, that balance is not a tough one to figure out.

Zain 58:42

Good use of the term pedantry, Corey. Nicely done. I appreciate that. Carter, I'm gonna actually move the blame game, if I can call it that, to someone else. And Corey Or he said, in his perspective, he doesn't necessarily blame Justin Trudeau. But I want to ask it to you, Carter, in this way. Trudeau and his government's refusal to meet with the convoy, fine,

Zain 59:03

fine, fabulous, or fucked. And the reason I ask that is because much blame to Trudeau, right? Like hate, vitriol, etc. But also the conversations, including some we've had on this podcast about Trudeau's election rhetoric against the unvaccinated, Trudeau's anti-vax rhetoric, the pounding of that wedge. So talk to me about it. Trudeau's refusal to meet with this group, continuing to call them a fringe group, fine, fabulous or fucked?

Carter 59:32

I turn it around?

Carter 59:34

Right. These people's demand to meet with the with the prime minister is fucked. Right. These people's demands that this is going to you know, that they're going to be heard is fucked. That's not the way the world works. There's a protest at Parliament Hill every week. There's a protest at the legislature every couple of weeks. These are things that are that are supposed to happen. You demand to see the prime minister. You demand to talk to a minister, whatever. You're not going to get your meeting by protesting. You get your meeting by doing old fashioned work and getting people to listen to you. This is bullshit. The fact that the conservatives gave meetings to these people was fucked. the fact that michael cooper enabled himself to do an interview with a with an upside down canadian flag walking past him in a swastika that's fucked anybody

Carter 1:00:22

anybody who's any protest that's got those types of people there should never be meeting with the prime minister of canada because it's fucked so if you ask me if it's fine fabulous or fucked that the prime minister didn't didn't meet with them i don't want to say it's fabulous i don't want to say it's fine because the idea that he would in and of itself is just fucked so there is no way that this is something that should be allowed it's totally fucked corey

Zain 1:00:47

corey i see you smiling i see you nodding i see you raising your eyebrows i

Corey 1:00:51

i i mean i absolutely agree um well

Corey 1:00:54

well let's just say with 90 of that you know it's 90 what's the 10 you don't agree

Corey 1:00:59

don't even worry about it but i i think it's true like why meet with them What's the negotiation here? Why in Christ would Justin Trudeau sit and talk to these assholes? Like, what's the negotiation? You want to hang me for treason. And you think

Corey 1:01:15

there should be a coup. How about instead we just kind of like crank my neck a bit, you know, maybe break a few vertebrae. Tard

Carter 1:01:23

Tard feather would be fine. Leave me alone.

Carter 1:01:25

I'm up for tarring and feather. I'm

Corey 1:01:26

I'm good to be paralyzed but not killed. Like, what the fuck is this? This is a stupid protest with stupid goals that is deeply unfocused, as we've talked about before, and I don't think a prime minister should be meeting with them. There

Corey 1:01:40

There are other ways that the prime minister could have shown his empathy on this matter, to your broader point. None of them involve meeting with this. Let

Zain 1:01:49

Let me get to that broader point, but I do want to talk about a potential political victory that the convoys, plural, now that there's multiple regionally, could be backing into, which is political victories from premiers that might be sunsetting certain restrictions or vaccine passports, etc. et cetera. And one of the increasing, and I'll keep the focus on the prime minister, Corey, one of the increasing data points that we're seeing is that what once was maybe a 90% wedge issue with vaccinations is less so that when people now look at restrictions, and that's less of a popular wedge issue, if a wedge issue in the prime minister's favor at all. So it relates to that political risk for Trudeau. I'll ask it to you in that way. Is it fine? Is it fabulous? Or Or is it fucked, the political risk that Trudeau faces now with growing swells of the population, not just these convoys wanting fewer and fewer restrictions?

Corey 1:02:47

Yeah, we flagged this for the past few weeks at the very least. But this is a growing area that the prime minister is going to have to deal with. The sentiment in this country is shifting to one of we've got to ease up on restrictions here. And that's been clear since early January, at least. You saw that with reactions to some of the measures that Ontario brought in, for sure, where there was not a lot of gratitude that schools were going to be closed for, you know, a few more days. Let's put it that way there. the center is moving on this issue and it's moving for a lot of reasons one is just straight up fatigue people are so tired of it and i mean we can we can kind of point

Corey 1:03:26

point to the absurdity of saying well i'm fed up of this danger so i'm just going to like who cares but that is sort of human nature we we kind of re-baseline all of the time the other is much more selfish so many of us have had covet at this point like on this podcast two out of three two out of three yeah and uh and so So we start looking at these restrictions, not us personally, I'm kind of just sort of rhetorically grandizing here, and we start saying, well, why? I don't have anything to worry about now. Fuck the kids under five. You know, fuck the people with the comorbidities. I just want to go to, you know, Montana's and get myself a steak or whatever. I don't know, right? But there is a certain selfishness in here as well where the fear is gone, right? The fear is gone for so many of us who have now gone through the disease, and all we see are the restrictions in front of us. And that's a damning testament on humans, but I think that's a huge component of it.

Zain 1:04:20

Carter, find Fabulous or Fuck the political risks of the prime minister of the ever-shifting public opinion on restrictions. This might be the political win that he doesn't want to give to the convoy, but how does he react? How do premiers react? Let's talk about the prime minister for a second. can find fabulous or fucked the political risk at the moment i

Carter 1:04:40

think it's fucked uh and and the reason i think it's fucked is because i'm not sure what the risks are or not i'm sorry not what the risk are what the restrictions are right cory talked about wanting to go to montana's uh which is good because he's got a big family and you know we don't want it to cost him too much money so he goes and he gets the uh he gets the uh the onion ring thing or the you know the fried onion that kills you in three three

Carter 1:05:03

three years early whatever you're eating um you

Carter 1:05:06

you know that that's good for him i i'm pleased but he can go to montana's right the only people who can't go to montana's are the people who don't have the uh the restrict you know the what is it the the qr code right uh because the restrictions exemption program our vaccine passport here is actually pretty easy right i take my piece of id out and i show them my my passport i can go anywhere I don't feel like I'm restricted right now. Am I restricted in some fashion that I'm unaware of? I can go to work. I can go to – I mean I guess we're not supposed to go to work.

Carter 1:05:42

I'm not going to fucking work right now.

Zain 1:05:43

In fact, Carter, try

Carter 1:05:45

try it. I'm not asking for anybody in particular. I'm just saying that it might be time that we monetize this. You're

Carter 1:05:52

at work, Carter. Yeah, this is what I do now.

Corey 1:05:58

You've got time to go to a lot of restaurants. We hear you. Here's my question.

Carter 1:06:02

What are we restricted from? What are we restricted from? Like, okay, great. You pulled the restriction exemptions program. Am I more likely to go to a restaurant when that's done? No. Because, yeah, I'm done with this, Corey. Yes, I've had COVID. Yes, I don't want to wear a mask. But we went to Revelstoke on the weekend to go skiing. And that's why we couldn't record last night because it got a little bit dicey getting home. But

Carter 1:06:27

we skied. We went to great restaurants. We, you know, we showed them our passports. We showed them our ID. We walked in. We got we got great food. We had a lovely time. We went skiing. It was fantastic. What am I constrained on here? What am I constrained on? All it is, is minor inconvenience to try and protect people

Carter 1:06:48

people that need protecting from a virus that, frankly, continues to kill too many people. I mean, we don't even follow the numbers anymore. I used to follow the numbers religiously. I don't know what the numbers are right now.

Carter 1:07:01

I still know, like, and if all the exemptions left tomorrow, would I show up at Chinook Center without a mask on?

Carter 1:07:09

I'm not sure I would.

Carter 1:07:11

I'm not sure that I would. So I'm not sure exactly what it is that we're going to be rescued from. Yeah, sure. Send us back to work. Whatever. I don't care. What I do care about is making sure that more people don't get COVID and we don't have a fifth wave because we've done, or I'm sorry, a sixth wave because this fifth one was crap and I don't want to do anymore.

Zain 1:07:31

Corey, you want to jump in here before I move on? Well,

Corey 1:07:33

Well, yeah, there are some restrictions still. A lot of workplaces are not really backing at them. There

Corey 1:07:39

There is also the reality that there's limited capacity in some areas. Not every jurisdiction is as libertine as Alberta as well, I think we should acknowledge at this particular moment. Oh,

Carter 1:07:48

Oh, yeah. Every Quebecer was in Revelstoke skiing.

Carter 1:07:51

It was all French. It was all French. It was fantastic.

Corey 1:07:56

Well, but, you know, I'm also but I would say all of that notwithstanding is not based on a rational lack of access to things. It's a feeling. It's a feeling that why why are things open, quote unquote, open again? And I shouldn't we be over this? And I don't have anything to worry about now. And look, like I said, it doesn't speak well to the human existence. But if you were the prime minister, and this is your question, Zane, and I never actually gave you a fine, fabulous or fucked on here. The reality is there is a shift in public opinion that has like the bow wave has, you know, like it has crashed through the conservative party. It has it has shattered it to pieces, right? right?

Corey 1:08:34

But now it's going to hit the liberals, it's going to hit the New Democrats, public opinion is shifting on this matter. And if you're the prime minister, you are still pretty far out on a ledge with some of your rhetoric here. And let's just talk about the strategy of that and the tactics of that. And, you know, you

Corey 1:08:52

you and I, Zane, in particular, have talked about the poison of that.

Corey 1:08:56

But there is a challenge coming for this prime minister. And to lose a couple of weeks to a moment where he rightly he's got to tell them all to go go fuck themselves, right? Because of the way this is all set up. It's

Corey 1:09:08

It's just another couple weeks that he's not resolving some of these issues in a more optimal fashion. Let's

Zain 1:09:12

Let's jump to that question. Corey, I'll start with you. Fine, fabulous or fucked. The Prime Minister was not seen from January 31, when he first announced he had COVID to tonight, when he spoke at the emergency debate in Parliament. Fine, fabulous or fucked his lack of absence or even lack of social media sort of commentary commentary putting out a post doing anything about this this convoy to the point that ottawa's mayor or i think earlier this morning or or was it yesterday and all the days are blurring together said we need the prime minister here guys like we need the prime minister here to get some compromise on the table but trudeau's choice here he said some shit like that uh watson did fine fabulous or fucked uh the absence from the 31st to tonight when he spoke for the first time and we'll talk about what he said at the emergency debates uh in the house of commerce

Corey 1:09:58

commerce well for For sure, fine. I might even say borderline fabulous. Let's unpack a few things. The first was just sort of like a throwaway in your comment. The guy's had COVID, right? He's missed

Corey 1:10:08

week. How dare you?

Zain 1:10:09

you? He's had COVID. It's fine. People

Zain 1:10:15

but also in any other form.

Corey 1:10:17

form. Let's be clear. That's

Corey 1:10:18

That's fine. The guy's had COVID. Ask me how productive I was last week relative to a normal week on the job right number two uh

Corey 1:10:27

negotiate with what we just finished saying that we thought any negotiation would be absolutely asinine so what is he gonna say just stand up and poke people in the eyes and say here i am fuck you here i am fuck you like doesn't that seem like that might be pouring steven would want that wouldn't that seem like pouring diesel fuel on a diesel fuel filled lot like i like it just it's just adding more combustibility to the whole situation here So I'm fine with him not being around. I do think that it is surprising that he disappeared, but I'm not necessarily sure it was a bad thing. And I really think it's a little bit bullshit that the conservatives have played footsie on this matter for the last week and is now trying to lay it at the feet of the prime minister. That's a bit nonsense. And I don't really want to play into that game. And that's part of maybe why I'm being kind of stubborn on this fine borderline fabulous.

Carter 1:11:18

just love his absence.

Zain 1:11:19

absence. Fine, fabulous or fucked. Well,

Carter 1:11:20

Well, I'm just going to start with Corey's. The conservatives were playing footsie. Is that how you described, you know, when you full on go into bed with somebody, have sex with them, have their babies? We're just playing footsie. I mean, they were right in there, man. They were loving the convoy. Aaron O'Toole all the way through. Everybody was getting interviewed. Everybody was talking to these folks. This was the Conservative Party jumping right in. And in terms of the absence of the prime minister, he was sick. He had COVID. I don't care if we see him tweeting about how bad this thing is. He has ministers. Everybody was doing their job. So I'm not sure that it can be fine. I'm not sure that it can be fabulous. he was fucked with covid that's it what are you gonna do i'm

Corey 1:12:07

i'm starting to realize something

Zain 1:12:13

you got something to add we're an hour and

Carter 1:12:14

and 12 minutes in and you guys have finally figured it out good

Carter 1:12:20

listeners figured it out 45 minutes ago they've

Corey 1:12:24

they've always been smart they're smart let's

Zain 1:12:26

let's let's let's let's maybe drop the format for a second and maybe end on this carter let's talk Let's talk about how this ends. Let's talk about the natural conclusion here. Let's talk about the strategy. Let's talk about the tactics. Let's talk about the goals here. What does de-escalation look like? If you are advising a prime minister, this prime minister, is

Zain 1:12:46

is it any pressure points from his office? Is it the government? Let's talk about it from a political strategy perspective, but then also let's do a bit of the analysis as we've been doing. How does this end? I don't want to ask it in the same format because I think there's a longer conversation here at an hour and 13 minutes. But Carter, how

Zain 1:13:05

how does this end? And what are you thinking about from a political strategy and tactics perspective to help this ease and end?

Carter 1:13:13

Well, I mean, I think that if

Carter 1:13:15

if it were me, I'd be advising the prime minister to stay away from this until such time as it was over, because I don't want to be seen to be weakened by these folks. I don't want to be seen to be, you know, kowtowing to them in any way, shape or form. They are taking a position that, you know, what, 70 percent of the population feels is wrong. You're on the right side of 70 percent. You should stay on that right side and try not to mess it up by getting in front of this thing. You know, he was fine in question, you know, in the emergency debate today. That's great. You know, now

Carter 1:13:49

now get out of it and hope for the Ottawa police to

Carter 1:13:52

to do the right thing. Make sure that your security, I can't remember what the minister's title is, safety, public safety. Is that what it is? Public safety minister has, pardon

Zain 1:14:04

Is it Blair? I think it might be Blair. I

Carter 1:14:06

I think they changed it to. Okay.

Carter 1:14:08

But it doesn't matter. Just make sure that that

Carter 1:14:11

that minister knows that you're giving every support you can to the Ottawa Police Service, Ontario Police Service, and, you

Carter 1:14:21

know, the RCMP. everybody knows that they've got whatever they need to do they've

Carter 1:14:25

they've got the resources uh because that's what the politicians can do is give out the resources so make sure that you've got that message going out we are taking care of this this is the this is now well resourced from the federal government right this is the equivalent of the federal government saying we will pay the security fees security costs for the olympic games they

Carter 1:14:45

they are now saying to ottawa we will pay the security costs for getting you know for whatever the Ottawa Police Service determines

Carter 1:14:52

determines is required we will pay for this and then get him the hell out of there and then once it's over then he comes in and he says you know I actually like the fact that you have to be vaccinated to travel you know I'm hoping that they don't remove that because I think that that's imperative to ensure that we're not spreading other variants later in as this thing develops so I'm not hoping to see major changes from him. I'm just hoping for him to weather well, this particular nightmare in Ottawa.

Zain 1:15:23

Corey, what is what is the end of this look like from a political strategy and

Zain 1:15:28

communications perspective? And Carter, that Minister Marco Mendicino that we were talking

Corey 1:15:33

talking about public safety?

Zain 1:15:34

Corey, what do you think?

Corey 1:15:39

Well, it's, you've got kind of the short term and the long term here, short term, how do you clean up the mess in ottawa how do you just resolve this particular situation the answer is pretty simple it's not fancy it's effectively

Corey 1:15:51

effectively going block by block putting everybody on warning that within say 12 hours you're

Corey 1:15:56

you're going to start ticketing you're going to start towing you're going to start pulling insurance if we can't find a tow truck well we're just going to get a bunch of truck drivers uh you know to literally just drive your car out of here but this is over this This is done, and you are on notice, and then you just start moving basically block by block and taking everybody out of the city and just keeping that police presence there for a few weeks, hopefully at a lower level, just to sort of manage the situation, and you also got to watch it and see that it doesn't kind of spill out everywhere else. And then the Ottawa police probably has to answer some questions about how they were so ill-prepared for this particular situation to begin with, why these requests came, when these requests came. It has to be noted that other provinces in this same country have been able to deal with this, Quebec, British Columbia, even other cities in the same province, right? And when we start talking about if you are the prime minister, it's not necessary to kind of apportion blame, but you do need some of those facts to stand for themselves. Now, Ottawa is not a federal city. It's not Washington, D.C. I think that's an important thing to keep in mind. It

Corey 1:17:05

It makes an interesting case for it being a federal city. What do you mean by that, Corey? I mean, Washington, D.C. is not part of a state. Washington, D.C. is directly run by Congress. Congress can just do whatever they want with the city. Even self-governance, limited though it may be, is entirely at the whim of Congress. So you've got to work within our federal construct here. You've got provinces who are primarily responsible for policing. But Stephen's right. You've got to make sure that there is everything

Corey 1:17:31

everything that they could possibly need, money to pay for overtime, time. You know, federal police forces that exist available to do that, putting

Corey 1:17:38

putting the pressure on people around, including Doug Ford, some of that was done today. And you've got to just make sure that it's available. But there's obviously a much, much bigger problem here, like a much bigger problem. And there's so many different ways to take it. One is just kind of this, this deep polarization and tension that we have on this matter in this country more general.

Corey 1:18:00

Let's maybe park that for a moment. I think we also got to see this as a bit of a wake-up call here. This is just kind of part of a story. We've seen this been playing out for two decades in the United States. We're seeing ugly elements of it here. You can argue about how much of it is imported versus homegrown. It doesn't really matter. Here it is, right? And one of the things that I think Ottawa made really clear to me is that maybe

Corey 1:18:27

maybe it's already too late, but we've got got to decide we want to do something about this, right? We got to decide we want to do something about this, and this is not acceptable. We can't just sort of sleepwalk forward. Because if I do have a criticism of governments writ large, including Justin Trudeau's, it's that feels

Corey 1:18:42

feels like people are asleep at the switch here, right? We can learn from this, though. So maybe let's park that blame for a minute and ask ourselves, what can we learn to be more prepared so the next time a convoy of 100 trucks shows up in downtown Ottawa, it doesn't disrupt this nation so severely for 10 days where we go from now what we do next matters a lot so let's let's spend a little time on recrimination if only so certain people don't get put in positions where they can screw things up so badly but let's think about what's next and let's think as a country about what we want to happen next time a situation like this comes up koi

Zain 1:19:17

koi i hate to give you any credit or even call you prescient but there was a piece you wrote for politico was it two three weeks

Zain 1:19:25

back just a few weeks ago.

Zain 1:19:27

Predicting, you had, I think, correct me if I'm wrong, don't fall asleep at the switch and look at what's happening in the United States. And I feel like those were two of your points, or maybe they've been one point. And you said them here today. Those two were penned three weeks ago prior to this kind of taking shape or taking root. I think that lesson is very strongly relatable right now. But Carter, I wanted you to jump in, and I'll kind of end with one final strategy question to make you guys a little bit uncomfortable. But Carter, I want to get your thoughts on what Corey just said here around the broader problem, the bigger problem. We'll have plenty of time to dissect it, but in the confines of how does this end, talk to me about some of the vision pieces and the strategy pieces of the broader problem.

Carter 1:20:12

Except Candace Bergen's point, we are a deeply divided country. We

Carter 1:20:16

We are a deeply divided country. That is completely true. But

Carter 1:20:19

But we're a deeply divided country with 70% on one side and 20% on the other side. And if you're going to be successful politically, make sure you're on the side where the 70% is, because that deep divide is not wrong. But it's not 50-50 like they're seeing in the United States. It's 70-20. There's 10% that can't decide which side of this chasm they want to be on, but it's 70-20. So why not just allow yourself to live in that 70%? You're not going to get them all voting for you, but this is a really good, this is a good opportunity to go back to our six rules for the pandemic and find that safe middle road, not too far to the right, not too far to the left, you know, not too hot, not too cold, the Goldilocks zone for the last bits of COVID. Keep going back to where we were however many episodes ago when we had our six rules for managing COVID. COVID, those rules aren't wrong. And they can still be managed right now. And as I'm watching Jason Kenney, Jason Kenney is getting ready to break one of the rules and move too far too fast to one side.

Zain 1:21:26

And you're talking about sunsetting the restriction exemption program. Is that correct, Carter? I mean,

Carter 1:21:30

mean, just move slower. No one's that angry. Well, I shouldn't say no one. 20% of the population, 15% of the population is really, really angry about having to show their vaccination vaccination status. Oops-a-daisy. Let them stay angry for an extra three

Carter 1:21:45

three weeks, four weeks. And I mean, that just doesn't fit into his leadership timeline. That's all that problem is. It just doesn't fit into his leadership.

Zain 1:21:52

I told you I would end with a question that might make us squirm, but we have to talk about it, which is, how

Zain 1:21:57

how does this end, of course, from the political side, the long-term consequences of short-term policing?

Zain 1:22:03

Carter, how does this end from the the convoy's perspective. How did they declare a victory? How did they find an off-ramp? What is something they need? And not saying the prime minister or the police service or a city council or provincial government needs to give it to them. What is something they take away as showcasing their movement so that, let's call it chapter one, and hopefully the only chapter, but let's call it chapter one of this saga ends now.

Zain 1:22:29

And, you know, this group is already taking preemptive credit for sunsetting of vaccination passports and exemption programs across the country. They took credit for O'Toole falling. The irony in that is not lost on many of us. They took credit that Legault backtracked on his anti-vax tax in Quebec. But let's talk about what victory or winning for this group looks like, because the end to this might need a little bit of give and take. And what's something they walk away with? What's something, if you were whispering in their ear saying, you got this, leave, walk away, you declared victory, you made your point, and you got, you know, something from it. Carter, from your perspective, and I told you, it's an awkward question, but I want to ask it. Because we're a strategy podcast at the end of the day, they may not be thinking in these terms, but what is on the table for them in that regard?

Carter 1:23:20

I think that their only real victory is going to be some sort of confrontation.

Carter 1:23:26

Yeah, because they'll claim victory for whatever, right? Jason Kenney removes the restrictions exemption program. We win, right? Good for us. We did what we needed to do.

Carter 1:23:38

You know, Quebec and Ontario are slowly reopening. You know, we start to see changes to the way that people are perceiving this pandemic. They get to claim victory, to your point. They get to claim victory for everything. What is the real victory? Well, when you go in and demand that the, you

Carter 1:23:57

you know, the prime minister be arrested and that some sort of new government be put

Carter 1:24:02

put in place, you're calling for a coup. There is no victory in your call for a coup.

Carter 1:24:07

So, you know, you're coming down a long ways from changing the government to, you know, you no longer have to show on your phone that you've got your vaccine exemption, you know, that you're vaccinated. like that's that's quite a distance so i'm not really sure how they how

Carter 1:24:22

how they get there unless the goalposts

Zain 1:24:24

goalposts or whatever well

Carter 1:24:24

well the confrontation i think is ultimately where their their real value is and they're i

Carter 1:24:30

mean i'm sure that somewhere the police the the people who are on the other side of the argument that i made earlier are saying we

Carter 1:24:35

we can't give them the confrontation you can't give them that confrontation because that's what they what that's what they need but i don't care anymore just get them the hell out of the capital so give them the confrontation confrontation that they want and get them the hell out of there cory

Zain 1:24:50

cory that's where carter is where are you on on you know if you were whispering in their ears of what they have take it and leave as part of the the de-escalation and the close of this chapter what is it for you yeah

Corey 1:25:03

yeah so we said a week ago that this wasn't about their specific demands that they were a vehicle for general frustrations and people who wanted things to change and yes there will will not be a coup in canada but make no mistake they're not just claiming victory they

Corey 1:25:21

mean they're 20 of the population and they want so

Corey 1:25:25

so if you the 70 have a problem with that think

Corey 1:25:28

think about what you're going to do next time and think about what matters to you and think about if this is the dynamic that we want to have set up in this country going

Zain 1:25:38

let's give me a bit more more on this give me a bit more on they won you

Zain 1:25:42

you give me a bit more on on

Corey 1:25:44

on on what they've won

Corey 1:25:46

the reps are all going down now you

Corey 1:25:48

it was going to happen at some point anyhow but it's now happening because of them you

Corey 1:25:53

you know doug ford will be there jason kenney's already there lego has even had to soften and lego doesn't soften on fucking anything anything yeah they won

Carter 1:26:03

did they win or they just happen to be doing it at the right time when all this was going to fall all down, and they get the clean victory. But I think that's Corey's

Zain 1:26:09

Corey's point, is that you're saying, Corey, that to Carter's analogy, the 70% of us kind of sleepwalked, tweeted, watched, whatevered as this happened, while the 20% just kind of, whether

Corey 1:26:23

whether perceived or real, I

Zain 1:26:25

I don't put words in your mouth, but I'm trying to rephrase for my purpose, perceived or real, took credit for and perhaps even influenced the outcomes of...

Corey 1:26:36

this was about eliminating

Corey 1:26:37

eliminating restrictions that existed in society for the unvaccinated,

Corey 1:26:44

how do you read it any other way? And it's easy to sit here and say,

Corey 1:26:49

I don't want them to win, but

Corey 1:26:51

but it doesn't change the base facts in front of us right now.

Corey 1:26:54

We are going to find ourselves in a situation in one week with far fewer COVID-19 vaccination vaccination restrictions than we did two weeks ago then

Zain 1:27:04

then talk talk to me carter about what that means for this group is that just further embolden them does that further kind of give them more

Zain 1:27:12

don't want to use the word ammo does it win behind their back so to speak i

Carter 1:27:15

i don't know i mean maybe it does i mean but again it it's you

Carter 1:27:20

know it's like being at the finish line of a marathon just as the other runners are approaching and claiming victory i won the marathon i mean these These guys, you know, this

Carter 1:27:28

this is the natural end of this particular wave. We've seen this five times before. We've seen the natural end of all the other waves. And, you know, to be in a position where they just get the claim victory, I think the 70% of us that are putting up with things that are, you know, quietly, you know, angry about being in the situation that we're in, we're going to just continue to be the dominant force in Canadian politics for a while. while and i'm just hopeful that the the 20 remains at 20 i don't think that they grow to 25 because they claim victory i think the 70 is going to look at them and say what

Carter 1:28:06

the fuck are you doing like who

Carter 1:28:07

who are you you guys are nutcase people do

Corey 1:28:11

do you honestly tell

Corey 1:28:12

tell me you feel like the dominant force of canadian politics on that 70 today do you even believe that having the majority support matters well matters

Carter 1:28:21

matters i had a setback last week but i still feel like i'm pretty good that's

Zain 1:28:27

that's an interesting to be discussed steven carter will end the show with you fine fabulous or fucked this episode break your streak break your streak fucked

Carter 1:28:36

mean first of all we're an hour and a half in and we're in the first segment like what the hell who's hosting this shit show we're

Zain 1:28:44

we're gonna leave it there that's a wrap on episode 968 of the strategist my name is zade velji with me as always cory hogan and he'll always be here because he's got nothing Nothing else to do, Stephen Carter, and we'll see you next time.

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