Transcript
Zain
0:01
This is The Strategist, episode 1052. My name is Zain Velji. With me, as always, Corey Hogan, Stephen Carter. Guys, we have done it. We have all successfully gotten rid of our blue check marks. Congratulations to all of us. We all had them, and we all decided not to keep them. But of course, Stephen Carter, Pierre Poliev, has kept his because he now has Twitter blue. He's got Twitter blue. Well,
Carter
0:26
Well, and he can charge it back to the people, right? I think that that part is pretty important. He would
Carter
0:32
would count that as an expense to his office, and he would bill it back to the people, whereas normal human beings who have to pay for stuff don't have that opportunity. But Pierre has lived on the government dime basically his entire life, and yet he pretends to be some sort of fiscal conservative, which just brings me great joy. yeah
Zain
0:53
yeah this isn't a segment this is the throwaway comment is this the lightning round is
Carter
1:00
the lightning round again and
Zain
1:01
and Carter of course goes into a partisan rant no it's not partisan
Carter
1:05
partisan it's an observation about his weakness which you know I hate very quickly you
Zain
1:12
in you in on Peter Polyev
Corey
1:13
Polyev you a fan
Zain
1:14
just quickly check it
Zain
1:16
what if your favorite politician Jagmeet Singh had purchased Twitter Blue Carter what would you say you
Carter
1:21
you know I would say say that it's probably the only thing that's going to get him any attention this year so it's probably a good investment cory
Zain
1:29
cory you heard about this twitter uh twitter's of course of course you heard about it because you talk about all fucking day yeah let me tell you something yeah
Corey
1:36
i don't i don't actually how's the morning period i
Corey
1:39
i don't remember uh it the same way as you i don't remember all of us having the blue check i remember
Corey
1:48
but you know one of the interesting things about it is apparently they couldn't figure out how to mass unblue check people so what they did instead is they just hid the blue check so if you actually go into the html you can see that it's just a hidden check and in fact if you of course everybody here who has a blue check will be able to do this uh you can go and you can look at your notifications and you're
Zain
2:10
you're doing it right now yeah
Corey
2:11
yeah and you can still do the verified search like you You can look for verified people and you will see the
Corey
2:16
the people without checks now who used to have checks. Hey,
Zain
2:19
Hey, can I ask you, did you guys ever use your, did your verified blue check actually get you anything in real life? I mean, did it up your networking potential? Did people respond to you quicker? Do you feel like there's anecdotal or otherwise evidence that you were actually, there's actually a real loss for you here? Because I'm now genuinely curious.
Carter
2:37
curious. Don't tell them.
Zain
2:38
them. As you know, I never had the blue check, just the fullness of the question. Yeah, we can't tell them.
Carter
2:42
them. We can't tell them. We can't tell them. yeah
Carter
2:43
there were some perks there
Zain
2:45
there were some maybe
Zain
2:45
maybe you can uh i'll do my new podcast series which is called unchecked where i'll just interview people who had blue check marks and talk about the their mourning and their loss that they had and you two were going to be my first my
Corey
2:56
actual answer is once i actually did have a company send me a bunch of stuff fuck off when i when i made just like i'm not going to say i made a random comment and they sent me a bunch of stuff uh and i don't think they would have done that if i did not have a blue check let's put it that way
Zain
3:11
way is that that explains that giant bonza air flight that's just in your lawn right now yeah
Corey
3:18
yeah no it was just it was a throw it was a joke on twitter it wasn't even like a serious comment and it had like the most minimal of engagement but it had the company's name and the company sent me what i would guess was about 150 of free merchandise like it wasn't a life so
Carter
3:34
so hold on a second here should we be pushing for this from the pod you know like Like we've got more than minimal engagement and.
Zain
3:43
Whoa. You know, don't blow the doors off this place. Someone could just send a shit and
Carter
3:48
and we could have it sent to Corey's house because I don't want it sent to my house. And we could get like free stuff. That's what I'm hearing. Free stuff for everyone. No,
Zain
3:57
No, you lost the opportunity. That's what you're hearing. You had a blue check. You had no longer have it. Paradise lost the opportunity. speaking of uh speaking of things carter um just very quickly before we jump into our first segment
Zain
4:09
sacramento kings are they real no
Carter
4:11
no they're not they uh they're not they're not real they are uh they're kingly and you know what that means i
Zain
4:18
i don't know what that means just i'll give you i'll give you another beat on it it
Carter
4:21
it means that they uh they
Carter
4:23
they show up at the beginning but they can't hold till the end what
Corey
4:26
what kingly means oh is that what kingly means yeah
Carter
4:29
yeah what are you saying What
Corey
4:29
What are you saying about Prince? What are you saying about King Charles?
Carter
4:31
King Charles, you know, I've always been a queen kind of guy. You know, if they were the, I just, I'm not, I'm not a big fan.
Corey
4:39
Well, often when I talk to you, I do wonder, is anybody out there? Yeah,
Carter
4:42
Yeah, well, I'm not going to lie to you guys. The NBA has been less important to me after the Raptors lost, and it was not that important to begin with.
Zain
4:51
Let's, let's actually leverage that into our first segment, Stephen Carter, our first segment, the strategy of sport. Corey Hogan, Stephen Carter. The time is here. The
Zain
5:00
time is here for politicians who've never watched a single game of hockey to don a jersey, to go to a local bar, to do their thing. It's happening all across the province here in Alberta. It's happening in Ontario where there's a mayoral election. It happens all the time, whether you're running for election or not. This, I felt, is a great time to talk about the strategy of sports. Oh, good. and the strategy of sport more specifically steven carter we've seen it many times right we've seen politicians
Zain
5:29
do the uh like the home team jersey before the game we've seen them go to a bar watch the game but i want to talk about the strategy behind this cory do you have to do it in a 2023 world are we beyond sports as a cultural and social glue and you know um binder remainder of community that you can perhaps not do it if it's not authentic to you? Or do you still have to do the sport thing? That's my first question that I want to kind of dig into. If the answer to that is yes, Corey and Steven, what are the rules for that in 2023? How do you kind of still be authentic, but still try to be relatable? Corey, let's talk about the strategy of sport. The binary question first, give me your answer. Do you have to do it in this 2023 world? Or is sports just less important than it used to be? You
Corey
6:15
You have to do it at a certain point, Zane. I'm not sure you necessarily... That's an interesting answer that I want to hear more about. What do you mean at a certain point? I don't know if you need to do it in round one all of the time. It really depends. Does your team normally get to the playoffs or not? Are
Corey
6:28
they usually out in first round? You have to kind of plant the seeds and show that you in some way, shape, or form care about the sport the minute you're into that playoff season. But you don't need to go all in. You don't need to make the bet with the Premier and the other province. You don't need to make the... The
Zain
6:43
food bank charity swap or whatever happens.
Corey
6:46
All of that shit's unnecessary. I think nowadays, because there are so many different sports, and we're a little more divided, and it's not this monolithic love of hockey that we once had, where it's like every Canadian loved hockey, and that was it, you know? There
Corey
6:59
are other sports. There's basketball, there is soccer, there is football, there is the other football, you know, you name it. There's a lot of sports out there, and people's interests are divided in different ways. but once
Corey
7:13
once a city really takes over like once you're in those later rounds when you've got a deep playoff run good luck being the politician who doesn't give a shit right because people like
Corey
7:24
tapping into civic pride is something that politicians try to do and you rarely see civic pride like you do during like a deep playoff run like i was in toronto i was in toronto toronto when
Corey
7:34
when the raps won and um like i was in the city when it happened and
Corey
7:41
mental like i think the whole effing city was out that night until one in the morning and the excitement was just over the top and uh yeah if you're the politician who's like well i don't watch basketball at that point like
Corey
7:54
like who are you like you know at a certain point at that point that's
Zain
7:57
this is my thing yeah
Corey
7:58
yeah you've got to ride the wave with the community so it might It might be round one. It's the sports fans who are interested. But, you know, round two, round three, everyone's
Corey
8:08
everyone's interested. And you've got to be there if everyone's interested. That's a requirement.
Zain
8:12
requirement. Carter, I'm going to come to you in a second. And I guess the heart of my question is perhaps the opposite of Corey's answer here, which is, can you gain political points? Can you gain political points by not being a bandwagon jumper? Or is Corey what you're saying that jumping on the bandwagon is totally kosher if you're a politician? there's
Carter
8:27
there's a saying in politics that uh you know politicians are just basically people who look for the parade forming and then run to the run to the front of it and is there anything more a parade forming than jumping they literally have
Corey
8:40
have a fucking parade
Corey
8:41
if they win the championship they
Carter
8:43
they have to be there now i hate it i hate it i hate the fucking that with the other city i mean that that's a new relatively new type of phenomenon i i i think it's just an absolute absolute waste of space and suddenly you're all wearing you know the wrong jersey or the wrong color um like i don't think that it needs to be betting around it uh but this you
Carter
9:08
you have to you have to make it my town is better than your town my town is you know my sports
Carter
9:15
sports insert whatever sport you're interested in is the only sports team that could possibly be good enough to win in this thing. And if we, it's just an absolute requirement. And if you don't, you just come off looking so, you
Carter
9:30
one dimensional and, and let's be honest, they are for the most part, one dimensional people. They, they do not necessarily follow these things closely, but they will go, they will go to the owner's box. They'll they're happy to take the owner's box tickets. So when the owner's box tickets are handed out, they go. So when the, when the the
Carter
9:51
the victory is is nigh uh they also have to start to at least pretend to care the
Zain
9:58
the reason i'm bringing this topic up let me actually go back to it is that there's a a politician or a political candidate running for mayor in toronto who posted a picture of him in a leafs jersey and then was called out for posting that picture saying can't wait for the game to start when the when the leafs were already down 5-2 and on their way to losing the game and he was called out by many people uh uh online and i was like well this reminds me like he you know he probably had a long day of door knocking is a guy who's running you know at least as it relates to the poll several points behind is doing his obligatory carter his obligatory political jersey moment stopped by at a bar for 15 seconds so he can get the picture and move on and and you know just probably got there later the team posted it late as they're still working out the the kinks in the campaign campaign team uh but cory do you agree that you have to do it like you like let me stress okay use your rule is almost i'm starting to almost make a list of rules right this is what i want to get out of this segment okay what are the rules for politicians uh as it relates to to sporting events and i should be clear and core you have made it clear around playoff sporting events right when it gets serious right like i'm not talking about you do it every saturday night if you're playing teams playing hockey in canada or whatever i'm talking playoffs you're right where where the team is congealing, or the city is congealing around a team.
Zain
11:12
You've said, at a certain point, you got to do it. Carter's saying, you got to do it, period, even though he hates it.
Zain
11:18
Talk to me about Carter's point. Is there any nuance in that? Or is it a binary for you?
Corey
11:22
So I personally think that there's some nuance in it. For me, the opportunity you have to not do it is actually if you are a Calgary-based politician right now, for example. Are we supposed supposed to pretend that we're oilers fans at
Zain
11:37
at this particular moment yeah like i don't i don't actually know that that's necessary so let me be clear you mean a calgary-based politician who's maybe representing the province in a sense yeah like
Zain
11:45
like i'm actually thinking about danielle smith okay who's
Corey
11:48
calgary but you know she's a calgarian for all effective purposes yeah i
Corey
11:53
i i think it's legitimate to be like hey they're the last alberta team let's go oilers and there's the premier you can't like cheer against the oilers as i don't know i think if If I was Premier, I might be inclined to a little bit. Wouldn't be popular, though. Let's put it that fucking way, right? But yeah, like, you don't need to get full-throated in there if it's like your team's rival and it's in the same geography. I think that's the kind of thing that gets people a little bit eye-rolling because, you know, do you, like, I don't know, my Twitter feed right now is full of Flames fans cheering against the Oilers and just being like, yeah, go Kings, right? Right. And so I think that you have to if you want to come off as that sports fan, you again, you have to match the cadence of where the actual sports fans are. If you're not one, if you are one, just let your passions fly the way they are. But like, if you're not, you can't be too far ahead of the sports fans in your geography.
Zain
12:46
Carter, I really want to test this with you in this. I don't want to extend this segment longer than it needs to be. But no, I would like
Carter
12:52
like to go for a whole night. Well,
Zain
12:55
you know, I've got all the I've got all the time in the world. world if you know um this is great is
Zain
13:01
this just one of those things we haven't stress tested enough that we just lean back on you gotta do it carter because i i genuinely come at this with a genuine sort of could there be a politician who said just fuck you to all this just this inauthentic bullshit use that airspace for something else even be self-deprecating about their lack of fandom even be self and and perhaps be joined by a majority of people who are in that that category and maybe not even risk those that are sports fans like i'm just trying to see is there another path here than the extremely conventional always do it or as cory's nuance says always do it at a certain point rule
Zain
13:37
rule because to me i think there could be another lane here maybe that's what i'm ultimately trying to force feed upon both of you sure but why right
Zain
13:45
right what do you mean but why the upside 100 no i'm 100 with steve authenticity what's your game yeah i mean
Carter
13:51
mean if it's truly who
Zain
13:52
who you are that
Zain
13:54
that you actually either do not care or in certain cases despise the game could you not use that as part of your personal brand and expand on that
Carter
14:04
okay but you don't come out and say I hate puppies you
Carter
14:06
don't come out and say I hate fucking puppies puppies are the worst dogs are shitting everywhere hockey is full
Corey
14:13
full of violence you never
Zain
14:15
hockey is full of violence what
Carter
14:17
what I am saying is
Carter
14:19
yeah i don't like the opportunity i'm not a big fan fuck why would you bother i'm
Zain
14:25
i'm not a panelist here i'm just i'm just arguing
Carter
14:26
arguing amongst each other okay
Carter
14:31
took it like you were making a point find
Zain
14:33
find some nuance in your thinking okay join my side and then argue against each other that is the format of this entire show okay
Zain
14:40
cory's cory's gonna join my team in a second why would
Carter
14:42
would you do that is what
Zain
14:44
what what point would i what point would what i make cory that would persuade you to join my side go ahead well
Corey
14:50
well look i i think you can make the argument that if somebody was being the unpolitician and showing a certain candor that's okay but like sort of play it forward again it works in round one like i actually think it would have been refreshing if daniel smith's like i'm not there you know like go oilers i guess a little bit but like i'm not like i'm a flames fan i'm not i'm not there like we'll we'll see where it is later and and you sort of leave yourself open a little bit but like the idea that you'd be full-throated like this is not my thing what
Corey
15:21
what i don't know if politicians should generally be in the business of saying your thing is not my thing right there are wanting
Corey
15:29
wanting better what you want this
Carter
15:31
this is no this is this is why we have the whole one fact framework right
Carter
15:35
right the whole one factor framework it's set aside for knowing one framework
Corey
15:43
framework get out of it it's now a political theory i thought it was just your way of gaslighting people what
Carter
15:49
what is the one fact okay so one fact framework and we do this quite a bit on the show you guys literally tried to get me framework you guys literally tried to get me on it this as we started the podcast what's my position on some sack you know king thing like there's like there's some sort of king's i
Carter
16:06
basketball i feel like you guys
Zain
16:07
guys are glossing over my point about authenticity way too lightly no we're not okay there's no you are no one you are no you fucking it's the number one thing that everyone wants from their politicians the
Corey
16:19
the number one thing
Zain
16:20
say they want they want people wear oversized jerseys you're and they're just like oh watch the game they're down seven five they're down seven two they're not even in the playoffs they're posing fucking
Carter
16:32
stupid they don't want authenticity they want to vote for someone who's like them and
Zain
16:38
that is i don't know if i believe that it
Carter
16:39
it is totally true cory back me up this
Zain
16:43
this is interesting yeah i don't know i don't know if you're going where carter you you you may have a different theory carter's is interesting like them is interesting i'm actually gonna pick it's actually
Carter
16:52
actually there's data but
Zain
16:53
but go but go there's data on how
Corey
16:55
that's a well well-backed theory yeah i look i i actually wanted to tell a bit of a story and through the story maybe make a point and it's a story that actually involves i'd be a first Yeah,
Corey
17:07
Holy fuck. It's a story that actually involves Stephen and I, like me and Stephen. So it goes back to the 2012 Alberta provincial election. And he and I were at a meeting with the media conglomerate that was running the leadership debate. I was there for the liberals. He was there for the PCs. And for the wild rose was Flanagan. You remember? Uh-huh.
Corey
17:33
Tom Flanagan was there. and it was one tom running the wild rose campaign he was like a senior person there and he was kind of like this yeah yeah that's
Corey
17:42
yeah oh shit and and so and then there were a few representatives from the ndp which in itself was funny because everybody else sent one person and they didn't and they
Carter
17:53
they were in fourth at the time and they
Carter
17:56
biggest they ended in
Corey
17:57
fourth for the record it's 12 he's talking about 12
Corey
18:01
but like the um uh
Corey
18:03
uh and you despite Despite having the most people there, they had the smallest contribution to the overall conversation. They
Carter
18:11
They sat there and were confused. But
Corey
18:12
But this is not a story about that meeting. That's the story for another day, maybe. This is a story about at one point, Flanagan
Corey
18:20
Flanagan is asking about potential conflicts that might occur with the debate time. I don't know if you remember this, Stephen, but he says, is there any hockey happening that day that the Flames or the Oilers are in? And the rest of the room laughed at him because, of course, that was a season where the Flames and the Oilers were both fucking terrible and had been like counted out of the playoffs for a long time. And he got really red and he's like, well, I don't watch hockey. It's not my thing.
Corey
18:48
You don't want to be laughed at, Zane,
Corey
18:50
right? You don't want to look so out of touch that people think it's incredulous that you feel these particular things. it's a dangerous place for a politician to be even if it's not his thing and even you know and he was just a organizer in the back rooms now imagine if you're actually a politician standing up and showing that kind of ignorance of things that people care about you
Carter
19:08
you have to know at least one fact about the game about what's happening about who where people are what they're thinking about you cannot show up and not at least pretend to care about what they care about it will be the the end of you even
Carter
19:27
you know who i would probably put it you know i think he is more of a sports fan than people would have assumed but he jumped right into the sports stuff um in part i think because it actually was relatively authentic but also because you know that's what you have to do he might have been able to get a pass but he didn't need you know like it served him to not have to have one uh
Zain
19:50
uh available on the strategist.ca uh merch store the Zane Veltri for Leader posters now with the fuck hockey meme underneath with the
Zain
20:00
fuck the shitty game on ice. Those are excellent posters. Please buy the exclusive fuck hockey edition. I will sign them for you.
Carter
20:09
I'm there. I do not like hockey. I'm there. I'm with you, man.
Carter
20:14
I'd vote for you. Corey, we do have
Zain
20:14
have a second place that people can buy this merchandise. Do we not? You can also go to westofcenter.ca. That
Corey
20:21
That is correct. if you're looking
Zain
20:21
looking for a strategist
Corey
20:24
this group that's listed definitely will um
Zain
20:26
um but listen like okay keep going i've got one final question then i'll i don't fucking move on but
Corey
20:30
but like i'll tell you this there is actually a risk of being the politician who tries to be engaged to your point uh and just becomes a punch line because like they either can't wait for the game to start that's already started uh the jersey that's clearly brand new still has the tags on it you know
Corey
20:46
they they don't use the right terminology when they're talking about the game in some way that absolutely betrays that they've clearly never watched a moment of hockey a moment of basketball a moment of whatever's going on right and if that's the situation you do need to realize that less is more and you don't want to get ahead of your skis and some people have very short skis zane like i could tell you in 2010 2011 david swan who was at the time like the leader of the opposition i recall at one point um and i can't remember was
Corey
21:19
was it the blackhawks who won that year uh yeah yeah so uh anyways it it happened it happened while he was up at a speech doing a town hall and his political director of communications went up and sort of like whispered to him like hey let them know that the blackhawks won right and so uh
Corey
21:38
uh and i'm there i'm the executive director of the alberta liberal party at the time and
Corey
21:43
and uh and so david swan says I was like, oh, I just want to let everybody know the Blackhawks just won the Grey Cup.
Corey
21:55
And it wasn't like he immediately caught what he was doing wrong. And it was like, oh, oh, it's the Stanley Cup. Oh, yeah, I guess the Stanley Cup's what they just won. Like, that sucks. Like, that's really bad. And, you know, don't pretend that you're so excited you've got to stop and give like a PSA as to the state of things if that's not who you are.
Corey
22:12
you do need to have kind of the minimal conversant, just as we all do. Like you have to just apply a regular human standard to this. If the Flames were in the Stanley Cup finals and you were going about your life and you're like –
Carter
22:24
We'd all have to have one fact. We'd all have to know something. We'd have to have one fact. We'd have to know something.
Zain
22:28
How surprised have you guys been when you've worked with political candidates as to the delta between them and what Carter's theory, which both of you say is well-stated and well-researched, around having people elect people that are like them? like these are not normal people putting their hands up in most cases to to to so have you had to do like pop culture training have you had to kind of like update them like give me give me some of this because i know now i bought a very similar
Zain
22:55
similar but tangential like training because i'm getting nowhere out of what the new rules for sports are because he goes about fucking saying you got to do it so we took whatever except me whenever i run for anything which normally never we took joe clark
Carter
23:06
clark do you remember the uh hi i'm joe and i'm canadian phase for the molson canadian ads of
Zain
23:12
of course yeah so
Carter
23:13
so joe clark just won his uh calgary seat right and so the flames and molson were running these things and and they were making announcements from the from the stands um about you know uh i'm you know i and my buddy steve strachan was hosting the the the flames games at that time and he they would he would do this monologue and he would say and i'm steve and i'm canadian and this was part of their molson promotion uh at the at the stadium well joe clark wins and the flames and molson think you know what let's get joe down here to do the uh and i'm joe and i'm canadian thing that
Zain
23:53
that legendary voice of him yeah
Carter
23:54
yeah so all he needed to do was stand up and say oh
Carter
23:58
oh i'm joe when i i'm canadian right like that's all he has he just just became
Corey
24:03
became like will bailey you
Carter
24:05
you know what it was i think it was actually the guy from um
Carter
24:09
uh men in black that's that's the i need some sugar water ah that's
Carter
24:16
that's what happened anyways it's
Zain
24:17
it's a different voice but yeah it's a good it's a good sequel of dave yep okay good anywho
Carter
24:21
anywho um so we had to explain to him what the ad campaign was what his role in the ad campaign would be how he was supposed to you know so we had him sitting in the gen pop section which So he and Maureen, we went to pick up from their place. Heather and I did it because Heather, you know, I was kind of the boy Friday who kind of knew every, you know, was doing all the jobs. Heather came with me because we had four tickets to the game. Heather is like nine, nine and a half months pregnant with our first daughter. We're late because Joe and Maureen are fighting. I have to brief him in the car on what he's supposed to be doing. He's nervous because we're, you know, we're not in a box. We have to go find our seats. I have to take him through the concourse. Everybody's talking to him. Even before we got to the concourse, we arrived so late that they actually asked Heather, my nine month old or
Carter
25:12
or nine month pregnant wife to park the car in Victoria park and walk through all by herself while we found our seats. Oh, it was fucking horrible, but all of it needed to be explained to him. He didn't have a fucking clue, but he stood up on his mark and said, and I'm Joe and I'm Canadian. and and the whole fucking place lost their shit and if everybody who's who walked up to him and said that they voted for him that day actually voted for him we would have won in a landslide so it was a fantastic you know like it's a great example of like you just go with the flow and try not to fuck it up and that's joe went with the flow did did not fuck it up except he did except
Carter
25:53
except Except he did, and that was he spilled his pop all over Maureen's jacket, and we had another meltdown. They were already fighting when we picked them up, and they were fighting when it was done. But
Corey
26:04
good news- I'm loving this. This is like the dirty laundry of
Zain
26:08
- Yeah, well, this
Carter
26:09
is what the Patreons pay for, baby. Or the Patreons. What am I supposed to call them? Anyways, the point is that we wound up in the owner's box, and everything worked out fine.
Corey
26:22
Like Zane, I don't want to like totally discount your point. I think that there's some logic to not, you
Corey
26:28
you know, not being superficial about these things and just saying who you are, but like, it's a risk reward thing. And like, what are you really gaining by saying like, I'm authentic and I don't care about the things that you care about? Like maybe it works, maybe it works.
Corey
26:42
Big chance it doesn't. And what's the reward? Like there are a hundred other ways you can show authenticity that don't piss off all of the sports fans of your city. That's just the reality of it. you'll
Zain
26:51
you'll never hear that from me let's move it on for to our next segment our next more than this i
Zain
26:57
feel like uh uh i feel like yeah we are doing more have
Carter
27:00
have you seen how much fucking content we've done this week like i'm it's
Zain
27:03
it's a lot of content it's a lot of content it's a lot of content yeah
Zain
27:06
uh carter our next segment you revolt me oh
Zain
27:10
carter's an intervention no i'm talking about voltage i'm talking about electrical batteries i'm talking about the volkswagen battery plant plan subsidy. I'm so angry about
Corey
27:19
so amped about this segment. Oh, yeah.
Zain
27:25
Corey Hogan, the $13 billion joke. Stephen Carter, industry minister, Francois-Felix Champagne, says the federal government's plan to provide approximately $13 billion in subsidies over the next decade in order to see Volkswagen build its first overseas battery manufacturing plant is a good investment. Corey, he's also amped about it. he says the payback is in five years that's a very good investment talk to any banker he would say if you get your money in five years for a plan that's going to be there for a plant that's going to be there for a hundred years that's a pretty great fucking deal for canadians i added the great fucking um on my own because i can yeah i'm not a journalist stephen carter because
Carter
28:03
because you're trying to sound like
Carter
28:04
everyman that's what you were doing right there sounding like the everyman yeah
Zain
28:07
yeah man everyman talking about sport uh talking about battery production stephen carter we know No, economic development is complicated. We know that the time horizons are generally long, but this is opening up a conversation of corporate subsidies, corporate handouts. And I really want to talk about, A, the situation and then the strategy. The situation, because I suspect, Corey, you may have heated opinions, but I know Carter certainly does. On the policy itself, Carter, why are you out? Because I know you're out on this policy. This is the feds providing $13 billion to Volkswagen, come here, kind of trying to match the
Zain
28:44
the Biden-level IRA, the Inflation Reduction Act, the incentives that they're providing to say, to be competitive, Canada needs to do this. That's their line. That's what they're doing, and they say it's a good investment, Carter. But why, despite all of that, are you out on something like this? I'm
Carter
29:04
I'm totally out on it. And I understand why it's done. Right. But the idea that we are getting these new jobs and this is an investment. I'll tell you what an investment looks like. An investment looks like you have something that's going to give you a return. If they'd given a loan that gave a return to the people. I mean, if you look back at some of the better subsidies that we have had in Canadian history, we got stocks for them. When we bailed out the car industry, we got our money back and we got our return on our investment. This isn't an investment. This is giving away money to people who don't need our money. Do you think Volkswagen really isn't going to build a battery plant? It's only a question of where they're going to put it. And if we're not competitive enough on its face to get the battery plant, then we're just buying a little bit of action right now. And buying a little action right now feels a lot more prostitution-like than actually a good business sense, if you want to break it down. That's what it feels like to me. We're just buying a little action on the side because this isn't core to the Volkswagen group. I mean, sure, they'll be here for a while, but will they be here for 100 years? I don't
Carter
30:19
don't think so. I'm sure we don't have a fucking guarantee that they're going to be here for 100 years. We just bought something. And governments do this in film production. They do it in tech. They do it, you know, any industry that's kind of up and coming. The very first thing that these entrepreneurs do is get massive government subsidy for activities that they were going to do anyway.
Zain
30:45
Corey, this thing does sound impressive. Larger than 390 football fields will cost $7 billion. The government's footing an initial capital investment of $700 million and then up to $13 billion of those subsidies that I mentioned. Your take on something like this, this is making
Zain
31:00
making headlines because of the sheer sticker shock of that $13 billion. But this concept of government putting a couple hundred million, couple hundred thousand, couple billion into projects isn't something that is reserved for one partisan Jersey color. We've seen all governments kind of do this and engage in it. But your thought on this one, especially perhaps related to the particular dollar amount and maybe even the particular
Zain
31:27
particular sector that it is targeting.
Corey
31:30
Well, I'm a little more torn than Stephen on it. Everything he said is generally true. And if you just replace a battery plant with, say, arena, I mean, this is a playbook people use. They try to get people to bid up with public money to give private benefit. And there's a bit of a race to the bottom here. But there's a couple of important things to put on the table here. And one of them is this was an attempt to match the US, right? right? The US
Corey
31:56
US are the ones who shot first on this particular one. And so if we want to even just get to a level playing field again, then
Corey
32:03
then we need to match the US. Because where I disagree with Stephen is if the IRA, the Inflation Reduction Act benefits went away, well, in 100 years, and Canada was in the same place, like, you know, they're not actually that much better than us. They're splashing a lot of federal money in. And so if we want to kind of re-level the playing field, it's going to cost federal money. Now, is that still in our interests? That's really tough for me to say. In some ways, I have less of a problem with this kind of approach to subsidies than I do if we were just trying to create something out of whole cloth, because what we're trying to do is almost negate another person's subsidy. But the absurdity of this is, that means both us and the United States have taken an action that if neither of us had taken it the same degree, it wouldn't have cost our public purses as much money. Yeah, several billion dollars
Zain
32:48
in this case, correct.
Corey
32:48
correct. Well, and that's very frustrating, because maybe Volkswagen still would have needed something to get to North America, but maybe it wouldn't have been the equivalent of $13 billion. Maybe it could have been $4 billion. Maybe it could have been $5 billion. But there's a kind of a broader economic thing here. And there's a school of thought, which I actually have an awful lot of sympathy for, which is that all of these subsidies are kind of nonsense, right? right? You're effectively pushing uphill a rock that is naturally going to tumble back down. It's, you know, it's just buying off your lack of competitive advantage in an area. And why are you doing this? Because inherently the economy does not want to be there. And there are places that we can have a comparative advantage to our peers. And if we were really that interested in it, we could, you know, we could have more free trade deals, for example. we could do all sorts of interesting things in order to get more more stuff on our shores but
Corey
33:38
there is a there is a reality here right which is comparative advantages is really about like overall economic benefit and sometimes that's not the only consideration here sometimes we want to talk about how it's spread around sometimes we're talking about trying to build industries to have new comparative advantages in the future and sometimes that does require a bit of a catalyst and it takes a concerted effort and it says we're going to do something we're not competitive at for a bit in order to become competitive down the road. And there is an argument to be made that if you create a hub for battery development in Canada, it's going to have wraparounds and it's going to have more of a natural draw for other battery plants down the road because that's the way industry often works. Like geography matters a lot for these particular things. This is a relatively nascent field. And so there's probably a stronger argument to do it now than perhaps in 30 years if we were trying to play catch up so all very nuanced and i i think that ultimately though we do need to keep an eye on what we are trying to will into existence that is just not otherwise going to happen i think that's important carter
Zain
34:42
carter respond here and then i want to get into the politics because those are the politics and the political sort of plays here are fascinating to me go ahead there
Carter
34:48
there are certain areas that require government intervention if they're going to be successful and i can almost wrap my head around them i mean take a look at the at the alberta oil sands okay the alberta oil sands simply do not exist without peter laheed's government investing in the technology to to uh get the the oil out of the ground and they do not exist without um you know that kind of commitment that came from government as a as a driver for the oil sands and and as a result and then we gave them subsidies on top of that where we said okay like, hey, you know what, we'll take almost no royalties until such time as your plant is 100% paid for itself. Okay, you know, I guess I can get that. I understand what's going on. And then the second, the second that it becomes not 100% profitable, if the second it becomes a little bit to the company's negative
Carter
35:41
negative bottom line, everybody's out. Everybody bails on it. Everybody's, the private corporations say, I'm sorry, we're not getting enough subsidy anymore. more. We're going to have to leave. We're going to go somewhere else. We're going to go do something else because there's another capital opportunity and there's no, the, the, the investment that's being made, isn't an investment in the, in the, in
Carter
36:04
in the classic sense. I could almost understand it. It, you know, Corey's points about developing a hub of knowledge. We did that with the oil sands. We, we, we drove new knowledge because we had new industry here and, and better industry in many regards. And we could drive more new knowledge if we were investing in things like climate change and actually shifting, as Peter Lougheed did, to new technologies that were required and were going to be required in the future.
Carter
36:32
But we don't take the right types of stakes. We give away money with no requirements that these corporations behave in our long-term best interests, our long term best interest being that of society, not of their own shareholders. And because they, they write the terms of the deals, these deals have a tendency to not just be spirals to the bottom, but but they don't pay off in the long run for our society in general. You can look at the film industry, if you want to look at another one that everybody Everybody just races to the bottom. And then the second that it's not profitable, you know, we'll have a surge of filming in Alberta because all of a sudden our tax credit looks good. And then our tax credit gets cut back by the government and all of that filming moves to British Columbia or Toronto or, I mean, next year, even The Last of Us is filming more in Vancouver. I'd love to know why. I'd
Carter
37:32
I'd love to know why.
Corey
37:34
because it, like, the second half takes place in Seattle, right? Okay,
Corey
37:37
Okay, well, there you
Carter
37:39
changes the show but you know what carter
Zain
37:40
carter we we we do a really good boston but we can't do a seattle okay yeah
Carter
37:44
yeah i mean obviously our boston was pretty fucking bang on especially the wilderness stuff like
Carter
37:50
like that was i
Zain
37:51
i think we nailed we nailed the boston yeah hey cory um let's talk about the politics here okay is
Zain
37:57
is this a give me the scope of win and victory
Zain
38:02
for Champagne on this.
Zain
38:05
Do you want to go
Corey
38:07
Well, it's way too soon to tell, right? You think so.
Zain
38:11
But isn't that just the point? The fact is, he's like, the payback happens in five years. That's five years from now. There
Zain
38:17
There could be two liberal leadership races from now. This is a guy who wants to run. This is a guy that could probably run around the country saying that he takes credit for what happened here. 390 football fields, biggest sort of thing. What sort of scope of win? I'm kind of pushing my perspective. which I never do on the show. But what sort of scope of win is this for Champagne in your perspective, for a guy who maybe wants to take over this party one
Corey
38:40
one day? I mean, let's be fucking clear. The five-year payback is using some pretty interesting numerators and denominators. And
Zain
38:47
And also the word payback. Let's be clear what he means by that. It's not like they're getting paid back.
Corey
38:53
It's like talking about economic development. That's not the same thing as the hard dollars put in by the government. Like coffers back.
Zain
38:59
back. Yeah, exactly. Yeah.
Corey
39:01
You know, I think that it's
Corey
39:03
it's – yeah, I mean, it's developing a new industry, an industry new for Canada. And that's something that he can point to. And that certainly is going to assist in kind of the geography that is so relevant to the Liberal Party, which is in Ontario there. But it's not so simple. And it's
Corey
39:22
it's a lot of money that
Corey
39:24
could still go a lot wrong, right? Like, we just don't know how a lot of these things are going to develop over the next bit. And the reality is, it's quite possible, because it often happens that there will be a bit of a battery glut seven,
Corey
39:35
seven, eight years from now, as all of these various plants come online,
Corey
39:39
the economics might not be there. All of a sudden, there's layoffs at this plant. They never hit the 7500 jobs that were originally planned. Do you
Zain
39:47
you recall, though, Corey, let me ask you this, though. Do you recall a government, maybe even just one example, you may have it in your back pocket, of
Zain
39:54
of a government saying, we're making this investment, it's going to yield this particular outcome, and we've had the media or opposition parties track the bouncing ball 5, 7, 12 years later and be like, here's the jobs it didn't create. Yeah, like the Northwest Upgrader
Zain
40:10
Upgrader immediately comes to mind here in Alberta. And they had to pay a political price for it. And
Corey
40:14
And the Northwest Upgrader here in
Zain
40:16
in Alberta. What was the political
Carter
40:16
political price? LNG in British Columbia.
Carter
40:19
Yeah. How many do you want? Site C.
Zain
40:23
Wait for the last part of the question. Political price paid. Oh, yeah. Yeah. These things are- Did it lose them an election, Carter?
Carter
40:31
Yes. As a matter of fact, the liberals are no longer in power in- I
Zain
40:35
I wouldn't say that's the reason why. Come on.
Carter
40:37
No, it is absolutely part of the reason why, Zane. Because people, first of all, these aren't win-win. in these are lose-lose because all of a sudden you're investing in their jobs but not my job fuck you champlain whatever your name is my fucking i i run a business where's my money
Carter
40:57
where's my money why am i not being supported i have to make my payroll i've got people who work for me you know what the biggest driver of economic opportunity is in the country of canada small fucking business small business and and where's the government when my small business needs help nowhere to be found it's a double-edged sword that doesn't necessarily work out we we always are chasing it it's like the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow but it very rarely actually works for government and and more often than not you wind up finding and tracking these things that are fucking horrible and investigative journalists pick them apart find the information and put it in front of albertans or or canadians and they say you know it only cost us seven thousand seven hundred thousand dollars for jobs that the people didn't even get right like it it's it's
Carter
41:47
it's an it's a lose-lose
Zain
41:48
-lose we've seen that headline i don't know if i've seen the political point taken though yeah
Carter
41:53
the question you you thought i couldn't do it and i did it well
Zain
41:57
well the question first of all was never phrased to you secondly the question i
Carter
42:00
i helped my good friend and cory well
Zain
42:03
yeah he needed that help carter i did yeah hey carter carter champagne
Zain
42:07
champagne how big of a witness is for him and then i want to get into paulie of what he needs to do on here i
Carter
42:11
i actually don't think it's a win i
Carter
42:14
i think that these things are absolutely fleeting at all by the time i'm
Carter
42:17
i'm asking you about
Zain
42:18
about scope of when you think it's actually not a win tell me why i
Carter
42:20
i don't think so i think he gets a few headlines and then we move on this
Carter
42:24
this that the challenging thing with all of these investments is that first of all the scale of them is enormous right like it is a lot of money and secondly the benefit is felt late right um the construction will generate i mean that was always the best part about this the oil sands the oil sands when they generated construction jobs that was great that was a great day in alberta but as soon as those construction jobs are gone and we move back into kind of like how the plant operates there's very little upside for government and i suspect that will be the case with this particular plant as well cory
Corey
42:58
let's talk politics and Pierre Poliev. Wait, I wanted to talk about Muskrat Falls too. Oh, fuck.
Zain
43:03
Yeah, me too. Go ahead.
Corey
43:05
No, I don't want to. I was just pointing out there's like an unlimited number of projects that meet your criteria that you seem to be unaware of. Muskrat Falls 2
Zain
43:12
2 sounds like a movie. Okay, I was like, let's talk about it. It was
Carter
43:15
was part of Dave.
Zain
43:16
the first one I didn't love.
Zain
43:18
You want to talk about Pierre Poliev?
Zain
43:20
Is corporate welfare his
Zain
43:22
his attack line? And how aggressive should he be on it?
Corey
43:28
I mean, I mean, is it his attack line? I don't know. It's
Zain
43:30
It's a real question because the MP from the area, conservative, standing for the announcement, happy, looked happy, let's do it all together.
Zain
43:37
But Pierre Pallievre has been an ardent
Zain
43:39
ardent critic of corporate welfare writ large. And so how does he play this, Corey? Maybe that's a more nuanced way of asking you the question. question the
Corey
43:50
classic cynical way a politician plays it is they try to make sure that they can they can have their finger in in both the success pie and the failure pie by just you know complaining about the deal like they're picking winners and losers i'm happy that we have this plant but they're picking winners and losers uh i think that it's great that we have this plant but they overpaid for it and i would have you know gotten it for much less and you know there are ways that you can be for it and against it if you're willing to be entirely duplicitous about it and frankly
Corey
44:17
frankly, welcome to politics, right?
Zain
44:20
What would your suggestion be, Corey? How would you suggest he played given his track record on corporate welfare, which I guess I should say, has nuance, but not a lot of it. Like he's been pretty hardcore against this as a practice, kind of like a point one of you made earlier around like, there's a school of thought around the philosophy of all these subsidies are bullshit. I'd say Pierre Polyev, if he was being true to himself, has kind of subscribed to some of that thinking.
Corey
44:44
Yeah, well, and maybe you just say you and Joe Joe Biden are bidding against each other with public money. And that's, that's really unfortunate. And that's really unfair to the taxpayer. But the, you know, it's very difficult to come against something like this, when it is such an enormous driver of not just jobs, but economic activity, like, the reality is this, this could be a very big deal developing
Corey
45:07
this battery plant here in Canada. This
Zain
45:09
This is really interesting, Carter, maybe I'll pick it up on that. Is this too big to attack?
Zain
45:14
Right. We've heard too big to fail. But is this too big or potentially too big to attack today? Even if there might be short term political gain, you can squeeze out of it, even if it aligns with your long term and long standing criticism of corporate welfare. Is this too big to attack and have the liberals strategically weathered themselves in that regard? Or would you say, no, there is a lane for Polyev to attack and it is two million dollars
Carter
45:40
dollars a job or a million dollars per job? Yeah, I mean, it's going to pay back over five years. I just don't see that. That's voodoo numbers. Those aren't numbers that are real. You know how I know that? Because I know how jobs work. I know how jobs work because I have friends who are entrepreneurs who are making more. If you gave each one of my friends that have employees a million dollars per employee, you know what? Their businesses would grow too. Their employment would grow. But is that the way that we want Canadian jobs to grow? Or do we want to invest in the actual ingenuity of Canadians? And the way I would invest is to lower everybody's taxes. How much lower would your taxes be on your corporate income tax if we hadn't made this investment? right this is a way of stealing from others stealing from entrepreneurs who are making it work giving it to a foreign corporation and not even making sure that the jobs stay here for at least five years this is a mistake corporate welfare is almost always a mistake when we're bidding against a government that has unlimited pools of debt and that's what the united states is unlimited pools of debt we cannot do the same here and i'm watching justin trudeau drive our our deficit higher, drive our debt higher, and pushing Canadians into a worse place because of it.
Carter
47:03
I don't know. I think he could attack it.
Zain
47:04
Corey, that was pretty
Zain
47:06
pretty compelling, Corey. Thoughts?
Corey
47:09
I think that there's still the crass reality that the auto
Carter
47:11
auto industry is pretty important to Ontario. I
Corey
47:14
I do think that there's something to Stephen's argument that we don't want to play the US's game. We want to play our game. And the idea that we would simply me too the IRA, which people people agree is going to create like uh you know record debts and all of this is an argument that he can uh he can put out there and in a funny way it allows him to do what i was suggesting earlier which is still support the project but um but not support the specifics of how it was getting there being like there is a canadian way we could have gotten this project this project we could it could have stood on its merits here because we have a great auto manufacturing sector and the the The Trudeau government has given away money for nothing because this was always the right choice for VW. Now, that's nonsense, right? Like VW is going to make the decisions they're going to make. But it's a way you can almost like pat people on the back and champion them while
Corey
48:04
while still critiquing the liberal government. Carter,
Zain
48:06
Carter, you're on fire. Give me the Trudeau line here. Give me the Trudeau sort of like in the spirit and in the vibe
Zain
48:13
vibe that Corey has presented, the too big to fail, like the winds behind our back. What would your line for the Trudeau government be? Because, you know, Champagne kind of looked weak today, despite the fact that I think it's still a bit of a win for him and you disagree. He looked kind of weak because he's on defensive about something that Corey said might be too big to fail. This is huge for the overall perhaps innovation footprint. So what should the Trudeau line or message structure, Carter, be on this particular file? And how do they actually own the win rather than having to be succumbing to this sort sort of like defending of spending of public dollars, which governments have done for years and decades. We
Carter
48:52
We are on the verge of seeing the largest single change in how our economy works since the Industrial Revolution. And we could sit back and just let it happen. We could sit back and wait for it to occur under our watch, the next government's watch, the government after that's watch. But you know who's going to be left behind?
Carter
49:10
Canadians. We are watching as industries that leave all kinds of different areas. But
Carter
49:17
But this government is not going to let those people be left behind. Instead, we made a strategic investment to ensure that our world-class auto industry is able to keep up with the changes that are happening.
Carter
49:29
We could have waited. We could have hoped. We could have hoped for the best possible outcome. But hope is not a strategy. You know what a strategy is? Making deals with some of the largest automakers in the world to maintain Canada as the number one place where they're going to build the new technology, develop the new technology, technology create new jobs and more importantly create new clean jobs this this technology we're developing through the volkswagen group will go across our country it'll go around the world and when it does we're going to have the best possible outcome for all canadians
Zain
50:06
cory i think carter's on fire today the
Zain
50:07
the late the late night you know you disagree it's pretty
Corey
50:10
pretty good I mean, sure.
Corey
50:12
Pretty pedestrian, in my opinion, you know. It's fine. I
Carter
50:15
I was really into the other one, and then I had to flip it. So it's tricky.
Zain
50:21
Yes. I feel your pain. Final question on this for both of you. What role do the... If the liberals in this case... I'm
Zain
50:29
I'm going to make this extremely simple, okay? If the liberals in this case are seeing championing corporate subsidies and corporate welfare, you've got Polyev, who will probably take the line of...
Zain
50:41
listen, historically, I've been against this. We shouldn't, you know, Corey's version of the, there's a Canadian way to do this. Well, how dare these two idiots, Biden and Trudeau, you know, bid up against each other with money that isn't theirs. He takes the line against it.
Zain
50:54
Where would you fit as the NDP, Carter? What would you want to do on this file? Or would you want to just let this be a pitch that you don't swing at? The
Carter
51:05
I mean, this is happening because the NDP are supporting this government. the the second we walk away from this there's no investment in people the ndp is the only reason that this government gives a shit about canadians and uh if if we were to walk away and and remove the pressure on the on the liberal government they wouldn't they would they would walk away as so fast your head would spin so that's why we supported this deal from the beginning uh that's why we are supporting this government for now and we'll be looking for more jobs for canadians um through the coming through through at every opportunity you
Carter
51:47
would pay credit for
Carter
51:48
if you're gonna have this stupid fucking deal that promotes the government you may as well take credit for everything the government does cory
Zain
51:56
cory would you take credit for it yeah
Corey
51:58
yeah well and i i think that probably i would take a positive tone but say you know our role here is going to to make sure there's good value for money for working canadians and that and that this is supporting a you know good union jobs and all of the things that you would uh expect that would speak to the audiences that the ndp is trying to speak to but um yeah
Corey
52:17
yeah i don't know i mean i sing i guess could do a bit of the hmm seems
Corey
52:21
seems expensive tut tut that could be direct money paying for groceries i mean he could he could choose to be opposed to it he could choose to talk about what he would spend the 13 billion dollars on that's certainly possible um and
Corey
52:34
and maybe he will right but again
Corey
52:36
again it's it's one of these things that it's gonna people
Corey
52:41
people are gonna say okay
Corey
52:42
okay well then what's your plan right and where steven was talking about good you know clean technology jobs that is a liberal narrative that they're going to continue to push here i think that the liberals have placed bets on a number of different things that are you know from the transmountain pipeline to this 13 billion dollar battery plant that uh you know collectively show quite an interventionist government but individually these projects are difficult for the conservatives and the ndp respectively to to oppose we're
Zain
53:15
we're going to leave that segment there move it on to our final segment are over under our lightning round the whole episode for you this whole whole show is for you carter i mean of course it has been carter correlation is not causation but But Jagmeet Singh has successfully booted out Galen Weston as CEO of Loblaws.
Zain
53:34
Would you actually give a win? And should Jagmeet Singh be parading around as a win? I'm not saying he is, but should he be parading around Galen Weston leaving Loblaws as CEO as part of his ongoing advocacy
Zain
53:49
advocacy for lower grocery prices, cost of living, etc.? What would the Jagmeet Singh strategy here be? And do you give him any credit, Carter? No,
Carter
53:56
No, I wouldn't give him any credit. I mean, I wouldn't take credit either. What I would say is, you know, we're
Carter
54:02
we're not going to let up on Galen Weston and the Loblaw group just because they changed their CEO. In fact, we're going to double down. We're going to make it hard for them to increase prices.
Carter
54:12
This new CEO may be coming in with a different, you know, with a different name. But if he's still got the same corporate agenda, you got to know that the NDP are going to be there fighting for you to make sure that your grocery prices don't go up any higher than they are right now.
Carter
54:27
Boy, that was good, too. Jesus.
Corey
54:30
was good. That was actually good. The other ones were not, but that was pretty good. Should
Zain
54:34
Should he be taking credit, Corey?
Corey
54:36
I like exactly what Stephen said. The idea of like, this is not victory. Victory is when we have affordable food for Canadians. And we're going to continue putting the pressure on the loblaws of the world, the liberal government, and frankly, anybody who thinks that they can profit off of, you know, the basic needs of Canadian workers who are struggling right now because the government is not doing enough for them in a time of record profits for corporations we have record poverty for for the middle class and so maybe you know maybe we can say this is a sign that uh loblaws is realized that something's wrong there but you know i'm i'm i'm from missouri that's the show me state and uh i want to see i
Corey
55:20
i want to to see things Missouri
Carter
55:20
Missouri line is fucking money that is so this is weight that was so good do
Zain
55:26
do it yeah do that here I'm sure people will eat that shit up Corey uh Corey overrated underrated Jamil Giovanni well-known conservative uh commentator former CEO of the Manning Center uh is is now running for Pierre Polyev to replace Aaron O'Toole seed in the by-election in Durham uh an interesting cat uh someone I know personally but in your in your consideration consideration he's he's in his statement saying this is very much about the polyev direction this is my brand of conservatism overrated or underrated this type of candidate kind of wanting to join the the pure polyev camp in your mind uh
Corey
56:00
uh overrated it's nothing against jamil who i i know in passing i don't know him as well as you do obviously uh really like him a nice guy but uh the reality is how much do you think the average voter cares about whether you were the ceo of the the banning center. And in fact, that might cut against for an awful lot of people in southwestern Ontario. So certainly, once in, assuming he can win the seat, and I have no reason to believe he wouldn't be able to win the seat, once in the House of Commons, he'll be quite an interesting lieutenant, I think, for Pierre Poliev. But the
Corey
56:34
the voters are not going to care very much. And he could certainly provide the same sort of support as a staff person, or from the outside. Does not need to be an mp and in fact being an mp might distract him from what his true talents are interesting
Zain
56:47
interesting points carter overrated underrated uh jamil giovanni joining uh the pierre pauliev cam kind of not rounding out but adding to to the the new crop of conservatives that seem to be joining in the lining i
Carter
56:59
i think anything the pierre pauliev touches turns to shit
Zain
57:08
so we're gonna go with the
Corey
57:09
the lightning we are
Zain
57:10
are gonna go with underrated no i i like that But a final question for you. Let's get a heat check on this. Carter, I'm going to start with you. In the ongoing PSAC strike against the feds, this is the public service employees that are currently on day two of the strike. Let's use a clear-eyed, simply a strategic lens on this. Who's winning thus far, Carter, the feds or PSAC?
Carter
57:36
don't think anybody's winning yet. And I'm not sure that this is going to be a situation where anybody comes out ahead. You know, strikes aren't great for either party. And, you know, once you're in them, you
Carter
57:50
getting out of them is it seems to be much harder than it should be. So my my great concern is that both the federal government and PSAC, you know, don't make the progress that people expect. And right now it hasn't impacted people too badly, but it will have an impact. I mean, the public sector matters and getting this thing solved is going to be in everybody's best interests. I'm not going to come down and say this is going to, you know, the Trudeau government has to solve this. I think this is going to be a shared problem that both PSAC and and the government of the day here have to have to really shake their heads and say, is this really what we want right now?
Zain
58:35
Corey, a non-answer from Stephen Carter, who's currently winning between PSAC and the Feds.
Corey
58:41
No, I think, I mean, I really want to underline what he said. Like, work stoppages are tough, and they will hurt both parties over the long term, which is why, generally speaking, they are to be avoided, right? There's a lot of animosity and antipathy that carries forward, even when it's done, when it's settled, because there are lost wages that never come back. there is this ill will between management and workers that is tough to get past and god help you if you get in a situation with scabs or replacement workers right all of a sudden the people who cross the picket line are going to have some tensions with the people who didn't cross the picket line and i certainly hope we don't get to a place like that uh and yeah
Zain
59:20
yeah like there's there's not a lot
Corey
59:21
lot of winners in
Corey
59:22
work stoppage which is why generally speaking you try to negotiate uh around them and and when you get to them it's because there's been a serious breakdown in some way shape or form the two issues that seem to be at the core of this are of course wages we're in a deeply inflationary environment and i think that the peace act probably gets an awful lot of sympathy from
Corey
59:42
from an awful lot of canadians on that right like you know that there needs to be an increase where i think they likely have less sympathy and where i think that they have a bit of a confused strategy is also the idea of remote work which seems to have been elevated to a right for a number of people in many eyes, which is obviously not the case for many, many workers. And, you know, we can roll our eyes at this notion of there being a laptop class who had a very different pandemic experience than service workers, than people who work in construction, than people who work in, you know, industrial settings. But this really underlines it. And I think PSAC's big problem here is that that is a very unsympathetic position to say, like, Like, I want to work remote when so many Canadians simply do not have the ability to do that. About a quarter of Canadians work in sales and services, just to give some rough numbers
Corey
1:00:33
numbers here, right? You're not generally doing that kind of work remotely. Additionally, industrial work and on top of that, like, there's not actually a majority of Canadians who can work remotely even a couple days a week. And so I think PSAC needs to be very careful there. there. Now on the plus side, the fact that there are these two big issues means there's also movement to make a deal or a range of movement to make a deal because you don't need to get both. You can get something on one or both and you can declare victory and you can get yourself out of a strike situation. And similarly, if you're the government, you have a few more things that you can potentially offer there. But it's going to be rough on both parties. It's going to be rough on on canadians uh it is obviously at a moment where many people have just filed their tax returns my wife being one of them i filed months ago so that's the guy i am but uh yeah
Corey
1:01:25
yeah like uh you know this is this is going to be disruptive to people and and that's really unfortunate so i hear you i i know i know the general conceit of this show as we talk about winners and losers i just don't think there's any winners in this one i think this is a lose-lose for everybody and the sooner that that this can be resolved in a kind of a bargaining sense, the
Corey
1:01:44
the better off we'll all be. So
Zain
1:01:45
So conciliate. Oh, winner of the episode is, is, is, I mean, that was a, that's, that will be, we're going to start doing that Carter. We're going to announce winners at the end of the episode. It's not
Zain
1:01:54
not going to be good
Corey
1:01:54
good for your longterm.
Zain
1:01:55
longterm. Yeah, this is, this is good. You started out like my San Antonio Spurs, but our record shit season. So congratulations to Carter for going one to know in our new game. I suspect it won't last
Carter
1:02:04
last very long. You know what? We're
Carter
1:02:06
to leave it there. You know, you should see me in the one game. I'm pretty amazing. Oh,
Zain
1:02:11
Oh, you mean the one-fact framework? Yeah.
Zain
1:02:13
Well, we'll get to it soon. We're going to leave it there. That's a wrap on episode 1052 of The Strategist. My name is Zane Belchew. With me, as always, Corey Hogan, Stephen Carter, and we'll see you next time.