Transcript
Zain
0:02
This is a strategist episode 1093. My name is Zain Velji. With me as always, Stephen Carter, Corey Hogan. Carter, you just, just before we started, you said you don't care about the podcast. And I'm curious to explore more about that.
Carter
0:14
No, I don't care about Corey's recording podcast. It's totally different.
Zain
0:18
Oh, yeah. Well, then we're aligned. We
Zain
0:22
much about Corey's rules. I
Carter
0:23
I think anybody listening to the podcast knows I never phone it in. I'm always engaged.
Zain
0:30
There have been times where you have tried to literally phone into the podcast. We've told you that is not how this thing works. You've been on the road. You've tried to dial into this podcast.
Zain
0:41
Yeah, not a radio
Carter
0:42
radio show. Not a radio show.
Zain
0:43
I'm still having trouble with
Carter
0:44
That was back when we were using – Yeah, Carter, what network were you on? Oh, no, this is the software
Carter
0:49
you have to have this software on your computer. Yeah,
Corey
0:50
Yeah, the same. Hey, hold on
Corey
0:52
on there, guys. Yeah,
Zain
0:53
Yeah, do you want to? Yeah.
Zain
0:55
Ah, let's celebrate Stephen Carter with those 35-cent Calabrino calories. Empty calories, Corey. Empty calories. I think
Zain
1:02
think it might be one of those 35-calorie ones. It is
Corey
1:04
is one of the 35-calorie ones, yeah. I know my Hogan.
Zain
1:06
Hogan. I know that. He wouldn't waste 150. He wouldn't waste 150, Carter. I'm like, dude, whatever you drink from that. It's water.
Carter
1:16
You know, because I'm
Zain
1:18
I'm all about living forever. I've got no hydration. I'm literally in an oversized closet here trying to record, trying to get high quality audio for Corey, not for the listeners, to be absolutely clear. It is for Corey and Corey alone. Anything we need to talk about before we talk about what we need to talk about? We
Corey
1:33
We got to talk about Donald Trump's mugshot. So
Corey
1:35
So that's not your
Zain
1:36
three segments? Yeah, that is. That is. Okay, that's good. Here we go. Are we jumping into it? Are we jumping into it?
Zain
1:43
Let's move it on to the first segment, our first segment, what is a mugshot, guys?
Corey
1:52
what i wanted to talk about guys i
Corey
1:54
i don't care about anything else about
Corey
1:55
about it except for this one thing oh
Zain
1:57
oh i care i care about a lot more than
Corey
2:01
hours ago this is what like a 150 year old man he claimed on newsmax which is apparently still a thing that he had never heard of a mugshot before today yeah
Corey
2:15
because it didn't come up at Wharton, he said. So he'd never heard of a mugshot.
Corey
2:20
And I want you guys to know, I immediately thought, well, that's bullshit. He's 182 years old. He's aged 32 years, even the sentence. So I started looking. I thought, well, maybe he's tweeted about mugshots. He's never tweeted about the phrase mugshot.
Corey
2:36
I looked at the script of Home Alone 2, did not appear in the script of Home Alone 2.
Corey
2:40
And so then I went to ChatGPT and I said, hey, ChatGPT, to your knowledge has donald trump ever used the phrase mugshot and the response was as of my last training data in september 2021 i cannot pinpoint a specific instance where donald trump used the phrase mugshot in any of his public statements tweets or interviews oh my god so it must mean he's not lying there you go this
Carter
3:02
this is a different direction than i thought it was gonna go this
Zain
3:05
this is this went a different
Zain
3:07
direction this is a high integrity individual this is a individual whose
Corey
3:14
there's a chance he has never heard the phrase mugshot wow what
Corey
3:19
what do you make of that uh
Zain
3:21
i mean okay fine let's start here even though i wanted to start with the blue steel pose that he is doing in the mugshot which i think is the most blue stop the steel blue stop the steel okay well there we go can we just end the podcast yeah that's good we
Carter
3:34
we gave him all they asked for it's a patreon that's good uh
Zain
3:37
uh so okay well we'll get back to the fact that he's borrowing the look look from Zoolander in a second. Carter, I don't think it's possible that he doesn't know what a mugshot is. I suspect that in the criminally ridden circles he travels in, it's probably just known as a portrait.
Carter
3:55
Yeah. I mean, it
Carter
3:56
it is a portrait. I mean, and the thing that killed me is he's obviously practiced his pose for the mugshot. So what did his aides tell him? What what is he telling that he was practicing sir we're gonna have you practice the uh law enforcement official photograph like what did they refer to it as did
Carter
4:17
did he and this is a guy who's like chronically yeah so this
Carter
4:21
is a good point
Zain
4:22
point what do you think you know
Carter
4:25
know i'm searching out his references like he's all over social medias and such and he you know there's no way okay
Zain
4:31
okay here we go here we go i got it you got it i got it cory i think they told him this is his new profile picture for
Zain
4:38
for Truth Social. I think they said, sir, we
Zain
4:40
we need something. The theme of this campaign is you need to look like a
Zain
4:47
a comical character of a hard ass from a crime mob story that is probably dated in the 50s or 60s. And he said, you know what? Fuck it. I can pull that off. Sir, no, we don't trust you to pull it off. We would like to rehearse it for 12 hours a day, three days next week he
Zain
5:03
he nails it and then he gets that photo taken cory i think that's so good because
Zain
5:07
because this picture i have to say it's it's pretty badass
Corey
5:10
sort of nail pretty fucking like i
Corey
5:13
i hate the guy but we have to admit he did sort of nail my mugshot
Corey
5:17
i think he looks presidential portrait picture my mugshot
Carter
5:19
mugshot doesn't look anywhere he might
Corey
5:21
might use this as his official portrait carter yeah modern day presidential i would yeah i
Zain
5:27
i think he would use this as a a portrait, Carter. I think this will be the official portrait that he himself decides.
Zain
5:33
Let's talk about everything around this. I mean, outside of the fact that the president is in Fulton County, has been booked, has a mugshot slash profile picture taken of him. Carter, let's actually take 24 hours back from this. Donald Trump was not at the first Republican debate, which turned out to be a tire fire of a debate. Was this the right strategy for Donald He knew what was going to happen today, already scheduled. He did a Twitter live
Zain
6:02
live stream interview with former Fox host Tucker Carlson, kind of sticking the knife into Fox in some ways, even more considering his ongoing drama with them. Was it the right move for Donald Trump to skip the debate? He said the quiet part out loud. loud. I'm the front runner. What the fuck does it matter if I debate? I'm only going to go down from here. I think you're just going to take shots at me. I'm not going to show up. Was it the right move? And I want to talk about if this sort of transparency is what front runners will continue to go and fight. I mean,
Carter
6:32
mean, this is the playbook for so many different politicians. We see this with the, you know, the Conservative Party, the, you know, the United Conservatives pulled their
Carter
6:45
candidates out of the debates. A debate, when you're going to win regardless of whether or not you attend, is just filled with risk. There's no upside for going to a debate. If you don't go to the debate, the voters will in some fashion punish you. They're not going to do that. So why would you go to the debate? I mean, it is just risk. There is no reward. So if you're if you're being quite crass about it there is absolutely no reason to go to a bait and in fact i've advised some of my candidates don't go to the debate there are other ways that we can use your time that will get you the same outcome or even a better outcome and i would argue for donald trump he got a much better outcome now for other candidates getting booked in a jail in in uh in in Georgia, isn't going to be a better outcome. But for Donald Trump, I mean, he's got the Midas touch in some fashion. You know, anything he touches turns to gold. And by gold, I mean fundraising opportunities. And he's turned it into fundraising opportunities. The guy's nailed it. Absolutely nailed it.
Zain
7:54
I want to come around to that, especially as it relates to the image that we are seeing. Corey, I've called this on a previous episode, probably going to be the most circulated image that we're going to see going forward when it was out. But talk to me about debate first, before we get into the tactics of Donald Trump and what lies ahead for the week. Was it the right call to just skip out in the debate? And was the right call strategically to just be like, there is no upside for me. So settle this yourself, second place contenders.
Corey
8:24
Yeah, you know, Donald Trump has always been a little bit, he'll play it his way with debates. You'll recall in the 2016 debates, he's like, maybe I'll show up, maybe I won't. There were the pat questions about, will you agree to support the other candidate if you lose? And he said, no. And there were boos in the crowd, and he's like, I don't fucking care. Right. His strength as a candidate, insofar as you can call it a strength and not a deep moral weakness, is that he is willing to push those boundaries and break those norms if there's not any kind of extrinsic punishment that comes with it here. And like, there's a broader story about debates. And Donald Trump's just an extreme manifestation. You know, I remember in 2004, I think it was, where Vladimir Putin was running for re-election. I think it was 2004, might have been like 2012. You know, it was one of those presidential election years for him. And he just didn't do the debate. And I remember thinking, well, that's that's pretty good example of like what Russia is or has become, because obviously, if somebody tried to do that in a Western democracy, they would be they would be crushed for it. You know, there was this sense that the voters would punish them, as you've already talked about, we used to at least think they would.
Corey
9:39
Well, and you know, even if we didn't think that they would necessarily, we used to think, well, it's just wrong. You're like, you got to show up for a debate. those rules don't apply anymore and nobody manifests the the rules don't apply anymore id of our time more than donald trump so so i i mean i think it's he's running an optimal strategy is it a moral strategy i mean no one's ever accused the guy of running a moral strategy and he's the front runner and if nothing else happens he will be the republican nominee so why would he help anybody make news it just doesn't make any sense carter
Zain
10:15
carter carter what's What's the broader lesson here? Because we've talked about on a riding level, we've done episodes where on a riding level, why candidates skip debates. If they feel like there's no upside, usually it's the central campaign telling them to be like, fuck off, don't go to a debate. Anything that gets clipped out of that debate takes us off message. This is not that question. The question I have is, this is the guy at the top skipping out on a debate. I suspect that if the polls stay the same for him in the head-to-head against Biden, he might do the same. Now, the polls don't say that right now, but he might do the same. So the question I have for you is like, is there a lesson here that
Zain
10:51
that you would want to consider? Or are we just looking at Trump as the anomaly and the one-off case that we can't extrapolate any political lessons from? Because to me, there's two interesting things. The guy at the top is not showing up, comma, he's talking about why he's not showing up in very explicit terms. arms
Carter
11:09
i think that i think that it's a fool's errand to extrapolate that trump got away with it therefore everybody can get away with it um trump is a special case because it would appear that the man just simply does not feel shame uh because that is a large portion of what this is i mean
Carter
11:28
morally there are issues around this he doesn't feel he doesn't have morals that's not something he has to worry about. And he doesn't. Other
Carter
11:38
Other people have tried these types of things. Since Trump became Trump, a lot of people have tried to mimic his behavior, to change the way that they're perceived by taking actions like those actions that Donald Trump has taken. But no one else survives it. It is a unique phenomenon. And therefore, I would caution anybody from taking a a lesson from it. I don't think that Justin Trudeau and
Carter
12:07
and his advisors should be thinking, you know what?
Carter
12:11
We've got the perfect debate strategy. We just won't go, right?
Carter
12:14
right? You can minimize them. You can reduce the number. Can I put
Zain
12:20
Poliev in that position? Let's say he's still nine points up in head-to-head polls and we're 15, 20, 30 days away from an election. Corey, is there any transferable lessons here or is Carter right that there's a big asterisks around Trump like
Corey
12:34
like what do you I mean he's
Corey
12:36
he's not right because lest we forget Stephen Harper pulled out of a debate he pulled out of the consortium debate my own thing I'm gonna pick well
Corey
12:46
well man he didn't lose it because of that you know like there that was a long effing election but there is the reality 2015 you're
Zain
12:54
you're talking about right that the
Corey
12:56
the one he lost yeah those norms do not apply he lost anymore they don't i mean okay come on you're gonna tell me you actually believe he lost a single vote because he
Carter
13:04
he didn't show up
Carter
13:05
he lost because he didn't show up is what i'm inserting hold
Zain
13:11
cory help me understand this so if if there is lessons to be taken or not like we can we can clearly discuss that and i feel like i'm getting both of your points and i don't want to go
Zain
13:21
how did the rules change because
Zain
13:22
because to your point this has been happening on, at least let's put this back in the Canadian level, riding level all the time. I'm going to Corey first on this. National level, you had certain candidates kind of pull out without any cost, right? Did Trump kind
Zain
13:37
kind of push things forward at rapid pace? Was he like the end of it? Was he a leading indicator, trailing indicator? Give me an analysis here of how the rules change, like how we're grappling with this reality right now.
Corey
13:49
Well, look, I think there's a certain incrementalism that happens here. And And
Corey
13:54
somebody pushes the boundaries a little bit and somebody else pushes them a little bit further. And it sort of starts with those riding level debates and this idea that, oh, you know, you can get away with not doing a riding level debate. And, oh, you know, in this province, Candidate X didn't show up to the debate or he said that he wouldn't go to the consortium debate and he threw his weight around. And, hey, you know, Prime Minister, that seems like that might work for you. Maybe you want to pull out of these consortium debates, get some more favorable terms, figure out a way that you can keep everybody off kilter. And let's be clear, the reason why Harper did that, people
Corey
14:26
people can say otherwise, but it's bullshit, is he did it because he thought fewer people would then watch the debate, right? It would be kind of a spin audience.
Corey
14:35
Yeah, and so it would have just less of an effect on the election. And he had this strategy of trying to triangulate between the two. And you know what? Arguably, if he had pulled it to the logical conclusion and not shown up to any debates, he'd still be prime minister because it was the Quebec French language debate where everything turned and all of a sudden, because of the, you know, the Nakib debate, the
Corey
15:00
the liberals started to pull away from the NDP and it created this virtuous cycle for Trudeau. So, but,
Corey
15:06
but, you know, to get back to it, nobody
Corey
15:08
nobody has actually pulled out of a U.S. presidential debate yet.
Corey
15:13
This is me speculating what could happen. No, I know. And what I'm saying is like this is part of this incrementalism. Like it's easier to pull out of a
Corey
15:20
a primary debate because there's 800 million of them. It's easier to pull out of an early one. And then you say, well, maybe I'll go to some of the later ones. And this is how the walls get tested. And if there's no pushback, if it turns out that that wall doesn't have anything supporting it, There's no public opinion to punish you. You know, the voters in the Republican Party say, that's totally fine. He doesn't need to show up. Well, then they're just going to push harder. And then you are going to see people test the boundaries of this thing and see just how far it goes. And you know what? It's a real shame in some ways. We've obviously on this show even said debate's not perfect ways to choose candidates. candidates. But you know, they provide a certain amount of value here. But it is part of that overall Trump ethos of, I'm going to break the rule, I'm going to call myself smart for doing it. And for whatever reason, you're all going to agree. I'm smart for not paying too much tax. I'm smart, because I don't have to go to the debates, and I'm the front runner. And
Zain
16:13
And you know, what's interesting to your point, Corey, is a lot of the media, regardless of their political persuasion, has agreed with them. Because as we talked about about earlier, he's saying what campaigns discuss internally out loud. Carter, I want to get your take on this. And then I've got a kind of a follow up for both of you. How do we get here? Is Corey right? Yeah,
Carter
16:30
Yeah, I mean, we got here. I mean, Corey, Corey took a very long time to get to the right answer. I mean, he put it in his last sentence there, where
Carter
16:37
where he said that, you know, we get there by having the voters not punish people, right. And so
Carter
16:43
so the voters haven't punished people. And one of the reasons that the voters don't punish people is that the media have turned themselves from being reporters to being uh armchair armchair pundits uh and and totally
Carter
16:56
all of a sudden now every media outlet is a fucking strategist right like um you
Carter
17:01
you know they're reporting on the strategies they're they're talking about good game bad game instead of talking about what's the the duty of a candidate or or you know getting like they've changed the way that they report and because they've changed the way that they report we're changing the information that we're getting you know you're changing the norms the norms and media have fundamentally changed the the norm i mean we've talked about this on so many different levels and yeah
Carter
17:27
um it's these changing norms that enable it i mean it
Carter
17:33
it goes back to why nixon stepped down right nixon steps down because his party is not prepared to offer him cover for the situation that he authored um how
Carter
17:45
how is that different than what we're seeing with donald trump donald trump's party is prepared to offer him shelter for any situation that he that he authors regardless of how heinous it is i mean lindsey graham in one sentence will say if we if we nominate donald trump we deserve the shit kicking that we're going to get and then he becomes the biggest sycophant uh within a year you know i mean this This is the failure that enables these positions to be taken. And it's not getting better. It's only getting worse right now because team play is more important than anything.
Corey
18:28
Well, yeah, I 100% agree. And I do think that the media scoring everything on strategy and saying like, oh, it was reprehensible, but clever. I mean, that's not a great development, frankly. and um and that's too bad i don't think it's the root cause i actually think the sports team thing is a much more meaningful challenge that we have right now people not willing to hold their own team to account but to bring this back to you know the strategic implications you asked about the reality is politicians of all stripes are testing walls always you know they're they're looking to see what they can get away with uh what they will be punished by the voters for doing and what the voters will turn a blind eye to. And Lindsey Graham is actually the perfect example of that. Lindsey Graham clearly
Corey
19:10
clearly hates Donald Trump. I don't doubt that for a minute. But Lindsey Graham is clearly a coward. And he has this feedback mechanism around him where every time he speaks out against Donald Trump, the world around him comes down and criticizes him. And he says, Oh, my God, I am so afraid of not being popular. I'm going to jump back into the boat with this asshole. And so this is something that I think as voters is, I mean, we live in a democracy. This is so self-evident, but I'm going to say it. This is your superpower in a democracy, your ability to moderate behavior based on what you are willing to tolerate. And if we're going to tolerate anything, well, then anything is going to happen. And that's just a reality that I think should cause us all a little bit of concern. Hey,
Zain
19:56
Hey, Corey, I'm going to go to Carter on this, but I want your help on the back end of his answer, which is, Carter, if politics and working with politicians is you're a black hat strategist, can you put a white hat on and work for this broader cause known as democracy? As someone who's kind of advised candidates, as you've said earlier, to skip out on debates, to not show up, to say, listen, this is not going to harm you.
Zain
20:19
Is there any mechanism in your mind with your strategy hat on, your white hat for strategy, strategy for
Zain
20:25
for the broader cause for the broader public good for the commons carter right
Zain
20:29
right i'm going to keep going is there zane bill watch
Corey
20:31
watch your hat carter
Zain
20:32
carter yeah watch that carter
Zain
20:33
carter what would you what would you install if you could make people if you could have something that punishes people on public it's
Carter
20:41
because i actually i actually spent some time thinking about that that this week i was trying to figure out if there is a means to getting to i've got a project that someone's reached out to me on that on
Carter
20:53
on its surface appears to be impossible because it is asking me to make people care about something that they just simply don't care about.
Carter
20:59
And, you know, I'm struggling because I don't know how to make people care about something that they should care about, but they don't care about it. And so from my point of view, you know, I can take their money and do this work. And this is not exciting. I make my, you know, my monthly nut and I'll do do good work but it won't change
Zain
21:24
do we want to let's not google that keep going
Carter
21:29
that's going to be the episode title you're welcome here's
Carter
21:31
here's the thing you know we we i
Carter
21:36
can't make the electorate go to their to their better angels that's in fact it's it's very hard for me to do that the only the only recipe for success that we have have is that the people find their better angels on their own. Um,
Carter
21:50
Um, because you, you can't instill that you can't, because first of all, my values aren't the same as everybody else's values. They have to represent and reflect their own values. And right now their values that they're reflecting are, we don't give a fuck.
Carter
22:05
And maybe that manifests itself and we don't trust any of you and that's fine, I guess, but people are going to govern you. And if you're not going to trust any of them, if you're not going to invest any time in understanding the differences between them. I mean, we at one point equated Hillary Clinton to Donald Trump. I mean, Hillary Clinton did some not great things. The Clintons did some not great things. But there's only one person facing indictment right now for inciting a potential coup. And that was Donald Trump. They aren't the same. They aren't the same. And so I don't know if there's a white hat, that zane i think that it relies too much on the electorate not enough on uh and not at all on those of us doing the practitioner work cory
Zain
22:50
cory help me on this and before you do i just want to make a quick plug for our carter's monthly nut wall calendars which um on uh the full moon every month we'll have a date circle for you so you know when he's getting his monthly nut um don't you guys
Zain
23:03
call it that's gonna be available like am i alone in this it's a wall calendar so they can can put it on their wall calendar like
Carter
23:10
like don't you call it the
Zain
23:10
the wall calendar like
Zain
23:15
course help carter with this is he right is he right that this is just like a if there's good to be done for the commons the commons has to kind of respond the people have to respond here that you can't put together a system that penalizes or that's punitive in a certain way to public opinion um and i'm just looking for the broadest answer right like i'm kind of curious Because at some point, if this incrementalism continues, we're going to have to see some changes.
Corey
23:41
Well, there's a responsibility inherent in a democracy, right? Like you have to take it seriously. You've got to put certain things ahead of other things here. And we used to talk about country before party, constitution before candidate, things like that. Really interesting to see how polling has shifted on a lot of those things and answers answers to questions, especially in the United States, to things like, I would be okay with an end to democracy if it meant my party was always in charge. Shockingly high percentages in the United States. Both parties would say that. And that's really, that's
Corey
24:18
that's a paradigm shift for the United States here. And it's a challenge because one of the things that you used to do if you were trying to do those so-called white hat strategies there, if you were a candidate who was going to, you know mr smith goes to washington everybody and you saw people come around every now and then they often disappointed in the long run but you know spoke their mind said the honest you know truth and we're in it for the right reason or it seemed that way it
Corey
24:45
it was often because they were trying to speak to higher ideals right well i thought we were all american i'm staying in the america frame i thought we were all americans and you know they used to say things like politics stops at the water's edge here you
Corey
24:56
you don't see that anymore like you don't you you see uh
Corey
25:00
uh people absolutely willing to sell out the united states and its interests to russia uh if it means that their party can get the advantage and like let's be really clear russia
Corey
25:12
russia hacked the the dnc and republicans cheered it right donald trump almost directed it absolutely like this is like this is this would be so deeply problematic in a different time and i guess the point i'm trying to make here is
Corey
25:28
it's hard to speak to higher ideals if there's no higher ideal than party and for too many people that that is becoming the case here and so uh you know there's not great solutions but you do have to find trumping values and and if you want to talk to people and you want to make it important to them you don't tell them this is important you you tell them how it supports the thing that they actually care about, whether it be their family or healthcare or what. And so, this is kind of the crass transactional nature of politics.
Corey
25:59
Because in the short term, that's the only way you do it. Like, you're not going to give everybody a 10-year civics lesson in a 28-day campaign. Carter,
Zain
26:06
Carter, we started with the photo. Can I move back to the photo for
Zain
26:11
If there was coaching, whether there wasn't coaching, did that coaching help? If you agree with the premise that we've introduced on this show, that this is going to be the most meme-ified, most seen, most distributed image potentially ever, what
Zain
26:25
what value was that coaching for that look that Donald Trump has? And do you think, as an extension of that question, he will actually weaponize it or leverage it himself in a fundraiser? Could you see that particular mugshot? It's already done. He's already done
Corey
26:40
done it. It's already out. Social, yeah. Yeah,
Zain
26:42
Yeah, so talk to me about this. Talk to me about the coaching. Did it work? Was it a good strategy? And then talk to me about how he, if he's already done it, what's next? Give me a pathway of how he uses this and jujitsu is next. next is
Carter
26:56
is i mean if we follow this along the road i mean all this is if
Carter
27:01
if you are where donald trump is right now you are just simply this is a uh fake prosecution by by people with grudges and vendettas and
Carter
27:13
and that you know that is the recipe um
Carter
27:17
to undo sarah palin is out today already calling essentially for civil war um
Carter
27:23
um these aren't the the you
Carter
27:26
you know these aren't smart people who understand the consequences of what they're calling for uh these are people who are you know they've taken the red pill for lack of a better phrasing um and that red pill blinds them um to the consequences of their actions you know we're watching a group of people who who took action based on falsehood get charged and they're doubling down you know um rudy
Carter
27:54
rudy giuliani is out in front of the courthouse making statements that could very well land him back in front of the courthouse right like like this is not normal behavior and because it's not normal behavior we've we've reached the end of our ability to predict what's going to happen we did not predict that january 6th was going to to happen in the way that it did. But at some point, you have to start predicting that, you
Carter
28:19
you know, the rhetoric will, at the very least, incite some people who are, you
Carter
28:29
prone to such a thing. Let's just say prone to such a thing. People who want to believe this will believe it, and they will ultimately take some sort of action. And I don't think, you know, I don't want want to be too alarmist, but I think that it's fair to say that when you've got leaders calling for warning of civil war in such a fashion that it actually makes it sound like they
Carter
28:52
they want a civil war, like I would warn against a civil war. I would warn and say, you know what? We
Carter
28:58
We are taking steps right now that worry me that we are moving towards civil war.
Carter
29:03
These people aren't making that that type of statement. The statement that they're making is we need a civil war. We need,
Carter
29:10
we need bloodshed to, to cleanse the country and create the country that we, that we thought we were a part of, you
Carter
29:19
you know, I mean, this is, and it's not just the United States. I mean, we've got people storming the barricades in Kelowna trying to access their homes because they're convinced that there's some sort of conspiracy to steal their fucking homes from. I don't need, i don't know what to say anymore zane i i just we're at the end of anything vaguely resembling reason cory
Zain
29:40
cory talk to me about this the weaponization of trump's image by trump what
Corey
29:48
he's he's wanted a mugshot for a long time except he didn't know what a mugshot was actually pretty he doesn't know
Zain
29:53
know what it is but he's wanted it didn't know what it was great
Corey
29:56
great point great but But because his, after he was indicted in New York, I think it was, I think it was the first one, the
Corey
30:06
the Trump campaign released a fake mugshot of Donald Trump, and they started selling shirts with it on there. By the way, the best part of that fake mugshot, it listed his height as 6'5". Oh, good.
Zain
30:18
By the way, I have to say, they're very generous on today's height and weight measurements too. 6'3", 230. This is like Lou Dort size.
Carter
30:26
Oh, he looks great.
Zain
30:27
great. so they're giving them like i think it's at
Zain
30:30
215 yes 250 they're giving them six six three 215 he
Corey
30:34
that's us that's a shooting guard i mean like carter i
Corey
30:37
i mean there's some argument about whether he's actually six three might actually but it doesn't doesn't really matter point is he wants the mugshot because he wants the culture war he wants the fight he wants he wants to be the victim think and listen i'm not i'm not trying to psychoanalyze it's very very clearly his strategy. He's made speeches like, they are coming after all of you. It's just like, I am the stand in for all of you, and they are after us. And I am going to take the slings and arrows for you, and I'm going to keep fighting them. That's a huge, huge part of his brand. And so he was more than happy to get this mugshot.
Corey
31:12
Didn't know what a mugshot was, but he wanted the mugshot.
Zain
31:14
But here's the thing, Corey, and I don't mean to kind of talk about this needlessly. But the point that I'm trying to make, and the question that I have back to you again,
Zain
31:24
is he wanted a mugshot, but he got this mugshot. Did the coaching, did the, did he, does this actually matter that he got this particular shot? This is not your standard mugshot, right? This is like a, I don't know how to explain, I don't know how to, everyone's going to be seeing
Corey
31:40
seeing it. Everyone will have seen it. Yeah,
Zain
31:41
Yeah, so I don't need to explain it to you, right?
Zain
31:43
So he got this shot.
Zain
31:45
What value is there in that? Like the fact that it looks like this.
Corey
31:51
Because he's saying that he's angry, that he's the aggrieved party he's outraged about this he's seething he's he's barely containing it but he looks like he is containing it and uh it is all just a big big part of the same story there i really think like
Corey
32:08
again i hate the guy but he really nailed it from a strategy point of view if his shot looked like he had fear in his eyes if he he you know if he had some sort sort of funny face on it, it would have been not great for him. But instead, he got exactly the shot he wanted, I'm sure.
Corey
32:25
He, you know, he nailed it. He, you know, and his supporters will see that and be like, yeah, this is an injustice and, you know, natural human emoting and looking at somebody and mirroring their emotions will kick in.
Zain
32:38
Carter, talk to me about the same point. What value is it that he got this shot and not just any mugshot?
Corey
32:44
Well, he's muted. Carter doesn't realize he's muted yet he's been talking for a bit sorry
Carter
32:48
sorry i lowered my desk that was my fault he he he looks like a fighter are
Zain
32:54
are you shrinking at that rapid
Carter
32:55
i was standing i was standing because you know i i'm an athlete and
Zain
33:01
carter thought he was 6 3 2 15 that's what happened here he's like how tall is 6 3 2 15 turns out he needed some lowering yeah um
Carter
33:10
yeah the 215 is something i'm shooting for here's
Carter
33:12
here's the thing he he looks like he's a fighter right he looks as staged as those ufc fighters when they go in and they do the way in right they do the way in and they're making the faces of each other and they're punching each other's
Carter
33:28
he looks exactly like that guy and we know that we have a cultural reference point for that image and this This is the thing that Trump is excellent at. He doesn't create necessarily his own cultural touch points, but he mimics the cultural touch points that actually matter. He knows that Joe Rogan announces the UFC fights and he's going to get Rogan when he goes on, you know, when he does this, this face, Rogan's not even necessarily going to know why he's responding to it. But he will respond to it because he's looking into essentially a mirror of something that Joe Rogan values, which apparently is human combat. But, you know, it doesn't matter to Trump. Trump just grabs the cultural touchpoint, morphs it and uses it for himself. And that's his really, I think, only skill is being able to take those touchpoints and turn them into his own thing. No, you've nailed
Zain
34:27
nailed it. It's wrestling, right? He's kind of leaned into the wrestling
Zain
34:30
wrestling meme in a real
Carter
34:31
real way. Or the good guy who's aggrieved or whatever the storyline is that he's telling himself.
Zain
34:38
And this is a guy who's quite literally been in the wrestling ring throughout his long sort of non-presidential career, right? Like in the past, he was with Vince McMahon in that wrestling ring. It's very much playing into that same cultural point. That's an awesome point, Carter. I'm going to leave that segment there. moving on to our next segment our next segment small sum but big cost guys i want to talk about something that has been making smallish headlines but i really want i've been struggling with it in terms of how important it is it's krista freeland's speeding ticket carter oh
Carter
35:10
oh i'm glad here's
Zain
35:10
here's the reason i want to bring it up here's
Zain
35:13
here's the reason i want to bring it up you know we we've talked for a long time that politicians hold on what
Zain
35:18
even know what this
Zain
35:20
i'm i'm We'll talk for a long time, Carter, that politicians are just like us. Well, just like us, and when I talk about us, I mean us Albertans, Krista Freeland has got a speeding ticket. She was going from Grand Prairie to Peace River. It's a 110 highway from what I understand. She was going 132. She got a $270-some speeding ticket. She's paid it.
Zain
35:41
Here's my question to you.
Zain
35:43
Does this make her more relatable?
Zain
35:45
I'll start here because we talked – No, this is great. Let me start here and then expand out. Now, because
Zain
35:50
because to me, all of the coverage, the fact that this was a story, quote unquote, leaked to right-wing media, which has then made it into mainstream media, almost kind
Zain
36:01
of says, well, why would right-wing media put this out if this is about politicians are just like us and all of us have speeding tickets and many of us collect them for a living, right, in some cases, especially on Alberta's highways, but
Zain
36:15
but it doesn't seem to have that ring of relatability. So without putting my thumb on the scale – Too much. Carter, what does
Carter
36:21
does it do to Christa Freeland? Without putting your thumb on the scale, too
Corey
36:23
too much. I mean, your sentence before was literally, it doesn't seem to have the relatability. Carter,
Carter
36:28
Carter, you know – No, I understand. It's been really tough for me to transition
Corey
36:31
transition into roles. It's being
Zain
36:33
Shoya Ohtani of this podcast.
Carter
36:35
Here's why it didn't work. Because Christa Freeland – Why
Carter
36:39
Why didn't it work? Christa Freeland decided to make it not work. Because her press conference, she stands up and says, i did it i was wrong and i will never do it again and it sounded like bullshit and instead of standing up and say you know what i
Carter
36:56
i sped i got caught i paid my ticket like every other canadian every single other canadian who's ever had a ticket i stood up i i paid my money that's what the that's what it's for you know that's the that's the system that we have and instead of of standing up and just saying i
Carter
37:15
i i got caught i'm sorry i paid the ticket she made it into this thing where she's like and i will never do it again because it's just so shameful it's really not that shameful she got a fucking speeding ticket like
Carter
37:29
like we cory have you ever had a speeding ticket oh
Carter
37:34
oh so many i mean we've seen your car does it even go over they tell
Carter
37:37
so i'm saying where Does it even go over the speed
Zain
37:38
speed limit? I'm in the 05 Corolla. Let me tell you something, okay? It takes a while. But when it gets to 132, oh my God,
Carter
37:45
God, it stays there. You can't slow it down. It
Zain
37:46
It stays there. You know, it's too expensive. The deceleration is a risk. It's more of
Carter
37:50
of a hazard. Every Canadian has one. She's taken it from, you know, really a very every man position, right? To a, I,
Carter
38:00
I, you know, I'm really sorry and I will never do it again. Come on, Christian. you like just
Zain
38:07
just it's it's it's interesting carter because it's the same it's the same core i'm going to get to you in a second but it's the same commitment our sponsor flare airlines has made to never speed again uh or to never go fast at all uh cory
Zain
38:19
but also it is their commitment uh cory does this make her more relatable well
Corey
38:24
carter's point is is a good one it's really interesting there's a couple more elements though that do need to be at least acknowledged here one is that the the right wingers who loathe
Corey
38:35
loathe christia freeland also really loathe the comment that she made about you know you should ride your bicycle more which actually you know riding bicycles good for you and it's if you know it's not the if you know how
Corey
38:53
a lot of a lot of snark from the usual suspects about like oh i didn't know bicycles could go that fast and and all of this right so it's seen
Zain
39:01
seen as she's also famously said she doesn't own a car that's
Corey
39:03
that's right it's seen as the peak of hypocrisy right to say oh not only do you have a car but i'm not saying i believe it is i'm saying many people see it this way so
Corey
39:12
so that's the other component and then you
Corey
39:16
you know it's really interesting to imagine her just saying like yeah you know it's it's between grand prairie and peace river get
Carter
39:23
get out of there
Corey
39:24
there i was worried i'd be overtaken can buy traffic at 130 you know have you ever driven that like people just bomb down that if they have the ability because there's not there's not a lot in between it's
Carter
39:33
it's a fast highway i got pulled over there i i got
Carter
39:37
got away with it because i was chief of staff thanks to the sheriffs again thanks guys oh
Zain
39:41
oh my god jesus god damn it casey seriously
Corey
39:47
Stephen Carter soft launching his corruption um yeah
Corey
39:53
yeah listen this is uh oh by the way I should actually say were you driving a government had the entire
Carter
39:59
entire premier's office in the in my government vehicle yeah so
Corey
40:04
so I yeah so I will say I I've been pulled over in my government vehicle too and they know it's a government vehicle and you know have gotten lighter didn't ask for it but god i gotta walk
Corey
40:15
i think it's a thing that i gotta walk not do but uh um
Corey
40:20
so no no mugshot for steven but but
Zain
40:24
but uh it's just only a matter of time yes so back
Corey
40:28
back back to so that you know i think those are components and then the thing is like as
Corey
40:33
as the deputy prime minister what do you i'm
Corey
40:36
i'm sure there was a conversation about whether it would be appropriate to say like It's fine, because you can immediately imagine people saying, what an outrage. Somebody could have been killed, that kind of speed. Oh, come on.
Corey
40:49
don't know. Everybody's got one. I think it's interesting, because listen, as
Corey
40:53
as an Albertan, I will say, I
Corey
40:56
I think it was actually a 100-kilometer limit. Zane, I might be wrong about that. Yeah,
Zain
41:00
Yeah, the article says 110. On a 110
Corey
41:01
110 road? Yeah. Okay. Well, then, if it's a 110 road, the flow is 130 on Highway 2. All of those highways. For sure, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Corey
41:11
Like, everybody's sitting between 125 and 135 on those highways at that. So, like, you know, it does seem like it's a little bit much. And probably she could have just said, like, yeah,
Carter
41:22
yeah, I went fast, you know. Didn't realize how fast I was going. Probably
Corey
41:27
Probably shouldn't have. I don't feel great that I had to pay $270.
Carter
41:33
there you go. More careful in the future now.
Zain
41:38
carter could that have worked could the more relatable fuck like i you know it's a speeding ticket half
Carter
41:44
half the population sucks like
Zain
41:46
like rather than like the i i murdered a family sort of vibe but yeah
Carter
41:50
yeah half the population isn't involved in the cosplay that the far right wing is involved in right like going after her and throwing all this shit oh you know how dare she how hypocritical most of the population's coming at this saying yeah i've been there been there got the got the ticket to prove it right like we've all done things that that fit into this category and it could be a very humanizing moment where she says yep i you know yeah uh i'd like to tell you this is my first one it's
Carter
42:23
it's not i should be learned you know damn
Corey
42:29
guess i guess i'm better
Carter
42:30
better i'm gonna get back on my bike when i get back Do
Zain
42:32
Do you think self-deprecation would have worked for her? Absolutely, if she had that tool. Would you have advised self-deprecation? I just, like,
Corey
42:38
like, yeah, I mean, I think if somebody said, I just think the whole thing is a bit much. Like, I don't know the context. I'm assuming she didn't just have a press conference
Carter
42:47
conference to talk about. No, she was doing another press conference. No, she
Corey
42:49
she was asking questions. I was sure. Like, it would have been wild otherwise. But, like, if it came up, be like, yeah, well, don't
Corey
42:56
don't do the crime if you can't do the time. Next question. Like, you know, it's just like, yeah. Yeah. Well, are you making light of it? Well, I guess I'm making light of how bad of a driver I am. Next question. And I
Carter
43:08
don't know. I mean, I don't know. That's actually
Corey
43:10
actually a terrible answer. You
Carter
43:11
You know, like, come on.
Corey
43:15
But I just, I do agree. You don't need to kind of rake yourself over the coals for something like this. I said online, I said, this is probably the best evidence we have that Chrystia Freeland actually is an Albertan if she's going 130. That would have
Carter
43:28
have been a great line, actually. actually. This just proves I am an Albertan. That
Carter
43:32
That would have been a great line.
Zain
43:35
Hey, Carter, I wanted to kind of get at a point that you mentioned, which is,
Zain
43:40
can governments get too cautious? Can they get in and over there versus like in the era of wanting to be relatable of
Zain
43:48
of could they overthink this, be over analytical to the point where Corey made, right? Like, well,
Zain
43:54
well, you know, this is a highway and who knows what could have happened if you're you're speeding at 130, like lives could be lost, that sort of thing. So we can't play it self-deprecatingly. We got to play it straight. And then we got to play it on the brand because you're not just Christopher Freeland, you're the Deputy Prime Minister, and like you speak for the government. And could they keep dominoing
Zain
44:11
dominoing into a response that seems so unrelatable
Zain
44:16
unrelatable at the end of the day, and that costs them more than the more sort of casual relatable response. And I feel like you see this with governments and and i and this is where i i'd kind of add a point per se and just get you to comment on you see this when governments kind of get a bit stale or when governments kind of are are in this mode where that they're they don't realize they're on a constant campaign for for people's attention and people's they get
Carter
44:39
get scared zane right
Carter
44:41
right the governments uh get scared and when they get scared they start making different types of mistakes mistakes and getting too tight if you will is just a different type of mistake it's just a different thing that happens um you
Carter
44:55
you know you for you forget like ralph klein right like everybody always goes back to ralph klein look at how relatable he was blah blah blah guy made mistakes all over the place he was fine making a mistake because he had confidence that he could get out of it and sometimes governments forget that every every issue we've talked about on this podcast for the last 1093 episodes is for the most part fleeting. Very
Carter
45:22
Very few issues that we have spoken about on this podcast are singularly the reason why someone lost the government, with the notable exception of Stephen Harper skipping the English language debate. That's
Carter
45:37
That's really the only one that
Carter
45:39
we can look at and say that was the piece that cost him the election. Everything else is cumulative. cumulative so if you if you were like trying to play error-free ball you're probably just going to make more mistakes and become less relatable cory
Corey
45:54
cory yeah you know i've been sitting here trying to think about what i think her answer should have been weighing all of these things and it's i i don't know i mean it's hard to get past just saying like like yes
Corey
46:06
yes i got a speeding ticket you
Corey
46:08
know next question you know how do you feel about it i feel like i'm 270 dollars poorer horror next question like i i honestly think that adding anything to it has has too much risk and
Corey
46:20
and you know if anybody wants to be outraged about it they were probably going to be outraged about whatever you did so just you know give
Corey
46:27
give them as little as possible how do
Carter
46:28
do you feel about it i feel i feel like we should have a national ban on fines over 200 but justin says we're not allowed to do that so you know like there's a million jokes that you could come and you could workshop shop some great jokes like we do here on the strategist for only our best stuff winds up on air cory
Zain
46:46
oh it's only our best stuff in this podcast yeah you should you should hear the cutting room floor
Zain
46:51
floor yeah oh my goodness uh littered littered with b-rate material uh you
Zain
46:57
you didn't sound serious you've been in government how do you how do you how do you not get i like Carter's word tight about this stuff. How do you like pull yourself out of the constant dominoing? Well, that's the, you know, this and then someone could say that and that person could say that. So we can't do that. And you close more doors than you leave open. How do you get out of that?
Corey
47:21
Yeah, I can tell you and I've observed it with up close with multiple governments, you do tend to see a bit of an arc where people come in with tons of swagger, we're going to do this we're going to do that we're not going to compromise we're going to be the change agents we're going to get everything done and then boom a baseball bat hits them upside the head and it's not one that
Corey
47:40
expected right it's it's something weird all of a sudden and everybody's mad at them and then there's a story about a staffer and nobody saw it coming and then there's like whatever it is but the point being you accumulate these hits you go from writing in the polls at like 70 approval to everybody hates your guts and you get a bit of a bunker mentality you get a siege mentality and people start to play a lot of defense they start thinking anything i do is going to be viewed in the most critical negative light and it's actually the most dangerous time in my opinion for a government because if they succumb to that if they start trying to play only defense then they are going to lose because ultimately they will be chipped away at right like you've got to take a couple of risks in this business you've got to go out You've got to put yourself out there, to your point. And the good governments I've seen, they
Corey
48:30
they do tend to say,
Corey
48:31
say, okay, well, that hurt, but we've got to take ourselves off the map. We've got to do things, and we can't be afraid of our own shadow, and we've got to move forward. But it's a conscious thing, because we're
Corey
48:41
we're all humans, and you
Corey
48:43
take that kind of abuse, and you do sort of want to shelter from it at a certain
Zain
48:47
Carter, how do you maintain that swagger? Because the one point that I wanted to bring up here, you brought up immediately, which was her apology just being so over the top, right? Like, I will not do this again. And listen, I don't mean to read so much into Krista Freeland's remarks that this is about the government, but let me do that for a second, right? It was almost read to me like, I won't do it again. Like, please keep trusting us, right? Like, I'm part of this government. We care about the right things. Like, you know, don't let this be the reason that you leave us sort of thing. it kind of seems so tight
Zain
49:15
tight in that sense i'm going to use your term again that it kind of missed the mark from a human perspective carter your advice how do you keep the swagger going as someone who's been noted to have swagger till the end uh in in well i
Carter
49:27
i think you i think you have to keep changing your team i think that uh
Carter
49:30
uh cory's point is bang on i mean you take a few smacks on this stuff and it starts to hurt like you you feel it and you feel it in in a fashion you
Carter
49:40
get humble oh man like you The first time you get dinged in the media, you're like, holy shit, we're never going to recover from this, right? And then you get dinged a few more times and it's just like, man, we got to change everything. We got to change how we're thinking about these things because we cannot keep taking these hits. These hits are going to kill us.
Carter
50:01
you lose the fact that it's fleeting, right? You lose the fact that this is a moment in time and every government goes through them. And if you come up with a good strategy for changing the channel or, or, or creating a different narrative, you're going to be just fine, but you just, you need to have those people who can come up with those, those channels. And, and one of the consistent themes, uh, Corey and I were talking about consistent themes today because we were talking about you most of the time and, you know, you're nothing if not a consistent theme.
Zain
50:31
Me consistently wanting to not do this podcast. But the
Carter
50:34
the consistent theme that we have with the Trudeau government remains that they don't know how to do crisis communications. They don't know when it's a crisis and when it's not a crisis. And this particular case actually, I think, was an opportunity to redefine Christopher Freeland from the cyborg to the human being. That was the opportunity. And And they
Carter
51:00
they blew it because they thought it was a crisis. It wasn't a crisis. It was, you know, I mean, we should probably be saying something trite about, you know, the symbol for, you know, crisis is opportunity, but bullshit. But, you know, whatever. This is just, you have to, as a professional, be able to read the room and know which side of this it is and how normal people think. thinking. The problem is the longer you spend in government, the less normal you are.
Zain
51:32
I just want to underline that point. Can I paraphrase? Corey, I'll let you go here in a second. But Carter, are you saying that they took what wasn't a crisis but applied the crisis style of response to it and that was in essence the error? Yeah, I mean, get
Carter
51:43
get out there, apologize early, apologize often is like the crisis
Carter
51:47
crisis one-on-one. Get out of this as fast as humanly possible and i'm not sure that anybody even do
Carter
51:53
do you think anybody in the room said you know what
Carter
51:56
this feels like an opportunity to me i
Carter
52:00
i don't think anybody did yeah
Zain
52:01
yeah no that's exactly how i thought about it in some ways and maybe shows the mentality of the government correct too
Corey
52:06
yeah well i'm i think maybe there was somebody in the room who said you know what everybody speeds and they said yeah yeah but we're the government we got to be responsible we don't want to take this in we just want out of this and we don't want
Carter
52:15
want it to be a
Corey
52:17
and and i sure but you You can imagine how the conversation went. But I really think Stephen's point's a great one. Sometimes you get hit. Boxers get hit. And you're going to get hit if you get into the ring, but you can't win if you turtle in that situation. So you
Corey
52:34
you need to throw punches, set the agenda, control the fight.
Corey
52:38
Sometimes you're going to get hit. And
Corey
52:40
And I think it's interesting to me how quickly governments can get into that space. But you stay in that space and you're going to lose. I don't think that's what this is. let's not over interpret this, but it can be a worrying sign when a government is just like surrendering on anything like this immediately.
Zain
52:59
We're going to leave that segment there, moving on to our final segment, our over, under, and our lightning round. Stephen Carter, you know, this segment was devised, developed, and executed for you, and it still continues
Carter
53:08
continues to be the same.
Carter
53:09
So I hope you're appreciative of
Carter
53:11
of that. I am sorry I did it. I won't do it again.
Zain
53:15
oh thank you yeah
Zain
53:18
seems like a high bar by the way for christopher freeland to never like
Zain
53:22
impossible adult life yeah
Carter
53:23
yeah i mean next time it's impossible
Corey
53:25
impossible like come on
Corey
53:27
you will be run off the highway if you're going 110 on 110 road to our earlier point yeah
Zain
53:32
yeah but let's let's let's dedicate a crew to follow her everywhere
Corey
53:35
everywhere she goes yeah
Corey
53:36
yeah i think she never said i'll only i'll only normal speed going forward like this was maybe Maybe a little excessive. I promise not to get
Zain
53:43
get caught in the future. But she's never going to do it again. I don't know.
Zain
53:47
Man, I like this. I got a radar detector.
Zain
53:50
think it might work.
Carter
53:52
threw away my shitty one.
Zain
53:53
Corey's just out there measuring fastballs just on the highway. Hey, Carter, scale of one to ten, give me your rank or your rating. Let's call it a rating for Trump's mugshot. Oh,
Carter
54:05
Oh, it has to be at least a seven.
Carter
54:07
It is a really good mugshot. and uh when my mugshot happens i'm going to be hoping to have something similar
Zain
54:17
uh carter what would have made it a 10 what would you have uh what would you have wanted to coach donald trump for his uh definitely planned but definitely not kind of
Carter
54:23
of a booger hanging out of his nose you know like something that excellent
Zain
54:27
excellent i knew you i knew i knew you'd go there um somewhere childish cory one to ten what is this this mugshot uh it seems a little off center not to say you asked me but i'm telling you um what would have made it better
Corey
54:40
well that's like the rule of thirds though i think that that was part of the art of it all that's just just fine for me for me it's that he's a little too hunched right like he should be standing up a little bit straighter with the anger but i'm gonna give it a seven and a half
Zain
54:54
good mugshot i mean he never knew what was what a mugshot was part of today and given
Corey
54:58
given the fact he'd never heard of the concept fuck
Corey
55:00
in the top 25
Corey
55:01
25 percent of mugshot the
Carter
55:03
guy knows what to do like he knows intuitively what the right answer is he doesn't need to be be taught carter
Zain
55:09
carter your answer on wrestling i think was just just a great summation a
Zain
55:12
a couple of good this was
Carter
55:14
was really the fighting episode but i took it to wrestling
Carter
55:17
we did a lot of fighting analogies today it
Zain
55:19
was very good yeah it's
Zain
55:20
it's good we're in the spirit hey hey carter speaking of fighting are you in or out on this drag meet singh says the federal ndp should target blue seats in alberta betting on the urban prairie appetite for change almost suggesting that there's gonna be parts that that the liberals ignore. The orange-blue shift is real. The part that he didn't say is the part about the provincial election. Should Jagmeet Singh target Alberta? Are you in or out on that in terms of their growth strategy, or at least what he's publicly expressed as a potential growth
Carter
55:47
growth strategy? Well, I have to say, I think I'm out. I think that they have one seat in Alberta, which is one more than I would have bet on. Oh, two. They've got two. They've
Zain
55:59
They've got two, yeah. Yeah.
Carter
56:00
Massive difference. They're not going to get a whole bunch more. It's just not going to happen. I mean, do we see any seats in Calgary ever going to the federal NDP?
Corey
56:14
Oh, my God. I think that there is maybe
Corey
56:17
maybe Calgary Confederation. Come
Carter
56:19
Calgary Center. Do I have to pull up the numbers? I
Corey
56:21
I think the reality is you would need to kind of pull all of the vote from the liberals and the greens in those areas. is but you could in theory use
Carter
56:30
from fulton county to actually make that work i mean there's just no way oh
Corey
56:38
what what what a zag i'm
Carter
56:42
what what are you implying right
Carter
56:44
i really had fun with that you
Corey
56:46
you you would like that
Zain
56:48
i don't know did
Carter
56:49
did you guys not like that one ultimately
Zain
56:53
okay who gives who gives a shit anyways cory uh uh overrated underrated mary simon three million dollars of travel expenses in her first full year of governor general overrated story underrated story in your mind um
Corey
57:06
i i don't i don't think it's a story for most people like i i doubt it's going to register past a certain certain group i think it's interesting in that i'm of three minds of this the main one is nobody's going to remember this or care or notice the second is those who do will think instinctively three million dollars is an an awful lot of money for travel and then the third is is three million dollars for a ceremonial role who your job is really just to show up places too much i mean it's basically the gig isn't it
Zain
57:40
carter overrated story underrated overrated
Carter
57:42
overrated story i mean these things come out all the time i mean we we got buzzed on um expensive orange juice uh and and And those are the ones that really kill you. $5 million travel budget for the GG just isn't going to be something that resonates. And I think we can give that advice to the vice regaling Alberta as well. So, you know, get ready for some family travel, big fella.
Zain
58:09
You know, one thing I've been suggesting for our sponsor is that they jump in, right? These travel bills for these ceremonial roles have been too high for too long. And our sponsor could really help make a difference. They could make that cost $1-3 million. Oh, yeah,
Zain
58:20
for Mary Simon. So so get on it. Flair Airlines. We're going to leave it there. That's a wrap on Episode 93 of The Strategist. My name is Zane Veldt. You're with me as always. Stephen Carter, Corey Hogan, and we'll see you next time.