Zain: is a strategist episode 1895. My name is Zain Velji. I can't even do my name guys. I can't even do my name.
Carter: even do my name.
Zain: Zain Velji. You go to the dentist and it all falls
Carter: You
Carter: all falls apart.
Zain: I thought it was the P's that I, can I even do the P? P. They're
Shannon: P. They're
Shannon: They're popping.
Zain: They are popping. Well, I think it's because I'm close. Zain Velji, Shannon Phillips, Stephen Carter. What's up guys?
Shannon: are popping.
Carter: Well, I'm excited about this episode now that you're kind of, you know, I'm impressed that you can still drink out of a mug. That's impressive.
Carter: Didn't
Zain: Didn't drool yet. I'm going to be talking from the left side of my mouth. Are you in a jail
Carter: drool yet. I'm going to be
Carter: Are you in a jail cell? Like, where are you?
Carter: This
Zain: This is a mini recording studio of
Zain: sorts.
Carter: sorts.
Carter: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Where's that? Is it in your house? Did you upgrade? Undisclosed
Zain: Undisclosed location, Carter.
Carter: Undisclosed location. Oh,
Zain: Oh, my God. Carter, undisclosed. Oh, my
Carter: Oh, my God. Sorry, I pushed you into a place where you were uncomfortable.
Zain: I pushed you
Carter: That's usually Shannon who does that.
Zain: Shannon who does that.
Zain: Proximal to many things. Shannon, how are you?
Shannon: Oh, I'm okay. okay i'm
Carter: i'm
Shannon: i'm uh i'm tired of traveling i
Shannon: put it that way
Carter: way if that's my honest answer already you just started with the money firm yeah
Zain: isn't that what the money firms do so they just make you travel and then make
Zain: you useful when you're traveling i think the i try
Carter: the i try to the mbap stands for money bucks and phillips right yeah
Shannon: try to
Zain: to the
Shannon: the
Zain: the
Shannon: mbap stands
Carter: no
Shannon: no uh but it is uh it's a lot of travel put it that way and uh bc last week toronto this weekend i'm uh i'm tired of it but that's okay we can travel
Zain: okay we can travel
Zain: travel we can work travel i'm taking my kids
Shannon: can work travel i'm taking my kids to toronto and then i'm staying the worst the
Zain: the worst the
Zain: worst uh the worst weekend work travel is the worst carter had did you have to do weekend work travel i
Zain: i used to yeah
Carter: you never
Zain: you never took me on weekend work travel trips when i would have enjoyed that no
Carter: no we we didn't uh in fact we would do is we take your recommendations of where we should go in new york city and then go and do those trips without you those were some of our favorites fuck
Zain: some of our favorites
Zain: you so much one of
Carter: so much one of our best ever trips are
Carter: are we recording yeah
Carter: yeah we are recording of course we are
Zain: are recording of course we are this
Zain: this is how we start my mouth warmed up okay
Carter: this is how we start my mouth warmed
Carter: say zane velgey again
Zain: zane velgey i can't even do it now i just forgot my name yeah zane velgey hey look i could have done it i could have done it well we could start okay i've got an idea for this show uh stephen carter we did a patreon episode after After the live show, is there anything – I'm assuming this is not a Patreon episode, unless it is. I don't
Carter: yeah zane velgey
Shannon: velgey
Shannon: i could have done it well we could start okay i've got an idea
Carter: I don't know. Let's
Zain: Let's just assume it isn't. Anything you wanted to tell the general audience about the Strategist live show? We still have a Part B side coming out to that maybe sometime this weekend with our Q&A and maybe our interviews
Carter: isn't. Anything
Carter: you wanted
Zain: with our special guests. But, Stephen Carter, anything you want to tell the general audience? How was the hangover?
Carter: Oh, man. Everything was just perfect. It was the most fun. Thank you for listening to everybody who's listened to the podcast. It has been an exceptionally successful podcast, mostly because people love to watch me get beat up. So that was pretty great. So thank you all very much for listening.
Zain: And thanks to one Corey Hogan for showing up as part of the beat up, and I think leading it. Oh,
Carter: Oh, yeah. He was way worse than any of us. Yeah. I mean, Corey and I aren't speaking right now. It has nothing to do with the podcast. podcast and everything to do with the podcast so
Shannon: Oh, yeah. He
Carter: so you
Zain: you know i don't speak to cory either and i've told him this until he becomes a minister don't waste my time uh and i think i told him that the live show and uh we we don't talk either so we're on the same page i talked to him yeah
Shannon: i talked to him yeah
Shannon: yeah
Zain: yeah okay well you've got a nicer person
Carter: yeah okay well
Shannon: well
Carter: well you've
Shannon: you've
Carter: you've got a nicer person than either of you lobbying him or something lower standards
Zain: something lower standards
Carter: standards
Zain: standards here's what i want to do today i've got an idea and i'm gonna throw it at you it's not dissimilar to what what we've done in the past. But there's a lot going on in Alberta politics. There's a lot going on in Canadian politics. So today, I'm going to pitch you, and we'll see how many of these we can get through, a series of things that have happened in our Canadian politics broadly. Some of them might be acute to Alberta, some of them may not. And I want you on a purely strategic level, and I'll give you some release valve to talk about how you feel about these things and your sort of analytic analysis in that sense but on a political strategy angle i want you to tell me are you going to take what the person in question did is it going to be a take i'm going to take it at its face value am i going to tweak it or
Carter: here's
Zain: am i going to trash it oh
Carter: oh the three t's take at
Zain: t's take at face value you're going to tweak it or you're going to trash it this
Carter: is great
Zain: great talk about this purely from a political strategy level and let's start with the story that i think is just interesting we'll get to the alberta stories because i know both of you maybe want to talk about notwithstanding and private health care let's talk about
Carter: great talk about
Zain: conservative mp jamil giovanni and his end liberal racism events so
Zain: jamil giovanni for those who don't know is a conservative member of parliament he
Zain: is a a former yale law school grad best buds with jd vance uh former bell media talk show host. He's now kind of taken on the in-house role of the conservative Charlie Kirk mantra, going to university campuses and starting to try to ignite that base that the conservatives believe is there for them already. They kind of believe that these are their people, especially those men. And so his most recent salvo into this conversation is about ending liberal racism as an extension of his university tour uh and he call had an event earlier this week called the national forum to end liberal racism in ottawa 50
Zain: people showed up uh
Zain: giovanni's
Zain: giovanni's campaign targets what he labels as liberal racism criticizing dei policies and suggests they create race-based government decisions he's also got on the record to criticize the liberal government's uh school lunch program carter
Zain: you get your feelings aside your feelings i can't you know what the letter i can't do it's the f yeah
Carter: yeah that's feelings yeah that's good feelings your feelings aside
Zain: feelings yeah that's
Zain: feelings your feelings
Zain: feelings
Zain: aside the
Zain: strategy that giovanni and the conservatives are employing do you want to take it do you want to take uh tweak it or do you want to fully just trash what they're up to with this being the most recent salvo strategic level steven carter let's go i
Carter: i think i'm going to trash it um not just because it's it's uh you
Carter: you know it's crazy on its face but but i sometimes feel like what the What the conservatives do is they look in the mirror and they see themselves and they say, let's accuse them of that. And I think that that's where we are with the racism complaint, right? There's an inherent, I
Carter: don't want to say racism, but there's an inherent bias with the conservatives. And they look
Carter: in the mirror, they see it, and they say, well, the other side must be guilty of it too. And the same thing happens when they're talking about fiscal conservatism, when they're talking about the failings of the liberal government and the lack of ethics. That all exists on the conservative side. They look into the mirror, they see themselves, and then they accuse someone else of that very same thing. And that's the Donald Trump mantra. I mean, if Donald Trump says anything, chances are he's doing that very thing. So when I think of Donald Trump, when I think of the conservatives movement as it stands currently, it is stand in front of the mirror, find the negative that you see, and then accuse the other side of doing that thing. So that's why I'm going to trash Jamil Javani and his lunacy in this particular case. Shannon,
Zain: that's
Zain: what do you think of this strategy? You know, the conservatives may make a case that woke is at an all time low, DEI is at an all time low, that this is something worthy of pouncing on, that this is something that really speaks to the new generation of young, predominantly white men, perhaps. What are you doing? If you're the conservatives on this strategy? In your case, are you taking this? Are you tweaking this? Are you trashing this? Well,
Shannon: I'm trashing it and not just because it really is like finger and nails on the chalkboard for my values, but I'm looking at what the conservatives need to do here,
Carter: at what the conservatives need
Shannon: here, right? Like what they're doing is they're doubling down on the young men strategy. They've seen that they've got young men now, you know, pretty narrowly in most polling, but they've got them. uh and so they think there's more there to find to put them over the edge in the places where they need to need to be put over the edge or keep what
Shannon: what they just won places like london windsor uh at northern ontario stuff like that you know and some other stuff in the 905 um
Shannon: um but
Shannon: but i'm trashing this number one i mean 50 people showed up so like
Shannon: like there's your answer pal pal uh but also because young men don't vote uh
Shannon: so it's very similar to new democrats going into super low income areas and and and trying to till that soil if they're not going to vote they're not going to vote right and you are better off quite frankly like i'm just talking about a straight door knocking uh and trying to like how are you spending your time because i always look at things through that lens and usually that yes then gives me a key to how i'm looking at polling and other things but
Zain: yes then gives
Shannon: if you're going into a where they have lost is certainly women over 50 but they've lost men over 55 to the conservatives have why because they they don't uh it's not that they need to like mr poileva they didn't really like harper like what was right but they trusted him and
Shannon: they they thought of him as capable and that's where the conservatives that's where canadians are more likely to place a conservative vote like
Carter: like oftentimes
Shannon: oftentimes when they when they're replacing liberals at least the history of this country they're they're replacing they're they're they're voting conservative because of usually like the liberals have timed themselves out of some sort of corruption self-dealing you know uh or or other like that is the the pattern with those folks that is you know it's kind of their achilles heel they they elect new democrats because they want a threat to the liberals or uh to the conservatives they elect uh conservatives because uh because because oftentimes they want to sort of replace some of the things that have gone sideways with liberals. That's why Canadians are motivated to vote for those parties. So they need to restore trust, and
Shannon: and not necessarily likability, but capability, the
Shannon: Conservatives do. And screaming about internet things is actually not going to do that for you in the groups of voters that you need, especially not school lunch programs, which like last I checked, when Jason Kenney came to power in 2019 he explicitly kept our school lunch program and expanded it because it's popular right so he's doing things that are are wedgie and that are are trying to like find this group of voters or like create you know antagonism or grievance but I mean is this popular right
Shannon: like I go back to like what do people like they don't really like you know that kind of antagonism that that kind of instability you know they're not interested and
Carter: and clearly young people
Shannon: people aren't interested because 50 people showed up.
Zain: Carter what do you think is going on with with politicians these days I almost feel like they're getting into the pundit space more aggressively like it used to be novel but now it's not novel now it's like what they do like this transition between politician and pundit has happened so swiftly that even in the online video space without Without criticizing one party in particular, a lot of politicians are starting to look like influencers who just go to the polls every
Zain: every couple of years. And so is this Giovanni transition something you think we're going to see more of from a strategy perspective? And should we see more of it, even if this is not the right play for them? Should we see like one-off MPs having their own initiatives and building a little bit of a kind
Zain: of a fiefdom or a sort of media enterprise around them as a quasi-influencer who also happens to have a vote in parliament in this case? I
Carter: in this case?
Carter: I mean I've talked for quite a while. I can't remember his name now, but he was the – he
Carter: was a congressman from Tennessee or something along those lines, and he had this wonderful TikTok presence. And I didn't give a shit about him. Yeah, he's a South Carolina guy, I think. South Carolina, yeah. One of those Carolinas. He's moved into the state hierarchy now. I can't remember his role, but let's say attorney general or something along those lines, state treasurer, some stupid thing that I don't understand. He had a great TikTok presence. The way he would deliver, the way he would make you feel about the information. And our good friend Corey Hogan has a great internet presence. And, you know, there's there's kind of two tracks that he has. He has his very professional ones and he has his little, you know, stand up, talk to the camera ones, both of which I think are extremely effective. You
Shannon: give a shit about him. Yeah, he's a South Carolina guy, I think. South Carolina, yeah. One of those Carolinas.
Zain: he would deliver,
Carter: You know, they get tons of views. And those those
Carter: interrelate those relationships that are developed through those communication tools, I think, have tremendous value. value so i
Carter: think that we will see more of it will we see more jamil giovanni style negative type of stuff of course we will of course we will um
SPEAKER_01: course we will um
Carter: um it has value and it um you
Carter: know it it creates opportunity for the person who's doing the uh the the
Carter: the
Carter: the communication piece if you can find an audience. And I do agree with everything that Shannon said about the audience. If you can find an audience, then you're nuts not to take advantage of that audience. And if that audience is Charlie Kirk style and you're an elected MP, I mean, they're not going to kick you out because you're doing communications that are effective. They may kick you out because you do communications that are ineffective and ultimately paint the rest of the party poorly.
Carter: So Jamil Javani needs to worry about that.
Carter: But I think that the Corey Hogan's of the world that are doing their communications for their party with a strong sense of party loyalty and a strong sense of party commitment, I think that that is a really strong thing.
Zain: That's interesting to me. And Shannon, I'm curious to get your take because the party commitment piece can be questioned on Erskine-Smith because
Carter: because the
Zain: because the guy freelances all the time in highly produced videos, probably better than most politicians, if not the central party.
Zain: But he also kind of sounds like a liberal adjacent, adjacent a liberal friendly mp who happens to be a liberal um so i'm curious to get your take on this jen and like will we see more of this and maybe the question to you is should any of the very small federal ndp caucus be thinking about something like this well
Shannon: um this is the the part of the giovanni strategy that i'll take right
Shannon: right like the substance of it i think is like not smart um but i mean what do i know i'm not the target audience uh but he's
Zain: like the substance
Carter: substance of
Shannon: out there by all accounts You know, with the blessing of the leader's office, he's largely on message. It's not like he's cross-talking the message like Nadir Tzortzkin-Smith sometimes is, and becoming a talking point for the opposition, because Nadir Tzortzkin-Smith absolutely did last week or whenever it was on the budget. it um and uh what giovanni is doing is he's counting on media fragmentation to be able to quote-unquote get away with it right
SPEAKER_01: did last week
SPEAKER_01: was on the budget.
Shannon: right so that he is he's targeting straight into young people and using that to drive a bit of the cultural zeitgeist so that you know other older voters might find it more culturally acceptable that's what kirk did um
Shannon: um and uh so but he's counting on in the first instance that he's talking about those issues that will kind of get some of those young folks up in the morning um and that boomers won't notice women won't notice necessarily right because it's not in their corner uh of the internet or the the information environment so
Carter: because it's not
Shannon: i mean that part is fine right uh as far as it goes as a strategy on its face uh because it does allow you to you know uh collect new lists maybe uncover new uh fundraising opportunities although Although, you know, I wouldn't really
Shannon: really be
Shannon: be trying to do too, too much small dollar, even small dollar fundraising off of the under 30 crowd. But again, what do I know? I'm not in these spaces. But, you know, so they're clearly seeing it as additive, the leaders offices, right, to what Puella de Ávila is doing.
Shannon: And I think the only problem with it is when it starts to subtract from message or detract or distract from the overall message. Again, though, it shows you that Puella de Ávila is not changing, right?
Shannon: He's not going to get off this Jordan Peterson whack-a-doodle nonsense. He's just going to double straight down on it. He thinks it's fine. Why? Because he actually agrees with it.
Carter: He's not going to
Shannon: That's who he is.
Zain: Let me stick with federal. Federal provincial, Carter, before I jump. Actually, no. Shannon, should the NDP do something like this? I don't want to. Should the federal NDP? Because this does get attention. At least it did in Giovanni's case.
Zain: And say what you will. Well, I think he's a pretty interesting, maybe not fully compelling, interesting person in that caucus. So it does get him attention.
Zain: Should the NDP with their low numbers and struggling to get attention consider something like this where they send a person off on a tour where they try to really invest in one person's like media vertical in a non-traditional way such as this?
Shannon: I'm really like, first of all, like I'm not sure who because they're in the middle of a leadership race. uh number two like where are the resources for this who's the they quote unquote right they you know they're down to a a couple of staff to run house business um because uh you know the liberals didn't give them uh anything approaching resources so making sure you've got enough people to show up to committee uh it you know has to be the first order priority right and they're they're running a leadership so all other resources are
Zain: leadership race.
Zain: like
Carter: anything approaching resources so making
Shannon: going towards that because it's not small to to as we we all know uh to pull together the the debates and run the membership and uh just all of the back end of a leadership race right so like who and also who right like who on the front end and who on the back end would be would be doing that's interesting right i mean like some can do it on their own steam right like i again and this is switching over to provincial but janice erwin uh you know has like a couple of cas like the rest of the mlas and she's she's running you know One of the most influential social media presences on the left, anyway, in the country.
Zain: back
Zain: doing that's interesting right
Zain: Yeah, it's interesting, Carter. In some ways, it's kind of changed the calculation. We're not necessarily looking for star candidates. We're kind of looking for, I don't know what the term is, but micro-influencer candidates in some ways. Or even nano-influencer candidates, people who can have reach that can organically grow, not necessarily have big profile and then rely on something that they did. right it's like the it's like they're not relying on what they historically have done to bring them credibility they're relying on their ability to get constant attention day to day which is a fundamentally different thing to continue to build their and their party's credibility and we don't necessarily look for that in candidate making and in a modern sort of we probably should going forward and maybe some are doing it more than less but i'm kind of curious to get your final reflections before i move on well
SPEAKER_01: Or even nano
Carter: well i think we're gonna have to change the vetting process because Because I think that people who develop audiences and have these audiences that are built in are, by definition, going to be more controversial than some of the others, right? But more upside. Way more upside. I mean—
Zain: But more upside.
Zain: mean— Like, Corey's vet probably took days. We know that, thanks to our friend. Yeah, I mean— Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean,
Carter: thanks to our friend. Yeah, I mean— Yeah, yeah, yeah. I
Carter: mean, it was— Yeah,
Zain: was— Yeah, months in a days-long election. In a days-long election. Like, they didn't
Carter: election. In a days-long election. Like, they didn't get through it. They, you know, they assumed that he was fine at their own detriment. We shouldn't
Zain: fine at their own detriment.
Zain: detriment. We shouldn't tell the conservatives that. We'll just skip over that. But
Carter: We'll
Carter: But the truth is that this is
Carter: a new skill. You know, communicating on behalf of your leader, communicating on behalf of your party was always part of the game. But now using these non-traditional or now,
Carter: now, I guess, very traditional methods of social media and video especially. And Janice Irwin's a great example. And you can contrast with Kathleen Ganley, who also does a lot of videos, but doesn't have the same reach and presence, right? Both of them are making, you know, using the medium, but neither, you know, but Janice is nailing it. And Kathleen tries really hard. And I like Kathleen's stuff actually better than Janice's, but maybe I'm more her target audience. Well, I am one of her constituents, I suppose. We
Zain: We both are, exactly. So
Carter: So this is – I just think that this type of targeted communication structure is going to become more and more valuable. And I think that parties are going to have to change the vetting process because Lord knows if you've been on social media for a while, you've said something stupid at least once. And we have to be able to get past those moments. So
Zain: in part, I agree with you. But like, let
Zain: me ask you the question this way. And we haven't gotten past the first question 22 minutes in, but I'm finding this interesting.
Carter: this interesting.
Zain: Like
Zain: Shannon, if you were the Liberal Party today,
Zain: would you take Erskine Smith in your caucus? Like if you had a chance to do a do over, then you could make a binary choice. Like I think he's an interesting case because he's obviously talented. He's obviously a great communicator. He obviously seems to want to produce his own stuff. Yeah, he's got
Zain: flirty eyes with other political ambitions, Maybe even currently. But someone like him, would you want him in your caucus? Or is this kind of the danger of the relaxation that Carter is proposing that for every Janice who's loyal to the party, you
Zain: you
Zain: still get a bit of a freelancy aspect to some of these people because they're loyal to their own audience and themselves rather than a political institution. like we we might be entering a new era which i agree with card run but you know like the question maybe is like is erskine smith perhaps a a telltale sign or a cautionary tale no
Shannon: no i
Shannon: i think so uh i mean but like i am naturally so much more cautious due to my experience uh working uh in the notley government where we you know like we were uh we very much learned these uh lessons in the first 48 hours uh that uh there was much more strength in um in uh in the protection of the group uh uh because we were so uh you know like we were they were trying to disqualify us from day one uh and so i uh i always like as a matter of like it's it's tattooed in my dna now uh to be very cautious even at the live show i'm like oh cory you know um like i'm the one like i am my own issues manager right um because i don't like it uh it it is uh it's an eye poker for me uh i just don't think that it can lead anywhere productive to be freelancing off your party and your leader uh
Carter: uh
Carter: much more strength in
SPEAKER_01: like i am my own issues
SPEAKER_01: um because i
Shannon: uh and second guessing your government's message uh i i just don't think it's helpful when if you're up or you're down or otherwise uh and uh because i don't think it it is actually the job like your job is to contribute to the whole when
Shannon: you're part of of a caucus it's not about you i can't stand this uh idea like when people think oh well you know you should just step outside your caucus or you know and they kind of look down on uh towing the party line i actually think that contributing to the group behind closed doors and then going out with a unified message is an element of professionalism it is part of the vocation of politics like if you don't like it go get a different fucking job um
SPEAKER_01: you're part of of a
Carter: politics like
Shannon: um but and so like i I wouldn't take an Erskine-Smith or I'd slap his wrist behind the scenes because I don't like it. I don't think it's productive. But that's not what Giovanni is doing, right?
Carter: wrist behind the scenes
Shannon: right? No, it isn't. You know, like not at all. It seems to have probably blessings.
Zain: No, it isn't. You know, like not at all. It seems to have probably blessings. And I guess I could kind of use your opinion on if you were in a caucus and the party made a decision to invest resources on a fellow caucus member. Great. Right. How would that sit with you? I would think it was amazing. You would, hey? Yeah. Yeah,
Shannon: would think it was amazing.
Zain: yeah,
Shannon: yeah, because you're going out there and you're probably communicating in a different way than the leader. You have more freedom than the leader. You can be more authentic sometimes and more approachable than the leader, or you can take on specific topics in a way that's consistent with the party's message, but that the leader doesn't always want to be talking about, right?
Zain: because you're
Shannon: right? Maybe on certain social justice issues or whatever, you know, you want the leader to be broader sometimes than some specific struggles. So it's perfect to have people who can reach specific audiences. That's that's great. More power to what
Zain: would you what would you for every Shannon Phillips? There's probably three other people that are like, fucking I can do that job better than Jamil Javani or whoever the Jamil Javani stand in is for your caucus. Well, how do you kind of like what do you kind of make of that aspect of it? Because to Carter's point, and I'll get your take on this to Carter, like there's always people that you elevate in a caucus. Marcus, this is an interesting opposition sort of element that Giovanni is in. They're elevating him. They're not necessarily investing in elevating others. Probably some of this is based on his own mojo and his own abilities, no doubt. But like, how do you kind of deal for the rest of the folks who don't necessarily come with that same sort of profile or when they kind of be like, fuck, why are you growing his audience for him when that seems to be the modern day metric of success? Well,
Carter: I think that Jamil Javadi has all but become the deputy leader for the Conservatives. I think that that's why he's given these opportunities. That's why he takes these opportunities. I don't think that he's, you know, I don't think I have
Carter: have a chance to Google whether or not he's a deputy leader or not, but he feels like a deputy leader to me. He is not. No shadow
Zain: like a deputy leader to me. He is not. No shadow position either. Yeah,
Carter: Yeah, he just feels like someone, though, that is super close to Polyev. And the reason he feels super close to Polyev is because he talks about these things and doesn't get his knuckles wrapped.
Carter: I would think that this would have gotten your knuckles wrapped in most caucuses, even just hosting the event. But instead, I think that Pierre Polyev will embrace this because he embraces the idea of being
Carter: combative. and that's you know the most combative person in the in the conservative caucus i would argue is giovanni any
Zain: final thoughts here before i move on to my next one not
Shannon: really i just i there's parts of this strategy for giovanni that i would take some that uh i would tweak and some that i would trash carney
Zain: and smith carter
Zain: i'll start with you are moving closer to reaching a deal on the future of alberta's energy sector according to senior government officials and it's likely to include some language about a path forward on the northwest bc oil pipeline and potentially relaxing the tanker ban
Zain: stephen carter from a federal government perspective are
Zain: you taking this strategy if
Zain: it was given to you are you tweaking it or are you saying folks trash it right away uh this is not worth the pain what are you doing stephen carter as you're assessing this from a fed government perspective your feelings aside strategy and politics feelings aside this
Carter: politics feelings aside this This is tricky for me because apparently I'm a closet environmentalist and I believe very strongly in curtailing,
Carter: curtailing, you know, in getting us off of fossil fuels. So,
SPEAKER_01: So,
Shannon: So,
Carter: you know, from that point of view, I would probably start trashing this in some fashion. But the zeitgeist has shifted. it. We are now
Carter: now talking about Canadian oil being there and using Canadian oil and gas in ways that we weren't considering a decade ago. And I guess
Carter: from that point of view, the only thing that I would tweak is making Alberta carry
Carter: much of the load on this. I would probably make sure that it's very clear that Alberta has decided that they want to take an ownership position and an ownership stake in the next pipeline by the actions that they have taken, and that the federal government will stand by and wait for the
Carter: the government of Alberta to tell them what
Carter: they want to do and how they want to do it in terms of actually getting a pipeline through British Columbia. I
Carter: I don't think that we need to see the federal government do what they did with Trans Mountain and jump in and become the owner-operator-builder of the pipeline when we've We've clearly got Alberta standing there wanting to take the reins on this particular project.
Zain: Shannon, this is not a deal struck just yet. This is leaks from government sources. We also know a couple of other things that EV has aggressively,
Zain: is that a good word? Strenuously opposed a pipeline. And we're also hearing to my earlier point that there
Zain: might be slight exemptions made, limited exemptions as it's been told in the media reports on the tanker ban, and potentially using C-5, the legislation to do so. From
Zain: the Fed's perspective, are you taking this wholesale? Yep, good, next. Are you tweaking this? Are you trashing this as a strategic political move by our federal government?
Shannon: think it depends on whether it's kind of a memorandum of understanding to have a task force to maybe have a meeting for a committee,
Shannon: or if it's actually we're putting money behind this and here are the conditions that we're putting money behind it for. Here's the equity stake and here are the specific conditions for how we're relaxing the tanker traffic ban. I think they're two different things. But in the main, I think these guys are flying way too close to the sun with their 20 liberal MPs, like leaving aside all other, you know, driving ourselves into a fucking intellectual cul-de-sac for the 87 millionth time on pipeline politics, like leaving that aside for a moment. you have 20 new liberal mps the majority of whom won because the ndp vote collapsed in
SPEAKER_01: or if
Shannon: in british columbia and in fact that i it's those mps and quebec uh where they had their their most growth um
Carter: in british columbia
Shannon: and uh so i'm not really sure what exactly we're doing here from an electoral calculation standpoint like it
Shannon: it is
Shannon: is it is dangerous i uh they may touch the hot stove and the reason you know it's dangerous in british columbia is because john rusted has been so quiet about it sometimes you know um i'm a new democrat so we didn't always have polling for things and oftentimes you'd have to go with your gut one of the best ways to get your own polling was to would be to listen very carefully to what the other side is doing because they do have money for polling and then you can kind of deduce from there what they are hearing and
Shannon: and and rusted
Zain: and rusted
SPEAKER_01: rusted
Shannon: rusted has like he said oh yes we need to have more investment in bc and the ndp is bad because we don't have more investment which is of course kind of a bullshit argument because six of the 12 new major projects are are in british columbia that have been named by the feds but
Shannon: but if you listen carefully he hasn't said repeal the tanker ban at all he
Shannon: he hasn't been clear on that at all
Carter: hasn't been clear on that
Shannon: uh and And that tells me, well, and we know this, we know this from Christy Clark back in the day, imposing her five conditions on Northern Gateway, who, you know, newsflash, she was not exactly an Elizabeth May Green Party cardholder, but she represented a centre to the quite right coalition where
Shannon: they didn't go there on tanker ban either, right?
Shannon: So, I think there's a fundamental misread from the Liberal Party of Canada on what they can get away with in british columbia because i think what they're doing is they're probably looking at polling that says yay we want more resource development right
Shannon: which is true as soon as you put it in the context of a particular project you're
Shannon: going to go back to the old battles and yeah it's true that maybe david eby doesn't you know necessarily at
Shannon: at the end of the day hold the pen on the saying no but i tell you who does the coastal first nations like
Carter: like
Shannon: like you
Zain: like you
Shannon: you want to fuck with that carny like this is what it kind of seems like when
Zain: this is what it kind of seems like when all the other things kind of settle it
Zain: seems like it might be the same thing carny really couldn't solve over the summer which
Zain: is the indigenous groups versus the federal government like
Zain: i could see resolutions and deals and side deals and alleviation for everything else but it comes down to that and i think that's what the the use of c5 against that i think becomes a core strategy point uh for for me to potentially assess. Carter, any thoughts? Shannon, I'll let you even argue with my interpretation of where we might end up. But Carter, you wanted to get in. I mean,
SPEAKER_01: see resolutions
Carter: in. I mean, I just think that, you know, using it against an interest like the Coastal First Nations isn't going to work. You
Carter: You know, you still have the constitutional duty to consult.
Carter: And
Carter: that constitutional responsibility is not going anywhere. Even if you write yourself into a piece of legislation, you
Carter: you know i think elizabeth may was the one who was saying this is just not going to happen we're not going to see tankers on the coast we're not going to see a northern uh pipeline for uh for oil for heavy oil i think that that's uh you know and i don't usually take elizabeth may's word on things but i think that she's got a very strong read of the coastal first nations and the combativeness of those first nations i mean i can't remember what the stats were on northern 80
Carter: % or 75% of the First Nations along the route were in favor of Northern Gateway until you got to the end, right?
Carter: right? And the problem with 75% of a pipeline being in favor is that the end matters. You can't stop a pipeline in the middle. You have to get to the part. and i think that um carney is going to be very smart insofar as uh you know placating um daniel smith but i wouldn't be surprised if this that this relationship was very alberta centric insofar as alberta needs to do a lot of work if alberta wants to see something we'll
Shannon: problem with 75
Carter: we'll support you because
Carter: because i think that i think that where i differ from shannon is that carney's not looking at this this from electoral politics. He's looking at this from economic politics. The idea is that most governments can't sustain themselves in a recession. If
Carter: If we continue towards a national recession, which I think it feels like we're heading, if it hasn't been declared already, it is somewhere where we're heading, then we will be heading, we have to have economic stimulus, we have to have economic opportunity to try and lift this out. And I think that Carney's primary focus is economy first build it out so the and the environment second because ultimately even the people of british columbia are going to be more inclined to support a federal party that's overseeing economic growth rather than economic production well
Shannon: that's what the interesting thing is uh in terms of the coastal first nations perspective because
Carter: because they
Shannon: because they are actually trading one form of economic activity for another because the taker van actually i i mean it helps them be able to like quite literally manage the growth in the area for the lng the other port infrastructure the electrification that is going to be uh happening and their interest in in
Carter: economic activity for
Shannon: some critical minerals projects it's not like this is an anti-growth it is actually those boats are not compatible with this geography with all the other stuff that is going on there is they have made a trade-off they've they've made a trade-off in favor of the 56 billion dollars worth of projects that have been uh that have been approved through the major projects office or sent through the major projects office in the province of british columbia a lot of which are concentrated in northwest british columbia uh
Shannon: uh and so those are real benefits as well right and and and the on on the other side, you have a fake pipeline.
Shannon: And so, you know, 56 billion or something that makes Daniel Smith and like weird people at the ranchments feel good. Like it doesn't it doesn't add up. And so I think what will be interesting is, you know, because Carney considers himself a dealmaker, like he actually is, you know, Trump likes to go around saying he makes deals. And meanwhile, you know, Carney is the guy doing it.
Shannon: It will be interesting to me what kind of deal They cut with the coastal First Nations, if anything. If they actually move forward with this, then they will have to have one.
Shannon: That's the contents of a memorandum of understanding that I would find interesting. You know,
Shannon: whatever they do with Alberta, like, who kind of cares?
Zain: Could this be a situation, Carter, where,
Zain: actually, before I get there, would you advise Carney to still stay on, as you called it, economic versus electoral politics? Would you say, buddy, be aware of the latter, not so much the former? Well,
Carter: right now, I think that the zeitgeist has shifted tremendously. I think that we are in an era of economic politics, not an era of environmental politics. But how about electoral,
Zain: how about electoral, as we talk about? I'm
Carter: I'm not too worried about it. I'm far more interested in economic politics. I think that, for the most part, people are concerned about their pocket. I mean, people remain selfish. So Shannon's made a good point. You know, the 20 MPs that come from the New Democrat collapse. I don't think the New Democrats pick up the green movement because I don't think the green movement is anywhere near what it used to be,
Zain: economic politics.
Carter: as
Carter: evidenced by the Green Party collapsing, as evidenced by the NDP collapsing. Let
Zain: me move it on to my final one because I want to try to shove this in before we got to kind of call it quits, Stephen Carter. And Shannon, let me start with you on this. And this one I have to impress that I need to put everyone's feelings aside, but I'm just going to frame it this way.
Zain: The shit that Danielle Smith is doing,
Zain: the bucket of it, the
Zain: notwithstanding clause on teachers counted and talked about, the notwithstanding clause on trans kids and the three bills on trans legislation. the first floating and then seven minute video explanation of upcoming legislation on letting doctors work both privately and publicly simultaneously the negotiations with Carney on pipeline the the session is not done yet there could be much more I'm just highlighting a couple of things and I'm sure I missed a half a dozen that
Zain: would be big things but they almost seem to be small and maybe that's inherently the question here which is from a strategic level level of what Smith is doing.
Zain: You're taking it,
Zain: you're tweaking it, or you're trashing it. And I know it's hard to ask a former NDP cabinet minister this from a strategic level. So I'll let you event as you need to, because we want to talk about the substance of these and we don't have to do it all today. But I'm really curious in terms of, as we assess this political moment, Shannon, we also have seen this political strategy playbook before played elsewhere. Smith is not doing doing something entirely novel but she seems to be doing it at a pace that has worked in other places so with that in mind and not trying to put my finger on the scale take
Zain: tweak or trash uh
Shannon: i think the substance of these big uh pieces is pretty antithetical to what she ran on uh and what she won on and so uh this uh these moves of the last couple of weeks i think prove that potentially uh i was very wrong um in that i i thought potentially we were going into an election in spring of 26 but i don't see how you do such large things uh and and glide into you know a bigger majority or
Carter: and what
Carter: or or
Shannon: or like and so i i i think that i may have been wrong on that and she is going to go uh the full term to 27 um
Shannon: if
Shannon: if she wants to go in spring of 26 i'd trash this uh and uh and i would go back to what i was elected on which is uh you know grow the economy like we have the either highest or second highest uh unemployment in the country uh there's a number of other economic indicators that are a little wobbly um and so i would be looking at like what else am i getting through to the major project office why do i have literally fucking bupkis i
Carter: and uh
Shannon: i i on that list when i'm supposed to be you know the big economic engine of the the country right and and david eby a new democrat next door is eating my lunch on that on major projects like the only idea i have is a fake pipeline um
Shannon: um like at some point uh
Shannon: uh albertans are going to go back to we you know we think we elect conservatives to run uh the economy and to you
Shannon: know at least not make health care and education poke me in the eye uh as issues she's not doing either of those things and
Carter: and so
Shannon: and so um i would i would trash this big stuff and go back to uh more of the the small ball of of economic management and the reason why people send the conservatives to the legislature.
Zain: Carter, your take, take, tweak, or trash?
Carter: Well, I mean, she's also throwing out some of that small ball, right? Like, I wonder how many people are talking about 120 kilometers on the divided highways instead of talking about, you know, the health, the private versus public health care. I mean, allowing doctors to participate in both, this is the furthest that anybody has stepped into private health care. Ever
Zain: care. Ever in this country. It
Carter: Ever
Carter: It is massive. um massive step and and very much contrary to the canada health act i'm dying to see how we get past this one um but regardless she's throwing it out there and she's she's trying to cover it up with things that are still populist and you know um the transportation minister was astounded that 77 of albertans supported his you know the little idea of going really fast on the qe2 has he ever been on the QE2. They're already doing 130 kilometers an hour up and down the QE2. This is a complete joke. But
Zain: It
SPEAKER_01: and down the
Carter: But I think that Shannon's point is 100%. We haven't even talked about some of the nurses and healthcare workers talking about a Saturday strike this weekend. Yes,
Zain: Yes, AOP. I haven't even mentioned it. I mean, you
Carter: haven't even mentioned it. I mean, you can't you can't be fighting all the fronts at all the times, but she's trying to fight all the fronts at all the times. And I think that at some point she's going to hit a nerve and it's going to come smashing back at her. So the idea of a spring election, I do think is off the table. I think she's going to go and do as much as possible in the next. I mean, obviously, she's doing as much as possible before Christmas and into the year and we'll clean that up in the new year. and then at the end of uh 2026 in the fall that looks it looks and feels like that's when we'll see the election yeah
Zain: you can't
Shannon: yeah
Carter: yeah that's when she'll
Shannon: she'll
Carter: she'll
Shannon: she'll start cutting
Carter: cutting
Shannon: cutting us checks for some right
Shannon: right
Shannon: right
Zain: right
Shannon: right
Zain: right right your your dividend from the savings of the public private uh simultaneous work you know but carter i'm
Shannon: right your
Carter: your
Shannon: your
Carter: your
Shannon: your your
SPEAKER_01: simultaneous work you know but carter i'm
SPEAKER_01: i'm not hearing
Zain: hearing fully trashing from you though right
Zain: like you are both
Zain: of you i don't think are agreeing with the contents but you're are you agreeing with the speed of the play are you you agreeing with any aspects here i know you're saying she could eventually hit a nerve
Zain: i just want to try to get some clarity from you i
Carter: i think that frankly um most organized most politicians now are being advised and wisely advised to do much fast to do as much as possible as fast as possible much fast that seems to be the winning formula not to do slow i mean carney's doing much fast. It's going very, very well for him. Trump is doing much fast. We could argue about his, you know, his overall popularity reaching the lowest point that it has so far in the second term. But still, he's getting away with murder, almost literally. So when you do a lot and you do a lot fast, people miss the details. And I'm not sure how many people even really picked up up on this private versus public health care that aren't listening to our podcast quite
Carter: literally
Shannon: literally i mean
Carter: i mean
Carter: mean
Shannon: mean
Shannon: mean it was a central plank of the of ralph klein's third way and
Carter: was
Shannon: and was allowing doctors to practice in both systems and and you know it was ultimately they they walked back on it and didn't look at it again for quite literally 20 years because it was 2005 and why because there were regional health authorities at the time and rural pc mlas who bucked on him she has neither thing uh
Shannon: uh so you know they just waited for 20 years and uh and now the big money uh you know health care insurance interest in they come into the system uh
Shannon: uh the interesting thing will be whether the federal government uh
Shannon: uh yeah actually steps in to uh enforce the canada health act which again i mean she may want that she does she doesn't have a fight on natural resources she may want one in 2026 on on uh other things with the liberals i don't know let
Carter: yeah actually
Carter: does she doesn't
Zain: other things with
Zain: let me let me pick up on that um because i want to ask you a final question here which is very much related uh carter naid nenshi his response summarized as danielle smith if you're going to do this dissolve the legislature call an election on the question of privatization uh in our alberta health care uh system you're
Zain: taking that you're tweaking that are you trashing that based on everything we've just talked about in the most most recent comments from shannon here i'm
Carter: i'm taking it you
Carter: know i think you like it i think that that's the right play i think that private
Zain: know i think you like it i
Carter: private versus public health care is still really different you know privatization of our health care system is still a gigantic problem now i would say that for the most part it's a red herring is most pride most most
Carter: most oh you're gonna go there this is most
Carter: anyway most doctor's offices continue to be privatized they're private bill to
Shannon: private bill to one system It's a single payer, which is what the change is that she is going to make, where you have more than one payer. You can pay privately. But the point is, it is a health care insurance plan, Medicare is. You're not government doctors. It's a totally red herring argument.
Carter: privately. But
Carter: It's a totally red herring argument.
Shannon: I
Carter: I think that we should be doing more ARPs. I think we should be doing more. That's fine. Especially with primary care physicians. There's still one insurance plan that is billed to Carter. insurance who
Shannon: we should be doing more ARPs. I think we should be doing more.
Shannon: more. That's fine. Especially with primary care physicians. There's still one insurance
Zain: insurance
Shannon: insurance
Zain: insurance plan that is billed to Carter. insurance who
Carter: don't
Zain: don't
Carter: don't
Carter: don't start with me oh don't start with me is just absolutely you on fucking health care is just it's just a bad look for you frankly keep
Zain: oh
Shannon: oh don't start with me is just absolutely you on
Shannon: on
Shannon: on fucking
Zain: going you like you like you're taking what nancy's saying i'll ask you it's still a fucking third
Carter: i'll ask you it's still a fucking third rail are
Zain: are you taking are you tweaking are you trashing shannon in terms of nancy's dissolve the legislature and i guess the the the forward Forward-looking question is, is this a rich vein to keep mining? Is this your new thing? Can you now turn this back into corrupt care? Do you drop notwithstanding? Like, I'm trying to, like, triangulate all the shit from their perspective. Give me a sense of, like, now that this is on the table, are you back to your sweet spot historically on health care, bringing corrupt care back in, privatization back in, dissolve the legislature, call an election on this question? Take, tweak, or trash on the initial question, then some ideas going forward. Oh,
Shannon: into
Shannon: corrupt
Shannon: Oh, I'm taking it because, I mean, health care is always part of the ballot question if you're a new Democrat with their name on the lawn sign.
Shannon: And it is, you know, at least number one or within the top three, economy, affordability being the other ones, usually in the issue set in salience for voters. And who do they trust on health care? They trust us. And, you know, you can go back to just the old ads and run them again because quite literally she is saying, you know, get out your credit card. um so this is a great place for the new democrats to be it was going to be even if she didn't do this uh you know you done fucked up the health care system and now you need to uh you know elect us and we'll fix it that's i mean it's always the offer in some way shape or form from a new democrat um
Carter: is a great place for
Shannon: but number two i mean really what you've got are two issues with danielle i think the number one is health care and then number two is like can we trust you are you self-interested uh or are you looking out for people and that's where you put the bucket of literally everything right
Shannon: from notwithstanding this and that and uh uh you know all the other you know kind of like vaguely corrupt things that they've done and uh flying off to saudi arabia and every other uh issue right like you don't care about me that's why you're worried about license plates you don't care about uh me that's why you're giving contracts to your friends you don't care about me that's why you want to um You know, before you said you weren't going to privatize health care, you did it. Now, then you said you didn't want to touch my pension. I don't trust you because you don't care about me.
Zain: Carter, final thoughts here as we wrap up this episode. Does this now become the NDP go forward strategy? Does everything triangulate to this? Even if there's other distractions and noise, health care is your turf. She may have inadvertently escalated the issue right to the top. She may have tied it nicely into affordability. So
Zain: are you putting all your eggs in this basket? How are you thinking about it, Carter, as we wrap up? I
Carter: I wouldn't put all my eggs in it. I think that health care, education, and social services are what people elect provincial governments to do. So I'm still going to keep my education. I'm still going to keep banging on the teachers being forced back to work. I'm still going to keep banging on the notwithstanding clause. But I have lots of time for this one. This is a big, big opportunity, and it needs to be taken care of. And that's why I was taking Nahed Nenshi saying it's time to call an election. I'm
Zain: going to leave it there. That's a wrap. I can't even do it. I
Zain: I feel like I did okay. You
Carter: I feel like I did okay. You did a good job. You did a good job. I'm never
Shannon: You
Zain: You
Zain: You
Zain: You did a good job. I'm never going to the dentist again. You know, they told me it was a routine visit. I got four needles in my mouth, Carter. Four needles. That's
Carter: That's not routine, brother. Something
Zain: called a post. I
Zain: have a post. You have a post now?
Carter: You have a post now? That's not good. That's not good. That's not a good thing. It's a different
Zain: not good. That's
Zain: different story. That's a wrap on episode 1895 of The Strategist. My name is Zane Velich. as always shannon phillips stephen carter and we shall see you next time ready
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