What do you think the role of government in society should be? You have to start by asking what is government? And uh the only thing that's unique about government is that it has the legal power to apply force. That's it. There are plenty of other decision-making bodies, uh associations, governance structures around society, but they're not governments because they cannot apply force legally. So you start with the first principle that government is the legal use of force. So the only thing that government should do is the thing that people can't do for themselves that that we as people need to be forced to contribute to or be part of without which it would not exist. So for example a military uh border control policing some basic infrastructure and supplying uh necessities to those who would otherwise not be able to provide for themselves. Those are all things that would not happen if the government was not requiring it and therefore those are the things the government should do. It should not do things that people can do for themselves. So I think of the world of business. We don't need government subsidies to prop up businesses uh because there are sources of funding for businesses. It's called credit and capital. We have very developed capital markets and credit markets where you can raise money. So there's no need for government to do that. There's uh no need for government to be the provider of um uh of media uh when people can you have a this is a media outlet right now. Why is it that you need the government to do what what other people with people free citizens can do for themselves? And the answer is that you don't. So um my view is that government should only do what the people can't do for themselves and then leave the rest to free people uh to decide how to live.

How do you define Canadian national identity and how would a government under your leadership strengthen or reshape that? I always ask myself what what is the thing we all have in common? And in Canada it's never been ethnicity. Even when Wilfrid Laurier was asked what is Canada's nationality uh he couldn't define it as an ethnic nationality or religious nationality or uh any other kind of bloodline because by that time and this is 100 years ago we were all mixed up already. We had Scots and Irish and first peoples and French and English and so he said Canada is free and freedom is its nationality. People come here for freedom. They don't come here for the weather. I mean, look out the window. Um, they come here because when, you know, the place they came from, they weren't free to build a life, start a a family, build uh, you know, afford uh, food and housing. They weren't free to speak their mind or practice their faith. So, they said, "Let's go to this place where you can you're free to do all those things." And whether it was the pioneers of the 1800s uh who settled the West or uh the the Catholics uh who settled Quebec hundreds of years before that or it's the person who gets off the boat in uh 2025 uh figuratively speaking it's almost always for that same freedom and uh so we share that in common but how do you how do you preserve that freedom? Everybody has to be Canada first. They have to put this country first. And what we've allowed to happen over the last decade is that the government has said the Canada has no national identity. We're a postmodern, postnationalist state. And there's nothing that binds us together. And as a result of that and mass migration on levels that are not absorbable. People are increasingly divided along foreign along demarcation lines that were in their country of origin rather than coming here and leaving that all behind. uh these Protestants and Catholics tore each other's eyeballs out for centuries in Europe, but they got along in Canada because they said, "We're Canadian here, and I don't care if my neighbor's a Protestant or a Catholic. They're my neighbor and they're a fellow Canadian." And that is what we have to get back to. We're all Canadian. We're all here to enjoy freedom together. And uh to do that, we have to be Canada first. What's our role in the global world then? If we're Canada first, what's our responsibility to the rest of the world? Well, the first responsibility is to put our own country above all else. So that means we need to unlock our resources. Um fund a strong military that preserves our sovereignty without being overly dependent on any other country for our defense. Those are the first things and we have to ask what makes us safe, what makes us secure, what makes us an affordable country. Those things must be the top of the decision making matrix for a prime minister. After that, we can ask how we can help. And I believe that our general posture should be to favor freedom and democracy over tyranny and dictatorship because it's generally in our interest to have more democracy and freedom in the world than it is uh to have less. So that is uh that is how I would prioritize it. So sort of like putting on your own mask first like when you're on the airline when they make the safety announcement it's like you have to put your own mask on first cuz you can't take care of other people if you're can't take care of yourself. Well, exactly. And you know, I I've said him very clearly, I will be cutting foreign aid. I find it appalling that we had 2.2 million people lined up at food banks, that we got a return of scurvy in Canada or one in four kids are going to school hungry, and yet we're putting we're giving money to the UN and other international bodies supposedly for foreign aid. Uh, and I think we should bring our money home and and put our own country and its national interest first and foremost.

The first thing is too much too fast. Uh you know, we we have been the liberals have been bringing in a million people a year, growing our population almost 3% while our housing stock grows by 1%. Our job market grows by about the same and our availability of doctors and nurses grows by about that 1 or 2%. So when your population is growing faster than health care, housing and jobs, then eventually you're going to have shortages. It also makes it hard for people to integrate. Uh we used to bring people in very large numbers but in numbers that you could integrate into Canadian life. So people would arrive here and they'd be say they they'd be encouraged to sure keep their, you know, their foods and their customs and traditions, but also they'd be told about Canada, our war history, Terry Fox, our proud past, all of the millions of people we've saved by allowing them to come and take refuge here. And people were genuinely proud. But the woke liberal ideology imposed over the last decade has been to say that Canada is nothing but a a racist country with nothing but shame and we should denigrate the history, knock down our statues. And so people come here into a vacuum and it's not hard to figure out why they don't feel as much of a commonality as they they did 10 years ago when they arrived and they were proud. My wife came here, you know, roughly three decades ago. She was extremely proud to be Canadian. like she loved Canada and uh she thought and her whole family thought this is the best place in the world and they learned that in school. They learned that this was a great country and they they should be very we should all feel privileged to live here and I think that is part of the missing piece. We have to get back to telling people Canada is amazing and it's a privilege. So when you come here to our country, you're Canadian first and you're proud of it. Speaking of amazing, it's really easy to get trapped in what's wrong with Canada, but what do you think's going right and how can we build on that? Well, I think our people are are fantastic. We have like I I meet these I meet the people across this country and they're astonishingly brilliant. You know, I go to factory floors and I I see people, you know, programming a CNC machine and I say, "My god, like the brain power that goes into running this kind of machinery. It just m it's mind-blowing." Um, you um you see how hard people work. I'm actually the thing I love right now is our young people. I actually think this is the hardest the the youth of today are the hardest working generation of youth since the Second World War. Everywhere I go, I meet, you know, a waitress who's got like she's working 60 hours a week and she's taking university classes. It's like, wow, that's work ethic. Now, it saddens me that she has to work that long. But on the flip side, what does it say about uh the uh potential of this country when you see a a generation of youth who are willing to put in that much much uh time and effort to get ahead and if we could un lock their potential with a government that's worthy of them, then man, we could be easily the most affordable and richest country in the world. I was reading an article the other day about how youth are feeling checked out, too. Yeah. Is that because there's no rung? Like if you think of capitalism as a ladder, that first rung seems to have gone higher now and it's harder to get a job. It's, you know, you go to school, you get an education, you come out and you're applying with 700 other people for one job, right? And that's changed. Yes. It's um this is generation screwed. Uh, and frankly I I am not surprised that they feel detached and frustrated with the system and the government that screwed them over. Let's walk through the wrap sheet of the government of the last 10 years when it comes to youth. They doubled housing costs. So young people can't even come close to making a down payment. Uh, you know, it takes till you're late in your late 30s to to afford a down payment. Then they have driven up the cost of rent. So even just surviving in a rental situation, treading water is more and more difficult. Food prices are up. So young people have had to downgrade their diet. And then as you say, jobs are missing partly because the we haven't unblocked our resources. And partly because the government is bringing in so many temporary foreign workers and international students who through no fault of their own are filling jobs. Of course, the some in the corporate elite love it because they get to pay lower wages, but it means that our young people can't get those jobs. So, even in places with double-digit youth unemployment, there are temporary foreign workers who are making less than the in reality less than the prevailing wage and driving wages down and jobs out. So, uh, the, uh, the young people today have had it harder, as I say, than any generation, uh, since the Second World War. And what I'm trying to offer them is hope, jobs, and homes. Those are the three things. Hope is important. I'll come to hope last though. Jobs, we we know what to do. Stop bringing in temporary foreign workers. Get rid of that program altogether. unblock our resources so that our young trades workers can make, you know, 200 grand, 250 as pipe fitters, welders, industrial carpenters, etc. Cut taxes on on job creation. And then homes, we need to unblock home building by speeding up permits, getting taxes off houses of of home building, and let people afford to have a house again and start a family. But I'll close off with hope because I what I worry about more than just the ad policies of the government is that the Liberals will convince young people to permanently lower their expectations just to say, "Yeah, it sucks. It'll never get better no matter who's in power, but it could be worse." And I had I was on another podcast about four months ago and this lady asked me, "Well, shouldn't we just accept that home that home ownership is a thing of the past and we're all going to be renters?" And I said, "No, you shouldn't accept that. That's ridiculous. Everybody should be able to afford a home if they get a job and work hard. Uh we should be the cheapest place in the world to afford a house. We have the most land to build on." And um I don't want the liberals to gaslight people into thinking that things cannot get better. My purpose is to provide people with hope. And that's not just a touchyfey word. It's actually a political strategy for me because if people can be convinced that there's hope, then they'll vote for it in election. If they can be if they can be convinced that things are hopeless and they'll never get better, then liberals will win by default. So my strategy is one of reinstilling hope. It seems like the second and third order consequences of that too are also impactful. So people uh when you can't find a job, you delay marriage, you delay having kids. Um talk to me about that. Well, I I met uh an airline attendant who said that him and his wife uh are making the were in the process at that moment of making the decision to never have kids because they can't afford it. And it was a simple economic decision. you said like we we can't afford a house and we don't want to raise a kid in a 6 or 700 foot apartment and even if we tried we we're already you know up to our eyeballs in grocery bills and rent and other expenses. So adding a child which is obviously thousands of dollars of costs every year I argue worth it but but if you don't have that money then how do you do it? And uh so him and his wife or wife to be how do they why is it they're having to give up on a major life decision because of numbers? It doesn't make sense. We've always been able to afford to have kids in Canada. How is it that with all the advances in society that that's not possible? It and uh the good news is that we know how to fix it. We we need to get back to to sound money, to free enterprise, uh to open up the opportunity so that young couple can actually build a home, build a family, build a life. One of the things I don't see people talk about a lot when it comes to having kids is sort of the third order, if if that was the second order consequence, the third order is um you just tend to be more selfish in a way in how you vote. And it's really hard like we think about you think about voting for your kids. you think about you want Canada to prosper long term. That's a lot harder I would imagine if you don't have kids. I would talk about the inverse of that. Um and I understand some people don't don't for them it's not the right decision to have kids but but they are incredible blessing. I know for me it's been a great blessing to have kids. Uh even though I was a very late bloomer. I think I was 39 when we had Valentina and in my 40s when we had Cruz. But it's it's been a great blessing. It's taught me a lot of lessons. And I even read a study a while back about people who had been laid off and had been long-term unemployed. And the happiness level of those with kids was actually higher because even though they didn't have a job, they had they had children bringing them joy in their lives. And uh we want people to to have the option. I mean, I people decide not to have kids. I totally respect that. It's going to be a great decision for some people, but I don't want them to be forced into the decision by economic decisions imposed by government.

What do you see as the major factors facing Canada's lagging economic prospects? And what are sort of the concrete steps aside from pipelines that we can take? The problem is that we're spending too much on government and not enough on productive private sector jobs. You know, um, every time we add a new government agency, department, bureaucracy, that's a cost without a productive outcome. And that sucks money out of the private sector into government consumption. And um so you think about these deficits we're running. $78 billion has to be borrowed from somewhere. Everything comes from something. Nothing comes from nothing. So if they there's two ways you can fund a deficit. You can borrow it or print it. If you borrow it, you're taking capital out of the private sector and putting into the out of the productive private sector and putting it into the unproductive government bureaucracy. And if you print it, you cause inflation. So it's lose-lose. uh when Israel reduced its deficit in the '90s, it actually unlocked a lot of capital [snorts] that then went into the tech sector and made it to into the startup nation. So I think by reducing the deficit, we not only reduce inflation and the cost of living, but also we reduce the drain on the productive part of our economy. There's also, I think, some very exciting things we can do like get rid of capital gains tax when you reinvest in Canada. The government's going to get its pound of salt one day anyway. Eventually, you'll fully cash out and you'll want to enjoy everything you built up through the series of investments you made and then you'll pay your capital gains tax. But in the mean if you want to keep rolling it over, building factories, mines, pipelines, IT, infrastructure, inventing new products, then why wouldn't we encourage that? Yeah. I mean, uh we we should be taxing people. We shouldn't be taxing people for what they put into the economy and uh that's uh I think it would be economic rocket fuel if we did that. What should Canada's strategy be concerning our relationship with the United States? Not just in the next few years, but say the next 50 years. How should we position ourselves? So the first thing we have to acknowledge is that American capitalism is the most powerful economic force in the history of the world and the American military is the most powerful defense force in the history of the world and both of them are right next door to us. We can't ignore that or pretend that it's just going to vanish. We have to think long term about how we use that proximity to our advantage. So the first thing I would do is create leverage. And that means unblocking the production and transportation of our resources to ourselves and to overseas markets. Whether we like it or not, and I like it, oil and gas is the single biggest net export in this country. Period. And there's nothing that is even close. And there's nothing that any government strategy or subsidy program can ever do to change that. So, we have to unblock pipelines and LG plants to our coasts. You got one pipeline to Northwest British Columbia that the Liberals blocked and that I'm pushing for that would move a million barrels and 30 a day and $30 billion a year overseas. That would be the single biggest boost to overseas exports in the history of Canada. $30 billion works out to $1,400 for every family every year, one pipeline. And to put put that into perspective, you know, the trade agreement with Indonesia is supposed to give us $400 million. So, one pipeline will give you 75 times more export overseas than a trade deal with this with a relatively big country. Um, then there's the LG side. Like, we've got a 1,300 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. We just have to get it to coast, liquefy it, put it on ships, send it over to Asia and Europe where it goes for four times the price that that we pay for it here and you're talking like tens of billions. Then you go to the Americans and say, "Okay, we've got options. We have other markets now. Deal with us fairly. Take off the tariffs and let's trade." And I think you'd have more leverage in that negotiation if you had done if we do unblock the other world markets that await us. Um at the same time, I think we can offer the Americans a lot of mutual benefit um by we can supply more oil to America. [snorts] That will reduce their gas price at the pump. They have an affordability crisis too. We can sell, we can, we can be a reliable supplier of critical minerals, which we have, as long as we get paid the market price for it. And we can ensure that our continent is secure from Chinese, Russian, North Korean, and Iranian threat by doing our part in the Arctic. And I think we put that all into a single package combined with more leverage, I think we can get back to tariff-free access to the most lucrative market in the world, which will make us and them safer, richer, and uh stronger.

How do you feel when people compare you and your approach to Donald Trump? And what do you see as the key differences between your approach and his? Well, I think that's just a liberal tactic because I I've been winning the debate on inflation, carbon taxes, affordability, crime, drugs, natural resources. So, uh, they engage in in that distraction. I find it ironic, you know, here's Mark Carney, the guy who moved his corporate headquarters to the US, who has 90% of his assets in the US. um who uh you know he Carney dodges his taxes in Canada by putting his putting them in the Caribbean and then he has the audacity to try and compare me to a foreign leader. I find that very uh ironic. Um you know by now I think people need to know people should know where I stand because I've been extremely consistent. I don't know if there's a political leader in modern memory in Canada that has been so consistent in what he stands for. And I would just encourage people to judge me on what I've said for my entire political career. It's been the same free enterprise, low tax, sound money, um, affordable, safe country that I've been advocating for. And, uh, I'm happy to stand on my own record. I think you saw the Nokia deal that we recently did. So, I I'm going to give a bit of a preamble for this question, but we basically bribe foreign companies to come into Canada by paying hundreds of thousands of dollars from taxpayer money per job. And this puts Canadian companies at a massive disadvantage. In a sense, it's worse to actually be a Canadian company in Canada than to be a company headquartered elsewhere. We are effectively taking our taxpayer money and sending it elsewhere. if you think about it that way. And so why are we doing this? And does that ever make sense? No, it doesn't. Uh giving money uh taxpayer money uh to foreign multi multinationals uh never ends up producing the promised jobs. They find a way to lawyer and lobby the money into their pockets with few conditions and as soon as they get the cash, they dash. And we've seen it with the Stalantis deal where we were in for $15 billion and Stalantis is cutting jobs in Canada. $15 billion for one company. That works out to almost $1,000 for every Canadian family in taxes for a company that has since it got the subsidy reduced its Canadian workforce and increased its workforce in the States and going to the Oval Office to announce a $1 billion plan to invest in the US. So my approach is guaranteed to benefit our country because what I propose is let's cut taxes on investment, income, and energy in Canada. So let's take my capital gains tax idea. You get rid of capital gains tax on reinvestments in Canada. You only get the money if you invest in Canada. Um you cut taxes on energy, for example. You only benefit from that tax cut if your company is using energy in Canada. So, we're better off to create a free enterprise low tax in environment for business to compete and to raise money through private investment in the way that I appro I approach it than to take money from workers and business all businesses and give it to a favored few. Do you think that optimizing for winning a reelection um prevents our elected officials from making extremely difficult choices that might cause them to not be reelected but are in the best interest of Canada long term? Yes, I mean I can speak from experience. I was running for in the last election for an Ottawa seat and I was very open about my plan to reduce the size of the federal bureaucracy and I [snorts] paid the electoral price for that. So, some people say I should have done what Mark Carney did and just lie and say that the um bureaucracy can keep growing when people are lined up at food banks and can't afford homes um because of the cost of government. Uh but if I had done that, then I would be a liar. I might have won my Ottawa seat, but I would be a liar. And so, I'd rather tell the truth, which is that in this case, the bureaucracy is too big. And it's one of the reasons why people can't afford their lives rather than to make up stories and uh then betray people after the election. Speaking of hard choices, recent court decisions in BC, including the Kawajan ruling and the implementation of UN drip, have raised concerns among Canadians about property rights, democratic accountability, and economic certainty. Pair this with increasing frustration that despite the federal government spending over 240 billion on indigenous priorities since 2014, many indigenous communities still face poor outcomes. In your view, what's the end state of reconciliation? Well, I I think the end state is going forward. Uh we have to um create a country where everybody has opportunity. Uh I think the end state is um the Enoch Reserve near Edmonton where Chief Billy Morren took 20% unemployment brought it down to 3%. Um took a huge deficit turned it into a balanced budget and opened up his reserve to business so that his community became self-reliant. Very proud that he's now a member of our caucus. or [gasps] it looks like Kitamat where Alice Ross who's also one of my MPs now was the chief counselor of the Heisla and signed a deal to bring the $40 billion LNG Canada project the single biggest project in Canadian history of any kind public or private. This is going to be like tens of billions of dollars of benefit for all Canadians and his people will now live in prosperity forever. uh that is the end state of reconciliation. Um it's not through court cases or government bureaucracies in Ottawa that only make us all poor. It is through the the model that I just described of unleashing the power of enterprise opportunity uh and allowing uh First Nations to be to use their god-given talents uh in uh building our economy with other Canadians. Has empathy been weaponized? I would say complexity has been weaponized [snorts] because the whole bureaucratic apparatus in both the first nations government departments now there's two used to be one now there's two and in all aspects of government the average person including indigenous Canadians would look at it and say that these programs aren't working they're making everybody except a small group in Ottawa poorer and they benefit only the people in power. And the reason that that they get away with it is cuz it's so damn comp complicated how all these government programs in Ottawa, they have good names and flashy PR programs, but no one in the real world has time to figure out even what they do. And so, you know, people are we're dumping tens of billions of dollars into all kinds of programs that have nice names, you know, like Build Canada Homes, which doesn't build any homes, or yet another defense procurement agency, which can't figure out how to buy anything for our military. But because the average welder small businessman is too busy feeding his kids, building a business, paying his taxes, and he can't undecipher it all, he ends up paying for it and getting nothing in return. And uh that is what that's not just the case when it comes to First Nations programming. It's the case with all the programming. Um and I don't blame the the the people uh the grassroots people either in First Nations or other communities. I blame this this um bureaucratic and political industrial complex in Ottawa. What role does media play in that? Well, it should be to hold the government accountable. Uh you know, unfortunately, our med media seems to think that their job is to hold the people accountable to the government rather than the government accountable to the people. But, you know, every day there's a scandal that comes out in the form like read Blacks. they're actually a real media outlet. They expose governmental wrongdoing and waste every day and it gets no coverage in mainstream media. Um, and so I think that's why people are are looking for alternative media that will get them the facts that uh the government funded and corporate controlled outlets don't report. I want to make sure I get this right, so I'm going to read it here. The government of Canada has provided over 3.4 4 billion in subsidies, tax breaks, and grants to support the operations of the Canadian media industry since 2017. This figure doesn't include the amount spent on CBC or the amounts the government spends on federal advertising subscriptions uh with mainstream media company and it does not include the numerous laws that they've used to protect the media from competition. With such enormous amounts flowing from government, some Canadians are starting to question the independence of mainstream media organizations. Can government subsidies to media organizations coexist with a free and open press? Let's go back to language. Language is important. You've just made the case that the media is dependent on the government. Can something that is dependent be independent? After our last interview to to go on the media train here a little bit, several former political staffers reached out to me and told me that there is an unspoken quid proquo in this town where backroom negotiations with journalists secure favorable coverage and avoid negative coverage in exchange for exclusive interviews. What's your reaction to that? I guess it's possible. um media have to negotiate to get information I suppose but uh I really don't I think the main problem is that too much of it is controlled by government and uh too much of it is concentrated and I think what we need to have is more independent voices like yours so that Canadians have choice and freedom and um we've seen this government has been trying to concentrate more and more media power whether it's through C11, which allows the CRTC to manipulate social media algorithms to favor certain types of media, whether it's the proposed um I think it was C68, which was designed to promote uh to to get rid of what what are called online harms, illdefined idea that could include things that the government considers to be politically incorrect, or whether it's the enormous subsidies that there's no question media outlets have to consider when they when they do their jobs. So, uh I think what we need is more decentralization, more competition, more freedom, more choice. And you know what? That's the the idea of having a free and independent media. It's not perfect, but it's better than all the alternatives. um if we can't tr if we don't trust the people to decipher what is the truth and then then how can we trust people who are in government to to decide for them. It seems like western countries not just Canada but they're cracking down more and more and trying to regulate what can and can't be said uh on particular platforms they're you know they it's guised in the language of disinformation, misinformation and fake news. What are the consequences of free speech being curtailed? Let's go back to first principles again. If you think that the average root reader, viewer, or listener is incapable of determining what is true and what is not. Well, then how will a government official be able to make that same determination? If man is not capable of deciding for himself what is true and what is not, then how is he capable of deciding for others? Put differently, some say what we need is a watchman to come in and he's going to say this is true and this is not true. So this can be broadcast and that can't be. Who watches the watchman? What if he's a liar? What if he spreads disinformation? If you think that a media, an independent media outlet is going to spread disinformation, what's to stop the same disinformation agent from getting into the government bureaucracy that decides what's true and what's not? There is no perfect answer to disinformation. But the single greatest antibbody to bad information is good information. to have an overabundance of information so that the truth clashes with the falsehood and in the long run, human beings judge for themselves. Now, you might say, "Well, that's naive. How can you expect human beings to be able to make that discernment?" Well, that's exactly what the sensors are claiming they're going to do. They're going to hire human beings presumably to tell us what's true and what's false. But if humans can't do that, then how can they how can they do it for other people? And the other answer is they can't. The the the the least bad option is to allow unbridled free speech so that good ideas clash with bad, true information with false. And in the end, the right side will win. I always frame this to my kids as you would never want to give power to your friends that you wouldn't want your enemies to have. Exactly.

Well, I I think the end state is going forward. Uh we have to um create a country where everybody has opportunity. Uh I think the end state is um the Enoch Reserve near Edmonton where Chief Billy Morren took 20% unemployment brought it down to 3%. Um took a huge deficit turned it into a balanced budget and opened up his reserve to business so that his community became self-reliant. Very proud that he's now a member of our caucus. or [gasps] it looks like Kitamat where Alice Ross who's also one of my MPs now was the chief counselor of the Heisla and signed a deal to bring the $40 billion LNG Canada project the single biggest project in Canadian history of any kind public or private. This is going to be like tens of billions of dollars of benefit for all Canadians and his people will now live in prosperity forever. uh that is the end state of reconciliation. Um it's not through court cases or government bureaucracies in Ottawa that only make us all poor. It is through the the model that I just described of unleashing the power of enterprise opportunity uh and allowing uh First Nations to be to use their god-given talents uh in uh building our economy with other Canadians. Has empathy been weaponized? I would say complexity has been weaponized [snorts] because the whole bureaucratic apparatus in both the first nations government departments now there's two used to be one now there's two and in all aspects of government the average person including indigenous Canadians would look at it and say that these programs aren't working they're making everybody except a small group in Ottawa poorer and they benefit only the people in power. And the reason that that they get away with it is cuz it's so damn comp complicated how all these government programs in Ottawa, they have good names and flashy PR programs, but no one in the real world has time to figure out even what they do. And so, you know, people are we're dumping tens of billions of dollars into all kinds of programs that have nice names, you know, like Build Canada Homes, which doesn't build any homes, or yet another defense procurement agency, which can't figure out how to buy anything for our military. But because the average welder small businessman is too busy feeding his kids, building a business, paying his taxes, and he can't undecipher it all, he ends up paying for it and getting nothing in return. And uh that is what that's not just the case when it comes to First Nations programming. It's the case with all the programming. Um and I don't blame the the the people uh the grassroots people either in First Nations or other communities. I blame this this um bureaucratic and political industrial complex in Ottawa. What role does media play in that? Well, it should be to hold the government accountable. Uh you know, unfortunately, our med media seems to think that their job is to hold the people accountable to the government rather than the government accountable to the people. But, you know, every day there's a scandal that comes out in the form like read Blacks. they're actually a real media outlet. They expose governmental wrongdoing and waste every day and it gets no coverage in mainstream media. Um, and so I think that's why people are are looking for alternative media that will get them the facts that uh the government funded and corporate controlled outlets don't report. I want to make sure I get this right, so I'm going to read it here. The government of Canada has provided over 3.4 4 billion in subsidies, tax breaks, and grants to support the operations of the Canadian media industry since 2017. This figure doesn't include the amount spent on CBC or the amounts the government spends on federal advertising subscriptions uh with mainstream media company and it does not include the numerous laws that they've used to protect the media from competition. With such enormous amounts flowing from government, some Canadians are starting to question the independence of mainstream media organizations. Can government subsidies to media organizations coexist with a free and open press? Let's go back to language. Language is important. You've just made the case that the media is dependent on the government. Can something that is dependent be independent? After our last interview to to go on the media train here a little bit, several former political staffers reached out to me and told me that there is an unspoken quid proquo in this town where backroom negotiations with journalists secure favorable coverage and avoid negative coverage in exchange for exclusive interviews. What's your reaction to that? I guess it's possible. um media have to negotiate to get information I suppose but uh I really don't I think the main problem is that too much of it is controlled by government and uh too much of it is concentrated and I think what we need to have is more independent voices like yours so that Canadians have choice and freedom and um we've seen this government has been trying to concentrate more and more media power whether it's through C11, which allows the CRTC to manipulate social media algorithms to favor certain types of media, whether it's the proposed um I think it was C68, which was designed to promote uh to to get rid of what what are called online harms, illdefined idea that could include things that the government considers to be politically incorrect, or whether it's the enormous subsidies that there's no question media outlets have to consider when they when they do their jobs. So, uh I think what we need is more decentralization, more competition, more freedom, more choice. And you know what? That's the the idea of having a free and independent media. It's not perfect, but it's better than all the alternatives. um if we can't tr if we don't trust the people to decipher what is the truth and then then how can we trust people who are in government to to decide for them. It seems like western countries not just Canada but they're cracking down more and more and trying to regulate what can and can't be said uh on particular platforms they're you know they it's guised in the language of disinformation, misinformation and fake news. What are the consequences of free speech being curtailed? Let's go back to first principles again. If you think that the average root reader, viewer, or listener is incapable of determining what is true and what is not. Well, then how will a government official be able to make that same determination? If man is not capable of deciding for himself what is true and what is not, then how is he capable of deciding for others? Put differently, some say what we need is a watchman to come in and he's going to say this is true and this is not true. So this can be broadcast and that can't be. Who watches the watchman? What if he's a liar? What if he spreads disinformation? If you think that a media, an independent media outlet is going to spread disinformation, what's to stop the same disinformation agent from getting into the government bureaucracy that decides what's true and what's not? There is no perfect answer to disinformation. But the single greatest antibbody to bad information is good information. to have an overabundance of information so that the truth clashes with the falsehood and in the long run, human beings judge for themselves. Now, you might say, "Well, that's naive. How can you expect human beings to be able to make that discernment?" Well, that's exactly what the sensors are claiming they're going to do. They're going to hire human beings presumably to tell us what's true and what's false. But if humans can't do that, then how can they how can they do it for other people? And the other answer is they can't. The the the the least bad option is to allow unbridled free speech so that good ideas clash with bad, true information with false. And in the end, the right side will win. I always frame this to my kids as you would never want to give power to your friends that you wouldn't want your enemies to have. Exactly.

All right, let's step outside politics for a minute and do some get to know PR questions. Growing up, your wife may have tipped me off on this one, but growing up, who was your favorite wrestler when you were a teenager? What did you love about him? I loved Hulk Hogan at the time. Why? Well, you know, he was just like such a a classic uh hero, you know, he was like a big lion heart. uh and uh he would overcome hardship and he fought against Andre the Giant in that famous fight with that incredible body slam and uh you know he was he was outmatched in size and he was battered and bruised but he fought on and overcame and won and I uh I loved that that moment was like epic but I used to go to Stampede Wrestling in Calgary which was like uh the Hart Brothers I don't know if you know the Well, they're all from Calgary. Brett and what was the other guy? Well, there's Brett, Owen, and then Bruce. Bruce wasn't very wellnown. And uh but we go to we go to that. And when I was a kid, I loved it. And my mother was a substitute teacher. So was Bruce Hart. He was the one of the lesser known, but a great guy. So she convinced him to come to my birthday party. My dad actually built a wrestling ring out of PVC pipe, some bed padding, some bedding, uh a camping uh beds, and he put some ropes around it, and we had a ring in my front yard, and Bruce Hart came and taught us how to wrestle. And then my my buddy's dad owned a funeral home and so he showed up with the limousine that they carry the remains in removed the coffin and so we could actually go to the stampede wrestling in a limousine and uh we sat and watched the match and it was probably one of my my best ever birthdays. U so I still thank my parents for putting that on for me. I was about 10 or 11 at the time. Who's your favorite MMA fighter right now? The guy I enjoy watching is uh Ilia Topurya. Um I think he's um I'm just saying in terms of the the pure enjoyment of watching him. I think the guy is so fascinating. He's he's a grappler. He comes in through he came in through wrestling and jiu-jitsu, but he learned how to strike and he's a really good puncher. like it's you feel like you're watching a worldclass boxer when he strikes and uh his head movement, his dodging, his uh his knockout punches have been just something to behold. And I think he's going to be kind of the big name in MMA for the next the biggest name for the next little while. I know he's going through a few challenges right now. Um but uh I think he's the funnest guy to watch these days. What's your favorite thing to do with Cruz these days? I would say uh building things. He loves to build and assemble. So, mostly Lego. Um he put we put together a little uh gingerbread house for Christmas the other day and uh he likes to meticulously assemble projects. I would say the second thing is reading. He we're depending on the week. Sometimes he really loves books, sometimes not so much, but I love reading with him. So, uh, that's what I would say are the two favorite things. Explain the Let's Go to Home Depot song to me. Well, that's, uh, there's this this Spanish song my my wife listens to and and I couldn't obviously can't figure out what they're saying and I so I just in I just insert English words all the time and start singing them along and her and her family always laugh at me. And so, one of the one of the songs it sounded to me like they're saying, "We're going to go to Home Depot. We go to Home Depot." So, they're all listening to music, enjoying themselves, and I walk in and start singing like a a gringo, and uh brings lots of laughter to them. You've been underestimated uh over and over again in life. Did that start early? Yeah, I think so. I mean, uh, when I when I was first elected, I was running against, uh, Minister of National Defense, and I was 24 years old, and he had been elected, I think, six times federally and and municipally, and no one thought I had a hope. And I won that. And then, um, most people thought I would never get into cabinet. I did that. And then I don't think people expected that I would win the leadership of the Conservative Party with such a strong victory. But I like being underestimated. What's your guilty fast food pleasure? You know, I don't have a lot of guilty fast food pleasures anymore. I've become much more disciplined in my diet. So, um I always had a weakness for ice cream, but I'm I'm pretty hard pretty hardcore disciplined now. I'm mostly a carnivore diet now. What's your workout regimen? Kettle bells. Every day? No, I wouldn't say every day as as often as I can. The great thing about kettle bells, you can hit your you can do a full body workout in 15 20 minutes and you're set. You don't need to work out the next day. And I just do some body weight usually in my hotel room, I bring uh some bungee cords along just for like some fine tuning. It's nothing impressive, but it if I'm on the road for long periods of time and I don't have my kettle bells around, then I just use some bungee cords, push-ups, squats, that kind of thing. And I can usually I can bang out a workout in 15 minutes. You got to be efficient. Tim Hortons or Starbucks? I don't love either of them to be honest. I like independent I I like independent coffee shops that are stronger. I like strong coffee. Really strong. I don't like it watered down. Uh I like uh you know a really punchy uh like Turkish coffee or or espresso. I don't like anything with too much water in it or milk. Boxing or MMA? I'd say MMA, but I love both. Hockey or baseball? Hockey. Desert or ocean? Desert. Why? I find the desert incredibly uh beautiful and peaceful. I like the dry air. I've been to a lot of deserts. Like my wife and I had our honeymoon in Morocco and we went to the desert and slept there. Uh and I just find the desert to be incredibly uh beautiful. I love the hot, dry air. Um, it's it's very peaceful. Um, I I I love it. What's your least favorite household chore? Matching socks. I hate when you pull a big pile of socks on and you have to sit there and try to match the It's the most uh frustrating thing in household uh living. If your wife had to describe you in one word, what word would she use? I think she would say determined. And how would you say the kids would describe you in one word? Ridiculous. Cuz I love to I love to horse around with them. I love to tease them. I love to wrestle with them. I love to uh make funny faces and and uh half the time it makes them laugh and the other half the time it makes them uh want to give dad a little hit across the face. [laughter] What's your favorite memory with your family from the past year? I can't think of one particular moment, but I would just say watching Valentina make progress. She's really progressed. She has obviously some some challenges, but she's very communicative now. She's not quite speaking yet and she uh she knows how to communicate through her own form of sign language, her own she understands words. So you and you know that cuz she responds to what you're saying and she actually can project into the future. So we can tell her what she's going to be doing throughout a morning and and as the morning progresses, she will walk through that day. Um, she was just at the uh shopping center with Anna, I think it was yesterday, and she picked out a little pair of dress shoes. She was very proud when she got back to our residence for uh a Hanukkah party that she could put her her her fancy new dress shoes on and she had a little bit of makeup and she was pointing at her lips saying, you know, to indicate she wanted makeup on and she's become very advanced and I think she's much happier little girl. She's a calmer now. She's sleeping a lot better. So, I I I can't pinpoint like one instance. I can just tell you that that progression for us has been really great. Do you ever get stressed? Less and less, you know, and it the more stress I face, the less stress I become because you learn that wor you not only in theory but in practice that worrying has no point. There's no purpose to it. and I focus on what I can control and that is the most liberating thing you can do. And whether it's the serenity prayer or um I saw this Hindu priest online and he said uh he had a magic formula to end all worry. He said you ask these yourself these questions. Do you have a problem? No. Why worry? Yes. Do you have a solution? Yes. Then why worry? you don't have a solution, well then why worry? At the end of the day, no matter what the circumstances, worrying won't make it better. So, I have found as I've grown, I used to be a lot more used to have much more anticipatory anxiety in my youth, like what's going to happen? We got to control events. But now, you realize there are certain events out of your control, and you focus on the things that are in your control, and it's an incredibly liberating um feeling. How do you maintain hope in politics? And I'll I'll sort of I'll give you a bit of context to this. I find the more I pay attention to politics, the more it affects me as a person, it affects me positively and a lot of optimism and it affects me negatively and sort of um I wouldn't say cynicism, but despair almost like things aren't getting better and how do we make things better? And I feel for all the the you know millions of people who are lined up at a food bank and I feel for our policies and the consequences of those policies. How do you maintain hope? What other choice do we have but then to have hope? Um and [clears throat] you know I meet so many people that tell me that they see me as their hope and um what what strikes me about them is they don't give up. You know, like I meet people who are [sighs] fighting every day just to get by to just to feed their kids. I meet, you know, the middle-aged couple that wants to have kids and they can't afford a home. Uh I meet the mother who lost her kid to an overdose, but she's still advocating for drug treatment to save other people's sons and daughters. And these people don't give up. So I don't give up. That's what keeps me going. That's what keeps me having hope.