Unlearn16: Class is in Session - The One Where I Save Democracy...And I Don't Even Drive a Truck

00:00:00.000 class is in session. Hey everybody, welcome to unlearn 16 classes in session. You just

00:00:07.700 get me today. You just get me, but you're going to get, you're going to get the teacher

00:00:12.320 me. You always get the teacher me because I can't really ever shut that off. But today

00:00:16.060 we're going to talk about democracy in Canada. I need this as a lead up because hopefully

00:00:21.960 next week I'm going to have a pretty awesome guest come on. We're going to talk about the

00:00:24.920 trucker convoy. But a lot of people are throwing around words like democracy and freedom and

00:00:31.180 they're talking about our constitutional rights. And in fact, I don't think a lot of people

00:00:35.760 understand the parameters of democracy, the limitations to our freedoms and what those

00:00:42.840 look like. I don't think a lot of people understand that. So today I'm going to do my best to give

00:00:48.840 you my grade 12 politics lesson on what a democracy looks like specifically in Canada

00:00:56.980 and what those indicators are. First and foremost, I'm going to give you a brief, just a brief

00:01:02.800 sort of depiction of what a parliamentary democracy looks like. I have a lot of people

00:01:07.000 from the States who listen to me who don't necessarily know our democratic system and

00:01:12.020 a lot of Canadians who really haven't taken civics for a very, very long time and maybe

00:01:16.140 have you know lost the thread of what goes on in this country so let me stipulate canada is broken

00:01:23.040 up into constitutionally into two different power groups the federal government provincial

00:01:27.500 government their jurisdictions are separate although connected through money we can talk

00:01:32.520 about that later so provincially in canada we elect a premier under a certain party or certain

00:01:40.820 banner and they serve a term as our premier we have no limits on those on those spots

00:01:47.040 federally we have our prime minister in his or her cabinet they're also elected um democratically

00:01:57.080 in the same way that our provincial premiers are elected and they are elected with no limitations

00:02:02.360 on how much they can run either today i'm just going to talk federally federally this is the

00:02:08.800 way it works. Canada's broken up into 338 ridings. Each riding geographically represents

00:02:16.760 approximately 150,000 to 200,000 Canadians. Each riding gets one MP. So we have our election and

00:02:25.900 it's spread out over the whole country. Every riding votes and every riding gets a winner.

00:02:32.000 Now those winners don't always win by a majority. If there are four or five candidates in that

00:02:37.680 riding, that vote can be very much split. You could win the most votes with only 25% of the

00:02:45.060 entire vote. So that's why you get different sort of perceptions or different realities when it

00:02:50.580 comes to how many seats did you win versus the popular vote. So 338 ridings. There's an election.

00:02:57.700 Prior to that election, each political party has already chosen their leader. There's a party

00:03:03.240 convention if you want to choose the party's leader you can belong to the party if you're over

00:03:09.440 18 and you can go to the convention and you can vote for that leader you can listen to the debates

00:03:15.920 and choose between their seven options or however many options there are other than that you wait

00:03:22.300 to see what a leader is announced since you're not going to go to the convention and then you

00:03:26.400 vote and if you vote liberal in your riding for your particular candidate candidate you know in

00:03:31.800 the back of your mind that if the liberals win the most or the majority seats in the house of

00:03:36.740 commons 338 that their leader that has already been chosen will become prime minister and then

00:03:44.020 the prime minister will choose his or her cabinet from the other people that have been elected

00:03:49.460 within that party so everything in canada has to be elected in the united states it works a little

00:03:55.700 bit differently the president's chosen separately and he or she unfortunately it's only been he so

00:04:03.220 far but here we go kamala he or she uh has to choose their cabinet from outside the government

00:04:09.640 altogether so it's a complete separation of powers where in canada it's a fusion of powers

00:04:15.500 all of that being said our prime minister gets elected for five-year terms and every five years

00:04:21.800 they can run again now if they have a majority they can call an early election just like Trudeau

00:04:28.100 did not too long ago if you call an early election let's say around year three when you're very

00:04:34.340 popular you have the opportunity to get re-elected for another five years we don't have any limits

00:04:42.820 on those terms either I think our longest running prime minister 16 years maybe I think Mackenzie

00:04:48.800 king i could be wrong but he did you know speak to to his dead mother through uh crystal ball so

00:04:55.860 neither here nor there so all of these things being true when people are talking about democracy

00:05:02.260 in canada i don't know if they're really challenging the way we elect because there

00:05:08.300 are flaws there and i'll come back and i'll do a whole separate podcast talking about the flaws

00:05:13.880 in how we elect, if we should have more of a system where we elect our leaders separately

00:05:18.780 and all of those kind of, you know, intricacies.

00:05:22.240 Having said that, what I want to talk today is about what democracy means and how it functions

00:05:29.900 in a democracy.

00:05:30.980 But let me be clear, no one anywhere, period, has a full democracy.

00:05:35.620 Having a full and complete democracy would mean every citizen, you know, over the age

00:05:42.940 of 18 has the right to vote on every single issue that is ever put before government or that it has

00:05:50.480 ever put to the entire country now a lot of people would say why not why don't we do that well there's

00:05:55.980 a couple of reasons number one i know nothing about fishing rights in northern bc and the idea

00:06:01.400 that i would vote on that doesn't make one hell of a lot of sense number two it would be the cost

00:06:10.220 of that would would bring us to a grinding economic halt so it doesn't make a lot of

00:06:18.540 practical sense it doesn't make a lot of even ideological sense because i don't know what i'm

00:06:24.120 talking about when i vote on fishing rights in bc so all of those things being equal let's get into

00:06:31.520 what builds a real democracy because a lot of people just talk about voting rights right that's

00:06:37.000 what we get to do we vote and when we vote the majority wins we go on our way and a lot of the

00:06:43.240 things about protesting is trying to speak to what happens during a political sort of office

00:06:51.360 sorry a political candidate has taken office and they're in there for that five-year term

00:06:56.060 how are we allowed to influence policy then because if we just elect and we have no way

00:07:02.640 to influence policy. Technically, you've elected a dictator for five years. That's not quite the way

00:07:07.560 it goes. So I'm going to take you through eight, eight very simple yet incredibly complicated

00:07:15.500 aspects of what a full democracy looks like, where we do well, where we fall short. But I want you

00:07:24.620 to see a full picture before we judge protests or before we judge invoking emergency powers acts or

00:07:31.820 anything like that. And the first aspect of democracy that everybody talks about is majority

00:07:36.160 rule. This is like the founding principle, right? Whatever the majority wants, whatever the majority

00:07:42.580 says, that's what goes. And when I say a majority, it's funny because that's still, that doesn't even

00:07:50.480 apply in all circumstances. I'll give you an example. Right now, Trudeau has a minority

00:07:56.700 government. What that means is he doesn't have 50% of those 338 seats. So in order for Trudeau

00:08:04.260 to pass something and the liberals to pass something, other MPs, member of parliament,

00:08:12.340 need to side with him and vote with him or else nothing passes. I don't know how many people

00:08:17.040 quite understand that. But when a majority of people in the House of Commons pass a piece of

00:08:22.460 legislation legislation it then goes to the senate if the senate passes it queen signs it

00:08:28.720 to law please i don't want to fight about the queen right now uh all my best to her and you

00:08:33.780 know covid crisis so all of this goes there it gets signed into law that's what a majority rule

00:08:41.720 is but and here's the big huge caveat in a democracy we have to go to number two which is

00:08:49.340 minority rights. So the majority is allowed to push through things that they want in their

00:08:56.740 country. That's what a democracy is about. However, the majority cannot use their power

00:09:03.500 of a majority in order to oppress or subvert or control the minority. So in a lot of ways,

00:09:11.600 if we had a majority of Canadians saying we don't like gay marriage, it doesn't matter because our

00:09:16.800 constitution, which is the fundamental building block of our society, stipulates those are rights

00:09:24.260 you cannot trample on. So the majority and our civil rights are in constant balance. I'm going

00:09:32.440 to talk about that when it comes to truckers next week a little bit in more detail. Now,

00:09:37.380 after minority rights, in order to protect the minority, in order to make sure that the majority

00:09:43.140 gets what they want but always taking into account minority rights as laid out in our

00:09:49.020 constitution of rights and freedoms and our charter of rights and freedoms we have number 0.54

00:09:52.960 three which is rule of law and rule of law stipulates that no one's above the law now a lot

00:09:58.880 of people at home you should be sitting there laughing a little bit at that one because we

00:10:03.700 all know there are many ways that rule of law doesn't play into a lot of democracies and

00:10:11.640 specifically because the more money you have the more power you have in the legal system

00:10:18.780 the more ways out you have if you have an individual with no money who steals a car an

00:10:24.600 individual with a lot of money who steals the exact same car at the exact same time they both

00:10:31.400 go on the joy ride the kid with no money is going to get a public defender and the kid with money

00:10:38.820 is going to be able to buy a team of lawyers that could quite possibly and in more practicality

00:10:45.200 make sure they don't spend any time in jail so in a system where i buy how good my defense is

00:10:53.880 if i can all of a sudden this idea of rule of law becomes very hard to access for everybody

00:11:02.320 and i'm going to come back to that in a little bit it's also who you know there's no question

00:11:06.660 about that. Now, number four, interest groups. In a democracy, you're allowed to have many

00:11:11.220 interest groups. Interest groups like PETA, like Greenpeace, like Mothers Against Drunk

00:11:16.960 Driving, like the trucker's convoy would be considered an interest group. And all these

00:11:23.440 individuals are absolutely allowed to have their voices heard. But to what extent are

00:11:31.400 they allowed to have their voice heard to what extent are they allowed to have access to

00:11:37.220 politicians having your voice heard and taking people hostage might be two very different things

00:11:45.760 now one of the most important features of democracy that a lot of people don't fixate on

00:11:51.240 the the idea of voting and having a very pretty constitution is only one element of a democracy

00:11:58.880 and it's a very easy element to pretend as though you have

00:12:03.020 and look at my pretty documentation right here.

00:12:06.160 But number five is judicial independence,

00:12:09.680 is the idea that the Supreme Court of Canada is here

00:12:13.680 in order to ensure that they uphold our constitutional rights and freedoms.

00:12:19.320 It is the Supreme Court's job to make sure that the government

00:12:24.320 never crosses that line and takes away our democratic freedoms and our civil rights.

00:12:34.120 Now, here's the sticking point. What happens when your right interferes with my right?

00:12:43.840 I said, this was in a movie, I can't remember what movie it was, actually. I think it was

00:12:47.360 The Siege. And somebody said, it's easy to choose between right and wrong. The hard thing is to

00:12:52.460 choose between which wrong is more right. And I know that sounds ridiculous, but hear me out.

00:12:57.940 So right now we're sitting in a time where, and we can talk about COVID. I'm not going to, again,

00:13:04.180 I'm not going to particularly talk about the protests, but let's just talk about the mandates

00:13:07.940 for a minute. Because a lot of people feel as though the mandates are interfering with their

00:13:13.100 freedom, their liberty. And our Charter 7 writes, talk about life and liberty. Here's the question.

00:13:19.200 The life aspect is the mandates to keep people safe, are the mandates to keep them healthy, are the mandates to reduce the impact and the crushing sort of weight on our medical system, and liberty is our freedom to do what we want to do.

00:13:38.200 During a pandemic, these things are at odds.

00:13:42.520 So, our elected officials have to make a choice.

00:13:46.960 absolute freedom interferes with life and if we only prioritize life then our liberties are at

00:13:57.760 risk so how do we balance the two by the way life comes before liberty in the constitution

00:14:04.680 it makes perfect sense it does that our lives should be protected first and foremost

00:14:09.200 so these mandates and again we can argue them separately i'm just arguing sort of

00:14:17.060 ideologically here for a second so you understand the system our government's job at this point

00:14:23.680 no matter who was in charge needs to decide how do i balance those two rights and having

00:14:32.180 mandates and certain people that they have to get the shot or they can't do this job

00:14:37.560 or you have to get the shot or you can't go into a gym or a restaurant.

00:14:41.960 This is the balance that they have decided is legitimate.

00:14:46.840 Now, whether or not you agree with that balance,

00:14:49.200 it's a whole other discussion.

00:14:51.620 But that's the question that gets posed to democratic governments all the time.

00:14:56.800 How do we balance rights?

00:14:59.380 Because earlier I said minority rights.

00:15:02.680 So I'll give you an example.

00:15:04.300 if you are Mormon you don't believe in blood transfusions as an 18 year old individual you

00:15:11.240 can decide that you do not want a blood transfusion here's where it gets messy I also get to decide

00:15:17.940 for my six-year-old son so we get into a car accident my six-year-old son needs a blood

00:15:24.100 transfusion I as the parent get to decide that that's not going to happen for them even though

00:15:31.020 it's very clear it's going to save their life. And that goes to the courts. And sometimes that

00:15:37.540 goes to the courts very, very quickly. But all the while, we are trying to balance individual rights,

00:15:45.460 individual freedoms. And that's why people have made all sorts of comparisons between,

00:15:52.320 let's say, my right to smoke and my right to smoke inside the keg. Now, quite a few years ago,

00:15:59.860 that right was taken. We said that my right to smoke didn't get to usurp. It didn't get to

00:16:06.800 infringe upon everybody else in that restaurant, including the workers who have to work there in

00:16:13.400 order to make a paycheck. So what happens is that right gets taken away. I mean, I grew up in an age

00:16:20.380 where parents smoked in the car, people smoked in the mall, people smoked in hospitals, in the

00:16:26.580 rooms with patients. I grew up in a very unique age. And at some point we decided, and to the

00:16:34.460 hatred of a lot of smokers, we decided that their right to smoke shouldn't infringe on somebody

00:16:39.980 else's right not to have smoke in their lungs in an enclosed space. And again, COVID has just

00:16:46.140 introduced that in a very different way and in a very quick way because of the risk that it posed

00:16:51.840 to the people. But having an independent judiciary, having a Supreme Court that is

00:16:59.140 completely separate from the government. Now, a lot of people are going to say, well, it's not

00:17:04.600 completely separate because, and this is true in the United States and Canada, when it comes to

00:17:10.720 the Canadian government, they appoint Supreme Court justices. So in a way, they have had their

00:17:18.020 influence. And part of that is true. Whether you're conservative or liberal, the NDP have

00:17:25.060 never controlled the federal government, so they've never appointed anyone. Or if you're

00:17:28.340 looking at who Trump's appointed as opposed to who Biden would like to appoint, all of those

00:17:33.540 have influences in the Supreme Court. Absolutely true. But once they're appointed, the government

00:17:39.620 cannot step in and pressure in any way, shape, or form. In fact, their jobs are completely secure

00:17:47.060 in that appointment so that's what separates them from the rest of the body or the rest of the

00:17:54.760 political system and judicial independence and the supreme court's ability to strike down

00:18:02.360 laws made by the federal government is perhaps one of the most significant sort of pinnacle moments

00:18:10.940 in democracies where you really want to see if a democracy is working when the Supreme Court

00:18:18.460 tells the federal government what they can and can't do. That's the key, right? I'll give you

00:18:25.460 an example. When gay marriage wasn't legal in Canada, Paul Martin, who was a liberal prime

00:18:31.860 minister at the time, was looking to see if he was going to pass gay marriage. Now, it wasn't

00:18:38.080 popular in 2005 or whenever it was it wasn't a popular choice um but he wanted to see before he

00:18:46.180 passed the law he did something very politically intelligent whether or not you agree with the rest

00:18:51.980 of his politics or not what he decided to do was to take it to the supreme court before passing the

00:18:58.940 law so basically there's a particular process in which you can put this before the supreme court

00:19:04.700 and say is this constitutional is gay marriage according to supreme court and you're reviewing

00:19:11.340 of our constitution our charter is gay marriage a constitutional right for canadians supreme court

00:19:17.180 said absolutely it is so then paul martin goes back to the house of commons and he presents it

00:19:22.940 something to pass in the house of commons and says listen whether or not you agree with gay marriage

00:19:29.220 or not whether or not your religion precludes it whether or not your morals or your whatever you

00:19:34.440 want to talk about it doesn't matter because at the end of the day our supreme court dictates

00:19:40.100 that this is a fundamental right according to our charter of rights and freedoms and he was very 0.64

00:19:44.620 smart in that because either at that point you either stood against the charter or with gay

00:19:51.840 marriage he didn't make it a political issue he made it um he made it a charter issue

00:19:58.780 and that was a very sort of intelligent way of going around it now number six civilian control

00:20:06.200 of the army this is a hard one this is a hard one because it never feels like civilians have

00:20:13.580 an awful lot of control of the army when i say civilian control of the army you guys have to

00:20:17.080 understand it is not public control of the army when i say civilian control of the army i mean

00:20:23.840 that what our army does or does not do

00:20:27.320 is controlled through our elected representatives.

00:20:30.620 So our elected representatives can decide

00:20:33.220 and will decide what wars we go into,

00:20:36.120 what peacekeeping missions we sign up for,

00:20:38.220 how much money is spent, where it's spent,

00:20:40.440 when we come home, if things go awry,

00:20:43.540 how it gets investigated.

00:20:45.440 Now, a lot of those investigations might be withheld

00:20:47.860 from the general public due to issues of national security,

00:20:52.260 whether or not I agree that that's always an issue or not. They'll be withheld from the general

00:20:57.340 public so that they can make a decision based on what went on there. I think one of the

00:21:04.720 most significant ways in my years of listening to judicial inquest into our military was when

00:21:14.320 the Canadian military, specifically the Airborne, went into Somalia and set up camp during a

00:21:21.740 peacekeeping mission, ended up detaining, arresting, and then beating to death a 16-year-old

00:21:29.600 Somali boy for trespassing onto their military base. And I think he was stealing tools, not

00:21:37.780 weapons, but tools probably in order to sell. Now, when this happened, he was immediately,

00:21:44.160 the whole mission was scrapped. They were brought back and they were all put on trial. The airborne

00:21:48.680 was disbanded but let's be honest the airborne gets recreated under a different name but

00:21:54.160 nonetheless none of that was made like public it wasn't on you know our major news networks

00:22:00.420 because of all of the different moving aspects going on with our military but it it does mean

00:22:05.340 that there is civilian oversight whether we think that oversight is big enough that's a that's

00:22:12.820 a discussion for for another day now number seven is hard number seven is political diversity

00:22:19.340 what really makes a democracy robust is having different viewpoints that you can then choose

00:22:30.280 from to elect and i think over the years we have seen a narrowing of these viewpoints in a lot of

00:22:37.980 ways um in the united states they have two political parties they have the democrats and

00:22:42.800 and the republicans so they're they only have two viewpoints in canada we have federally we have

00:22:51.180 the conservatives the liberals the ndp conservatives being the most right the ndp being the most left

00:22:58.500 we have the green party we have the bloc quebecois which is just who just runs in quebec even if they

00:23:05.380 run federally they only run in quebec and we have some other minor parties as well but that's

00:23:09.900 That's five major parties that when we see major debates for our federal leadership, for our federal elections, and for a prime minister, we see five major parties debating the issues.

00:23:25.440 Now, I like the idea of that political diversity.

00:23:30.420 Ironically, once they're in power, I've found a lot less diversity in action.

00:23:38.020 Let me say that.

00:23:38.860 I found that different elements have been created or different elements influence how people get to actually express their political ideology on a national scale if they get elected.

00:23:54.020 Now, in Canada, we've only ever had two parties that have formed government.

00:23:58.580 We've only ever seen the conservatives and the liberals form government.

00:24:03.800 None of those other parties, however, formed the majority of government in Canada and their leader become prime minister.

00:24:11.540 So we haven't seen how those play out.

00:24:14.080 But if I look at liberals and conservatives, a lot of the times you find their, not their rhetoric, their rhetoric might be different,

00:24:24.740 but you find when they get into office that the way they play things out is remarkably similar.

00:24:29.920 And I think one of the big reasons is this.

00:24:32.660 we give the illusion that in a democracy we have complete sovereignty sovereignty means

00:24:42.180 independence over what goes on in our country the notion of state sovereignty is really old

00:24:48.280 and i think it's really outdated for a whole bunch of reasons and right now we're sitting in one of

00:24:54.500 them. COVID and the international crisis, the pandemic level, the international implications

00:25:03.920 of COVID as a virus, as it affects the globe, and then how it impacts Canada specifically

00:25:11.820 should show us that this notion that our elected representatives can control everything that goes 0.79

00:25:19.180 on within their borders to be a little ridiculous. The idea that COVID needs to be an international

00:25:27.940 response makes perfect sense. But then there's this horrible idea or this very difficult,

00:25:34.200 painful idea about how do we balance democracy? Because I didn't vote for who the Prime Minister

00:25:39.760 of England is or the President of the United States or any of these other world leaders that

00:25:44.400 are going to sit down and decide an international strategy and if I didn't vote for them what

00:25:49.380 happens to my democracy if Trudeau or my prime minister doesn't have the ultimate say doesn't

00:25:56.220 my democracy get get watered down and the answer is of course it does absolutely it does we need

00:26:03.660 to acknowledge that as a reality rather than pretending it doesn't exist it also gets watered

00:26:08.740 down when it comes to our environment we sit in Canada and we pass environmental legislation

00:26:13.560 which i think is incredibly important but unless we have serious international agreement things

00:26:21.200 like the paris records are an example but serious international agreement about the way that every

00:26:25.860 single country is going to act and react then these environmental concerns tend to be an an

00:26:33.680 an upward climb that we're not all on the same page i mean we sit right next to the united states

00:26:39.360 we share lakes if we pass significant environmental legislation the United States

00:26:45.740 said we're no we're not because it affects our economy and of course it does affect everybody's

00:26:49.300 economy then we're kind of at an impasse because we're still being controlled and we are still

00:26:55.640 being impacted by the wind and the storm systems and the impacts on the environment that we don't

00:27:03.800 necessarily control it's going to be impacted the only way you solve that is put a giant bubble

00:27:08.100 over canada and i don't think even elon musk has come up with that idea yet i do say yet because

00:27:14.580 you never know what he's working on but this idea that we are sovereign when it comes to our

00:27:20.660 environment is ridiculous so what happens to my democracy there well it fades and i'm going to go

00:27:25.700 you one step further the our economy right every single politician talks about canada's economy

00:27:33.380 Every single politician says that I can fix the economy.

00:27:37.440 Not a single politician, none of them,

00:27:41.300 will admit how much of our economy is woefully out of our grasp,

00:27:46.680 especially a country like Canada.

00:27:48.760 A country like Canada has incredible natural resources

00:27:51.480 that we don't produce here.

00:27:54.640 I'll give you an example.

00:27:56.080 We have a lot of wood, right?

00:27:58.440 So you'd think all those nice dining room tables we all own

00:28:01.060 would be Canadian-made, but they're not.

00:28:03.380 for lots of reasons. One of the big reasons is we have all these natural resources, but not a lot

00:28:09.140 of manufacturing because our manufacturing needs to compete with the United States because of

00:28:13.860 things like free trade. So it is cheaper for me as a Canadian to, as a government, we sell our

00:28:24.480 wood to the United States. Companies like Lexington make our tables. They send them back up here. We

00:28:30.200 buy American made tables. And I know a lot of people aren't even buying American made because

00:28:34.520 we're buying Malaysian made because that's even cheaper. But we're buying these tables from all

00:28:39.560 different places because they're less expensive. And there it is. We are constantly in this country

00:28:47.960 out of pocket. We sell our resources, we buy back manufactured goods. And a big reason is because

00:28:54.820 we are a part of this incredible incredibly significant um NAFTA agreement or the new name

00:29:03.420 i can't remember and i'm annoyed trump changed it we're a part of this whole agreement in order to

00:29:08.480 get more supply and more goods accessed amongst all levels of these three different countries

00:29:15.000 what it invariably does is it ties its two other countries economies lots of people love to talk

00:29:22.920 about china they'll talk about human rights abuses and they want our government to do something

00:29:27.520 in china yet i don't i have never heard a single a single government official 0.99

00:29:36.560 truly proclaim we should stop trading with china why because it would devastate it would have 0.99

00:29:46.060 devastating impacts on our economy so then what what are we willing to trade i'll give you a 0.96

00:29:52.140 perfect example i love uh as far as conservatives go i was always relatively impressed with brian

00:29:58.520 mulroney brian mulroney was prime minister during the tiananmen square massacres in china and

00:30:06.820 initially right away he wanted to block trade and then in about 10 minutes he took it all back

00:30:12.520 we're making constant decisions on what we're going to do what is the right thing to do and

00:30:18.740 what is the economic thing to do and i think that balance again isn't just canadian everybody's

00:30:27.760 talking about gas prices right well gas prices are controlled outside of our country on the whole

00:30:34.380 depending on what different oil producing countries set gas prices or oil prices at one of the perfect

00:30:42.340 examples of this would have been in the early 70s when oil producing exporting countries known as

00:30:48.620 OPEC, decided to quadruple, times four, oil prices. That just didn't quadruple gas, that quadrupled

00:30:58.440 everything that relied on oil or gas for energy, for production, for transportation. It was a

00:31:06.080 nightmare. And right in that moment, you saw that Canada, and P.S., no country, has complete and

00:31:14.700 out of control over their economy. And I think we're past that point of no return now.

00:31:21.340 I know that Trump loved to say, you know, bring back American businesses to the United States.

00:31:27.760 We're going to have more American manufacturing. We can't afford it. People can't afford it anymore.

00:31:34.520 Why? Well, because in the United States, we demand, and in Canada, we demand a minimum wage. 0.64

00:31:39.820 When you demand a minimum wage, then those companies, those companies, um, up their costs

00:31:47.540 in order to make a significant profit and pay whatever it is we're saying they have to pay.

00:31:53.460 So if I buy an American made t-shirt and I have to spend 25 bucks for a whole bunch of reasons,

00:32:00.320 or, or I could get my t-shirt from Walmart, um, from textiles company in, let's say Bangladesh

00:32:08.620 for five dollars people are making different choices on that right so when the canadian

00:32:16.660 government makes economic choices it it can't exist in a bubble so our democracy gets you know

00:32:24.880 whittled down or water watered down then but i don't think we can shut that gate i don't think

00:32:32.220 we can go back and i don't think anybody really wants to go back to the isolationist policies

00:32:36.880 that we had prior because let me let me denote a good thing when our economies are intrinsically

00:32:45.420 tied i have a goal i have a i have an intrinsic desire for their economy to do well as well

00:32:54.080 otherwise we both suffer and that that connection can sometimes make us

00:33:00.540 more apt to do better things for this world than not um but having politically diverse ideologies

00:33:09.320 also means different ideas when it comes to economic issues i know in the united states

00:33:14.940 they love to shout about communists constantly but listen capitalism is our current economic

00:33:22.420 structure and i could do an entire uh podcast on the basis on whether or not capitalism is the best

00:33:29.020 or whether or not we're living in a post-capitalist society anyway.

00:33:34.100 But the point of the matter is, let's all assume it's not the be-all and end-all.

00:33:39.060 Let's all assume that society doesn't stop changing here,

00:33:43.320 that economic theory doesn't halt here,

00:33:46.840 that there could be better, that we could do better.

00:33:51.700 So, if we exclude all possible other economic theories

00:33:56.800 and ways to adjust or ways to completely obliterate and start over we are actually

00:34:03.180 causing our self-damage now the last one is individual civil rights obviously in this world

00:34:10.340 and in a democracy you need freedoms you need civil rights freedoms and those civil rights

00:34:15.360 let me be real clear about this is a protection of your government from your government so my

00:34:22.460 divisible rights and in canada we don't have a we don't have amendments the way they do in the

00:34:27.040 united states we do have the charter of rights and freedoms but we have freedom of information

00:34:30.940 the press expression religion all of these rights now here's the problem and it's not a problem it's

00:34:37.200 just a reality because democracy is hard the reality is i in a democracy should have full

00:34:46.420 rights as long as and this is stipulated in the constitution as long as those rights don't

00:34:52.220 infringe upon the rights of other people, right? But here's where it gets complicated.

00:34:59.320 How much, how much freedom do I get to say and do and be who I want to be as long as it doesn't

00:35:09.160 impact somebody else? And we try to hold those rights as, as diverse and as wide as we possibly

00:35:17.400 can, but all of our rights have limitations. Every single right. You get a freedom of association.

00:35:24.420 Absolutely. But in this country, for example, if the organization that you are a part of has been

00:35:29.880 deemed linked to terrorist activity, that is limited. Now, could we argue about who gets to

00:35:35.380 make those decisions? Absolutely. But I think we understand the limitation of that right.

00:35:40.160 we also have freedom of expression we can say whatever we want to say now by doing so

00:35:48.780 my rights are protected from the government so the government can't stop me from talking the

00:35:55.120 government can't stop me from having that freedom of expression until until i promote hate and i

00:36:04.160 incite violence there's the line but you see this all gets murky this all gets very confusing

00:36:10.180 because then you have groups rather than overtly stipulating things you have them using metaphors

00:36:16.680 and you having have them use different words to mean the same thing so instead of using words

00:36:24.100 like white supremacy because we know what those words are talking you know how those are connected

00:36:28.580 We start using words like white pride. We start using words like individual pride. We start using words like historical respect. We just change the vernacular. We change the words. And when we change the words, we don't change their intent. But again, it's given us that freedom.

00:36:50.420 That's why in Canada, as disgusting as seeing somebody wave a swastika flag, it's not illegal.

00:36:57.500 It is in Germany, by the way, because, well, they know where that leads.

00:37:00.680 But it's not illegal.

00:37:03.100 All right?

00:37:03.800 We've given all of this as much as we possibly can.

00:37:08.700 That is not to say, by the way, that Twitter, that Instagram, that TikTok, that YouTube, whatever it is,

00:37:15.080 cannot limit what i say on their platform that has nothing to do with my freedoms

00:37:20.880 they they aren't they aren't responsible for protecting my freedoms and in fact they're not

00:37:27.660 the ones that can even take it away they can just change the services i have access to

00:37:32.800 so all of this really ties into one of the most important parts of democracy

00:37:39.880 which is when my freedoms infringe on somebody else's safety i'm driving my car i'm doing 200

00:37:47.340 kilometers an hour on the 401 i'm gonna get arrested i'm gonna put in jail even if i didn't

00:37:52.440 hurt anybody i can't drive drunk why well it's clear the implications of what i could do or the

00:38:00.720 foreseeable reality of me causing harm is enough in a free and democratic society in which i have

00:38:08.620 freedom to limit that freedom because the foreseeable reality of me hurting somebody

00:38:15.020 else or many other people is significant enough. And we talk about COVID and we talk about the

00:38:21.940 last two years that have been horribly frustrating and exhausting. We're really talking about a

00:38:27.840 balance of that. We're really talking about a balance of life versus liberty. And I honestly

00:38:34.320 believe that if more politicians could have talked and spoken about this honestly and intellectually

00:38:41.060 rather than politically jockeying for who was going to get votes in the next election we would

00:38:47.740 have had a much different thing i don't think the truckers convoy ever would have happened ever it

00:38:53.900 wouldn't have happened because the language that we use matters and the way we attack things matter

00:39:00.620 Even though I still believe that mandates save lives and we should have instilled them for the greater level of public safety, it's the way we spoke about them. It's the hypocritical ways we implemented them without conversation, without explanation, without intelligence. And then we take them away when our polling numbers shift.

00:39:22.300 To me, that's the real frustrating mark. And it happens, and if you look across Canada, specifically in the United States, it happens across all levels of government, all different types of government, all different political parties. And that should be significant. That should have significant weight.

00:39:46.100 When we talk about having a full democracy, we have to consistently balance what is functional, what can we do, versus how much democracy do we get to keep.

00:40:02.060 So, everybody can't do everything they've ever wanted to do and they can't vote on every particular issue that ever comes before government.

00:40:10.100 Okay? That's too much.

00:40:12.340 But how much balance do we have?

00:40:15.060 How do we allocate certain powers to government so that they have the power to do these things?

00:40:22.500 We limit some of our freedoms in order to mitigate the damage done to democracy or to other people.

00:40:29.980 How do we balance all of that?

00:40:32.080 Because if a democracy can't function, it's not useful either. 0.73

00:40:35.800 It's not going to have anything done.

00:40:38.480 Canada right now, 338 members of House of Commons.

00:40:43.660 Each member represents about 200,000 people.

00:40:46.500 When people talk about representation by population, that's one...

00:40:50.500 Guys, I can barely represent.

00:40:52.340 I could barely get my class of 20 kids to agree on something.

00:40:56.980 So it's not about consensus.

00:40:59.800 But even trying to represent 200,000 people seems really, really difficult

00:41:04.580 and sometimes kind of anti-democratic.

00:41:07.220 But in the States, it's worse.

00:41:08.280 One member of the House of Representatives represents about 800,000 Americans.

00:41:15.220 That's how the representation there works.

00:41:17.540 That doesn't seem as democratic.

00:41:20.820 But here's the balance.

00:41:22.940 What if we increased it?

00:41:25.020 What if instead of having 338, I double it?

00:41:27.980 I double it so that each MP now represents about 75,000 Canadians.

00:41:34.000 Does it become more democratic?

00:41:36.040 Perhaps.

00:41:36.560 But does that amount of government start to become economically problematic? And do decisions get made at a slower speed? Are they any better decisions? Do they become any more efficient at running a democracy? Or does the constant battle for power get in the way of any decision getting made?

00:42:02.080 which happens in the united states all the time all the time that's what happens when you elect

00:42:06.820 a president separate from your legislative body the legislative body's republican tells the

00:42:11.020 democratic president to you know get lost we're never passing anything you want or the the you

00:42:18.240 know democratic or the republican body here passes something and the opposite to them the president

00:42:23.940 strikes it down and so you're stuck at this deadlock and now even though you have people

00:42:31.360 representing your interests nothing happens and i'm going to end on this very last point because

00:42:37.020 i think this is the the bottom line of a democracy that i think we need to fix and this is the

00:42:42.260 problem we have politicians that we elect no matter who you believe no matter who you vote for

00:42:48.340 that promise 10 things for their election and and you go to the polling stations or you go to the

00:42:54.980 electoral booths and you say okay this candidate promises these 10 this candidate these 10

00:43:01.260 and so on i am going to make a determination on their promises

00:43:05.320 you elect them and then covet happens and i'm using covet as an example because life is like

00:43:13.560 this right there's a war there's an environmental crisis there's a there's a health crisis so many

00:43:19.980 different things can happen and that politician that you elected on the premise of those 10

00:43:24.680 things can no longer do them. Is that a failure of the politician or the reality of the practical

00:43:32.740 times that they face? I'll go you one step further. Let's say that you elect somebody on

00:43:39.960 the basis of their 10 promises and they get elected. Once they're elected and in that five

00:43:46.580 your term, they only decide to fulfill two. What was the point of my democracy then? Is that

00:43:54.840 democracy? Is it democracy when they only do two of the 10 things? Have they fulfilled any democratic

00:44:02.100 sort of principle in that moment, even if they could? And I think a lot of people are disheartened

00:44:10.160 to the point of not voting not caring never putting anything in until there's a frustration

00:44:17.680 level in during a pandemic of a lack of accountability and a lack of conversation

00:44:23.400 and a lack of ownership and explanation of issues do we see people wanting to be involved in politics

00:44:30.960 and i think democratic accountability has to be the main and the most important thing that we hold

00:44:37.880 on to, but we have to give space for huge life universe altering events like COVID

00:44:47.140 to allow our government to deal with it as they deem fit. And then that's why we end up basing

00:44:55.140 it in some sort of ideological principle, not practical one, not what are you going to promise

00:44:59.880 me, but what's your character? What things do you hold the most dear? Because if I don't know the

00:45:07.360 character of your party, I have no idea of how you're going to respond to the next crisis. And

00:45:14.140 how you respond to the next crisis is possibly probably more important than your list of 10

00:45:20.740 things. All right, guys, I hope that some of that made made sense to you that struck chords with

00:45:28.280 you. If you have any questions, please throw them in the comments below. And next week, we are going

00:45:34.360 to address the trucker convoy and all of the intricacies and the different perspectives

00:45:40.780 as we relate it to that convoy not just my own thanks so much for hanging out guys we will see

00:45:48.240 you next tuesday same bat time same bat channel dismissed

Unlearn16: Class is in Session - February 22, 2022

The One Where I Save Democracy...And I Don't Even Drive a Truck

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