Shaun Newman Podcast - SNP/WS Roundtable #7 - Tom Marazzo

Episode Date: October 20, 2022

Tom is a 25 year veteran of the Canadian military & was the lead spokesperson for the Freedom Convoy in Ottawa. We discuss his time in Ottawa & everything up to day 4 of the Emergencies Act Inquiry. Emergencies Act Inquiry https://publicorderemergencycommission.ca/ November 5th SNP Presents: QDM & 2's.   Get your tickets here: https://snp.ticketleap.com/snp-presents-qdm--222-minutes Let me know what you think Text me 587-217-8500

Good evening and welcome to the Sean Newman Show on the Western Standard. Tonight we're talking Public Order Emergency Commission. That is a mouthful. And I'm joined by Tom Marazo. So first off, Tom, I'll let them into the room here. Thanks for hopping aboard tonight. Yeah, thanks for inviting me. Now, I want to make a, you know, when we're talking about something that's going on for the next six weeks, roughly,

I want to make sure the audience knows we're recording this at the end of day four with our schedules and everything else going on. It's been a little difficult. So as more things come out, so people understand. I can't talk to them because we've recorded it a night or two before this is released, just so people are aware. So day four just finished happening on October 18th. But tonight, I thought one-on-one, Tom, and honestly, I haven't got to do this with you on the podcast. You've been on my list of people to slowly bring across and do on the podcast.

I thought we might kick it podcast style for the Western Standard, which is normally I introduced the guest on the Western Standard. I thought maybe we'd start with Tom giving us who Tom is and we'll go from there. Yeah. So I did obviously participate in the convoy back in January of February. I brought here with a, I came here to Ottawa. I was asked a couple of days after the convoy had already arrived. Through a mutual friend who, you know, one thing led to another,

I got on the phone with somebody from Kennedy Unity, James Boss. three hours later I was standing in Ottawa in the Ark Hotel. It actually did happen that quickly because I at the time was living just outside of Kingston, Ontario. So by the time I packed a bag and got cleaned up and drove here, I was here within three hours of that initial phone call. But the convoy had been here for two days. And I was asked to take the original phone call because the intention was to just be. provide some logistical advice because I'm a retired military officer. And so, you know, what I thought initially would be just to give some advice on the phone turned into 22 days

of being on the ground here in Ottawa. And, you know, we, you know, my role did evolve over time when we started to bring in more people into the arc hotel where we were all working out of, you know, start building relationships, but the situation started to fundamentally change as well. So we had to, you know, people's roles started to change. And then my role started to change. And then the lawyers from the JCCF and Keith Wilson from his law firm who is on contract to the JCCF, they arrived. And, you know, things on a daily basis, you kind of never knew what you were going to get in on a daily basis.

but, you know, we work together as a pretty good and effective team of people from all different walks of life. Everything from truckers. I mean, even me. I'm an unemployed now software teacher at a college in Barry, Ontario. I was fired because I didn't really appreciate that the stance that the college I was teaching at in Barry, Ontario, in Georgian College was taking with regard to the vaccine mandates and masks and all that kind of stuff. I cared less about the masks than I did sticking a experimental injection into my body for money, which is my paycheck. And I was fired for cause because I sent a email to the president and approximately 250 other faculty members,

objecting and questioning the legality of this mandate that the college came out with. So, you know, put it all together. And next thing, you know, I'm, you know, 10 months later, I'm sitting in Ottawa, participating in the inquiry. I'm currently sitting in Ottawa. And I've been attending the testimony or all the cross-examinations since the beginning on Thursday. Well, before we get to the testimonies and everything else, because I was just saying to you before we started,

like I've been trying to keep tabs on it because I am like glued to it when I have time. But as you know, I was just saying three kids under six and certainly doing the full-time podcast and everything else. I'm trying, but it's like eight, nine hours a day. So it's a commitment. Yes.

When you go back, I think 25 years in the military, correct? Yes, 25. Did you ever think you would end up walking into that room? Because I remember when you walked in the room Tom and I remember the atmosphere if you will changing a little bit like here's somebody who's at least comfortable in this situation because there was a ton of people there that had the best intentions but not crisis management or or as you would but in your career do you ever think you were going to be like I mean nobody could

foresee this coming yeah but is anything even remotely close come to this It's a great question. I guess the answer is yes and no. Nothing, obviously. Never in my life did I ever even attend a protest. And I have sort of more philosophical reasons why I've never done it. But also, in terms of COVID, I have a vulnerable, you know, one of my children has an extensive medical history.

So I didn't want to be a real. around large crowds and then knowing that I would have to go near him. So I wanted to be very, very extremely cautious about his health. And, you know, taking the chance that I could end up getting, it's not just COVID. Any sort of a respiratory illness could be dangerous for my child. So, you know, there was that aspect why I never participated in another protest. But then when I got to Ottawa, I have to say that this kind of a thing, I don't want to say that it's, it's custom. made for an army officer to integrate into because, you know, this is not an army.

This is not a, it's not even a company, you know, like an intern, in terms of like a corporation or an organization of business, where there's a leadership structure and there's employees and there's, you know, already well established social norms and also well established, procedures within the company and how they do businesses. Nothing like that. This was a completely organic movement of very patriotic Canadians that came to Ottawa with the mission of ending all federal mandates. And so, you know, they got to Ottawa and I think the thinking at the time was,

we'll figure it out when we get there. But let's just get there. And so this is kind of where I got kind of called into the picture. It was kind of like, listen, we are getting there. We physically got there, but we're still trying to logistically get ourselves a little bit sorted out. So for somebody with my skill set or any officer in the Canadian Army, this would have been something that we could have easily dealt with in terms of understanding the logistics problems. And less so may me understanding the social dynamics and the social interactions that we went through. Because you got to remember, I wasn't signing anybody's paycheck.

I didn't have command authority over anybody. Like, people could just tell me to get lost and I'm not listening to you or why should I? So, you know, you had to have the ability to work with people in a high stress complex environment. And I think that, you know, a lot of my training and just maybe my personality, I was able to do that. And, you know, there's one thing that I repeatedly reminded people, I would say between five and ten times a day is that, look, we don't have any emergencies. So just take a breath, calm down, relax. Let's think through this problem. We're not in a hurry here. We don't have any emergencies. Only the emergency services people in the city are the only ones who actually have

emergencies. We've got all the time in the world. So we can think it through and make really good decisions on on how to be both safe and responsible. And so I think a big part of what I did was to try to try to keep people calm and put them in a position to look at factors and make reasonable deductions that led to what I had hoped sound decisions on our part. You know, I think it was a different guest on the podcast who brought up. He had military background and come from the Army, I mean. Yeah. And so he'd been in.

situations that were, you know, gunfire and things that are like, you know, dangerous. And he said, sitting in Ottawa, he had to remind himself that you had a bunch of civilians. Yes. That had never been in a situation even remotely close to what went on there. And he, he had to remind himself that almost daily, if not multiple times a day. Would you agree with it? I mean, I'm kind of leaning on what you just said. Yeah, I mean, I'm not a combat veteran, but I trained for, for combat missions my whole

life, right? And my whole adult life. That's what you do in the military. The military is a huge post-secondary institution of perpetual training for war. And so, you know, you're right. You had to remind yourself that, you know, you've got the best well-intentioned Canadians that are here supporting the convoy, but they don't think in a, in a, in a, in a, um, These problems are not easy problems to confront if you don't have training in operating in a very complex, stressful, high-tempo environment. So, you know, from that perspective, I think the people that were here did exceptionally well in the evidence to that is the last two days when we saw all these people didn't retaliate with violence. they kept their heads. They stayed the course.

Their intention was still to end the mandates, but to do it in a peaceful way. And they didn't let the chaos lead them towards a violent outcome. The only violence that was in the city was from the police. They're the ones who brought violence, not the protesters. And so you're right. You're not dealing with soldiers. You're dealing with civilians.

But for a group of civilians, I think they did phenomenals. well under these very difficult cold weather conditions yeah you ever get a group of those people out in a in a combat action uh in minus 40 i think the canadians would do just fine because everybody seemed to just embrace it and move forward absolutely you bring up something tom that i was actually literally just having a conversation earlier today on and that is you know um why was there no violence. You know, like you get that many people there. And I would agree with the person earlier today that on the way up there, the level of anger was huge, but something started to dissipate the closer you got to Ottawa. And once you're in Ottawa and you had everybody come together and

that good feeling and unity and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And yet there was thousands upon thousands of people there put into extreme circumstances where at times the fear was pumped into there even more so than anything I've ever experienced. Why do you think, I don't know if you have the answer, I don't know if anyone can answer it, but why did nobody break the line, you know, like all of a sudden just lose their absolute top because I mean, right to the end, it's one of the magnificent things of it. Everybody stares at it. Like, how did everybody keep their head there?

Well, I think there's two good reasons for that personally. one is as you know from being here which you doesn't translate at all through a screen through your your phone or through video was the raw emotion of love and unity that we all experienced here so you know there's there's the contrary emotion to love is said to be fear and there was there was this overwhelming emotional feeling of love in this and unity and peace throughout the entire time, that I think it was just far too powerful to be taken over by fear,

and thereby the fear resulting or leading to violence. So that's one big reason. And I think the second big reason was it was exceptional Canadians like Tamerlitch and Chris Barber and Bridget and all of the other people that had a social media presence that the public was listening to that we're consistently preaching peace.

And, you know, that message was always conveyed through anybody who was streaming the actual situation on the ground here. It was a consistent message for the entire time. And when you were here, it was an easy message to believe because you felt it on a highly spiritual, religious, and emotional level. So there was no opportunity for the fear to give way to to the violence on our side. It wasn't until the police showed up. And I think that that lingering emotional connection to what it meant to be a Canadian

and to love your countrymen was just too powerful to lose out to fear. And that's what I believe. It's a very insightful. look at it Tom and you'd have a very good seat you know being there where you sat for as many days as you did um i had a moment i had i actually had a moment um you know this you've heard the expression mob mentality psychologically that is a real phenomenon that happens within a crap within a mob uh in the day that um the two people were run over by the horses i was standing right there and there was something inside of me that i realized

I was starting to succumb to this this mob mentality, even though there was no mob. It was just a collection. And I mean, I trained for war for 25 years. And there was something in me that said, okay, I've had enough.

Now I want to fight. I physically want to fight. And then I got a hold of myself. It only lasted me maybe a, you know, 10 seconds. And I realized what was happening to me. And I knew that I needed to

get myself out of that situation before even I did something stupid. And the reason I was so easily able to snap out of it was because that crowd set that example from even me. You know, I'm, you know, I do Krav Maga. I was an instructor in Krav Maga, you know, a black belt and Krav Maga. I trained for years. I did martial arts my whole life. I do not fear any, any person on this planet.

and I knew that I everything that I had ever trained for in my life was was starting to come into a focus that was wrong that was not helpful to the situation so I literally did a 180 and I walked away from the entire crowd and I went and I was I was re-embraced I think with all of the peace from the protesters further up Wellington but it's a real phenomenon and I have to acknowledge it because because, you know, in my position, I felt that I was losing control, but I was re-inspired by the crowd. I just had to acknowledge it, refocus, accept the leadership of the crowd, and then walk away.

And I think that that's something that's incredibly rare. I would agree on the mob mentality. I know a lot of friends that were worried about me going there was exactly that. Like, you get there. and I mean we just got to look at I always think of Vancouver when they lost in the Stanley Cup finals and the mayhem that broke out there right and you're just like what is going on right so it's in there and the thing you're talking about I certainly experienced I know a ton of people that went there and experienced you know I was talking with one guy today who showed up basically the last day that went on and he took his kids and the next day they were driving around and he said that you know how this was a peaceful protest you can tell is he goes look at all the windows like we're driving around and none of them are smashed out and i'm like you know that's very true right like i mean to try and put it into context for people you know you think of some of the protests

that went on and it doesn't matter which ones when it gets violent everything gets burned looted at least at least one police car gets torched at least one in everything right not one happened here no and and and he he, when he brought it up, I'm like, you're absolutely right. Like, I mean, uh, the, the thing that shocked me, well, not shock me. The thing that sticks out to me, you know, as you've been talking is one of the things I wrote down is you never attended to protest. That was the other thing that I found very fascinating about the group of people who showed up in Ottawa is, uh, certainly I, I went to my first protest after talking to Brian Peckford, about two weekends before

in Emmington, just to see it. You know, I was like, this is what Peckford says. says got to happen. All right, I'm going. So I went and I was like, huh, this is just, this is just isn't it. Like, this isn't going to change anything. And then the truck started going and I talked to obviously Chris Barber and when you showed up in Ottawa, you're like, oh, this is it. Like, yeah, this is where it's at. Yes. And, and, you know, I, um, I remember once I, I belonged in this one little simple chat group of really, uh, great people. Um, I'm still in that actual telegram group. And it's actually called, well, I won't say what it's called, but it's a great group of people. And I remember about a year and a half ago, I put on this kind of

little lesson on how to do deductive reasoning in order to make a good solid plan in case you didn't feel like you could, you could stay at your home anymore, that maybe you had to bug out of your place or you had to come up with a plan. Because in those days, in the early days, things were getting really, really dark, lockdowns, different things that were happening. And people were getting, you know, started to prepare. You know, this is the absolute emergence of the doomsday prepper. And I remember doing a thing for a group of people online saying, look, it's, I can't make a plan for each and every one of you because there's too many different scenarios.

But what I can do is teach you how to think about. doing a plan for yourself. I can teach you how to do deductive reasoning, consider, you know, you look at the factors, the considerations, make a deduction, create a task, and then do up a solid plan. And so, you know, I had the skills. I had the thinking.

But what I remember telling people was that the challenge was what we're doing right now is that we don't, you know, if we were going up against the Taliban or the German army or, you know, some enemy, we would know what their tactics are, what their training is, what their procedures are, what's their doctrine. But in this particular case,

we didn't know who our adversary even was. And, you know, now we talk about the World Economic Forum. A lot of this has come to light in the last 18 months. But we just didn't know who was who. Who's the adversary? How do you plan for something that when you don't even, your your adversary stays in the shadows and manipulates through through the government and so when you you look at that whole sort of a context um it was very difficult for me and on a personal

level i stayed the gray man i stayed silent i stayed um you know out of public view of any kind i wasn't one of these people like danie bullford or christine nagel i you know i wasn't political I wasn't like Maxine Bernier or, you know, any of these other other people that have come long before Tom or Azzo ever got onto the scene. I was hiding in the background literally as the gray man, knowing that someday maybe I'll get my opportunity to protect my family. And the important thing that I'm trying to get to, and I'm sorry it's taken so long to develop this point.

But the moment I saw that convoy and I was invited to participate, unquestionably, instantly, immediately, I recognized it for the opportunity for what it was for me to actually finally get into this fight and do what I felt needed to be done. And that's why I went from a phone call to a commitment within 15 minutes of driving to Ottawa, although I'd never participated in any kind of a protest before in my entire life. I just recognized the opportunity that was put in front of me for what it was and I seized it and I don't regret it to this day. Well, I appreciate you, Sharon. The lovely thing about a podcast style feel, Tom, is you can go for as long as you want.

The reason I brought you on is to get you talking, right? Because I want to hear some of your thoughts and some of your experiences and everything else. The seeing the opportunity, I think a lot of people felt that calling to drive. You know, I think about it. You know, like, Canada is not the most habitable place, I'll say, especially during that time, and especially when everybody went on one road across some of the worst highway the earth has to offer. And yet there was a ton of people that felt an opportunity had presented itself, and it was time to go.

And we saw, I mean, I speak from seeing it along the highways, you know, people standing out minus 40 on the highway. and there was thousands upon thousands on it. It was something you can never forget. Never, you can't, I mean, maybe if the men in black come down and white my brain, maybe then. But after that, like, I don't know how you ever forget anything like that. And certainly Ottawa was the same way. One thing I was curious about, you know, after Ottawa, you've, I don't know what it's called, a list, whatever, you're on it.

You're not allowed to be, you know, an association with like Tamara and different folks on that. How tough has that been? or is that just another thing in the because I mean you know for for it was only 20-some days yeah but it probably felt like a lifetime and under the the pressure that it was you get to know people extremely well and to be you know split apart from all those people not knowing if ever you get to talk to them again without legal ramifications how difficult has that been well it's been a lot less difficult for me than I would say for Tamara Litch because as you know, she was incarcerated for 25 days for, you know, the Crown Attorney for the City of Ottawa went after her because she appeared

in a photograph with me and was seen on video bending over for three seconds while I congratulated her on a speech that she had just given. And, you know, the background story to that is Tamara was charged, but I was not charged. So I don't have any conditions. So what you're referring to are bail conditions. And Tamara was the recipient this year for the George Jonas Freedom Award, that this is the 11th year that they put this on through the Justice Center for Constitutional freedoms. So, you know, the keynote speaker for that was Rex Murphy. Maxine Bernier was there. A lot of Conrad Black was there in attendance that night. And this was a, dinner. We confirmed because Tamara's bail condition say that she cannot go near me or Chris

Barber or any of the other people unless in the presence of her attorney, our attorney. So not only was an our law firm that was sponsoring the dinner, but the head of the JCCF was sitting beside Tamara. In between us was Tamara's husband, Dwayne. And, you know, there was hardly any interaction between Tamara and I because Tamara's you know an extremely popular person I mean she's the guest of honor so everybody every moment of the dinner that there was an opportunity we're coming up and doing selfies with her and meeting her and thanking her and so you know the the idea that she went she spent 25 days in jail I mean the how absurd it is is that the crown attorney originally sought to put her in jail just because

she publicly accepted the award that she didn't ask for, but she accepted the award, the Freedom Award, the George Jonas Freedom Award, by virtue of accepting that award, the Crown Prosecutor tried to have her thrown in jail for violating her bail conditions. Okay, this is the absurdity. And I remember saying to Rex Murphy the night in the dinner

that the irony of the night was that the least free person in the entire room that night was the guest of honor to Merlidge. right and and so you know this is the absurd uh world of justin trudeau that that we all live in right now and you know chris barber um does not have conditions where he could be in my presence um even though he was charged so some of the people in tamara's bail conditions she doesn't even know who they are so how they got on that list is kind of a mystery to everybody else um but you know this is this is the thing like they have i think chris and tamara and many of the others that have been charged have also got i think eight different charges um and we've seen the crown attorney go through

extraordinary measures to do things that have never been really done before which is to have a a canada wide warrant for her arrest because she appeared in a in a photo because of a uh uh a violation of her bail conditions like that's virtually unheard of. I'm no law enforcement officer or lawyer, but every police officer I spoke into about it, they're just like dumbfounded. It's like, how could they have issued a Canada-wide warrant on a breach of a bail condition? Like, they don't even do that for rapists in this country, but they went after Tamera Litch, sorry, I keep saying it wrong, because she appeared in a photograph, and when she walked past me, I congratulated her on one of the best speeches I've ever heard

somebody deliver. You know, so the, the, it's not for me that there's a challenge, but it is a challenge for other people. I mean, Tamara is not allowed to speak to the media. She's not allowed on social media. And yet it's, it's seems strange to me that these are all very punitive. And yet she's not been convicted of anything. She's only been charged, right?

And she spent a total of 49 days in jail for what? exercising her charter to right to peacefully assemble. This is the state of Canada because of the likes of Justin Trudeau, Doug Ford, Jim Watson, all of these politicians that believe that their birthright is to lord over the people of this country as opposed to serve them based on election. I loosely say results. But, you know, they were elected to be representatives, not to be. to be kings and queens, but they conduct themselves as if though they are.

Well, how, I don't know, I don't know the right word, to be honest, is it excited? Are you interested, whatever it is? Maybe you can explain in your own words with this, you know, this commission coming about, doing the inquiry into the emergency act being put in play during the end of the protest. Were you excited? I'm thrilled. Oh, I've been waiting. I've been waiting since the day I left Ottawa for this commission to start.

Now, you know, to be clear, and I've known this the entire time, that there is no, there's no charges that are going to be laid. There's no, well, I mean, I want to be careful when I say that, but the intent is not to convict the government of Canada or any representative. It is not to, you know, force the resignation. I mean, it's under Section 63 of the legislation when you invoke the Emergency Act. You must convene an inquiry into the steps that led to this and also, you know, produce a report exactly one year to the day that the revocation of the Emergency Act. So this process does have to happen.

and it is not something that is going to result in criminal charges being laid if Justice Ruello determines in the end after hearing all this testimony that Justin Trudeau was wrong and what he did. It's not meant to do that, unfortunately, although I know that myself and many people would like to have seen that. But the reality is that that's not what is going to happen. But what is going to happen is that the truth is going to come out about what happened. and for Canadians that are interested, and I just did an interview this evening with Laura Lynn, and I had this kind of thought in the middle of the interview, we've noticed a significant, almost invisible presence of mainstream media.

They're not here. They're not covering it. And so I think that that actually creates a very good opportunity for all of us, especially for people in your position. if the mainstream media is not here covering this, then they don't get to lie, right? They're not here covering the story. They're not talking about it. They're completely, it's almost a media blackout on what's happening in this commission,

which is good because it opens an opportunity for people in your position to do these kinds of podcasts and get the truth out there. Because when there's the absence of the liberal-funded media, then there's also the absence of the lying. other than what you hear on some of the testimony like people like Jim Watson. So if there's nobody lying about it in the media because they're not here covering it, well, that opens up an opportunity for people like you to tell the truth. The only challenges is that middle 40% of Canadians that are undecided or great consumers of the mainstream media,

the onus is on them now to go out and seek alternative media to find out what's going on. And we've all been in chat groups on Twitter and on social media, and we've been talking about making sure that we're spreading what is happening in the testimony to get people interested in and to tune in and listen to the testimony that is meant to either justify or not justify what the government of Canada did to his own people and the level of violence that they brought to us even though on day four you already have heard the testimony that that is unequivocally proven that this was unjustified we're on day four and I think there's 39 days of this. And we already know. We've already heard the testimony that's

completely damning to Justin Trudeau. For the audience, on the podcast set at least, I'll put it back in the show notes, but like you can go to, and I'm spacing on the, forgive me, it is freedom, just second now, public order emergency commission.comission.com. If you go there, you can literally watch the live stream all day long. You know, and I know a ton of people are, you know, on the road, working out in the cold, blah, blah, blah, blah. And nobody's going, well, I got eight hours. But like, honestly, you flick into it and, and get a feel for what's going on. It has been, I wish I could sit and watch it for nine straight hours.

Because at times, it's actually really eye opening into some of the things. Obviously, you know, they're trying, at times, they're trying to paint it as, you know, evil and these mean people and blah. But it's almost humorous to hear them talk about hot tubs and, you know, like, these different things that is almost laughable. When you talk about the one testimony, though, that is already, I don't know, day four, condemning, what do you talk about, Tom, so people know if they haven't tuned in? Okay, so today we heard, well, I had to leave the, I left the hearing today or the commission today around just after two o'clock. Jim Watson from 9.30 in the morning until at least 2 o'clock when I left was still giving testimony.

was being cross-examined by started off with the the commission and then of course every other group that are in attendance were given the opportunity to to cross-examine him and and for the listener if they don't know who Jim Watson is that's the mayor of Ottawa yeah carry out yeah and I got to say like so yesterday we heard testimony from to to the city manager everyone Excuse me, refers to him as just Steve K because he's got a Greek last name. It's kind of tricky to pronounce. And then the chief of staffed in Mayor Watson.

And their testimony was just brilliant because although they did not like the convoy being there, I think they were very righteous civil servants that were there to do the right thing for their city. you know, they gave extremely truthful, professional, honest testimony that was, for me was a little bit of a surprise in a sense that it was so forthright. And, you know, they were willing to focus vigorously on the truth. contrast that to the garbage that we heard from Mayor Jim Watson today. I felt like I had gone back in time nine months and was listening to somebody regurgitate mainstream media talking points, but even amplify the lies. Sorry. It was incredible to me to listen to the rhetoric come out of this man's mouth.

What are some of the things you're talking about, Tom? What sticks out to you about what the mayor was talking about? Oh, that people were ripping, ripping residents masks off their face, that safety lanes were all blocked. And we heard the testimony that completely disputed that today from Kim Aott, who he is the emergency service. Yeah. Kim was great. And I met him while I was in Ottawa. I'm one of the meetings that I was with.

And, you know, this guy was results focused. He's not a political guy. And when Kim gave his testimony, he confirmed. that they never had an issue with safety lanes in this city the entire time. You know, so it was nice to see at least Kim's testimony where he confirmed what we had been saying all along. And then you get somebody like the mayor Jim Watson who just, sorry, thank you very much. Keith Wilson, extraordinaire, just handed me a glass of water because he heard me. Coffing it up.

coughing it up. And so listening to Jim Watson, I, you know, this is the most bizarre thing that I've yet to hear about the convoy in relation to the give and go. He actually made the assertion today that in the the gives and go had accumulated roughly about three million dollars at that point. And he made the actual bizarre assertion, honestly, that we were just, um canadians were coming to ottawa because they were they thought that they could get a piece of that three million dollars like that was their motivation to come to ottawa to support the convoy was just so they can get a piece of that three million like i i don't i don't know what planet this guy lives on uh but it's not the same one i'm on but you know he's he i listened to a lot of

his testimony because he was up there for quite a while and um you know at the 17 minute mark I was just disgusted with the things that I was hearing him say. You could see where he was going. And he gave testimony where Brandon Miller, our guy, our lawyer, who's a brilliant man, was asking questions. And there was one thing that he actually, there was two things that he actually said that stuck out for me. Watson alluded to the fact that they were really happy. they were the beneficiaries of the emergency act because the emergency act was used to legally

compel tow truck drivers to clear out those trucks. So Brandon looked at him and said, wait a minute. Did you basically just say that you're happy you got the EA so that you could get tow trucks? Right. So that was a really bizarre moment. But the second thing is Brandon said to him, they had talked about the constant communication between the mayor and the prime minister's office. And then he said,

did you know that they were going to invoke the emergency act? And he immediately said no. And I thought, you know what? My BS radar just went off like crazy. There's no way that you could have had the level of integration of communication into the PMO's office or the PMO, and not have had some sort of a indication that the Emergency Act was going to be invoked.

And you could see because there's this letter between Jim Watson and Tamara that was leaked to the public ahead of time, where there was an agreement between us. And it was clear to me that Jim Watson was playing both sides. I believe, in my opinion, I don't have any evidence to support it, but my belief is that Jim Watson knew the Emergency Act was going to be in. I also know for a fact, because we heard it in the testimony, that the, the PMO, in the PMM self, Bill Blair, RCMP, all of them knew that we had a deal with the city to start moving trucks. We did have that deal, and they all knew about it, but they still chose violence over peace.

And so you can't, you know, when you listen to Watson's testimony, it's, to me, it's very, It's very credible to draw the conclusion that he knew the Emergency Act was going to be invoked, and that's why he was hedging his bets on both scenarios. Because there was some testimony to suggest that Justin Trudeau was kind of waffling on certain decisions. Doug Ford wanted nothing to do with this protest. That came out today because now you're seeing both Watson, who's a true liberal, and Justin Trudeau, who obviously the leader of the Liberal Party, they're actually attacking Doug Ford today.

After Doug Ford actually stood in a press conference and said he stood shoulder to shoulder with Justin Trudeau. And then at the end of the day, Justin Trudeau said, well, Doug Ford was hiding from his responsibilities. He actually used the word hiding. You know, this is just the level of insanity that we had to endure the entire time we're here. And I'm just excited the fact that all this is being exposed. I just want to see the Canadian public that are either on the fence or didn't support the convoy.

I want them to tune in and listen to what's going on and hear it from themselves. It's not about being right or wrong. It's about getting to the truth. Yeah, you bring up a lot of good points there. I caught much of the mayor's testimony today. and then a bit of the second man of the emergency services. Kim. Thank you.

Yeah, yeah. And once again, I, I just find if you're an average person and you're like, why do I want to tune into this? Yeah. Listen, I'm a guy that for like a hundred straight episodes talk nothing about anything else but COVID and brought on all these different people and then went to Ottawa.

And I find this is like the story behind the story, because here they are on oath, and certainly they can lie. I mean, they can, I mean, whatever. But overall, majority of them are giving them, giving you their account, and they're getting interviewed by so many different people. You know, I don't, how many, how many councils are up there? There's 14, there's 14 different groups that have standing. So on average, it seems like you, it's about 10, 10 different groups that will take a shot at you,

like that have the right to ask the question. And the way it works is, uh, the, the government actually, the lawyers for the commission, they actually get a set amount of time. So let's say, for example, they get two hours that they've asked for to cross-examine a witness. The remaining lawyers have to, they get an equal amount of time, but they have to divide it up. So it's not like we get two hours to cross-examine because the commission lawyers got two hours. It's like, no, all of the other 13 groups have to divide up two hours. So we don't even get a large portion of the time to defend ourselves or start to cross-examine other witnesses.

Now, the amount of time is all kind of prearranged or agreed to between the commission lawyers and the rest of the lawyers. How that process works, I don't know how they set the time. But it's really, it's quite interesting. And the other interesting thing about this process is there's no, a lot of the evidence we've heard so far is basically hearsay, right? So that's why you're not hearing objections. You know, you don't hear a lawyer, yellow objection, you don't hear say like you would see on TV. That's not what this process is about, right?

This is about fact finding and getting to the truth. And that's why all this anecdotal evidence is just being kind of bypassed. it's being allowed. But the judge's job is to do two things. He assigns, he listens to each witness and he assigns credibility to the witness and what he views as sort of truthfulness to what that witness is saying. So, you know, you and I could both go on there and give, you know, we saw the exact same thing. We saw a person walk down the street.

You give your account and I give my account. it's up to the judge to see which one is, because I could say, no, he ran down the street. You say he walked down the street. It's up to the judge to say, I believe this person over that person and assign a higher value to that. And that's really what his role is in that, and to kind of manage the clock and in the direction and in the rules and stuff like that. So it's a very different process than what you would expect to see. And the other thing is, I mean, a witness, it's unusual for a witness to be cross-examined by 10 different lawyers, right? it's a very different process.

That's what I was going to say. You think you're like, oh, this will just be boring. But when they're just trying to lay out the series of events, some of it you're like, yeah, okay, whatever, right? But when you get 10 different people up there, Tom, it's like, this is kind of like strange and fun all at the same time. Because obviously, you know, it's no different than yourself sitting in that seat and getting interviewed. probably 10 different times by 10 different people, the conversations have a different feel every single time. Yes. And some people are just really good at it. And then there's some lawyers that kind of bumble around. You're like, well, this is a train train wreck, you know. But at the same time

to have somebody on stand, you know, and I'll go back to the mayor this morning for as long as he was, it's a long time to keep the charade up, talking to that many different people. Well, you know he's going to sleep well tonight. He's going to, he probably went home. He's probably in bed already feeling like he ran a marathon is my guess you know my my slogan for the last year has always been the truth is easy you know you just tell the truth it's easy you don't have to track lies you just tell the truth and i mean that is the guiding principle that that helps you get through what you're saying you just tell the truth but i think for him he's going to probably go home and do an after action review of everything he said and he's going to toss and turn all night or he's going to

be, you know, the opposite and sleep like a baby because he's so skilled at being a liar. And yes, I don't, I have no issue saying that the man's a liar. I don't. Well, what days are you, I mean, you're probably looking forward to every single day, but you got a day circled on the schedule, Tom. Is it your day you're up? Do you even know what day that is? I don't know, yeah. I don't know the days that we are up. Like there's a, like, different groups of people that kind of have their witnesses and, and obviously, you know myself and Tamara and Chris and all the others when we get our chance to testify so our group let's say the the Freedom Court group or the the convoy group I think is the group

that is second last and then it is the federal government so Justin Trudeau and his cabinet ministers will be the very last group that will be cross-examined and and that's kind of a a tough thing to reconcile in my mind because they're going to have six weeks to have their legal team sitting there preparing and coming up with viable justifications or excuses, except Christopher because she never answers questions anyway, so they'll just give her a pass. But I mean, you're giving somebody a six-week advantage to come up with really good, justifiable excuses for your actions. Now, had they been cross-examined first, then we could have, we could have, um, sort of, but I don't do the strategy, right? I'm not the lawyers building the strategy.

I don't know how they feel about it. This is my own personal opinion, not the legal team that, uh, maybe it's, maybe it's the opposite though, Tom. Maybe it's like when you're back in class, you got group presentation and you're like, you know what, I'll just hold it to last, except your nerves get the best of you. And by the end, you can't even talk. And you should have just went first and got it out and been done. with it like who knows yeah maybe psychology this uh works the opposite way i mean i don't think any of us really expect to get much out of justin trudeau bill blair i think nandosino's in there uh freeland like i don't do any of us expect it all of a sudden they're going on stage and

like big things are going to come up no no no i don't the the bar is set very low for them right but it's the people in between that you just never know when they get up there and they get caught in something they're trying to say or what have you i mean who knows where it comes from yeah well i mean and this is the other this is the opposing argument too uh and again i you know i i don't do strategy around here i'm here to provide answers uh when asked questions but um the the opposite is true is like uh you've got six weeks of testimony you better be careful on on on how you answered because people are going to call you out so well wait a minute that doesn't jive with what Mayor Watson said.

Are you sure that that's, you know, because now you're getting into a situation where there's the potential to perjure yourself, right? And so I guess the flip side is also true. But again, I'm not the legal masterminds. You got, you know, Keith Wilson, Eva, Bathsheba, Alan from the Democracy Fund and, you know, Brandon Miller.

Like, you've got some pretty brilliant minds that, you know, I'm privileged to be around every day during this. And we're going to see how it goes, right? And I know I like watching, Brandon, because we refer to it as Miller Time. You know, like the old beer commercial, it's Miller Time when he gets up to the microphone. Because he's got just a very different approach, a different style than all the other lawyers that he gets up there, right? And if anyone, you know, Dean Blondell went after me on something, as he usually does, him and I banter back and forth. That, you know, he said that Brendan, he made a comment about Brandon style, and I'm like, don't forget the punchline comes at the end, right?

You got to set up, you got to set up the story to really nail the punchline home. and I sit here and I listen to Brennan and as far as I'm concerned, he's setting up a phenomenal punchline. And that's how it's going to go. Well, it's, I assume, you know, when it comes to lawyers, this is their Super Bowl or Stanley Cup or whatever you want to call it. I just look at it and I go, I can just imagine they're having a hard time sleeping because they're constantly in prep mode and going through the day's events and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I get it. And they have other cases too, right? Like Keith is working in the next room on a different case altogether.

And Keith and Eva both have the Peckford thing coming up shortly. So they're going to be both in the Peckford lawsuit as well as participating in this. So that's another challenge that this isn't their only case that they're working on. So no, you're right. They're not sleeping. I can tell you for a fact because I'm living with Keith right now. and other like we're all kind of spread all over and i can tell you keith doesn't keep anyway tom's going tom he's going he's probably staring at you going can can you tell sean to wrap up so

i can think again as i got you just yeah yeah yeah exactly well i am going to let you go because i don't want to hold you here all night i know you guys got long days and certainly knowing keith's sitting in the room i don't want to take up a a ton of time and and you know i have no idea i i always think my voice is just booming on that side. But anyways, that's beside the point. Is there something else? Is there anything else you want to leave with the listener today after day four of the commission going along? Is there anything you want the audience to pay attention to or any final thoughts? Yeah, you know what I would like for the audience to do? Find your friends that have not been interested or not paying attention or not participated in any of the watching this.

and ask them to tune in and listen and spread the word and assume that you're going to learn some really enlightening truths about what really went on in the streets of Ottawa. We get through this when we all know the truth and there's never going to be a better opportunity than this to learn what really happened in the streets and what the decisions were that everybody made on either side of this. So tell your friends to tune in and pay attention, because mainstream media is not doing it. They'll only do it if it's a hit piece that supports the lies. Go to alternative media, listen in, and learn about what's going on.

Well, I appreciate you, Tom, hopping on and doing this. And I think, you know, assuming you're up for it, I think what I'm probably going to do is I'm going to lean on you in the weeks to come, you know, because this isn't two days and she's done. Like, this is a long, long haul. If you're going to be a guy in the way, the room I would love nothing more than to have you come back on and maybe break down some of the things because like I was saying earlier today you know I and I may have said it at the start of this is like I want to watch it all but it's long it's long and it's not that it isn't

even enjoyable to listen to it's actually for my where I sit I'm like wow this is really really intriguing but the truth of the matter is day after day um all of us have certain obligations that are going to make that difficult. And to have somebody there watching everything, paying attention, I think the audience would love nothing more than to have Tom back on to break down some of what's going on, you know, week to week or, you know, every second week, whatever it is. Either way, Tom, I'd love to have you back on. Absolutely. I'd be happy to come back. Awesome. Thanks, Tom. Yeah, thank you, Sean. Okay.