The Ben Mulroney Show - A Carney and Trump tete a tete -- did Trump lob an insult?

Episode Date: October 8, 2025

Guest: Regan Watts, Founder Fratton Park Inc., former Senior aide to minister of finance  Guest: Andy Gibbons, Principal at Walgate advisory .  Former vp WestJet If you enjoyed the podcast, tell a friend! For more of the Ben Mulroney Show, subscribe to the podcast! ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://link.chtbl.com/bms⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Also, on youtube -- ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.youtube.com/@BenMulroneyShow⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Follow Ben on Twitter/X at https://x.com/BenMulroney Insta: ⁠@benmulroneyshow⁠ Twitter: ⁠@benmulroneyshow⁠ TikTok: ⁠@benmulroneyshow⁠ Enjoy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This podcast is brought to you by the National Payroll Institute, the leader for the payroll profession in Canada, setting the standard of professional excellence, delivering critical expertise, and providing resources that over 45,000 payroll professionals rely on. Hey, thanks, son. What do I owe you? Don't worry about it. It's payday. Payday, huh? I bet you it went straight into your bank account and you didn't even check your pay stuff. My what? Your pay stuff. Back in my day, you had to wait for a physical check. Then, you had to go to the bank. Deposit it, and wait for it to clear.

Your pay really meant something. Payroll is incredibly complex. It's art and the science. It literally keeps the economy moving. Parole professionals do a lot for us. You know, it's about time we do something for them. How about we ask our leaders to name a day in their honor, a national day to recognize payroll professionals?

I got it. This is perfect. Why don't we explain to people just how important the roles are the payroll professionals play in our lives. We can even ask them to sign a petition. We can even ask them to sign a petition to recognize the third Tuesday in September as the National Day to recognize payroll professionals. We'll rally support and bring the payroll party to the nation.

National payroll party? Precisely. Sounds like a plan, you know, just one thing. What's that? I'm choosing the music. What? And I'm sitting in the backseat. The whole way?

The whole way. This podcast is sponsored by BetterHelp. If you've been following the news, like really following it, you know how exhausting it can be politics conflict uncertainty it's a lot to carry and for many men there's this expectation to stay calm stay in control and not talk about how it's affecting you but the truth is you're allowed to feel overwhelmed you're allowed to say i'm not okay right now and trust me i have been there whether it's the state of the world stress at home or just feeling like you've got to have it all together and have all the answers you don't have to hold it in better help is here to

help with the world's largest network of licensed therapists. They've already supported over 5 million people. You can connect with a therapist online from wherever you are. No wait list, no office visits. And if it's not the right fit, you can switch any time. It's time to put your mental health on the agenda. Talk it out

with BetterHelp. Visit betterhelp.com slash Mulrooney today to get 10% off your first month. That's BetterHelp H-E-L-P.com slash Mulrooney. This is the Ben Mulroney show, but on days like today, I like to share, I like to make space and share the microphone with my friends. So please welcome for this week in politics. Regan Watts and Andy Gibbons, welcome to the both of you.

Thank you so much for being here. Hey, Ben. Happy Wednesday. Our prime minister went down to Washington for, I believe, the second time. and sat with Donald Trump inside the Oval Office. He did not get Zelenskyed, but it was a circus unto itself. And I would love your assessments. Andy, we're going to start with you.

Well, I was struck firstly by had Pierre Paulyev been prime minister and had he said the things he said to Donald Trump yesterday, CBC would have 24-hour coverage about it. From, you know, I wore a red tie for you, you're transformative. I mean, it was a lot. I mean, he gushed and blushed over Donald Trump. So that was quite surprising. I thought it was a bit over the top, to be honest.

But on the plus side, Donald Trump acknowledged him as an incredible negotiator and a world-class leader. So that's a big dub for Mark Carney. But I was just thinking to myself, man, if a conservative leader had said this is about Donald Trump, it's all we'd hear about. Of course, is one rule for me, one rule for thee. But Regan, give me your sense of the pomp and the pageantry, but then also give me your sense of, what did Prime Minister Carney come home with? So, Ben, a couple comments, as I was reflecting on this issue this morning. First off, I think Andy is absolutely right, just to echo what he said around the media coverage in this country.

If it was Mr. Polyev or Stephen Harper or even your father making those types of comments to Donald Trump, it would be 24-7 coverage for the rest of the week, and they would be ensuring it's a topic of Thanksgiving dinner on the weekend. In terms of the pomp and circumstance, I think that's what comes with being Prime Minister of Canada when you go to Washington. And I think that's appropriate. I think the president rolled out appropriate red carpet for our prime minister, and he is our prime minister.

And that was all fine. I was struck by a couple of things. First, when Mr. Carney was in the Oval Office, one of the first things he said and it has to be acknowledged today is that we are two years plus one day since those hostages were taken in Israel by Hamas and they must be returned home and we shouldn't forget that and Prime Minister Carney said that in the Oval Office with the President of the United States beside him talking about his peace plan secondly sometimes and I think that needs to be acknowledged and kudos the second thing that I thought was I think is worth pointing out to your listeners and your viewers

is sometimes the Prime Minister just goes down to have meetings without any expertise of anything coming back. Well, yeah, and you're right. Like, we were given, it was a decidedly unmarked Carney government thing to do where they actually downplayed and lowered the expectations going into Washington saying it was going to be a working, a working trip. Sure, but Ben, sometimes maybe they're learning his, his prime minister's office is learning actually how to do their jobs and managing expectations.

No, yeah. My experience, I worked to the Department of Foreign Affairs, and I've been to the State Department in the Oval Office and the White House. my experience is prime ministers and first ministers go down in Washington with one of two objectives one is at the ministerial or prime ministerial level either to sign a deal or announce a deal and we would have had leaks about that ahead of this trip or second and I think that was the purpose of this

trip to go and unstick some things that may be that maybe need to be handled at the leader level between the two countries I'll note that the prime minister had a working dinner last night with vice president manz and so this was hardly just a trip to the oval office and then home there are clearly some things that they're working on steel aluminum autos those were all things of the prime minister mentioned and the president mentioned and so this was from my account a successful trip because we're at least seeing some progress and hearing noise about that and i have to tell you

i was very proud of the prime minister i think andy was purring in his earlier comments i am certainly purring now the prime minister went down and behaved like an adult and we have a world class leader as president trump said and i think that's a positive from the long national nightmare known as Justin Trudeau that we've well-and. Andy, you want to button this up for us? Yeah, the other thing is just how much attention, you know, people complain, Ben, Americans don't know us, they don't get us, they don't, all of these things. Look at Trump and what he said, his joke about the merger, right? And when he said, just kidding, just kidding, just kidding, they know how sensitive Canadians are. They pay attention

to every word, our political class and media say, and how we talk about their country to their ambassador and all of these issues matter. So Carney is, I think, very wise to bring the temperature down, but this idea that they don't get us, don't get what motivates us, aren't in tune, I just don't agree with that. Donald Trump, very clearly in a joking, jovial way, really understands how sensitive and prickly we are about all talk. All right, well, let's move to a domestic, purely domestic issues in just a few minutes. Once my show is done today, I'm going to be sitting down with Premier Danielle Smith.

She's in town, and so we're going to have a wide-ranging conversation. And one of the topics that we are going to take on is, you know, the war of words between Alberta and British Columbia between Danielle Smith and Premier Eby. And this is a far cry from the optimism that so many of us had about this, you know, breaking down interprovincial trade barriers and working together. This is a moment in time where we can all nation build and take one from. of the team and see, you know, empathize with a province on the other side of the country. And it seems like those days are gone.

And I will start with you, Andy. Yeah, I hope you have a good conversation with the Premier. She's had an incredible visit to Central Canada. I think, you know, she's right. If Alberta's oil belongs to all of Canada, so does B.C.'s coast. And I think she has to make this point time and time. and time again in every single venue she can because that is right and that is the truth yeah and also the idea that exporting clean energy from our coast in british columbia is something

that needs a return on no that's what our country should be doing everyone agrees with this yeah and how mark carne plays referee here yeah is going to be a real test you know i mean a top test for a prime minister so but daniel smith is on point on track and making it in all the, making the point in all the places she has to. It's a double standard that's not fair to her and our people. Andy, I really like what you just said, but, you know, if the oil belongs to everybody, then so too does the coast. That's actually my approach when I'm on airplanes, where if I'm on the aisle seat and the

person next me will not close the, won't close the window, then I say, fine, you're not going to close the window. Well, guess what, I own the aisle. Good luck going to the bathroom. And there you, yeah. I said, sorry. But, Ben, but then, are you recliner? Do you recline your seat?

Of course I recline. Sadly, I can't do that on WestJet anymore. But, you know, yes. But. But, Ben, on Premier Smith, I'll just say, I think she has been, of the premiers, she gets a lot of flack from Central Canadians who don't spend 10 seconds trying to understand Alberta and Western Canada. And he's absolutely right about the coast and who owns the oil and how we get it to market.

I think the Premier deserves enormous credit for her work in advance. this project. I think it was a smart move politically to announce that the province wanted to build a project. And I have to give kudos to her and like Minister Schultz, Rebecca Schultz and her province who've done a great job advancing environmental regulations so we can get clean oil out of the ground. And the Premier is doing all of the right things. And the Prime Minister, I don't know if Andy's term is right as a referee. I think the Prime Minister will make the right business decision for the country. And let's remember, and people in Ontario probably don't appreciate this, Premier Eby is in a leadership review right now with his party.

So, of course, he's going to take the most extreme left-wing positions. He may be a bit of an extreme left-wing premier, and that's sort of consistent for British Columbia and New Democrats, but he's also fighting for his political life with his party. And so his posture, however misguided it may be, it needs to be understood in the context of the local politics that he's dealing with. Well, I'd love your sense of, you know, the premier of Alberta raised the specter of, you know, Western alienation leading to Western, possibly a Western separatist movement while she was on this press tour here in Central Canada. And, you know, some have taken great umbrage to that saying, you know, you're opening Pandora's box and you really shouldn't do that.

But if she's just calling it as she's seeing it on the ground, I don't know that I can fault her. And I'd love to know, Andy, your thoughts on that. Well, I hope she holds up a billboard today and shows all of the foreign tankers that are operating along the BC coast. Yeah. It explains that Canadian tankers aren't allowed to do the exact same thing that foreign tankers are like, are we suckers? I mean, on the point of separatism, yeah, she has to manage that. Yeah. But it's like anything when Quebec separatism was big, people didn't dismiss it out of hand. You know what, Andy? And I was not paying attention to the

clock. I'm going to ask you to put a pin in that. We're going to take a break. Come back. The floor will be yours and then we're going to give it to Regan and he can purr all he wants. Don't go anywhere. This is the Ben Mulroney show. This is the Ben Mulroney show and we are going to continue with our great conversation with our two friends and guests, Regan Watson, Andy Gibbons on this week in politics. The Wednesday edition. Andy, I interrupted you sadly because we had to pay some bills.

No, all good. I mean, I think Daniel Smith, the difference with this, the separatism movement she faces is that she wakes up every morning trying to demonstrate to them how Canada can and should work. Whereas separatist leaders in the past in our country have woken up every day to talk and demonstrate and talk down Canada and how it cannot and doesn't work. So she's, I wish the media would pay more attention to the comment she makes about how Canada can work, her encouragement of Mark Carney, her kind words about Mark Carney. These are, that's a nation-building posture.

But she has to manage these legitimate irritants. Regan, how do you see it? And if it was the fish in Newfoundland or any other sector, it would be covered very differently. So, Ben, I don't have much to add to what Andy has to say. I think the premier of Alberta and have thought this for some time has been an exceptional politician. She's very much in tune with her constituents.

She runs a more or less a fairly well-run government. There's always issues that come up from time to time. But, you know, on the operational sense, she's a very good Premier. And, you know, she's highlighting, I think, in the pipeline discussion with Premier Eby and pointing out to the Prime Minister that the courts have already ruled on this. And that is that interprovincial pipelines fall under federal jurisdiction. And so the Premier, I think, is well brief. She knows her file.

As I say, I talked about Minister Schultz and environment, but she's got a whole cabinet of people, energy portfolio and whatnot, who are advancing these causes because let's be clear, Canadians cannot have nice things, roads, bridges, hospitals, community centers, museums without oil and gas. And so we are going to, as Andy, to use Andy's words, we either are going to be suckers or are we going to do things properly and make money for the country so we can have the type of community infrastructure that we need and enjoy because no other country in the world would leave this much wealth and this much money in the ground because they want to make

themselves feel better. It's insane and it's time to move forward. And on that note, we are going to stop with the commentary and instead we're going to go to a relatively new segment on our show, the midweek political play of the week. This is the political play of the week. There we go. That's the new intro. That's my new, that's my new Mr. Voice. So Regan, you're up first. So that was kind of Mortal Kombat. Yes.

How do you get the best? Get over here. Anyway, I have two. My play, I have a star and a dud. My star is Premier Ford. You know, whatever one wants to say about Premier Ford, this man knows how to do two things. One, serve his constituents because he's won three majority governments, which is historic for the Progressive Conservative Party in Ontario.

And two, he knows how to get a headline and cut through the noise. And his comments this week, I thought about Crown Royal and Speernoff and how he's defending Ontario industries. I just think reflect a guy who's very much in touch with his populace. He's unorthodox. He may not be everybody's cup of tea, but my goodness, does he know who he represents? And so my star of the week goes to Doug Ford. My dog of the week, I have to say, and I hope your team can pull up the footage of this, is Mayor Olivia Chow. I don't know if anybody saw her Instagram post yesterday where she threw up that, basically from the front doors of City Hall to almost where the Nathan Phillips Square Pond is, I mean,

it was completely unhinged. And as somebody said on Instagram, you know, we had Mayor Ford who smoked crack, and he wasn't half as crazy as Mayor Chowley in this video and in some of the things she do. Like, you know, it's just a strange use of social media. It's not even a good bat flip. It's more of a bat toss. And she throws at 25, 30 yards. It's very, very strange.

And I think reflects a mayor who is out of touch and out to lunch. And if I may say so, Ben, should be succeeded by you in the next Toronto mayor. Well, that's very kind. I will not be running. But thank you very much. But no, listen, there's been a whole bunch of missteps as far as I'm concerned from Olivia Chow and City Hall. I don't hold her responsible for that nonsense that from Louis Blanche where those massive posters were put up. that said English is a second language.

And on the eve of October 7th, there was a big sign right underneath her office that said, you know, beauty is resistance. Like, this is... Amen, Ben. But we've had mayors who know how to throw football and shoot a hockey puck. I mean, that was some sort of warlike toss

of that baseball cap from the front door to the street hall to the pond. And I really hope your producers can find the footage because it's completely unhinged. Andy, your turn. Well, just on Chow quickly. I mean, what on earth is she doing between the tack, her description of her taco bar and her taco parties and this bad...

Oh, yes. It's just like a bad VEP episode or something. I don't know what is going on with that. Anyways, my player of the week is Daniel Smith, for one thing in particular. And that is going to Montreal. all. And I can't, I was thinking, Ben, when was the last time a Quebec premier went to Calgary or Edmonton and gave a signature business address and talked about how these regions of the

country needs unite, need to find common cause, and went in there and talked about the shared values that they have. So, you know, she is doing that work relentlessly, judge her on quality tone, whatever. But that in and of itself is is a real act of unity. And she deserves credit for that. And I honestly, I am biased. I'm, I'm a fan of hers. I think she's an excellent political leader. But that act in and of itself deserves credit and coverage. So Daniel Smith, on her mission to Montreal, to build Canadian bridges, I think is a good sign for our country. No, you make a good point. I honestly, I don't have top of mind the last time a Quebec Premier went out to Edmonton or to Calgary, but I suspect it's not a regular occurrence because

it's not top of mind for me. Let's continue with this. What do we think, as far as I'm concerned, I'm glad that the saga of the trucker convoy can be put behind us. It's been going on for far too long. There's been a really, there's a bad, the whole thing's left a bad taste in my mouth, but at the very least, I can now rinse it out and move on.

And I'm glad to see that these two people who were the face of it, I believe have paid for their sins many times over and I'm glad that it's not going to result in spending any more time confined behind bars. Regan, what do you think? I agree with that sentiment Bena and I think, you know, Tamerlich and the others who were involved with the convoys

I believe have been unfairly persecuted including those who sent money to the convoy to support them. way it was $20 or $200. It was a crazy time in our country's history. It's unfortunate we've never gone back to look at what happened, not just at the convoy in a meaningful way, and although there was that briefly politically motivated commission.

But we've never looked back at COVID from start to finish. And I think I was pleased to see that the defendants were not sentenced to extreme cases of time behind bars. I think it's great that we didn't have any politicians commenting on judicial decisions yesterday. I thought it was ridiculous when the Conservatives did it prior to the sentencing hearing. And I think we should all be able to move on and appreciate that justice has been served. But we should not forget what happened to those patriots in Ottawa who carried their voice. The last word goes to you, Andy. Yeah, longest, most expensive public mischief trial in Canadian history.

I was shocked that they were convicted, you know, the testimony that they worked with police every day. anyways, we don't need to relitigate the issues. I think common sense finally prevailed, Ben, because it's, you know, their sentencing is in light of the national conversation we're having about illegal immigrants and their sentencing and the bail reforms not happening. And sending these people to jail for that would have been incomprehensible. Exactly. Even to people who hate them.

Exactly. And I get that there was some forces at play that wanted to make an example out of these two. in the interim, over the course of years, as this example was being made, we saw our criminal justice system become more and more permissive towards some of the worst and most egregious crimes around. And so you had this divergence of these two people on trial for three, four years who could have been facing seven years in prison and a rotating door of some of the worst criminals out there, never seeing the inside of a jail cell. And that dichotomy, I think, was too much for the system.

They had to let these guys go. Guys, I got to let you go, but I want to thank you both for joining us and enjoy the rest of your week. We'll talk to you soon. Go Jays Go. Go Jays go. This fall on Flavor Network.

I'm actually on Top Chef Canada. It's super surreal. being here. The search for Canada's Top Chef starts now. Let's go! Ten chefs are on a culinary quest. It tastes like fear, anxiety, all at the same time, but delicious.

Only one will be crowned. It's tough. One of the hardest things I've ever done. Two minutes! Top Chef Canada. New season. October 14th on Flavor Network. Stream on Stack TV.