The Ben Mulroney Show - Best of the Week Part 5 - Kevin O'Leary, Warren Kinsella, Anthony Koch

Episode Date: April 13, 2025

Best of the Week Part 5 - Kevin O'Leary, Warren Kinsella, Anthony Koch Guests: Kevin O'Leary, Warren Kinsella, Anthony Koch, Adam Zivo, Franco Terrazzano, Dave Bradley If you enjoyed the podcast, tell a friend! For more of the Ben Mulroney Show, subscribe to the podcast! https://globalnews.ca/national/program/the-ben-mulroney-show Follow Ben on Twitter/X at https://x.com/BenMulroney Enjoy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Okay, Martin, let's try one. Remember, big. You got it. The Ford It's a Big Deal event is on. How's that? Uh, a little bigger. The Ford It's a Big Deal event. Nice. Now the offer? Lease a 2025 Escape Active all-wheel drive from 198 bi-weekly at 1.99% APR for 36 months with $27.55 down. Wow, that's like $99 a week.

Yeah, it's a big deal. The Ford It's a Big Deal event. Visit your Toronto area Ford store or Ford.ca today. Welcome to the Ben Mulroney Show Best of the Week podcast. We had so many great discussions this week, including friend of the show Kevin O'Leary dishing like only he can. Plus, the political panel weighed in on the current state of play in the election. Enjoy. Welcome back to the Ben Mulroney Show. It's Friday, which means it's time for our This Week in Politics panel. Very pleased to have back three friends of the show, Adam Zivow

from the National Post, Anthony Kosh, managing principal at AK Strategies, and Warren Kinsella, former special advisor to Jean Chrétien and CEO of the Daisy Group. To all three of you, I say welcome and happy Friday. Happy Friday. All right, Warren, I want to start with Warren, but not before we get to a little bit of audio. Mark Carney was quite defensive yesterday, and it feels like he pulled a page out of the Justin Trudeau playbook. If you don't like the story, attack the guy who wrote it. Mark Carney said the Globe and Mail is full of it. Let's listen

to Carney bashing the Globe and Mail. Well, I'm sorry, but you can't believe everything you read in the Globe and Mail. So in your question, and I guess in the article in question, you said I had a meeting with whatever your term was, a Beijing group. I've never heard of this group. Okay. Never heard of this group. Certainly didn't have a setup meeting with this group. Full stop.

So check your sources before you write things like that. Okay? Or your colleagues do. Yeah, okay. So yeah, I mean, listen, Robert Fife is one of the best of the best. And Warren, just I don't not for nothing. But the fact is, they never suggested he had a setup meeting. And they, it doesn't really matter whether he knows them or not, as he took he took issue with two points that aren't germane to the conversation picking a fight with Robert Fife and questioning his sources is a bold strategy and do you find it troubling Warren that we have a lot of questions

about China and not a whole lot of answers yeah hey Mark here's a memo to mark if he's listening in to us number, our job in the media is to ask questions and they're not usually softballs. So we ask tough questions. Number two, going after Bob Fife and his team is a bad, bad idea. Like trust me, it's a bad idea. Number three, that line you used, that was the exact same thing that Justin Trudeau said at the front end of the SNC Lavelland scandal. And how did that work out for Justin? Yeah, not so good.

Not so good. So like across the board, Mark, that was a bad, bad idea. Like don't get into a fight with Bob Fife who buys ink by the barrel, you're gonna lose. And Anthony, the very next day, the pictures were in the Globe and Mail of him shaking hands in a picture. Now, look, a lot of politicians take pictures of people they don't know. They I do not believe they should ever be tarred and feathered for taking pictures with people.

But this is a there are too many questions here. Now. Now the question for me is why aren't you answering the questions? No, exactly. And the thing is the context is everything here as well. They had that candidate, Paul Chang, in Markham, I believe, or I can't remember the name of the writing, but long story short,

who is then after a four or five day news story that should have been nuked in approximately three hours, dragging it out, dragging it out, saying he's not going to resign. He stands by his candidate for suggesting that his conservative competitor should be turned in to Chinese communist authorities for a million dollar bounty. He finally puts out a letter saying that he's resigning. And then we also find out the other story that comes out a few days ago, that the person that they find to replace him is every bit as much linked up with Chinese Communist Party figures than the previous guy was. So there's clearly some sort of anxiety in

the liberal world that's existed for quite some time now about just how implicated you know the Chinese Communist Party is in in in supporting the liberals and Mark Carney saw a few days ago as well there was another story the WeChat thing. On WeChat, exactly. So there's a lot of news, it seems to be, as it applies to this specific space. And it seems that it makes Mr. Carney disproportionately uncomfortable,

even more so than other questions. Yeah, and Adam, that's the issue that I have. I've said before, I'm left to speculate because no answers are being given. And I don't like speculating, but they're forcing people like me into that position. So you got the WeChat thing, you got the Chang thing, you got the follow-up with the new guy.

You've got the fact that I cannot find a single documented fact of Mark Carney on the record saying anything negative about the Chinese Communist Party. And then, so then I even go down the rabbit hole even more. When he then says that our relationship with the United States is effectively over, well then who the heck are we supposed to trade with? Are we gonna, is he going to leverage this problem

with the United States to forge a closer relationship with China? Is that what this is that the end game here? And I don't think it's wrong for me to speculate because he's given me nothing else to talk about Well, I think this is the problem with Mark Carney largely being unknown to Canadian voters We don't entirely understand what he stands for and what I'll say is that you know with all these stories in the past week I think that too much attention is being given to the fact that, you know, Carney was photographed with that, you know, one operative, because as he said, quite correctly, politicians are photographed with thousands of people over the course of a campaign. They

can't perfectly vet everyone and being photographed with someone is not necessarily an endorsement of their views. You know, we saw that about a year and a half ago, when pure poly of was photographed with someone who wore a quote unquote straight pride t shirt. What I think is more important, though, is that Carney has defended, you know, Peter Ewan, who is the guy who is replacing that former, you know, candidate who said that they should, you know, hand over the conservative MP over for to, for, uh, to Beijing, right? So Peter Yuan is this new guy and he's got extensive, very concerning ties to Beijing, right? This is a guy who was spoken at events that are, you know, managed by the United Front Network, who's gone and given talks in China and met with, you know, high level figures from United Front. And so Carney has defended this candidate and said that, you know, oh, he meets with people are expected to meet with community groups all the time.

There's nothing wrong here. And in doing so, he's downplayed this really concerning connection. So he's either being dishonest here or he's unaware of the extent of one of his candidates' connections to Beijing, which would imply that he's vulnerable to foreign interference. He's either ignorant or dishonest in this case, and neither reflects well. Warren, does what Adam says, does what Adam just said, does that ring true to you? Yeah, no, he's got a bunch of problems. You know, he's got the Chinese thing, he's got accusing apparently Israel of genocide, nagging questions about his holdings and so on.

It has not been a stellar few days for him. So I think that's why you're starting to see some leveling off in the polls, not dramatically, but it is happening. I think the biggest factor is Trump has stopped chirping at us about being the 51st state and governor, you know, of Canada and garbage like that. That's having a corollary effect where, you know, it's getting a bit tighter. I expect it's going to get even tighter as a consequence of the debates. Everybody knows that Poliev is a better debater than Carney. So you know, the liberals need to pay attention to this stuff. When the prime minister of Israel

issues an official statement calling on you to walk back this terrible attack, and, you know, accusing Israel of genocide, like, not even Justin Trudeau went that far. Yeah, and I know he claims, Warren, I know he claims that he didn't hear it, but, and I wasn't in the room. All I saw was the video.

It sounded pretty quiet to me. I watched the video a hundred times and, well, that's a slight exaggeration, but not quite. His statement is directly in context to what was shouted at him. Yeah. Yeah. Like it directly related to it. So I don't believe that, but he's the one who needs to say that. And here we are now, 72 hours later later talking about it. He needed to walk it back like, you know, as Anthony was saying, three hours after the event. Yeah. And he didn't. So now I'm getting emails, and I'm sure you guys are too, from, you know, Jewish Canadian voters across the country saying, you know, I was prepared to give this guy a shot, now I'm not. And that's 14 writings for the Jewish vote matters. Adam, it seems like almost every day when given an opportunity to say what he

wants to say, there has to be a walk back from what he said. I know I knew he was going to learn on the job. But there's a whole lot of foot in mouth here. Yeah, and it's unfortunate because he tends to be a fairly articulate guy. When I listen to him, I'm generally impressed, but I don't understand why he keeps on making these elementary mistakes, right? And him claiming that he misheard that question, I think undermines trust in him, obviously. I think one of his main assets is that he is perceived as being more authentic than Trudeau. So I find it flabbergasting that he in a sense keeps gaslighting Canadians. Yeah, it's an Anthony I definitely want your take on this when we come back from the break. But I want you I want you to have the run the runway to do that. We've got more with our political panel when we continue, including a Mark Carney pausing his campaign for the third time to step back into the role of prime minister.

Something feels weird to me. I don't think he should be doing that, but we're going to find out from our panel after the break on the Ben Mulroney Show. Welcome back to the Ben Mulroney Show and this week in politics rolls on with Adam Zivow, Anthony Kosh, Warren Kinsella. And before the break, we were talking about the foot-and-mouth incident where it seemed like Ben... Mark Carney was tacitly agreeing with Heckler who said that there was a genocide in Gaza. He had to walk that back, but not before Israel leader Benjamin Netanyahu posted this,

Canada has always sided with civilization, so should Mr. Carney. But instead of supporting Israel, a democracy that is fighting a just war with just means against the barbarians of Hamas, he attacks the one and only Jewish state. Mr. Carney, backtrack your irresponsible statement. Anthony, you're a member of the Jewish community. You also know as much about politics as anyone. Will this affect his chances of regaining the trust of the Jewish community? Yeah, but I don't think he cares. There are other communities that are up for grabs in

this election that are much more favorable to the Liberal Party at baseline, and I think Benjamin Netanyahu is a pretty good foil for him on those questions. So like you said, there are 14 writings, Warren's correct, there are 14 writings where the Jewish community has an impact. There are two or three where that impact is considered major because they represent almost a majority of the writing. But other than that, there are other communities that are much less favorable to Mr. Netanyahu or to Israel at large, who have influence in a much larger number of writings. So I suspect that I would even go as far as say that this was deliberate. If you actually watch the clip, you see very clearly there is no explanation for Mark Carney

saying what he said. Yeah. That, oh, I misheard, I this, I whatever. The backtrack probably has more to do with internal dynamics with regards to, you know, people like Anthony House, while they're probably having a fit or something like that. But unfortunately, and it's something that I'll say to the Jewish community in Canada, to the pro- Israel community in Canada, if you will, this kind of stuff just doesn't hurt anymore and you got to be ready for that. I actually probably think on

net-net-kiff-kiff, whatever you want to say, this probably helps Mr. Carney, unfortunately. All right, well, it seems like anytime he does something like that, the policy of this campaign, as soon as he does something like that and embarrasses himself, he picks up and leaves the campaign. He has paused his campaign for the third time because the Trump trade war raises the stakes, he says. So every time he does this, he's not the liberal leader

anymore, he's the prime minister. And it seems like, I don't't know it gives me a bad feeling and Andrew Coyne I think said it very well on a CBC panel They're also passing up on the opportunity that so-called earned media reporting affords Look at what Mark Carney's doing now He has the advantage of being the prime minister at a time of crisis, but my god is he milking it? You know, he goes out and he does these press conferences, he puts on this very somber face, and he announces

to the country what's just happened to us. And, you know, I think he gains every time he does that, even though he's not doing it through a YouTube video. You know, he's actually using the media. Well, it turns out that actually helps. Yeah. And I'll ask, I'll ask you, Warren, what do you think of what Andrew Coyne said on both fronts? This is good for his campaign, but is he milking it? Yeah, I think he's milking it. He wouldn't be the first politician to do that. It gives him good footage for spots that they do.

So they're heading into debate week, so they're not going to be campaigning as much and you've got to fill that gap with spots with, and so if he has footage of himself looking Prime Ministerial, mission accomplished. You know, by the same token though, I've had conservatives complaining to me, oh he's violating the caretaker convention and he's not supposed to be doing anything and my response to them has been well but guys you're the ones demanding that the House of Commons be brought back in Parliament sit again and the business of government continues well his argument will be he's doing the business

of government and now you're bitching about that so like it you know at the end of the day is it a capital offense I don't think so. But is he milking it? Yeah, probably. And Adam, you know, he says, you know, we're in a crisis, but, you know, as Warren pointed out, Donald Trump isn't the one calling us a 51st state anymore. It's Carney at his rallies saying, no, no, they want to take us over. There's a level of fear mongering and frenzy. And it's almost like a dissemblance where he's creating the chaos so that he can then present as the agent to restore order.

I mean, I think it's fair to say that we are in a moment of crisis, even if Donald Trump has cooled some of his rhetoric towards Canada. And yeah, Trump did walk back on his global tariffs and he did exempt Canada from them. But at the same time, this is incredibly destabilizing globally. And I think that it's perfectly reasonable to take a small pause to meet with your cabinet to figure out what do you want to do? How do you want to respond to this? Canada itself may not be targeted by these new policies so much. But at the same time, we have to figure out how we are going to coordinate with our allies. And we need to understand if our allies are now subject to these 10% reciprocal tariffs,

how that might impact our response going forward. So I agree with Warren here that he's obviously milking it, but I don't think that this is necessarily a bad thing. I think those two things can be true at the same time. The latest Nanos projections put the liberals in minority territory. Many ridings too close to call. I'm not a big fan of looking to polls day to day,

but I would love to get each one of yours assessment. I mean, is the election getting tighter? And does anyone need to? Obviously, jug meats out of this. So it's a two horse race. But what drastic moves does either one of them have to do to get a majority? Let's start with Warren.

I don't think a majority is there just yet for either. But when you're looking at the numbers, always keep in mind that the Tories have a point, or maybe even two points wasted, in Alberta and Saskatchewan, because you're not allowed to vote twice. So that distorts the national number that they get. a point or maybe even two points wasted in Alberta and Saskatchewan because you're not allowed to vote twice so that distorts the national number that they get and Aaron O'Toole and Andrew Scheer can tell Poliev all about that. However Trump being quieter is helpful this is why you know I think Carney is milking it

but the numbers are not good for the Poliev campaign. You know, and it's now, forget about Trump, you get people kind of, and I'm hearing it all over the place, I'm sure you guys are too, is like, you know, I don't like Poliev's style, I don't like, you know, he feels Trumpy to me, and his party feels Trumpy, and they keep fulfilling that prophecy. Like last night, I stumbled across a whole bunch of pictures of some young idiots showing up at one of his rallies, attacking the pollsters and saying,

don't believe the pollsters. And it's like, okay, well, what's next, boys and girls? Are you gonna do stop the steal too? No, and no, Warren, that's never been a problem in Canada. That suggestion, when I heard people suggesting that, I was like, come on, the polls- I'm suggesting suggesting it to you and I think that's where they're going I did official not the official campaign but then clearly people in the conservative rank-and-file are doing that they went to the trouble of

printing up war and I need to stop you because I got to get Anthony and I realized I didn't even go to him for the last question I I apologize, Anthony, I need you as a counterpoint here. Yeah, I'll say definitely, I'll go back quickly. Carney's milking it. Their strategy has been hide Mark Carney and hope Donald Trump makes the news. I've been saying that from the beginning because every time he finds himself in front of a camera,

his numbers go down. But I'll say this on the bigger question. The real problem of this campaign, if you see even the average of all the polls, Mr. Poliev is currently polling higher than Stephen Harper ever did. Okay. We're somewhere on average between 39 to 41 percent. The problem is complete and utter collapse of the NDP and the Bloc Québécois. So the left is coalescing, amalgamating around the liberals. That's been the story of the campaign so far. The story of the next week, especially following the debates, especially following the French

language debate, is going to be how many of those points can the NDP, but especially the Bloc de Mekwa in Quebec, peel back from Mark Carney to make this a little bit more competitive. But no, I agree. I don't think anybody's in majority territory right now. It's just there has been a collapsing left-wing effect rallying around Carney and That's got to stop if the conservatives want to fight for a majority Adams evil the last 45 seconds to you, sir Okay, I completely agree with Anthony, but I don't think that Jack meets think is going to peel back that many votes I mean the campaign has been incompetent as exemplified by that scandal last week

Where he appeared with an only fans creator. I know. And then have to disassociate from her because she made anti-Israel comments. So this is not the big boy, you know, this is not someone at the big boy table. So I don't see the NDP really researching here. Yeah, but these debates, I have no idea what to expect. I think if, if Pierre-Paul, I think Pierre-v has to fight hard, but not come off as a bully and let Mark Carney's inability to debate or lack of experience debating and lack of French do the talking.

To all three of you, I say thank you. I will be better at time management on this panel next week. But thanks so much. Have a great weekend. Hi, I'm Donna Friesen from global national life moves fast these days and we want to make it even easier for you to get the news you need. That's why you can now get global national every day as a podcast. The biggest stories of the day with analysis from award winning global news journalists, new episodes drop every day. So take this as your personal invitation to join us on the global national podcast. You can find it on Apple podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, and wherever you find your favorite podcasts.

Welcome to the Ben Mulroney show. I want to jump right in with a regular friend of the show friend of mine, Mr. Wonderful himself, Kevin O'Leary, Kevin, welcome back to the show. Thanks so much for joining us. Great to be here. Thank you, Ben. So you know, we're used to seeing you on TV, we're used to seeing you talking about business and entrepreneurs. Yesterday you actually were in in Washington, talk to me about that. So Senator Rick Scott decided to hold hearings, probably quite timely, although these hearings were set up months ago about China and the investment environment, obviously the tariff wars and it was obviously because it was timely, probably serendipitously so it was packed.

And there were many testimonies regarding the situation, but I don't think a lot of people in the US understood how blatant the IP theft is and how it works with China. And can I just jump in for a real quick, because when you read the headline, Kevin O'Leary wants 400% tariffs on China, you know, someone who doesn't dig into what you actually

say is gonna say, Oh, that's Kevin being Kevin, that's Kevin trying to get headlines. But when you listen to what you actually said yesterday, and you're going to share that with us, you make a really good case. Yeah, so the way it works, and I think the senators eyes were opened after they heard this, because there's so many instances of this, when an American company, frankly Canadian for that matter, gets investors and does a startup, let's say you put up 10 million bucks or whatever, you know, and eight out of ten times it doesn't work out. But when it does and the product introduced into the market, goods or service or technology, doesn't matter, as soon as it gets to a run rate of 5 million annually, almost 100% of the time it gets knocked off in China.

And so the company has to recoup the 10 million that it made, let's say, in R&D. The Chinese don't. So they knock it off and they reintroduce it into the American and Canadian and Mexican market and European market too, at 30 to 40% off of the price you're selling it at. Because they don't have to recoup anything. They're just making pure margin. You have no need to recover. And this happens thousands of times and there's no recourse and there's no consequences.

We thought 20 years ago when we as a sort of the Western world invited China to be part of sort of the global trading, we thought that commerce would normalize this country that was sort of working on its own rules. It turns out that didn't happen. That's right. In the year 2000 under Bill Clinton and his administration. They finally convinced China to join the WTO Within the very first month They weren't compliant and they never have been all the grievances brought to the WTO to be resolved through litigation

Never advanced. So China has basically built their economy on the back of Western Civilization's China has basically built their economy on the back of Western civilizations investment in IP. Yeah. And at this point as an investor, having seen it, I'm frustrated. I finally said, look, it may sound bombastic to ask for 400%, but I really want to put their feet to the fire. I've had enough. Yeah. And so I speak on behalf of millions of investors. Everybody knows what I'm talking about. It's been burned by China this way. Yeah. Well, and you also highlighted a story that I've actually mentioned on the show, and I read about this about 10 years ago.

China has so many what they call ghost factories, where an American or Western product is made in a factory in China, and they work a 12-hour shift, and then everybody goes home, they turn off all the machines. And then a whole other group of people come in and they make the exact same product, they maybe change a letter in the name. And that is the knockoff product, it's the exact same thing.

They sell it at 30% less. And that's been the stock and trade of a lot of a big part of the Chinese economy for years. It was so troubling if you talk to young Chinese people, they think that's okay. Yeah, no one's ever taught them that that's wrong. And so there's an education process that has to occur here. It's as if they have the right to steal. And it's embedded in them at a young age. I mean, there's something very, very wrong here. And now that we're going into an economic war with China, it's got to get resolved. You know, I want to take a step back and look at sort of Donald Trump's, the chaos that was sown by by all the tariffs that went on. And now it does seem like the focus is coming to where it

should have been in the first place and I would argue almost exclusively because you've highlighted how egregious some of the behavior is from China. But you got guys like Doug Ford who've been beating the drum saying we're not the problem. We're your friend. We want to help you with this problem. And yet here we find ourselves still today with automotive tariffs, aluminum and steel tariffs, and we're wondering why are we still being treated like a problem when the real problem is what you just highlighted

yesterday in Washington? Well let's talk about Canada and Lutnick, Harold Lutnick, excuse me, Harold Lutnick said publicly already that he's not going to deal with Canada until the election is over on the 28th. And so the rhetoric that we're, you know, I'm getting, you know, I was in Geneva last week and they were covering a Canadian story. Same in London. I mean, it's getting really, really crazy and noisy because Carney's doing a masterful job of saying to everybody look never mind about my party's performance over the last decade keep your eyes on this shiny bead called Donald Trump I'm the person that can save you only I can save you even though my policies brought you to your knees

financially don't worry about that I've kept all the same cabinet members yeah that took your knees and wiped out the country But I can save you from this horrible shiny beat Trump Trump sees this He's you know, she's watching it certainly Burgum and Doug Ford's been dealing with litany dealing with Burgum and they've just said we're gonna put the whole Canadian thing on hold So all this rhetoric stops and you've chosen a leader and then you know, get your high knees down here to Washington let's work this thing out because what they've offered Europe Eastern Europe the Brits and the Brits this even this morning have come back and said look we're ready to go to zero tariffs in both directions

which is what we want in Canada as well but each side has to drop all of their regulations and tariffs in the case of the British, they've got massive tariffs on agriculture, fertilizer, ag tech, grains. And so what's happening here, if you think of the two verticals, Ben, you've got this circle of friendship. I know it doesn't feel like it's only with Canada, but that's our own fault because of an election.

But we're gonna have a deal with Eastern Europe, Mexico, Canada, probably all at zero. And that circle of friendship is going to go against China, who's trying to compete to become the world's largest superpower economically. That's what the that's what Trump's signal is. I know the noise is insane. And by the way, no government has ever tried to compete 60 trade agreements at once. Yeah. In the open. I mean, you know, from that perspective, it's absolute chaos. Hey, with the one minute left that we have,

I'd love to get your take. What's the state of play today on the fate of TikTok? So Senator Cotton in that same hearings that you were talking about earlier, dropped a bomb yesterday. He basically, there was a deal on the table that included leasing the algorithm from China. So they get the safe face, keep ownership,

and it ticked off, goes on under American ownership, and they licensed the algorithm. The algorithm that has gotten, calls it, warcraft, weapons grade spyware, which is what it is. I mean, everybody knows anyways, he blew that up. He basically said we're because what's required to that deal, Ben is an indemnification against the 800 billion a year fine. Yeah.

Uh, so all the investors in that deal wanted to get indemnified. And he said, we're not indemnifying. We're not changing the law. You cannot buy TikTok with the Chinese algorithms, we're back to square one. Okay. All this stuff to figure out a new strategy as of today, we've got we've got 68 days to figure it out. Kevin O'Leary, chairman of O'Leary Ventures and Shark Tank's Mr. Wonderful.

Always appreciate you having me on the show, my friend. Take care. Bye bye. Welcome back to the Ben Mulroney show and the long national ordeal of dealing with the carbon tax that was foisted upon us by the Liberal government that made everything in our lives more expensive is kind of sort of over. Mark Carney took it down to zero. He could probably bring it back up.

But the drama of knowing that you're overpaying for pretty much everything that requires gasoline or diesel to get to your door, including the gasoline or diesel that you put in your car is by and large over. So a lot of us feel like we know everything we need to know about the carbon tax. But there's a whole story about it that we don't know.

And there's a new book that came out today called, Axing the Tax, The Rise and Fall of Canada's Carbon Tax, written by Franco Tarrazano, the Federal Director of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation and the author, and he joins us now. Franco, welcome to the show and congratulations on the book. Oh, hey Ben, really appreciate that.. Thanks so much for having me on today. Okay, so listen, like I said, I emotionally feel like I know everything I need to know

about the carbon tax. If I don't hear about it ever again, it'll be too soon. But why did you want to write this book? What was the story that needed to be told? Well, you know, first of all, the story that had to be told because look, some Canadians, including the Canadian Taxpayers Federation, has been fighting the carbon tax for about two decades now. Right? Remember, British Columbia, they imposed the first North American economy, economy wide carbon tax all the way back in 2008.

So we've been fighting this thing for a very long time. Now one of the reasons that I wanted to write this book is because you can already smell the carbon tax activists, the environmental activists, some of the political elite classes already trying to spin the history of the carbon tax, right? They're trying to say, well, the carbon tax was a good idea. Trudeau just bungled the policy or he didn't communicate it well. So I wanted to smash through that line of thinking and write a book that shows the history of the carbon tax, why it was always a bad idea and why it will always be a bad idea in the future.

Ben, you kind of hinted to this off the top, right? The fight against the carbon tax has been successful in the sense that politicians know that Canadians will not vote for them if they run on a carbon tax. But the fight is not over. As you mentioned, the carbon tax has been relabeled, repackaged, and especially Mr. Carney, he's trying to hide carbon taxes in the future. So, Franco, I've been beating this drum that, you know, when the liberals say, oh, the Tories voted against housing and childcare. And I was like, no, I've been beating this drum that, you know, when the liberals say, oh, the Tories voted against housing and childcare. I was like, no, they voted against your policies that did nothing to help with housing or childcare.

And I wonder in your estimation, would you put the carbon tax in that bucket as well in that it was supposed to be a tool to reduce carbon emissions. But from my interpretation of the facts, it didn't do much on that front. Well, that's exactly why Canadians oppose it. Okay, for two simple reasons. The carbon tax makes life more expensive. And it doesn't work. Okay, let me take you all the way back to 2008. Those politicians in British Columbia were promising

the world with carbon taxes They even promised that the carbon tax would cut emissions by a third and not only were they promising it They legislated that reduction that you know by 2020 and every year after the carbon tax would cut emissions by 33% Okay. Well using the government's own data. it shows that emissions have gone up. There's two reasons why the carbon tax failed on the environment and always will. Number one, you can't tax away the necessities of life. Canada, very big place, got to drive to work, got to drive to take your kids to soccer practice and the carbon tax makes that more expensive.

The carbon tax makes it more expensive for you to stay warm during the winter. It makes it more expensive for you to put food on your family's table. So instead of reducing emissions, all it's doing is reducing people's ability to save money for other important things like putting your kids through college. But number two, Canada makes up 1.4% of global emissions. And Ben, here's something the government never wanted to talk about. About 70%, more than 70% of countries around the world do not have national carbon taxes. Four of the five largest emitters, United States, Brazil, India, Russia, don't have national carbon taxes.

So look, punishing Canadians at home for the necessities of life, that's not going to reduce emissions in a place like China. Franco, in researching this book, I mean, listen, you're the federal director of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation. I have to assume you got a depth of knowledge in all the taxes everywhere in Canada. Did you learn anything new in researching this book that you didn't know before? Yeah, and it was actually one of the fatal flaws of the carbon tax. So Ben, you'll probably remember all the smart talking heads, right? Saying politicians had to run on carbon taxes.

Remember in the last election federally, you essentially had all major parties running on some form of carbon tax. But what I learned is that in fact, the places that brought in carbon taxes were actually never upfront and transparent with the people. Okay, so before BC brought in a carbon tax, the BC Liberals at the time, they didn't run on a carbon tax. Before the Alberta NDP brought in a provincial carbon tax. They didn't run on a carbon tax. Same story with the wind government in Ontario. No mention of the carbon tax before bringing in their own provincial system.

Also a similar story federally. Okay, so if you can go back to 2015, you probably remember legalized weed, expanded immigration. The real pinnacle of the Trudeau platform in 2015 on taxes was actually a promise to cut taxes for the middle class. Remember that? I remember that. So Ben, you had to squint real hard to find 39 pages buried in Trudeau's platform, an unrecognizably vague mention of a carbon tax.

So they were never honest with Canadians about the cost of the carbon tax. Then you'll remember the 2019 election where the former environment minister Catherine McKenna actually told Canadians the government had quote, no intention of continuing to raise the carbon tax beyond 2022. So all along the story of the fight against carbon taxes, you have the political class who wanted carbon taxes, never being upfront or getting consent from the people about what their actual plans were. And that was to increasingly make the necessities of life more expensive.

We are going to stand up for the middle class and those working hard to join it. That was the that's what they promised. Franco was there was there any pushback within the government or within the bureaucracy that was it that was entrusted with with with, you know, moving this tax forward and making sure that it was paid and it was it was, you know, working the way it was supposed to. I mean, at any point did they look at the data and say, you know, it's not doing what we said it was going to do, or was it a complete echo chamber? Oh, it was a complete echo chamber. And it was even worse than that where you had government

officials essentially trying to sell Canadians a bag full of magical beans, right? Where you even had government officials parroting the political line of somehow the carbon tax was making most Canadians richer. But you know, it doesn't matter how many taxpayer funded government spinners you have, at the end of the day, reality wins out. Right? Canadians never bought this line from the Trudeau or Liberal government that the carbon tax was making life more expensive because they could see at times the carbon tax bill being more than their natural gas bill every month. You know what I mean? So Canadians never bought that.

But Ben, you might be asking, why was there such an echo chamber? And folks, remember not only did the carbon tax directly make your life more expensive, but the carbon tax also cost taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars to hire hundreds of bureaucrats to administer the carbon tax. Well of course. So there was this perverse incentive within the bureaucracy who wanted to keep their taxpayer funded jobs to keep pushing the carbon tax on the people. And lastly, in about the last minute that we have,

there's the consumer facing carbon tax, and then there's the tax on the large emitters that Mark Carney says he's going to go after. Talk to me about how that's, they're one and the same, aren't they? Well, a carbon tax is a carbon tax is a carbon tax. Only federal major leader who promises to get rid of all carbon taxes is Pierre Paulie, Evan, the conservatives. So Carney wants to hide carbon taxes on Canadian businesses. Then he hopes Canadians won't notice when they pass those costs on to you through higher prices. But

Carney's carbon tax is even worse in a sense, because his carbon tax on business will push Canadian businesses to cut production here to set up shop in the United States. So Carney's hidden tax really means higher prices and fewer Canadian jobs. Franco Tarrazzano is the author of Axing the Tax, the Rise and Fall of Canada's Carbon Tax. It is out today. You're a busy man and I appreciate you taking time to talk to us about the book and congratulations. Thank you so much, Ben. Really appreciate the conversation. All right, this next segment, you know that we love doing it. We know you love it as well.

It gets a ton of love on the podcast. One of the most downloaded segments we do. And ever since we had Dave Bradley to this, he brings a voice of gravitas and authority and trust, if you will, to the show, which is probably why I fail so often at getting guessing them right because I trust him. He sounds like he's giving me the truth. It's time for, is it BS or is it real? But I warn you, there's some spicy language in this segment. So if you're a Pearl Clutcher, turn down the volume or go run an errand and then come back in a few minutes. All right. I want you to play along at home. Last time I did it. I didn't do so well. I'm here for redemption. Dave, take us away. So was Elton John and Patti LaBelle feuding over Tupperware? Patti LaBelle is very

fond of her Tupperware, so the singer loves to cook, shared an interesting tale on Sherri Shepard's daytime talk show. She explained that back before Elton John was famous and he was going by his birth name, Reginald Dwight, he was playing piano for her with his band Bluesology when she performed in the UK. So, LaBelle said she would often invite the band over to her flat, which is an apartment in the UK, she'd cook for everyone, LaBelle said, and then send home leftovers in her Tupperware. LaBelle said that's where the problem began, I gave some of them food to take back home, they never brought back the Tupperware.

She says she's brought up the lack of Tupperware. Returned Elton John on a few occasions telling him, I want my darn Tupperware. LaBelle collaborated with John on his 2005 album Classic Moments. They also performed together in Las Vegas, I should say, where the Tupperware thing came up again. Elton John finally caved and returned her Tupperware. All right, so I'm going to go with it's a great story. It's a great story. It sounds like a celebrity story, and they love telling stories about how their celebrities are just like us.

They want to humanize them. And Patti LaBelle is definitely a diva, but she wasn't always a diva, so I'm sure she had Tupperware. So I'm going to say that the story as conveyed was true, but with the caveat that there's no way Elton John returned the exact Tupperware that he stole from her in the UK. So I'm going to say it's true. Is it possible this story is true? Yes it is. It is. This is where my roots in entertainment come in because I can sniff out the BS, at least in that world. Alright, time for story number two. Did Steven Seagal and Jean-Claude Van Damme end their 30-year feud? It's a plot twist worthy of a 90s action movie

crossover martial arts legends. Stephen Seagal and Jean-Claude Van Damme have officially buried the hatchet after a chance encounter in France this week. It's a surprise reconciliation. It happened late Wednesday night in a restaurant, La Table de Réliens, L'Arger, where both men ran into each other. Van Damme is in France shooting a movie while Seagal was just visiting. Eyewitnesses say what looked to be a very tense conversation ended with a handshake and a friendly acknowledgement. The two have been feuding since the 90s when both were prominent action stars, and they started after Seagal made comments questioning Van Damme's credentials.

A lot of information in there, but I can't make a decision until you say the name of that restaurant again. You want me to again? Yeah, please. La Table Doréliens Larger. Okay, I gotta read this. It's La Table, where is it? La Table Doréliens Larger. Okay, I gotta read this. It's La Table... Where is it?

La Table Doréliens Largéaux. Largéaux? Largéaux. Okay. Doréliens Largéaux. I don't even know what that means. I don't think it means anything. I mean, yeah, no.

You know what? I'm glad you said it again. Because I think I maybe, maybe would have believed this. If it was larger? No, this doesn't sound like the name of a restaurant. I'm gonna say it's BS. See, now that's some bullshit. Hello!

The restaurant's real? Okay, the restaurant's real. So there you go. It doesn't matter how I got there. You didn't say I had to show you the math. There's no show you work in this one. Exactly, okay. Story number three.

Is NASA offering $3 million for solving its moon poop problem? Forget moon rocks, NASA's looking for gold in astronaut poop and there's $3 million U.S. up for grabs if you can crack the code. It's part of its new lunar innovation initiative. The Luna Recycle Challenge aims to solve

one of the most overlooked challenges in long duration space missions, waste management. The space agency is calling on innovators around the globe to figure out what to do with the waste generated on flights. It includes food packaging, used clothing, broken tools, human waste, and more. NASA estimates that astronauts on the Artemis missions

could generate nearly 96 bags of fecal waste during a four-person, 30-day mission. The challenge is to open teams, or open two teams and individuals worldwide. Participation absolutely free. Entrants don't have to have prior experience working with NASA or other space agencies either.

All right. Well, anybody who knows me knows that I love the movie The Martian and and human poop is central to his survival on Mars because he's a botanist and and he learns how to use the poop to make potatoes that keeps him alive until people can come back. So I appreciate that it is a very big deal. So this is what, this is in the, the Artemis mission is taking people to Mars, right? So why don't they just come up with a way

to just shoot it out in the space? Well, then it just floats forever. So what? It's true. I mean, there's nothing out there. Literally nothing out there. And it's a pretty big space. I mean, it's the first time. Literally nothing out there. It's a pretty big space. I mean, it's the first time, maybe in the future, we could come up with a way to figure

it out. But if we haven't figured it out by the time we go up, then just find a way to get it out of the rocket. That being said, this sounds to me like something that NASA NASA would do because they know it's a big problem so I'm going to say it's true. Similar event did take place. Okay, okay two for three. Two for three and let's see if I can add to that.

I don't want to I don't want to go 5050 today like I did last time. So let's go with story number four. All right is Amazon planning on building the world's largest clock? It's a move that has lit social media on fire. An anonymous source that works for Amazon has said that the tech giant will begin construction of the world's largest clock smack dab in the middle of Hollywood. It's dubbed the Prime Timepiece, it's a thousand foot tall monument that will tower above the Hollywood sign, counting not just hours and minutes but also serve as a digital billboard for the company promoting their Black Friday sales, sports deals with the NFL and more.

Social media was divided, some think it'll be cool and get lots of fanfare like the Sphere in Las Vegas, while others outright dismissed us as a baseless claim. An official announcement expected next week. Details including how soon work could begin on this project. Okay, first of all, I didn't hear about this on social media. I would have contributed to the debate and I would have said this is a terrible idea

because, I mean, this is a terrible idea because I mean it's so I mean this is their big a big clock and a and a digital billboard that's what that's what Bezos and Amazon have come up with that's something that he would have done anyone would have done 10 years ago 15 years ago and the sphere is the sphere you gotta go above and beyond the sphere I'm gonna say it's BS is the sphere. You gotta go above and beyond the sphere. I'm gonna say it's BS. This is bullshit. Oh, I was right. Oh, I think, hey, let's try to squeeze in this last one real quick. All right, yeah, this one's a quickie. Is KFC getting into the toothpaste business? Fried chicken, not just for food anymore because KFC recently introduced a fried chicken flavored

toothpaste. The flavors are all inspired by KFC's 11 Herbs and Spices. According to a news release, they partnered with toothpaste manufacturer High Smile to unveil the newest dental hygiene product for a limited time. It's offered exclusively on the High Smile website retailing $13. Sold out in 48 hours. The toothpaste description on the website claims it contains a fluoride free formula. I'd say that three times fast and has long lasting oral health benefits.

All right. I've got lots of reasons why I think this is fake high smile is trying to make a name for itself as a go to for people. I don't think you get there with KFC. And so I got a whole bunch of reasons. But I will say this. Even if it's right, I don't care. I don't want to live in a world where it's right, so I'm going to say it's wrong. It's BS.

It's fact. Oh my god. Oh my god. High smile. You deserve what's coming to you. That's a terrible idea. Dave Bradley, thank you very much, my friend. It's a great idea.

Thanks for listening to the Ben Mulroney Show podcast. We're live every day nationwide on the Chorus Radio Network, and you can listen online to the Radio Canada player and the iHeart Radio Canada apps. And make sure to follow and subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, or wherever you get your streaming audio. We release new podcasts every day.

Thanks for listening. code word and enter on our website for a chance to win $15,000. Oh my god that's so good. We're gonna blow some minds. Let's do it. Visit flavornetwork.ca for more details and to enter now. Game on people!