The Ben Mulroney Show - The Liberals say if you don't support funding the CBC you don't love your country.

Episode Date: February 21, 2025

Guests and Topics: The Liberals say if you don't support funding the CBC you don't love your country. 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

Want to own part of the company that makes your favorite burger? Now you can. With partial shares from TD Direct Investing, you can own less than one full share, so expensive stocks are within reach. Learn more at td.com slash partial shares. TD, ready for you. Happy Friday, my friends. Welcome to the Ben Mulrooney Show. I want to thank everybody for finding their way to the end of the week with the Ben Mulroney show on CFPL in London, on 640 Toronto in dot dot dot Toronto. And of course you may be listening to us on the iHeartRadio app or in podcast form,

wherever you find your podcast enjoyment. It's felt like a very long week. Of course we are gearing up for a really interesting week next week with the election coming up, the Ontario election. I'm very privileged. I actually haven't even told anybody this. And I'm, I assume I can tell people I'm going to be part of global news is provincial election coverage. It's a, it's a real feather in my cap to have been entrusted with helping share that, share that news and bring you the, the news of whoever wins the election. As you

know, my sister is a member of Doug Ford's cabinet. She's running for re election, I will park my bias as best as I can, in order to deliver the news in any way that I can. But I want to say thank you to global news for trusting me. And I want to thank the viewers who ultimately will be watching and hopefully will not be changing the channel. All right so it's been well the Super Bowl, Super Bowl Sunday was when it started snowing in the city and if you're if you got eyes and ears and if you need to get anywhere in the city you know that not a lot has changed in terms of how much snow has been removed since that initiative began. Olivia Chow, our mayor, sat with Sharon Carr, who was sitting in for John Oakley,

and Sharon asked her why not take streetcars off the roads until things are cleared up. And here's what our mayor had to say. Because some dumb driver disobeying the law, they are parking and I even have photos of it, you keep seeing, I saw one on Dundas Street. One car ended up blocking three or four streetcars and then the TDC riders, and you talk about hundreds of them, okay, have to get off and then we have to find a bus to take them to somewhere else or we can tow the car but by the time we take it in tow

that's quite a bit of time in the meantime all the streetcar are back up the cars are backed up so it's not about snow removal only. I didn't know. I'm actually I heard the I'm hearing that in real time. I did not know that our mayor called that driver a dumb driver. And I know the picture that she's talking about because I saw her tweet. The issue is not the car cars belong on the road. Madam Mayor, cars are supposed to be on the road. Street cars are supposed to be on the road. You know, it's not supposed to be on the road. Street cars are supposed to be on the road. You know it's not supposed to be on the road.

Six feet of snow. That's what's not supposed to be on the road. And we've talked about this before. This city had ample opportunity to start moving, removing that snow as it was falling. After the first dump on Super Bowl Sunday, you could have started. After the second dump, you could have started.

On Family Day Monday, after the second dump, you could have started on Family Day Monday after the third dump. And here we find ourselves where drivers have to get around. Drivers have to drive drivers have to park and you and your city and your priorities have made it so that is an impossibility. And rather than take ownership over the failure of your administration, you are blaming, not only blaming drivers, but you're calling them dumb. That's gonna come back and bite you, Madam Mayor. That is, that is, to some people, that's a bridge too far.

And I promise you, in a couple of weeks, in a couple of weeks when the snow is still making driving in this city, not just driving, but getting around in this city, not just driving, but getting around the city impossible. That epithet of dumb will not be ascribed to drivers anymore. It's gonna be ascribed somewhere else. And I'm gonna let you guess where.

Doug Ford on the campaign trail was asked to revisit an off-color joke that he made what about a week ago about criminal justice reform, bail reform, and how sometimes it makes him feel like he might want to take some extreme measures in sending those repeat violent offenders who use a gun and who terrorize people to what do you call it? Right to Sparky, a reference to the electric chair.

And so here's one journalist trying to get him to own that again. Well, first of all, you know, it was a joke and the 1200 people in the room knew it was a joke. But in saying that, you know what my frustration is, and everyone's frustration behind me too, is if the door gets kicked in, someone puts a gun to their head, threatens their family, steals their car, terrorizes neighborhoods. We're done with that. We're done with weak need liberal They are the ones who are the ones who are the ones who are the ones who are the ones who are the ones who are the ones who are the ones who are the ones who are the ones who are the ones who are the ones who are the ones who are

the ones who are the ones who are the ones who are the ones who are the ones who are the ones who are the ones who are the ones who are the ones who are the ones who are the ones who are the ones who are the ones who are the ones who are the ones who are the ones who are the ones who are the ones who are the ones who that protect our communities that put their lives on the line every single day? They get in the back of the car if we're lucky to arrest them first of all

They get in the back of the car and then they start getting mouthy with our police officer saying you can't do anything Because I'll be out by the time you start the shift again Okay, so my assessment of that was that was a journalist trying to ask a gotcha question, trying to paint Doug Ford as a regressive, pro-death penalty conservative, and they got what was coming to them. That was a mic drop moment because every single Ontarian and Canadian relates to the words that came out of Doug Ford's mouth after that ludicrously slanted biased question.

Good on Doug Ford because I feel that way too. I'm frustrated that way too. And I know a lot of you, the listeners are as well. He was then, he was asked another question. This was another kind of, they really want to get them in a gotcha question sort of situation. You know, he's talking about how Canada is in its own way. We are our own worst enemy.

And he was asked in a very slanted way. I hope we have the question with it as well. Oh, we don't. Well, the question was, you know, you keep saying that Canada is in its own way. That doesn't seem like a very team Canada approach to solving the problem. Like carrying Ottawa's water. And here's what he had to say. So everyone's heard of the Ring of Fire. This has been going on for 25 years. Assessment

after assessment after assessment after assessment. We're going to have assessments the rest of our lives. Well, America and the rest of the world are trying to eat our lunch. One of the most powerful tools we have in Canada is our energy and our critical minerals. Enough of the assessments and waiting around and... Let me be very clear. The ability to criticize the failures of a government, especially the one that we've had in Ottawa with the level of ineptitude and incompetence that we have witnessed and we have suffered through over the past nine years.

The right to do that is the most democratic thing I can do. It is my right. It is my God given right. And it makes me not just a patriot, but a proud Canadian. And to suggest that it is anything other than that is the anti-democratic thing to do. I will not apologize for looking at this government with critical eyes. Because to look at it with critical eyes is to look to the future with hope. To believe that Canada's future is better than it is. To believe that where we are today is not where we need to be in the future and anybody who comes at me and suggests

that I am not part of Team Canada you can go to hell. Welcome back to the Ben Mulroney Show thank you so much for listening it's time to take your calls at 416-870-6400 or 1-888-225-TALK. The liberal brand, the liberal party, is the single most successful democratic brand in the Western world. Meaning, since I believe prior to the first, second World War, it has governed longer for more years

than any other brand in the Western world. And what comes with that, in my opinion, as somebody who is not a liberal, is hubris and a belief in their innate ability and right to govern. And from that stem, a few other ancillary beliefs, not the least of which is, if you do not believe as we believe, then you are somehow less Canadian.

We see it all the time. We saw it during the trucker convoy. We saw it, we see it when big debates are happening in the House of Commons. If you do not believe what we believe, you are somehow less Canadian than we. You love the country less than we. You are, in some cases cases are actually against our country.

And we are seeing it rear its ugly head again with the outgoing minister of heritage, Patrick St. Ange, who put out a 17 page document detailing a plan to transform the CBC's funding model by nearly doubling the amount of money Canadians will spend each year by removing advertising from news programming. It would make it so that it wouldn't be subject to, um, spending the amount of money Canadians will spend each year by removing advertising from news programming. It would make it so that it wouldn't be subject to spending reviews, it would be entrenched in law. And she went so far as to suggest. Well, here, let's listen to her proposed funding

for the CBC. The existence of our public broadcaster depends on a single line in the budget. I'm proposing that we remove the decision-making around funding from the political cycles, whether it's the elections or the budget. Many countries around the world have chosen that path in giving their public broadcaster predictable, viable, and stable funding. CBC does not belong to the Liberals, it does not belong to the Conservatives, and it does not belong to any other political parties. It belongs to the Canadian people. And this is why to be able to give CBC Radio-Canada the means to fulfill its mandate, I propose

that it be financed directly in the legislation instead of in the budget through statutory appropriation. Okay, so Pierre Poliev wants to defund the CBC and Patrice Saint-Ange on her way out the door in the middle of a parochial parliament with a with a prime minister who is retiring. In other words, this government has no mandate to do any of these things. But they're putting it out there. They're swinging in the opposite direction. They want more money and they want it entrenched in legislation so that no government can,

no new government can touch it. But what if, Minister St-Ange, I, as a proud Canadian, take issue with this plan? What say you about me? Radio-Canada, CBC has been there for the past 100 years through conservative and liberal governments. It is more relevant than ever in the current context to have and to be able to rely on a public service media and to not understand that reality shows the lack of understanding of the global context that we're in and it shows the lack of love for our own country. And for the

fact that we need to be able to tell our own stories in our own way. And it has a Canada CBC will never be controlled by Musk, Zuckerberg, or any other private billionaire tech oligarch. How little respect do you have for Canadians, Minister? How low do you hold us in your esteem? That to suggest if we have a problem with the CBC, with our eyes and our ears and how much money we see is put into it each and every year, that we may have a problem with

your vision, that you suggest that we are too dumb to understand the reality in front of us and even if we do understand it we don't love our country enough to fully grasp how important the CBC is. How little regard do you have for Canadians, Minister? That's a shameful vision of the people that you supposedly represent. I want to hear from you at 416-870-6400 or 1-888-225-TALK. What do you think of this bold? It's a bold plan by these outgoing liberals, but it is, it's a plan I disagree with. I'd like to hear from you 416-870-6400 or 1-888-225225 talk. I've told this story again, it bears

repeating years ago when I was the host of Canadian Idol. At the time when it became the number one watched show on in the history of English language television, it was on CTV. We were with the exception of buying the license for the show from the Brits, it was a Canadian show with Canadian producers, Canadian kids singing by and large Canadian songs shot and produced in Canada for Canadians. What did the CBC counter program with? What Canadian stories that they tell were vital to the national interest, vital to our national sovereignty? What did they do? They went down to Los Angeles and they purchased the rights to a Steven Spielberg produced mini

series that was broadcast on the sci-fi network about alien abductions called Taken. That was a choice made with our tax dollars to counter program against a truly Canadian show. And I concede we are not living in that time anymore. But because we're not living in that time anymore, this nonsense that, oh, well, we're going to take ads off of certain shows. We're past that point, minister. That was an idea that you might have wanted to bring up nine years ago when this government wasn't so long in the tooth. We are past that. We are not living in that world where that's going to be the distinguishing factor that is going to change everything. I am

tired of living in a world where there are institutions in this country who are so full, who are so high on their own supply that they believe without them we will fall into a dystopian, a chaos riddled Canada without whom we have no ability to tell our stories and we don't know who we are. That is nonsense. Kenny, welcome to the show. Good morning, sir. Good morning.

You eloquently put my thoughts into words much better than I could. Well, thank you. I've had a lot of coffee today, Kenny. Wow, you got excellent vocabulary and you're super intelligent. I really appreciate your point of view. You can't speak to liberals, they're just they're lost. But they're trying to control the narrative. They won't have people like you on

the CBC. They'll have people that spin it so that they look good. And that's why they want control. Yeah, it was laughable to hear, say, oh, CBC does not belong to the liberals. I have eyes. I have ears. I have enough judgment in my head to be able to see. I have a brain.

I have a brain. And I can tell when something is slanted. I can read and write. I understand science. You don't have to lecture to me what it is to do. And you don't have to install your woke ideology, weirdo, weirdo values on me. I'm a real Canadian, and I don't need you to tell me

what my values are. Yeah, absolutely. Kenny, thank you so much. I'm going to go a little farther, because it's very rich for the liberals to accuse the Tories, try to paint them with the brush that, Donald Trump is coming for you

and Pierre Poliev is gonna hold the door open. This type of, this way of seeing Canada, we are right, we are the true Canadians, and anybody who disagrees is not a true Canadian, that is straight out of the MAGA playbook, straight out of it. Anybody who is, there are real Americans

and there are people who are less real Americans, people from California, people from New York, liberals, all those people in the United States, they're not real Americans, the real Americans are the MAGA Americans, they are the middle American Americans, they're the States, they're not real Americans. The real Americans are the MAGA Americans. They are the middle American Americans. They're the farmers, they're the blue collar workers. Those are the real Americans.

What I heard here from Pascal Saint-Ange is straight out of Donald Trump's playbook. I suggest to you, my friends, that the Liberal Party of Canada is the one that truly embodies the worst of Donald Trump's MAGA. The Liberal Party is the torchbearer of that brand of us versus them. So I'd love to hear from you 416-870-6400 or 1-888-225-TALK. or one at triple eight, two to five talk. This is, and by the way, the thing that gives me peace, inner peace is this is their playbook when they're on their heels.

It's the fear mongering and the entitlement and the casting aspersions on people's values and people's love of Canada. This is what they do when they are on their heels and they know that the next election ain't gonna be too good for them It happens all the time. It's it's like clockwork actually Reno welcome to the show Ben sir absolute pleasure speaking to you absolute pleasure speaking to you

Hey Ben, this this rhetoric does work for liberals for so many so many years fear-mongering. I kind of related to for so many, so many years, this fear mongering. I kind of relate it to these people that only follow politics when it's a week away from elections, kind of like us, these part-time soccer fans that follow World Cup only every four years. Same idea, same concept, but it's not gonna work this time. I really hope these people got their ears open.

I hope so too. Yeah, well, thank you for your call. I appreciate it, sir got their ears open. I hope so too. Yeah. Well, thank you for your call. I appreciate it, sir. And let's say hi to John. Hey, Ben. Hey, how are you? Good, good. So I've been listening to your show for quite a while. Very impressed. I love kind of the angle that you, you know, have an opinion towards. And it's really fighting for Canadians. And that's what politics for me right now I'm not too into politics but listening to your show and seeing the politics are all about self-agenda it's really not about Canadians so when you look at this comment about the CBC

it's all about the institution keeping that alive keeping the funding going. But do Canadians care about it? No. Like, Polyev is at least coming in and saying, you know, we're going to defund and we're going to use that money elsewhere to help Canadians. You're absolutely right. And I subscribe to that.

I absolutely do. Hey, thank you so much for your call. And let's take to the phones and say hello to Mike. Yeah, hello. How are you doing today? I'm well, thank you. Yeah, hello, how are you doing today? I'm well, thank you. Yeah, so liberals in the CBC have always wanted to control the narrative.

You can go back to looking to what they did to Don Cherry. The lady in pride right there, he's speaking the truth. And what did they do? They spun what he said, took it completely out of context, and they canceled him. Their whole cancel culture is just beyond atrocious. Like something needs to be done. Yeah. No. And listen, when I hear Pascal St. On say the, the, the, the CBC, the, um, the CBC doesn't belong to any one party.

That's not true. I mean, it's obviously officially it's, it's true. She's right. Unofficially in terms of the, the bias of the journalists, the slant of the stories, who they pick, the stories they choose to follow, the live events that they choose to cut away from. It's there for all to see. You can either see it or not, and it's up to you to decide. And we can have a fulsome national debate about it, if you like, but you know where I'm coming from.

Who do we have now? We've got Michael. Michael, welcome to the Ben Mulroney Show. Hi, good morning. Thanks for taking my call. I'll got Michael. Michael, welcome to the Ben Mulroney Show. Hi, good morning. Thanks for taking my call. I'll be quick. I gotta go to work.

As a preface, I have been a lifelong CBC listener. It was a preset on my radio. I'm 37 today. I listened to them since I was in my 20s and I'm a conservative. Today, I no longer listen to them because the ideologies they spew are very much in line with the hard left of our society.

Yeah. Yeah. But they get about a billion dollars a year from what I recall and their viewership is less than an unpopular YouTube podcast. That makes no sense. Oh yeah. Poliev had a good point. You keep some of it in rural areas in Quebec, because the market itself won't allow for these kinds of news organizations and the like to sprout. But in environments where you can do away with it, or at least on a minuscule budget reporting only necessary things that I would

advocate for. I agree. Hey, thank you so much for your call and thank you for your input. That's a great insight. Say David, welcome to the show. All right, thanks for taking my call, Ben. One thing that really bothers me about the CVC

is that they never allow for any live interactivity with any of their programming. I can, many, many times where I've listened to specific broadcasts, and there was one yesterday that bothered me a lot out here on the East Coast, where basically it was a diatribe going on for about 10 minutes about once again shaming the white man regarding colonialism and the hatred that they were spewing was absolutely disgusting. And it was, and they're allowed to do this unabated and unchecked all the time. They never allow anybody to

call in in real time. They never actually have anybody answer the phone. They only have a voice messaging system when you want to call in and question them about some of their commenting. They're just completely unaccountable. And as we all know, I mean, they're just a liberal mouthpiece and that's all they are. And everything that they broadcast out here, 30% of it is LGBT issues, 30% of it is environmentalism, and the rest of it is a smattering of small local news.

But until they're actually allowing themselves to be held accountable, I will never, ever support them. Listen, you just brought up some stuff I didn't know. I didn't know about the lack of communication with listeners and callers and viewers, but I thank you for your call. And let's welcome Stuart to the Ben Mulroney Show. Hey Ben, how are you?

I'm well, thank you. Happy Friday. Happy Friday. I'm gonna put it out on the line for you here. I'm a 60-year-old Jewish Canadian. I could never watch the CBC. I remember in my youth watching when it was fair and balanced and they gave you news, not commentary.

Their anti-Israel bias in CBC is disgusting. And it's unwatchable. And why my taxpayer money would have to go to an organization like that, that isn't giving me news. They're giving them, they're giving us a liberal, or not even a liberal bias, a far left bias. Which is the liberal party right now. And that may change in the future,

but right now it is a far left party. Yeah, so it's really, why why am I giving it should be a fair market economy. Yeah, people want to watch and support it. Let them get their money from advertising. Yeah, but they have their own agenda. And it's just a left mouthpiece. And nobody watches it anyway. No sinker sinker swim, you pick your pick your horse and and if that horse doesn't pay off, you pay the price.

And by the way, the cream rises to the top. If you are, there are a number of great journalists and producers and editors and camera people, audio guys, even executives at the CBC. If the CBC folded tomorrow, a great many of those people would find jobs elsewhere. And heck, with fewer outlets, maybe a new one would spring from the ashes.

I don't know. But that's the glory of the free market system. So who do we have? We have Rob. Rob, welcome back to the, welcome to the Ben Mulroney Show. How are you today? I'm great, thank you.

I hate to sound like a broken record, but if a news organization or a television network cannot garner enough ad revenue to support itself, it should go the way of the dodo. Very simple to the point I appreciate it. I've got time for a few more calls. So let's let's welcome Edward to the show. Thanks so much for calling in. Hey, thanks for taking my call. They are a bloated bureaucracy that have lost their way. Ten years ago, they were showing jeopardy. What is the national broadcaster doing?

Oh, I know. Competing with the other networks for jeopardy. Oh, yeah. And they won it. Well, if I'm not mistaken, and if I'm wrong, somebody please let me know, but a few years ago, they launched a streaming music service. What? A streaming music service to compete with others? Like that's not your mandate. That's not your mandate. It was nonsense. Nonsense. Let's welcome Sam. Sam, how are you doing today? Good, yourself?

I'm great. I've never, ever been a fan of government funding organizations like this. However, the CBC leaning towards liberals today and being funded by liberals with a lot of money is no different than any other government. I mean, I'm sure your kitchen table discussions are a lot different than ours, right? And you have probably heard and seen things that we've never seen, but I am a missed at the,

like I'm not a liberal, so like I'm not taking it personally that I'm a myth at the constant barrage against the liberal government. Whenever it comes to something negative, it's their fault. But the conservatives funded the CBC, six previous liberal governments and conservative governments have funded. I don't get what the issue is now. It's a it's a it's a it's a different beast today than it has been. It's a different beast.

They they're in, in my opinion, and I'm just one man, having watched enough of the CBC before and the CBC today, it is a different beast. It is a politically driven, partisan, government funded wing of the Liberal Party. That's what I see. Now, you may have a different interpretation. That's right. By the way, that doesn't mean I don't watch it.

That doesn't mean there isn't value. I'm not afraid of opinions that are not mine. I enjoy them. I need them. They reinforce in me. They test my own personal opinions and then make my opinions better. They are not worth the cost given the outcomes.

There's too few people watch to justify the money make my opinions better. They are not worth the cost given the outcomes. There's too few people watch to justify the money that we put into it and when you throw the slant in and by the way the anti-Israel part that's just a bridge too far for me. But I want to thank everybody for calling in. Welcome back to the Ben Mulroney Show. Last night's victory by Team Canada over Team USA in the hockey tournament was one of those incredibly patriotic, nation-building moments that none of us will forget. And of course a lot of us want to tune in immediately at the beginning of the game to make sure that we didn't miss the national anthems. And when Chantal Kravizac, great Canadian performer, musician got up and performed the national anthem, it came with a slight alteration.

O Canada, Terra nos ariam, True patriot love that only us come as one. So let me just tell you first where I'm coming from. I have a lot of time for Chantal. She's been a very good friend to me. At a time where I really needed a good friend. She was there for me. I think she's a wonderful person. I think she's a great and talented Canadian and deserves all the accolades she gets. And I was very glad to see her up there. However, changing the national anthem on your own, in that moment, I believe was the wrong move. By the way, the change itself actually made a lot of sense

with the backdrop of Donald Trump. Like in a a bubble in a vacuum, I can see why that makes sense. But in that moment, it took all of us out of that moment, we were we should have all been singing together as one. And we couldn't because we didn't know what was coming. And so I think it was wrong. I also believe it was wrong because the anthem itself is the point of pride. It's not, you don't change the lyrics for effect.

The effect is the anthem. And I think she might've forgotten that. Unfortunately, the Liberal government seems to have given license to people to change the anthem in the words when it suits them because they did that. I think for no other reason except to appear inclusive. The anthem was not exclusive. It was our national anthem. By definition, it belongs to everyone.

And they decided a few years ago to change the lyrics. I don't sing them that way. That's a change that another generation is gonna have to pick up, but I'm set in my ways, I ain't changing. And so because they did it, a good friend of the show, Julie Black, did it once as well. She sounded terrific.

I wouldn't have done it. I actually, I believe I tweeted that I thought it was a beautiful change, but in retrospect, I don't subscribe to that. So I'd love to hear from you at 416-870-6400 or 1-triple-8-225-TALK, and let me know what you think. Is it ever okay to change the lyrics of the national anthem? Let's start with Mark.

Mark, welcome to the Ben Mulroney show. Oh, hi. How you doing, Ben? Well, thank you. Yeah, I just want to say the anthem is not musicians to change. It belongs to all of us. It's not there for people to insert their political opinions or their bias. It's not there to capture likes and social media to boost a fleeting music career. It's like you have one job, just sing the anthem,

wave, say thank you, and get off the stage. But every artist these days wants to insert their own spin on it, their political opinions. Well, I don't know if they all want to insert their political opinions. I do know that everyone wants to make it their own. I do not ascribe malice to Chantal at all. I think she's a proud Canadian

and thought what she was doing was a demonstration of that pride. And I think if I had to guess what her motivation was, she thought that this small change was a dig at Donald Trump that we would all appreciate. I personally think that the dig that he would get would be all of us singing in unison the words that we would all appreciate. I personally think that the dig that he would get would be all of us singing in unison

the words that we all know. Who do we have now? We've got Brad. Brad, thank you so much for calling into the show. Good morning, Ben. Pleasure to talk to you. Absolutely. I think you've echoed a bit of what I was thinking as well.

In my opinion, it's not acceptable to change the lyrics, the cadence, the pitch of any anthem. And these artists need to understand that this moment isn't about them. It's not their own personal concert, not to advance their career. It's about the nation. It's about the people who are in attendance who expect a certain rhythm and expect the lyrics. Like you can see in the footage, fans stumbling on word.

And it's a point of national pride when we really need that pride. And I think it was a very big misstep on her part. Yeah, and I have a lot of respect for her as well. So yeah, and I think we're singing from the same hymn book you and I, and also not to nitpick, but the first French lyric that she sang was wrong as well. So those first two lines, just it was, we stumbled out of the blocks. and as a nation singing the national anthem you sing as one by deaf. I'll say it again. It is the most inclusive thing we can do is to sing one song with one set of lyrics together.

Now granted the Canadian do all duopoly of English and French makes it all the more interesting. But you get my point. Let's say hi to Brooks. Brooks, thanks so much for calling in. Oh, hi, Ben. Thanks for taking my call. I'm a longtime listener, but first time caller. Thank you.

So first off, I agree with you that John Tao is an outstanding artist, and I love her music. Fantastic artist. No argument there. And just like all your other callers as well as you, I certainly do not agree with any changes to the national anthem, especially at sporting events that promote artists' agendas or personal opinions. It's just not the place to do it. Second of all, you don't see any other countries doing that. No other country changes their national anthem at a sporting event for personal opinion.

And lastly, I didn't agree with it like you when it was initially changed from all thy son's command. This dovetails nicely into your previous comment about liberal wokeism. And it's just something that shouldn't be done. Yeah, it was a change that didn't need to happen. Like I said, I mean, people take those lyrics to assume that somebody hears that and says, Oh, I'm not reflected in this because I'm not a son. You are missing the plot. You've lost the plot. That has nothing to do with that. The act of all of us standing together with the pride of our nation in our heart and

singing the lyrics together is is what matters that is what makes it inclusive. That's what makes it inclusive. Full stop. We got time for one more call. So let's say hi to Matt. She didn't have the right to alter our national anthem. She should never get a job in Canadian media again. And the Liberal government brought in a bill that would give you 25 years in jail for doing something like this. And wait, explain that, sir.

In their last bill, under the multimedia, you go against the government's wishes, you can go to jail for 25 years. Remember that one? Oh, sure, but with this government, I guarantee you they would subscribe to this, no problem. Government wishes change on a whim. Listen, five days ago they loved the carbon tax. So what they want and what they wish for, you never know from day to day.

But thank you so much for your call. Look, I'll say it one last time. I believe in her heart, she believed that she was doing something that was going to resonate, but because it missed the mark and didn't allow us to all sing the same words together, we as a nation stumbled out of the blocks. Fortunately, Team Canada took it back, finished in the way that we were all proud, and we all went to bed a little bleary eyed, little tired but very very proud of our boys so thank you so much

for calling. At Desjardins we speak business we speak startup funding and comprehensive game plans we've mastered made-to-measure growth and expansion advice, and we can talk your ear off about transferring your business when the time comes. Because at Desjardins Business, we speak the same language you do, business. So join the more than 400,000 Canadian entrepreneurs who already count on us, and contact Desjardins today.

We'd love to talk business.