The Bridge with Peter Mansbridge - The Battle For Bakhmut

Episode Date: March 7, 2023

Why are the Ukrainians so desperate to keep the battle for Bakhmut going when every analyst says it's a battle they can't win?  Brian Stewart takes us behind the frontlines to try to understand the strategy.   Plus, the China angle -- what is Beijing up to on Ukraine.  And on Endbits, the resistance to the growth of Dollar Stores.

And hello there, Peter Mansbridge here. You are just moments away from the latest episode of The Bridge, the battle for back moot. Why is it that the Ukrainians are so desperate to hang on to this city? And hello there, Peter Mansbridge in Stratford, Ontario. This is kind of like, you know, the morning after the day before kind of story. This initial one that I'm going to talk about, that, of course, was the Prime Minister last night, Justin Trudeau, announcing in a statement in a kind of brief news conference why he was choosing a certain route to look into the question of election interference. There have been many calls for him to have a full-blown public inquiry.

But he's rejected that idea all along. But he was clearly pressured into saying something. And so last night he announced this special rapporteur who would look into the election interference story, and he would, or she, would decide whether or not there should be a public inquiry. The special rapporteur would do that, not the prime minister. The special rapporteur appointed by the Prime Minister to decide whether there should be a public inquiry.

Special Rapporteur. I'm sure the proper definition of that term is is more important than it sounds. Special Rapporteur sounds like oh, that's the person who sits at the side of the room when others are doing all the work and writes down what they're doing. That's kind of like what a special rapporteur sounds like. But that's apparently not what it is.

So now the prime minister and his office have to find this person who is completely kind of bulletproof in terms of criticism. This person can't look like they're in the pocket of the PMO,

even though the PMO will appoint this person. Can't have any kind of political taint to them. Can't be, you know, like a former cabinet minister or a former MP. You know, unless, of course, there's somebody from one of the other parties. Which is, you know, possible, I guess.

Could be some former Tory cabinet minister. Could be a former judge. You know, governor general. It's going to be interesting to see how they determine who that is. And as my friend Rob Russo said on the air last night, obviously they don't have anybody yet, or they would have announced it yesterday. They've given themselves a few more days to find that person.

And whenever that happens, you know, what you want to hear is, well, how many people said no? You know, I'm not touching this. Is it what the opposition leader called a cover-up? Just another layer of cover on this story before we get an eventual answer, if ever? Or is it real? So that's what today's going to be about. There's going to be a lot of people coming out of the woodwork, whether it's opposition leaders or university professors or, you know, various analysts of different kinds, they're going to all have their take. So we're going to watch that carefully throughout this day.

And then tomorrow on Smoke, Mirrors, and the Truth, Bruce and I will talk about it as well as a few other things. There has been an enormous amount of pressure on the government to do something on this. Canadians are worried they concede that. Canadians want to believe the system is fair and just and accurate and can't be tampered with to the point where elections can be determined by outside influence,

not internal voting. So we'll talk about that tomorrow. But Tuesdays, as you know, Tuesdays are Brian Stewart days. Brian talks the Ukraine story and has done in a fabulous way over the last year and will continue on. So let's bring him in. Let's have our conversation on the war in Ukraine, the Russian invasion of Ukraine, more than a year old now. Here we go with my friend, your friend, war correspondent, foreign correspondent, Brian Stewart. So Brian, I'm checking my Axios feed,

the Axios news service feed, and they had an interesting story last week that dealt with how Americans in particular are following the war in Ukraine. And the headline is Americans grow numb as war in Ukraine drags on past the one year mark. Now, some of this was expected. Some of this we talked about last year. And you can see, you know, how interest, you know, had dropped by the middle of last year. But they're into another drop now and i wonder as somebody who's covered you know lengthy stalemate conflict

situations uh over the years what this tells you and what how we should react to it well yes i think peter some of this is anticipated uh You know, people have a lot of worries in their lives right now, a lot of other concerns. And keeping up with what's going on in Central Europe, even so fundamental a fight as this can sometimes seem a distraction to them. But I also think it comes down to a couple of other things. I mean, since the Cold War, America has triggered back a bit towards isolationism again. I mean, since the Cold War, America has trickled back a bit towards isolationism again. I mean, Trump certainly pumped that flag heavily. And the parties that used to be so united

on foreign affairs aren't as united now. But I also think there's another aspect to this. And I think Biden has not been selling the american position steadily enough and he's getting criticism from some democrats in this whole very matter that he does uh suddenly he'll do a trip to europe and he'll be in the news for two three days but he doesn't keep up a steady message uh and he's this sort of back and forth attitude that the U.S. government takes that, oh, no, we're not going to OK that weapon. Well, maybe we will after all. Yes. Now, maybe we will give it, but it'll take a year to go. As I think a lot of people in the public wondering,

do they know what they're doing? And B, is it that relevant to me? They don't seem to be very rushed. They don't seem to be very rushed. They don't seem to think that Ukraine needs the big weapons now. Why should it be our priority? So I think there's a mixed message. There's at times a weak message in the United States. It's much stronger in Britain, by the way, than it is in the United States. And I think that's a good part of it. But also one has to remember that isolationism has strong roots in America, and it doesn't take much to make it flourish again

when it sees an opportunity. But I would add, bottom line this to one aspect, I wouldn't expect support in Congress to collapse at all anytime soon. The reality is a lot of Republicans are even more hawkish than the Democrats and are attacking Biden now for not having done enough soon enough with enough serious material. So we still have a consensus in Congress in electing the United States backing the war. And I think that's going to certainly see out the next, well, to the next election, perhaps. There's no data on how Canadians are reacting to the continuation, you know, into a second year of this conflict. But we keep in mind a couple of things. One, there are a lot of Ukrainian Canadians who are focused on this issue

and trying to ensure that their governments are focused on it as well. A much higher percentage of Ukrainian Canadians than the Ukrainian Americans, and we should keep that in mind. The other thing is, too, there's been no evidence, at least on the part of this podcast. Now, we're not a newscast, and we should keep that in mind. The other thing is, too, there's been no evidence, at least on the part of this podcast.

Now, we're not a newscast, and so the daily news is one thing, but people, our listeners, have grown used to the fact that you're with us on Tuesdays. We talk about this issue from any number of different angles that we can, and the audiences have not dropped at all in more than a year since we started this, which is really, you know, is quite interesting. A tribute, obviously, to you and the way you've been kind of filling us in on this. But, you know, the audiences have, in fact, gone up, you know, over the year, and they've maintained that level now into this second year. So let's get to some of the issues that we're looking at this week. And one is the battle for Bakhmut.

And, you know, it's an interesting story because you kind of wonder why the Ukrainians are putting up such a fight for this. Nobody thinks they can win that particular city. But they are in it, and they're not leaving. They've had opportunities to back away. They haven't. Why? Indeed, and I think there's some indication the Pentagon were urging the Ukrainians to pull out of Backwoods some weeks ago, saying, you know, well, the going is good.

But the Ukrainians are, if anyone's not up with the news, they're sticking in there, even though they've only got one line of supply going in. And there's a real possibility that they could be encircled and cut off. Once you keep it in perspective, backwoods right in the center of the center, central front, there were two other Russian offensives underway, one in Luhansk to the north and one in Bolandar to the south. Both of those offensives were basically turned back. They, what we say in the military business, culminated. The Russians essentially ran out of steam after suffering enormously high casualties. Backwood is the central one,

and that's the one that obviously is most on Putin's mind, the Kremlin's mind, and several generals' mind. They must get it for the sake of Russian prestige. So for seven months, they have poured in attack after attack after attack. And really, it's the most extraordinary story because if they win backwood they don't really win that much uh and the ukrainians are saying wait a minute you know we can still fight on there and by fighting on rather than just escaping to fight at another uh front further

back further to the west we achieve several objectives every day they stay and fight degrades russia more they're losing an estimated six or seven to one in casualties so russia loses more every single day every day that russia fails having set us about to attack to to capture backwood and fails it loses in reputation and, enormous cost of manpower and material and morale. And also every day they're fighting there, they are basically, the Ukrainians fix the Russians. That's a military term, meaning they pin them down in that one spot. That means all these so-called elite units or Wagner Group commandos aren't able to fight in other fronts.

They're stuck fighting for Bakhmut, even though they seem at times to be losing their spirit. And a very important factor here, our military bloggers, mill blogs, I think they're called in Russia. These are these very pro-war, usually right-wing military analysts that are very popular in Russia. They have big audiences. And they're starting to see in the battle for Bakhmut that this invasion is not nearly as easy as we thought it was going to be.

When we were promoting this invasion, we didn't think it would be taking seven months to take really a no-account city of Backwood, barely 70,000 people. It's just barely a city, which has no real strategic advantage, and we can't seem to take it because the Ukrainians are fighting so fiercely. What happens if we takehmut and then we face hundreds of other Bakhmuts ahead of us? You know, is it going to be one more of these fights after another? This is a tremendously important message that Ukrainians want the Russians to be picking up. And staying there, even a great risk, really achieves that. Several military analysts in Russia now are saying they're worried. One of them

is Khodorkovsky, who's a very well-known militia leader, as well as a meal blogger, has said that he now worries that even if they take Bakhmut, they won't have enough. They will have culminated. They won't have enough strength to face the Ukrainianrainian offensive when it comes which is expected within the next month so that's why ukraine's staying in there i wouldn't be too surprised to see them slip out one night uh and very skillfully the same way the russians to give them credit rather skillfully uh snuck off in the southern front when it fell uh about, about a couple of months ago. So I think they might still, but I think they'll do a, uh, fighting withdrawal, which is, you know, block by block, house by house, make the Russians pay for every single square acre, uh,

hectare of the place. And then, you know, as Russians keep bombing into some not bombing so much as shelling every building into rubble. The rubble creates more and more hiding places for the Ukrainians to fight from, more defensive positions. It's a terrible environment fighting in cities. All right. Let me back you up a little minute because you talked a few moments ago about the Wagner group, the kind of private army group militia

that is fighting on the Russian side and was supposed to be one that was going to take hold quickly of situations that the Russian army couldn't have. Well, as you say, they haven't in Bakhmut. And you also gave us a hint that their their morale the wagner group their morale is down what do you know about that yeah in a way they're not hiding it because they're pregozian the the uh multi-millionaire head of it all is very vocal in his complaints he's saying look you sent them our wagner group in uh fight, and we're the best fighters.

We do fight much better than your regular army, as you know. And we did all this fighting, but now they're telling us they don't have ammunition, artillery to back us up. Now the fighting is getting harder and harder. We're getting less and less artillery support. We're beginning, or at least I'm beginning, to suspect that just possibly Russia has set us up to be the scapegoats if we don't take Bakhmut. If the Ukrainians can hold it and it becomes their kind of mini-Stellengrad, really. It's not a good analogy, but I'll take it for the moment. They become a big victory signal for the Ukrainians. We'll get blamed, the Wagner group, because we did all the fighting, couldn't break through.

We couldn't break through because Ukrainians are fighting so well, but also because you don't give us enough artillery. So he started criticizing more the regular army, which detests him. You know, he's attacking the head of the Russian Defense Department, who obviously detests him, too. So once you get an army that's falling out like this, it really is showing a bad state for both supplies, because they fight over who gets what supplies, but also morale must be really very low. When you're a soldier in the field in one way or another you're starting to hear your top generals hate each other and are fighting each other and but basically we'd rather be fighting that other general than the ukrainians if they could it's not all that great for already low

morale there's another fascinating part to this story around back mood and that is how the ukrainians are trying to entice the Russians, the basic level of Russian fighters, to come on over. It's better over here on this side. Now, you often hear about this in times of war, but it's a pretty sophisticated siren call that the Ukrainians are using. There are some armies that are good at it, and some are not good at all, and the Ukrainians are using. There are some armies are good at it and some are not good at all. And the Ukrainians are really exceptionally good.

Take in mind that the Ukrainian, the Russian soldiers on the Eastern Front live in miserable conditions. They're cold, they're muddy trenches. Their food is alleged to be even worse than you get in the Russian prison, which is pretty hard to imagine. But that's often claimed. And what the Ukrainians have been doing is showering the Russian soldiers with various messages.

Look, come on over, surrender. We've got, and they're showering menus now on the Russians because they know they're hungry. So the Russian picks up a leaflet or whatever, and it comes in and says, you surrender to us. We got a full menu for you, lovely hot food. And you know that Ukraine makes the best borscht in the world. It's hard to say it is better even than Russian borscht. We make borscht that's better than your mom or grandmother even made it. You just come on over here and

you'll get your lovely soup, warm soup, and you'll get on top of that the best beef raised anywhere in Central Europe. And you know, we've got great sports. We have soccer here. We've got basketball. And you can watch TV. You get a room. You get a board and lovely clean sheets.

And yes, what else? You don't have to pay rent. You don't have to pay maintenance. You just live here. Live off us. And they're telling sending numbers to Russian soldiers. If you want to come over, call this number and we will advise you on the safest route to come and how to do it properly. And one other aspect I really quite like, because I always worry about the receptions prisoners get when they come over across the side into another side. Do they get well handled or in fact do they disappear and the ukrainians apparently are offering soldiers their soldiers a bonus for the prisoners they bring in and especially high bonuses up to up to 500 it's rumored to bring in

a technician or an officer so that's a good incentive, I like to see. A whole different kind of war going on there. It is indeed. We talked last week about Putin and some strange moves that he seemed to be making last week. But this week again, it follows a couple of days where he's looked particularly down in some moments when he's been in the public eye yeah he looks like a man clearly who's got an awful lot of worries on his mind i mean zelensky has a lot of worries too maybe even more but he doesn't always show himself looking

fretful and worried but putin is really now very alarmed by the number of attacks that are taking place inside Russia. Not just the drones and not just attacks on airfields, which have been growing in number and knocking out some very expensive planes, but also mysterious fires that break out. And then last week, there was allegedly, allegedly by the Russians, rather, the Russians alleged that there was a mysterious attack on a city, Bryansk region in Western Russia by a Russian guerrilla volunteer group, anti-Putin Russian group that operates in Ukraine that came across the border and attacked in Bryansk, well inside Russia. And he went in, he addressed the federal security, the FSB, the great counterterrorism, counterespionage force in Russia, and gave it, laid it on the line that he wants this stopped. He wants the number one question they should be facing right now is to stop attacks over

the Russian border, be they drones or be they any kind of guerrillas coming in across the lines. And he's wanting to see they've upped the budget in Russia for the military services, but the special security in the military is $150 billion being boosted. Remember, Russia has to protect the largest frontier in the entire world. So this is going to start picking up a lot of Russian manpower, a lot of the defense budget, which is already running. I think it's a third of the entire budget is now on defense and security. So this is going to be another cost of the war.

It's also, though, of course, a worry for the Ukrainians because they know the Americans are particularly anxious not to see any attacks across that Russian border because they don't want that to lead to the kind of escalation we all worry about at times. All right, we're going to take a quick break, but there are two other areas I want to get into. One is China and the Ukraine war, and the other is Canada. We'll do that right after this. And welcome back. You're listening to The Bridge on a Tuesday. That means Brian Stewart. You're listening on Sirius XM, Channel 167, Canada Talks, or on your favorite podcast platform. All right, Brian, I want to talk about China, which is in the news on so many different fronts right now. But in terms of the Ukraine war,

a question has been raised a number of times in this last little while about, A, whether China has been supplying Russia with arms with any effect, or whether it could be about to supply Russia with arms. There have been suggestions from the Chinese themselves that they're considering that possibility. What is your sense on that story? Do you think they would do that? And if they did, what difference would it make?

Well, I think some supply, not a lethal weapon so much, but technology has also already been going across the border. They have a lot of technical skills, the Chinese, and they've been sending apparently navigation gear and jet parts and jamming devices to Russia, very low key. The real question is, well, Russia is going to need desperately as missiles and artillery shells and the rest of that, much more simple gear. And whether China will do that or not, if it does do it, I think it's going to try and do it as quietly as possible

because it doesn't really want the outcry that will follow. And I suspect it won't do it because they've got not a lot to gain and an awful lot to lose. There would be a reaction from the world. They have been warned of that'll be a serious reaction for a major trading partner this would be a trading nation in the world this would be a great blow sanctions would be applied um you know they have russia as it is now in a junior partner status but they want to keep it going strong because they want an ally. But, you know,

they're not unhappy to see Russia declining to some extent and becoming a junior partner rather than the old senior partner once was. So I don't think they will. But I must say, the more China comes into the news, the more other nations are reminded, look, Ukraine's vitally important at the moment. It's critical, but we have to be spending more attention on China because it is just building itself militarily up by phenomenal leaps and bounds. I mean, its military budget is $225 billion a year, and that's thought to be an understatement of the budget it goes up by sometimes 10 every year and their technology gap they're starting to open up as is stupendous in certain areas they're doing magnificent work on missiles on fighter planes and they're becoming more and more determined to face down uh the outside world

the west uh let's say uh by by each passing month it seems so i think you know the problem with the china thing is not so much weapon weapons going into russia it's the fact that it's going to start start taking a lot of attention away in moscow and in berlin and in london uh as they start talking about you know we have to start looking to asia a lot more than we have been in the last year because of ukraine you know conventional conventional wisdom has been that because russia has clearly been embarrassed by uk Ukraine in this situation over the last year, that it would make China think twice or back completely off any idea of invading Taiwan. I'm not so sure anymore.

I mean, the way the Chinese talk, it doesn't sound like they're any less concerned about trying to bring Taiwan into their fold than they were a year ago. What's your read on that? I'm not sure I have a very good read on it. I do know the Chinese are extremely skilled at placing problems and challenges down the road a bit. Taiwan is going to be something they're not addressing right now, but they're preparing for a major war in Asia if it comes. In the meantime, they're doing high-tech development that is scaring them.

It blazes out of a lot of the military, Western military, and they can say to themselves, look, four years from now, five years from now, we'll see how the Ukraine-Russia matter turned out. We'll see how divided America is again by its electoral system, and its tendency to run around being nonsensical at times. And we'll see if Europe has gone back to being as divided as it used to be. Then we will make key decisions regarding Taiwan. But I think they look at what a defending country

can do with high tech, what Ukraine could do against Russia. And they have to think, you know, we must acknowledge that if we attack Taiwan to bring it to heel, we are going to take heavy casualties because there's no way we can put together an invasion force 140 miles away or something and sail it secretly over without it being running into missiles and all manner of defenses. So I think they take it much more seriously. Well, they do take it seriously, even in statements, but they're doing a lot of serious thinking about it, and they do have a lot of concerns on their hands just how easy a target that would be.

It seems a yet harder target the more the lessons of Ukraine goes on. All right, last point is about Canada. With much fanfare, we announced we were sending a number of our Leopard 2 tanks over to Ukraine to help them in the fight. They're desperate for Leopard 2 tanks, one of the best in the world. We've sent at least one so far. And there are also indications in the last week or so that the Ukrainians have moved some Leopard 2s into Ukraine for the fight against the Russians. Any indication of whether that's one of the Canadian ones? It's not clear. The Canadian government has been, again, traditionally shy about talking about its military gifts and what have you.

But yes, we have a leopard over there. Whether it went into Ukraine, I don't know, because it may be used for training. But there are at least, rumor to be, 10 to 12 inside Ukraine. And one of the good things is Canada offering its four. I mentioned this before. In the way they do it now in NATO. They go one country goes out. We get four. Can you give some? So now Spain, as I predicted, they would have given six.

So that means Canada is for Spain. Six comes up to 10. That's one tranche of leopard. And that's a good that's a good give. That would be very, very effective in the major fighting to come. And so I think Ukraine is not going to get anything like the number of tanks it wants, but it is going to get a substantial number. And we're going to see how that works out in the spring and in the summer. All right. We're going to leave it there for this week.

Brian Stewart with us. And Brian, thanks so much, as always, for your insight on this conflict. Thank you, Peter. And of course, Brian will join us again next Tuesday on The Bridge. Look forward to it. All right, time for some in bits. We've got two of them today. And, you know, I live in a small town, right, in Stratford, Ontario. It's actually a city, 32,000, 33,000 people.

I'm not sure if it's still the case, but in Ontario, it used to be that if you were more than 20,000 people, you were a city, as opposed to a town or a village or what have you. I'm not sure if that's still the case. It certainly is in terms of Stratford, because we are a city, city of Stratford. But like a lot of small communities of that size, something has happened in the local business world. And as I said, like a lot of others, you know, across the country,

you may well have noticed it. I haven't seen anything written about this phenomenon that's been happening. And especially happening since the pandemic hit. But I did see this piece just published the other day in the New York Times. I'm not going to read you the headline because I'll give it away right away. So instead, I'm going to read the first few lines. Morgan, Minnesota, a city of about 800 people, has two restaurants, several churches, a grain elevator,

and one small grocery store that sells ribeye steaks that, according to the mayor, are the best around. The mayor, Jerry Huris, 76, is protective of that lone grocery store, a family business that dates back many generations and operates in a downtown dotted with empty storefronts. So when he got wind in late 2020, the Dollar General was planning to open a store near the town,

inside the town limits, that this fast-growing national discount chain was known for undercutting local grocers with its low prices. Mr. Huris vowed to prevent that outcome in Morgan. Armed with a petition signed by more than 100 people, Mr. Huris was direct in addressing the developer seeking zoning approval to build the Dollar General. We just don't want your store, Mr. Huris, a Republican recalled telling him. Morgan is part of a movement of municipalities across the United States that have pushed back against the dollar store industry's rapid growth during the pandemic.

Since 2019, at least 75 communities have voted down proposed dollar stores, while roughly 50 have enacted moratoriums or other broad limits on dollar store development, according to a new report by the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, an organization that is critical of corporate retailers and their impact on communities. Now, I mentioned that the mayor was a Republican, but I'll tell you, this crosses party lines in the states. When you look at all the different communities involved, some are Republican, some are Democrat, but they're united in this concern about the impact that dollar stores have had

on their local business communities. Says Stacey Mitchell, who's the executive director or the co-executive director of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, as divided as Americans are politically, there's remarkable agreement that too much of what passes as legitimate business models is in fact fundamentally destructive and unfair. Federal policy makers have led big corporations run amok. Cities and towns of all stripes have learned that if you want to protect your community, you have to do it yourself. So what impact has all this had on dollar stores?

Not much, it seems. The dollar store's growth, this is according once again to the New York Times, the dollar store's growth shows no sign of abating. With inflation still high, discount stores are attracting budget-conscious customers. In the end, financial analysts say consumer interest will be the biggest driver of whether the stores continue to spread.

Sales are strong, said Shannon Warner, a partner in the consumer and retail practice of Kearney, a global strategy and management consulting firm. Consumers are voting for dollar stores with their wallets. So is that happening here too? In Canada, on this side of the border, are you seeing the growth of dollar stores? And is there a debate within your community about is this a good thing or a bad thing?

The impact that it's having on local stores is funny because 10 years ago, the issue was Walmarts. Well, Walmart's going to kill the local business industry. And that was certainly one of the issues here in the Stratford area when Walmart moved in. And there was some evidence of that. Well, I don't have the actual stats for my town or your town or communities across Canada, but I can see

with my eyeballs that there are more dollar stores here now than there were five years ago. And I can see with my eyeballs that there's been an impact for a variety of reasons on the local business community with stores getting shuttered. Now, some of that was the pandemic, clearly. Driven by the pandemic, people didn't shop, stores went out of business, and restaurants in some cases. So that's food for thought, as we say,

and I'm sure some of you are going to write in about that. Now, here's my last story, my last end bit for today. I love this story. This is a story about the human drive to help. The human drive to do something that matters. The human drive to show heart. This one comes out of Philadelphia. And you'll excuse me if I tell you it was written on a Fox News site.

Philadelphia. There's the byline. Here's the story. A Philadelphia doctor took matters into his own hands, or more accurately, his own feet, to get an organ donation to a patient on time. Dr. Adam Bodson, a surgeon at Jefferson Hospital in Center City, was scrubbed and ready to perform a liver transplant last fall when he learned that the vehicle transporting the organ was stuck in traffic. To make the situation more difficult, roads surrounding the hospital were

nearly impassable due to thousands of runners participating in the Philadelphia Marathon. We tried every which way to get them across, Dr. Bodson said. The driver talked to multiple police officers about potential access points. Unfortunately, despite that, the driver was unable to get across those lines. Still dressed in his white lab coat and scrubs, Dr. Batson ran for half a mile, weaving between marathon runners to retrieve the liver his 66-year-old patient desperately needed. I'd flagged down a police officer

before I crossed the marathon, thankfully, who agreed to drive me back if I can get the liver, Dr. Batson said. I think people are probably looking at me a little more odd carrying the box through. Charles Rowe, the patient who was prepped and ready for surgery that day, had no idea, thank God, about Dr. Bodson making that run for it until the day after his successful operation. You imagine you're lying on the bed, you're all prepped, ready to slice open, and they say, well, actually, we have a problem.

We don't have the liver. But don't worry, Dr. Bodson has just run across town to get it. It's blocked by traffic. But he'll get it, and he'll bring it it back and we'll pop it in there. No problem. Can you imagine if you're lying on the bed, on the gurney or whatever it is? Here's what Charles Rose said. He's amazing.

He's a really amazing doctor. He went beyond the call of duty. No kidding. I guess he has a cape on under that white jacket. Patient's doing great. Doctor's doing great. Doctor's a hero in his town. He should be. You know, when I hear about people saying the country's broken, and lots of different people say that, right? It's not broken. The country survives because people like that doctor in Philadelphia, and we have the same kind of people,

the people who do the jobs that you don't normally hear about. This happened last fall. It's just coming out now. You could take the argument, oh, the country's broken because Philadelphia let its streets get tied up. Or you could say the country's not broken because there are guys like that doctor who say,

I'm going to save my patient. I don't care what it takes. And what it took in that case was that he ran halfway across town so he could find the vehicle that had that liver in a box ready to go to the hospital to put in the patient's body.

As I said, I love that story. It's a great story. And the images, you can imagine. You can see it in your mind, right? You can see what happened. From that moment that the doctor in the OR said, where the hell is the liver? We're ready to do this.

And somebody says, well, you know, it's stuck on the other side of town. The doctor could have just said, well, that's that. I'm moving on to the next patient on whatever his crisis or her crisis is. But no. He said, out of the way, I'm running. Tell me where it is, where they're stuck. And he got it. And thankfully, a police officer who said, you know, this is important.

I'm going to help this guy. Got him back. There we go. Those are the people that make our communities work, no matter what the challenge is. All right, that wraps it up for today. Tomorrow, Smoke Beer is the Truth. Bruce Anderson will be by.

We'll talk, as you heard earlier, we'll talk about the events in Ottawa yesterday and a couple of other things too that I want to touch base on with Bruce. And tomorrow's edition is also on our YouTube channel. Thursday, it's your turn and the random ranter, so get your letters in. The Mansbridge Podcast at gmail.com.

The Mansbridge Podcast at gmail.com, themansbridgepodcast at gmail.com. And Friday, Chantal returns from her trek across Iceland for Good Talk with Bruce. That's it for this day. I'm Peter Mansbridge. Thanks so much for listening. We'll talk to you again in 24 hours.