The Bridge with Peter Mansbridge - The Weekend Special #22 - Enjoy!

Episode Date: August 14, 2020

Lots of your ideas on The Race Next Door.

and hello there Peter Mansbridge here once again with the latest episode of the bridge daily it's Friday that means the weekend special here for week 22 every week when I do that week number, I still can't believe we're still at this point in these bridge dailies as we've kind of plotted the course through the back and forth, the ups and downs, and a lot of downs with the story of COVID-19. Plus other stories getting added along the way as we watch the U.S. election, as we watch the Canadians' political situation

with the government, you know, fighting yet another scandal, now the we controversy still plaguing the direction of the Trudeau government. However, the big story is still COVID-19. Obviously, it's the big story with so many people impacted and affected and so much of our way of life impacted and affected by the fight against a deadly worldwide virus. All right. The weekend special this weekend coming to you from Quebec and coming from you from this little vacation spot. Lucky enough to have one. I know many Canadians pride themselves in the ability to get to cottages in the summers, either their own or their friends' cottages or ones they rent. But many other Canadians who, of course, don't have that opportunity and make way with vacations of a different sort.

Some driving around the country this year, and I've heard from many of you who are trying to make that, make it a go of traveling the country, which is all part of trying to help out the tourism business. Remember, one in ten jobs in Canada is somehow related to tourism. They are taking a big hit this year. Obviously, nobody coming into the country to tour around, to spend tourist dollars. And so therefore, the opportunity exists for Canadians to help Canadians on the tourist front. And I know many

of you are doing that when you're able to, and good for you. Yesterday I talked about passing the Big Apple on the way from Toronto up to Ottawa and then into Quebec to head up towards the Gatineau Hills where I am this weekend. Now on the way way, I passed one of those landmarks, or at least a landmark for me, which is the Big Apple on the south side of the 401, you know, about an hour and a half outside of Toronto, heading east. The Big Apple had a mask on, which was pretty neat,

and a lot of you reacted to that, including Deborah Sacrob. She reacted to it by sending a picture of her own from the tree, I guess, either on her front lawn or back lawn. But her tree has a mask. And that's the cover art for today, is Deborah's picture from her own location from her own home did she tell us where it's from I have to flip back and forth on my laptop it's very orderly fashion not so much this time because I don't have a printer here.

But I do have my laptop, so I'm able to get you. No, Deborah doesn't mention where she's writing from. But wherever she's writing from, she's got a mask on her tree, I guess, on her lawn. And good for you. Keeping in mind how many people are wearing masks diligently. Some are still fighting that. You know, I don't want to call it a restriction. It's not a restriction. It is just basic good common sense and good common health, the wearing of a mask. But I know some people are still fighting that. Hopefully at some point we'll all get together on the wearing of masks.

Now, I was taken to task a little bit on my mention of the Big Apple, not about the Big Apple itself, but about the fact that I did say I've been passing it for whatever, 20, 25 years, as long as it's been there, and I've never stopped at the Big Apple. And I guess that's a legitimate criticism. I probably should do that, and I've now pledged that I will at some point

but you know what it's like when you get on the road and you're heading to a spot and you don't want to get waylaid here or there you just sort of keep plowing along and keep going well maybe I should make some time if for no other reason than the fact that Mike Zaks wrote to me and said, among other things that he said, he did say, you should stop. It's the best apple pie at a reasonable price in Ontario. Well, just hearing that is probably reason to stop.

Do they put a little, like, vanilla ice cream on top as well, if you ask? I'll have to find out. Okay, moving on. And keep in mind, with all my letter reading that I do on the weekend special, I never, you know, there is no sort of kind of preordained order in these. And I don't read all of the letters. I just read parts of some of the letters. And occasionally I'll read one full letter near the end. So we'll have to wait and see how that goes. Because literally on some of these, I'll be looking at them for the first time. There was a lot of reaction I know to the Race Next Door, the special podcast within a podcast that Bruce

Anderson and I started on the Bridge Daily. It was on Tuesday I think of this week. Not sure which day we'll do it next week. But there's a lot of reaction and responses to my requests that you know give us some ideas of things you want to talk about. I wasn't planning to read some of these, but there's some good things to be thinking about, for all of us to be thinking about. And I'll, you know, obviously mention them to Bruce and we'll keep them in mind as we move forward over the next, you know, 10 or 12 weeks, whatever it is, until the U.S. election. Bill Shearhart from Grand Bend, Ontario. He writes, would it be possible or practical during a federal

provincial state election for all political advertising to be filtered through a fact checking process? Clearly, opinion advertising would not fall under this scrutiny, but it seems to me that when a candidate makes factual statements in his or her advertising, an independent, tax-supported, third party should fact-check the advertising before it's released. Candidates now must approve their on-air advertising as part of the advertisement, so it seems to me that the factual accuracy of the advertisement should be a requirement as well.

Perhaps you and Bruce could weigh in on that. Well, you know, the media has accepted this as part of their responsibility, and you see on occasion fact checks that are done by different media organizations. It certainly happens in Canada, at fact-checking the ads that are out there and making it clear when they're not accurate. But you're taking it one step further, Bill,, I don't have anything against that idea. You know, it, it would be yet another expense to the election process, but it may well be a very worthy, uh, expense in that a third party, an independent third party looks at the ads and declares whether or not they're accurate. It may prevent them from being on the air. Depending on where that fact-checking process comes into play, does it come into play before their broadcast or after? But I think there's,

obviously, it would be beneficial to voters if they knew that what they were seeing was accurate or not. So I'll talk to Bruce about that as well. David Oliver writes, another familiar listener to us, Bruce mentioned that there's a danger when your opponent is a woman to appear to be dismissive of women in general. And he mentions the example of the late premier of Alberta, Jim Prentiss, and what he said about difficulties surrounding math to Rachel Notley in the middle of the debate. And he got taken apart for that comment. And he goes on. But I think in general, he also talks you know, he talks about some of the

things Trump said to Clinton in the debates of 2016. And he's just wondering if Bruce or I would like to comment on this phenomenon and whether you think it's still relevant this time around. And I think it is relevant, and already we're seeing it played out with some of Trump's, you know, outrageous, racist, sexist comments about Kamala Harris and her position on the Democratic ticket. But I'll mention that one to Bruce as well. We got one from Christopher Wolf. Let's see where Christopher is writing from. I don't think he says.

Now, he had actually, there's a lot of things in his letter. I read this one an hour or so ago, and there's actually quite a few things in it. So I'm just going to read one of them, one of the points he makes out. My biggest concern about the race next door is what I call alternate reality politics. It's because of this that I feel Trump has a greater chance of winning in November, despite what people may think now. The only thing predictable about 2020 is its unpredictability. You may be right there. In spite of what we're seeing in the various polls that are out that have Biden with a fairly significant lead,

we'll definitely talk about polls and which polls to actually look at and consider and which to ignore and whether we should be looking at national race numbers at all anyway um we'll talk about that with bruce in uh in one of the podcasts and one of the race next doors in the coming weeks but on your basic point christopher that the only predictable thing about 2020 is its unpredictability. I think that makes a lot of sense. Lots of other comments in Christopher's note as well, but we want to move on.

Let's see. Carolyn Black has some ideas here for the race next door a couple of things i'm wondering about that may be topics for the race next door if trump loses and either contests the election or refuses to leave the white house who's running the u.s if a dispute is underway what powers does trump continue to have and for how long? Could Trump impose executive orders such as tariffs? What impacts are expected in Canada if Trump contests the election? And she goes on, it's very justified that our opinions on Trump are very negative. I'm making a conscious effort to try to see some good in everyone.

So far, I haven't succeeded with Trump. I assume at some point you'll be talking about the Republican and Democratic platforms, what good things, equality, human rights, environmental, left-of-center ideals, has Trump done in the last four years that could be used to help strengthen his campaign and draw some voters into his camp. Right. We'll consider all of that, Carolyn. In terms of when he leaves office, by law, he has to leave office if he loses the election, whether he contests it or not, on the 20th of January.

Now, if it ends up in a court battle, the courts will determine how the country should be governed. I believe that's the way it works, if it goes beyond the 20th of January. But during the period after the election, up until the 20th of January, and that's a period of a couple of months, he's still the president, and he can enact, no matter what the outcome of the election was, he can enact whatever laws he's able to enact at that time, during that time. So tariffs could be one of them. Anyway, that's my understanding of how it works. Okay, I remembered this letter.

I'm going to save it for the end because I like it a lot. Howard Gall wrote, he was concerned about the, he loved The Race Next Door, but he was concerned about the audio quality, the kind of difference between Bruce's audio and my audio, and the imbalance between the two. And we're working on that. As I've told all of you before, this is kind of a one-man band operation. This is not some expensive studio operation that's run by one of the broadcast networks.

This is just me. On this one, I'm just talking into my phone and then pushing it through a podcast service provider, and magically somehow it ends up on your phone. But it's pretty simple technology that I've got. Certainly for a remote broadcast like this, it's a little more involved when I get at home in Stratford or in Toronto, where I've got a mini kind of studio set up in my office. But still, it's all very basic. But we will work on that and try to make that audio quality better for the race next door.

None of you should be shy about writing when you have issues like that and concerns like that. Do, do, do. Moving down here. Pat Provo writes, perhaps we could start a discussion on wintering with COVID-19. Winter picnics, anyone?

Could be difficult to include my 95-year-old mother. Thanks for your consistent presence in our online lives. You know, it's still the middle of August, Pat. Do we really have to think about winter already? But we can be thinking about ideas, you know, and obviously picnics and the ability to be outdoors, still socially distant, still being extremely careful and wearing masks when necessary.

But the opportunity for families and small groups to be able to get out and picnic has been a wonderful part of the summer in a year of so many difficulties that we've been confronted with. So how are we going to capture that kind of spirit in the winter? Winter picnics, that's tough, but not impossible, you know, on, on, on reasonable days. But, uh, we'll start thinking about that. If we're, if we're still doing this podcast in the winter, we're probably going to have to come up with some ideas, right? Uh, a number of you wrote letters of condolence for me in terms of the Leafs. But you know what?

We're not going to talk about that. We are going to focus on the excitement that's out there for hockey fans who live in Vancouver and Calgary and Montreal who still have chances in the Stanley Cup. Long way to go. Man, we got a long way to go through the Stanley Cup playoffs. But the fact that we still have three teams from Canada in it always gives us hope, right?

Always gives us hope. Jim Stewart from Cambridge, Ontario. Here's what he writes. What a great idea you and Bruce Anderson have to devote time in your podcast to cover the run-up to the U.S. election in November. I'm not one to tell you what to examine. You just know that means he's going to tell us what to examine. I'm not one to tell you what to examine as you both are far more capable of that than me. Not necessarily, But I will express my concerns on two items. First, the issue of mail-in ballots as part of the larger topic of

potential voter suppression. I have a great concern with what's happening with the changes of the U.S. Postal Service, with the installation of a postmaster general who is a long-term GOP supporter, and in particular to the so-called Friday Night Massacre involving staff reallocations and an appearance of greater centralized control, plus the possibility of increasing postage on mail in ballot mailings. It all sounds suspicious. I suspect Donald Trump has a host of methods of strangling votes that might oppose him, and the U.S. Postal Service may well be a good place to start. Secondly, that of the vote preference in swing states. Will that be an issue you will follow?

Are polls in swing states readily available to examine? On the second one, yes, we absolutely will be looking at that, and yes, there are polls available to examine, especially for Bruce to look at, because as a pollster himself, especially for Bruce to look at, because as a pollster himself, he knows what to look for. On your first point about the U.S. Postal Service, I have two thoughts on this. Obviously, it presents a potential problem.

But secondly, and these are two things to keep in mind, that Republican Party Trump supporter that Trump put in charge of the Postal Service, I think I heard this right, but I believe he's married to the person that Trump is nominating as the next ambassador to Canada from the United States. So this is an interesting issue that you've got. This guy who may have an impact on how the vote is distributed in the United States through the Postal Service,

is also the husband of potentially the next ambassador from the U.S. to Canada. I actually heard a U.S. senator, Democrat, a senator or a congresswoman, say this morning that that presented a conflict that meant one or both of them couldn't apply or couldn't have the jobs they had. I don't know whether that's true, but it's interesting. But here's the other point I have. I'm worried about this postal issue that it's a distraction. Is it a problem? It is a potential problem. Is everybody on side with Trump on the Republican Party about this? No, they're not. And they're fighting it too. And they're upset with what 165,000 Americans are dead because of the miscalculation

and the just absolutely disastrous handling in the United States of the COVID-19 issue. And every day that Trump can have people talking about something other than that is a day he probably considers a victory. So I worry a little bit about that. But we will definitely Let's see here. Okay. Okay. B.D. McMillan from White Rock, B.C. writes about hockey. She's obviously a Canucks fan, and she kind of echoes the points I was making a little bit earlier.

Look, unfortunately the Leafs and the Jets and the Oilers, all who should have been in the playoffs, all lost in that qualifying round, which is unfortunate. But we still have three teams there, and as Bonnie writes, the Canadian teams have done us all proud this week, and I look forward to what the coming week will bring. And for me and possibly for many others, hockey has been the best medicine to fight the adverse effects of COVID fatigue.

Kind of feels like I have my bounce back. Yeah, well, your team's winning. A lot easier to feel bouncy than. Anyway, Bonnie, thank you. Okay, it's time for the last letter. And so I go back, scroll my way back up the list of letters that have come in. This one came in a couple of days ago. Let me find it here. Here it is.

It's a nice letter. It is from Alex Mekla in Thunder Bay, Ontario. And, okay, well, why don't I just read it? If you check your podcast analytics, you'll find that one of your favorite listeners, my 90-year-old mom, Pearl, is no longer streaming the podcast from Marco Island, Florida.

And I should just add here, when Alex says you, you know, if you're looking at your podcast analytics, I actually can look up, I can't find, you know, who specifically is listening, but I can find location. And the last time I checked, you know, there were, I think, over 140 countries now where people were listening to, or people had listened at one time or another, to the Bridge Daily. And then it lists every community in the world where somebody has been listening. And so it would show Marco Island in those analytics. Of course, it wouldn't show your mom Pearl in particular,

but it would show that at least one person in Marco Island, Florida, was listening. Anyway, back to Alex's letter, because he's now saying that it wouldn't show up anymore. In May, while Canada was still in a complete lockdown, Florida began their disastrous reopening. I knew immediately that I had to get my mom back home to Canada, as most Floridians weren't taking the virus seriously. What to do? I could not drive across the border to get her, and the Canadian Airlines had shut down all their flights from the U.S. to Canada. My solution was to fly her to Minneapolis. I hired a taxi service to meet her at the airport baggage claim. A five-hour highway journey to the

Pigeon River border crossing was next. We rendezvoused in the parking lot at the Canada Customs, and I then took over the responsibility of driving her to Thunder Bay another hour away. So all summer long, my mom has been safely isolating with me at my home on Lake Superior, but now our situation is getting her to the final destination, to her home in beautiful Victoria, British Columbia. I'm conflicted as to the best means of travel from Ontario to BC. How does one safely travel across Canada these days during a pandemic. Should one risk air travel? That would mean four different airports flying east from Thunder Bay to Toronto to get to the west coast. It would be a 12 plus hour journey with connecting flights in Toronto and Vancouver and no vacant middle seat. Or should one risk driving across Canada? That'll be a four-day

journey with three overnight hotel stays and the various pitfalls of stopping along the way, including finding any public restrooms. I wish to get her home before the fall and before a possible second wave of the virus. She's welcome to stay here longer, but I know she would not tolerate the long, cold winters in the lakehead. I'm curious about any thoughts or insight. Well, the situation is we find ourselves in now, right? What are we going to do with Pearl? First of all, Alex added a picture of Pearl on the balcony. I guess this is from their home in Thunder Bay or nearby. It must be very close to Thunder Bay because I'm sure I'm looking at, in the background, the Sleeping Giant, that island off Thunder Bay and the waters of Lake Superior.

It's a great picture. It was a beautiful day that the picture was taken. Nice blue sky, blue water, and a very happy-looking Pearl. All right, what are we going to do with Pearl? Well, you know, Alex, if you're still willing to drive a bit but not willing to drive right across the country, could you not drive her from Thunder Bay to Winnipeg, a drive I've taken many times,

including in my early days as a reporter based in Winnipeg and traveling the Northwestern Ontario route I was kind of responsible for that chunk of the country and I used to go drive from Winnipeg to Thunder Bay it's a long drive but I've done it many times if you drove to Winnipeg could she not get on a plane in Winnipeg and fly to Vancouver? Or should cut down some of the back and forths? I think you don't have a problem at the Ontario-Manitoba border getting in and out. I think. You could be wrong about that, but I don't think you do.

Anyway, that's one possible solution. You know, I don't know. It's going to involve air travel one way or the other, and, you know, I'm getting a lot of mail from people who have been on planes lately. And while it's not 100% positive, it's probably 90% positive. Some people have had bad experiences, but most have not. They said it's been okay.

Even in situations where the plane has been full, it's been okay. Uncomfortable, perhaps, but it turned out fine. Will there be exceptions to that? I'm sure there will be. But it sounds to me like Pearl is a pretty amazing person. She certainly looks it in the picture, but if she made her way up from Marco Island all the way to Minneapolis, then got in the picture, but if she made her way up from Marco Island all the way to Minneapolis and got in a cab, you know, sounds to me like she's a pretty together person who could handle a little challenge on the route from Thunder Bay to home in Victoria. Anyway, I'm sure others may have some ideas as well as to how you can handle this,

but thank you for the letter, Alex. I loved reading it. I loved the story, and I really loved that picture. It's a great picture. All right, folks, that's going to wrap up the From the Lakeside from the remote location in the Gatineau Hills north of Ottawa, but in Quebec. A special edition of the Weekend Special for Week 22.

Another big week coming. I'm not sure which day we'll do the race next door next week, but we will do it. So listen, have a great weekend wherever you are. Try to enjoy yourselves and try to keep in mind, as we always say, as you say, as I say, keep your masks on. Wash your hands. Keep distant.

Keep socially distant. Act smart. Act smart. And be kind. Stay safe. We'll talk again on Monday. day.