The Bridge with Peter Mansbridge - Winter's Here -- Finally.

Episode Date: December 1, 2020

From snow arriving to the minute on time, to the approval rating for how your premier is handling Covid. We've got it all on the pod today.

and hello there peter mansbridge here with the latest episode of the bridge daily for this tuesday of week 38 and boy did we get the big snow dump last night here in Stratford, Ontario. The first big one of the winter. And it's pretty out there as I look out the window. Here in Stratford, out on our street, and the trees are still covered with last night's snow. Kind of dripping, you know. It's cold enough that the snow's not melting, but it looks like they're kind of dripping off the branches, right? Street's a mess. Sidewalks are a mess.

That's all going to get cleared up as the day goes on. Here's the funny story about this. I mean, it is December. Happy December, by the way. It is December, so, you know, we should be getting snow. And hopefully it'll hang around for a white Christmas, seeing as we're all going to be indoors looking out. But here's the funny part.

You may recall last week, I think it was last week, I told you that we were having our roof done by a great fella from Mitchell, just down the highway, 20-25 minutes away. Brad runs one of the best roofing businesses in this part of the province. Very local. Like to shop local.

Anyway, Brad came by. I'd finally decided in kind of October that it was time to do our roof. It hadn't been done in more than 20 years, and there were patches that clearly were issues. So Brad came over to have a look at it. And I said, what are the chances of getting it done this year? And he says, Ooh, it's getting a little late and I'm still on a couple of projects. He said, but I think we can give it a try. And then he called me two weeks ago and he said, okay, I've got a window, and I'm looking at the long-term weather forecast,

and I think we can do it. I'm pretty sure we can do it. Maybe a couple of rain days, we won't be able to work, but we're going to stay clear of the snow. So I said, great. And in they came, and they worked, and they were great. They were like a really good crew. Roofing's a messy business, as any of you who've done it know,

but they were terrific in making sure that things were cleaned up and tidied. But here's the neat part. So Saturday, it looked like they might finish on Saturday, but on Saturday they said, we can't quite get it done because it's going to rain this afternoon and we're going to need to come in on Monday morning to finish off one major patch of the roof. I said, okay. He said, it's going to be dicey because it's supposed to snow on Monday. So here's the deal.

Yesterday, they were here bright and early, quarter to eight in the morning, up on the roof, doing their thing. They finished the whole project finally at three o'clock yesterday afternoon. At 3.05, it started to snow. This snowfall that I'm looking out the window at now started at 3.05 yesterday afternoon, and it's still snowing. But Brad nailed it. He got it right in there.

He said, I think I can fit it in a window. And he fitted it in the window. And, you know, obviously, if things hold up on the new roof, I'll be a very happy guy. Not so happy when I get the bill, but happy that it got done. And they were good guys who do work very hard on a difficult job. So I thought I'd give him that plug, but I love the timing of it. I think that it barely put the last tool away and the snow started. Okay, as I told you yesterday, Bruce is going to join us tomorrow for the latest results of an abacus data study that will be released tomorrow

on Canadians' attitudes towards the vaccine, right? When they expect it, whether they'll take it, and how happy or not they are with the way it's rolling out. So those are all important data points. And, I mean, we've had this discussion about polling before, and I'm not the best fan of polling at all times, but at this time, it does give us some sense of Canadians' attitudes. And if you believe in the accuracy and the methodology

in which these polls are done, this particular one's abacus, got a great reputation. So does Angus Reid. And Angus Reid and our friend Shachi Curl came out with a new survey today, and it relates to the Premier's, the First Minister's performances on COVID-19, on the coronavirus, on the pandemic. And it's interesting to see what Shachi's put out, because the numbers, you know, the numbers were very strong for the premiers in the spring and the way they were handling

the situation. They're still pretty strong in the sense that eight of the ten of them have majority numbers in terms of how the public in their province thinks they're doing. The majority of the public think they're doing an okay job. They're approving their job. At the top of the list, they're doing an okay job. They're approving their job. At the top of the list, they've all come down a little bit, okay? But still, if you're over 50%, that's pretty good.

So at the top of the list, you've got the premier of BC and the premier of Quebec. Interesting, both are having tough times right now. Especially Premier Horgan in BC. He's just come out of an election victory. The timing was smart because they're having a difficult time with COVID right now. Anyway, he's sitting at 64%. So is Premier Legault in Quebec. Those are big numbers um premier higgs

and new brunswick's at 63 uh premier mcneil and nova scotia's at 62 and premier moe and saskatchewan's at 61 then the numbers start and all those numbers are like within a few points of where they were in the spring. They're down. They're all down a bit. But they're still. Anything in the 60s, you know, is pretty good. Anything in the 50s is pretty good. But in the 50s are two premiers who were doing much better than this in the spring.

Doug Ford of Ontario was up near 70%. I think he was 69% in the spring. He's at 55% on this latest poll by Angus Reid. Premier Fury in Newfoundland is at 53% he's the new kid on the block but he's at 53% now there are two premiers who cannot be happy with how they're doing because their numbers are not good

and so we'll have a look at them, they're both in the west and and so we'll have a look at them. They're both in the West, and second last place, sorry, I was just rolling up the screen here to get the right numbers, is Jason Kenney of Alberta, and Alberta has been in difficult straits in these last month or so with astronomical new case numbers. And it has chipped away at his approval rating in his province.

In the spring, it was one of the lowest ones, but it was at 61%. Well, it's dropped more than 20 points since then. It's been a steady decline for Jason Kenney. And right now it's sitting at 40% approval. That's a long way from 61%. But it's better than two provinces over in Manitoba, where Brian Pallister, the conservative premier of Manitoba, is on a precipitous drop. In the spring, he was at 44%.

And right now, he's at 44%. And right now, he's at 32%. So he's dropped 10 points, 12 points. Actually, he's dropped more than that. In May, he was at 47%. Then in August, he was at 42 or 44.

And then I got to get new glasses. And then in November, he's at 32. So he's dropped 15 points in the span of this coronavirus. All right. So actually, let me back up because I misled you on Jason Kenney's numbers. He's definitely at 40% now. But in the

spring, in May, he was at 48%. So he was at about the halfway mark. He's dropped eight points. He's down to

40%. So there's only two premiers who have less than half of their population approving of

their job performance on COVID right now. And those two are Jason Kenney and Brian Pallister. Both conservatives.

Both conservative premiers who were looking much better when this thing started. So you've got, you know, if the bottom four, three are conservatives, one's a liberal, Fury in Newfoundland. And the rest are a mix of both conservatives and liberals.

So there you go on the premier rating performances. There are no new numbers, at least in the Angus Reid survey, no new numbers on Justin Trudeau. I'm just checking to make sure that's the case. I think they probably come out with those separately because that's it on those. All right.

That gives you kind of a glimpse of where they are. And sorry for the, you know, I don't know whether I need new glasses or I need to clean these more often. I always get my fingers on the glass and the next thing I know that it's all smudgy. We talked about vaccines a minute ago and I want to update you on a couple of things on the vaccine front. This is interesting. Occasionally, we talk about the stock market. I don't get into it too much because I just don't think it necessarily relates a lot to, you know, the average person.

Now, if you play the market or if you're in the market, obviously, you check these things out every once in a while. But I saw this in the Financial Times this week, which, you know, with all the play on the new vaccines, not surprisingly, there's interest in those vaccine companies, but smart investors take it a step beyond. They figure, okay, if we have vaccines, what's the big impact on the overall market situation going to be? Well, it appears in the week or so since news of the vaccine has happened, the vaccines, Pfizer and Moderna and AstraZeneca, that some investors have been moving away from the tech stocks, which there's been heavy into tech stocks in the last eight or nine months,

whether it's Apple or Netflix or Zoom or any number of these things that have benefited from having so many people relying on their technology during the pandemic. They're moving away from those thinking there's going to be less reliance. They're moving into stocks that got hammered out of the gate. And one of those areas, which would obviously be certainly of interest if it's real to Canada, and Western Canada specifically, are energy stocks.

Now, there are public policy issues which don't help the energy sector right now. But it appears some investors think this could be good for the energy sector. Now, here's another thing about vaccines that gets some play. And it comes out of the New Yorker this week. It's got a fascinating article, if you want to call it that, on another piece of this kind of vaccine distribution issue. And it is, you know, we all talk about what goes in those little vials. on another piece of this kind of vaccine distribution issue. And it is, you know, we all talk about what goes in those little vials.

What we don't often talk about is those little vials. There's going to be millions of those, billions of those. So there's something new in the vial-making business. The Corning facilities in upstate New York Are trying to scale up prediction of their medical vials Which now use something called Valor glass Which only hit the market a couple of years ago The glass is more resistant to degradation So they're less likely to leach contaminants

But they require a lengthy production process that is being rushed to scale up. You know, it's fascinating, isn't it? We think of this rush for the vaccine. We're all so desperate for it. Many of us can't wait to jab it into our arms. Some are not up for that at all. But the whole issue surrounding it is find a successful vaccine candidate,

find a way to produce it, find a way to store it, find a way to transport it, find a way that you're going to meet the clients, the consumers, the public, to vaccinate them. And one of the things we haven't thought a lot about is, well, actually, what are you going to put it in before it goes in the needle? Well, it goes in these little vials. And there'll be billions of those, as we said.

And this little place in upstate New York, they think they got the hot product on the vile making business. So that's interesting. A couple of other things. Probably less attention this past weekend to Black Friday than years gone by. I mean, we all knew it was happening. And we were all aware of, you know, the rush some people had to get there. And the restrictions that were being placed on shopping in certain areas and certain cities.

So what impact did that have on the actual sales numbers? Well, I guess this isn't that surprising either. There's a piece in one of the papers today. Is it the New York Times? It might be the New York Times. They had a picture of New York City's flagship show, flagship store, Macy's. And they had, it was a side-by-side picture.

There was Macy's flagship store in 2019. And in the same day and the same angle of shot in 2020. Very different. Packed in 2019. Barely visible or two shoppers in the 2020 shop picture. And that was kind of the story of the day about Black Friday. Not that there were no sales because there were lots of sales, billions of dollars worth of sales,

but they came in on the e-commerce side. Numbers for in-store shopping were way down. Numbers for digital sales way up, nearly 20%, reaching $7.4 billion across the 4,500 retail websites that Adobe Analytics tracks. Turned out to be the second largest online shopping day in history, eclipsed only by Cyber Monday last year, where there were $7.9 billion in sales. So this, you know, underlines the issues that so many store owners have right now. You know, they're in trouble.

You don't have to go far to see how much trouble they're in because you see a lot of boarded up, closed up stores. And will they ever reopen? Which big chain stores are going to go under? There's a piece in the British press today about all kinds of well-known brand name stores that are in trouble. Because people aren't going out to shop, and understandably so. So if they're not picking it up on the e-commerce side,

they're not picking it up at all. Okay, last story for today. And this, I don't know, are you an F1 fan, like car racing? I watch it occasionally. Not often. I'm not a regular fan. But one couldn't help but witness what happened on the weekend. The F1 race this past weekend was in Bahrain

and it was a terrible crash terrible crash and the driver Romain Grosjean from I think he's dual passport holders Switzerland and France

his car crashed passport holders in Switzerland and France. His car crashed in spectacular fashion, but he lived. And his big quote was, I saw death coming. I guess so, because he barreled right into this wall, and then everything burst in flames, and it was horrendous. And when you see the pictures, you can't believe it all happens in a matter of seconds,

and then suddenly he jumps out of what's left of his car, climbs over a barrier. And he's in pretty good shape, all things considered. But Forbes has a story this week. Because you watch something like that, and we've seen other accidents in the last few years, and you say, how the hell could that guy have survived that crash? And the reason he survived is because the way they're building these cars, they look flimsy and tiny,

but they seem to have unbelievable restraints built into them that help protect a driver who's hurtling down the track at whatever, a couple hundred kilometers an hour and either crashes into a wall or crashes into another car or flips and turns and bursts on fire and basically explodes. So Forbes magazine, and you can find it on Forbes.com. I'm not going to go into all the details of it here,

but their focus was how technology saved Grosjean's life four times in 28 seconds during one of the most brutal crashes in an F1 race in quite some time. As Forbes says, the driver's survival was miraculous as the car was shorn in half and exploded. The article walks through each technological innovation that saved his life. From the carbon fiber safety shell

to the controversial titanium halo on the track. Worth the story. And, you know, we tend to look at that and say, man, he was lucky to get out of that alive. And the people who've developed all this technology, the researchers and scientists who've devoted their time to making race car drivers safer are saying, that wasn't luck.

That was our research that developed a system that would save lives. Now, you say, okay, there must have been some luck involved. You also say, wow, are we going to spend all our energies in trying to develop a safer car for race car drivers who are going at unbelievable speeds around the track for other people's enjoyment? Or are we going to use that same kind of brain power and research and science and et cetera to save people who are in precarious situations of their own

but not in that precarious situation because of the enjoyment of others through entertainment. That's one of those questions that we all ponder at different times. But at the same time, we look at this and we go, that is an amazing story. And if you see the pictures, you'll go, my gosh, how did he ever get out of there? Well, he got out of there because of the kind of things that they talk about in Forbes. All right.

So there's your little snapshot of stories for this day on the Bridge Daily. Tomorrow, Bruce joins us. You know, we call the podcast within a podcast when Bruce joined us, The Race Next Door during the U.S. election. Well, you know, there's obviously still going to be things we talk about in terms of the U.S. election and the transfer of power to Joe Biden from Donald Trump. And we may even resurrect that name at some point if we need to talk more specifically about something in terms of that race. But we wanted to change the name because we are going to deal with so many other things now.

And one of the things, if you've been listening to our discussions over these last two months, Bruce and my discussions, we often get around to talking about how stories are portrayed either by the opposition or by the media or by the government and how there are issues about those portrayals. And so we've come up with a name, and it was once again mainly Bruce who came up with the idea for the name. So we're going to call it, we're going to try it out anyway tomorrow. Call it Smoke, Mirrors, and the Truth. Smoke, Mirrorsrors and the Truth. Smoke, Mirrors

and the Truth. Haven't picked out any music for that yet. But we'll see. We'll see what might be around. In the meantime, that's our promotion to get you interested in tomorrow.

Bruce Anderson joins us with Smoke, Mirrors, and the Truth. The podcast within a podcast right here on the Bridge Daily. I'm Peter Mansbridge. Thanks so much for listening. And as we always say, we'll be back in 24 hours. Thank you. you