Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - Jacqui Delaney: Toronto Mike'd #1037

Episode Date: April 20, 2022

In this 1037th episode of Toronto Mike'd, Mike is joined by Jacqui Delaney as they discuss her career in radio and television on such stations as 590, Q107, 1010 and Sun News Network and her transition into politics. Toronto Mike'd is proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, Palma Pasta, Canna Cabana, StickerYou, Ridley Funeral Home and Patrons like you.

Welcome to episode 1037 of Toronto Mic'd. Proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, a fiercely independent craft brewery who believes in supporting communities, good times, and brewing amazing beer. Order online for free local home delivery in the GTA. StickerU.com. Create custom stickers, labels, tattoos, and decals for your home and your business. Palma Pasta.

Enjoy the taste of fresh, homemade Italian pasta and entrees from Palma Pasta in Mississauga and Oakville. Ridley Funeral Home. Pillars of the community since 1921. And Canna Cabana, the lowest prices on cannabis, guaranteed. Over 100 stores across the country. Learn more at cannacabana.com. Joining me this week, making her Toronto mic debut is Jackie Delaney. Welcome,

Jackie. Thank you for having me. Now, let's get that name right, OK? Because when I talked about who was on my show, I've been talking about Jackie Delaney because there's a lot of name recognition, particularly in this market, but you changed that name, right? Sort of. I reverted back on my social media. I started going by Jackie Button. And the reason for that is Button is actually my surname. It's my dad's surname. And my dad passed away two years ago. And shortly after he passed away two years ago. And shortly after he passed away, I just thought it was a little thing that I could do just to kind of pay homage to my dad. So that's why I still go by Delaney professionally.

As you said, it does have some name recognition, especially when I'm dealing with media, having spent 20 years in media. So, yeah. So I still go by that professionally. But Budden is actually my surname. Well, my condolences on the loss of your father. Thank you. And I, I always wondered like when you have a name like Jackie Delaney, is that a, uh, is that a real name or is that like a, a radio name? Right. Uh, so is Delaney simply because it sounds cool. Jackie Delaney. Yeah. Honestly, I went through the process when I was starting out in radio, I knew I wanted it So is Delaney simply because it sounds cool? Jackie Delaney sounds. Yeah.

Honestly, I went through the process when I was starting out in radio. I knew I wanted it to be three syllables because I knew that the two and three flowed. And I knew I wanted it to start with a hard consonant. And I also wanted it to sound either Irish or Scottish, again, to kind of pay homage to my heritage. And I just started going through the alphabet and just saying Jackie D, Jackie B and just trying to figure out what would work and Delaney works. It works it's like a song Jackie Delaney like I feel like I'm singing a song or something. Yeah I remember you know what what got me to do the three syllables is I don't know if you remember Joey Vendetta. Of course, of course. Yeah, so it was

because of Joey Vendetta, because I was interning at Q107, and Joey was working there, and I used to always, you know, have to spice tape for him, and I used to always kind of get a kick out of Joey Vendetta. I'm Joey Vendetta. Joey Vendetta at Joey Vendetta's. He was very good at promoting his name. Right. His personal brand. Yes. Absolutely. And God bless him. And I realized that Joey Vendetta works. So I was like Jackie Delaney.

So that's why I chose the two and three. Okay. Smart, smart move. But now I have a question about the Jackie name. Now, is this the real spelling? Because you spell it J-A-C-Q-U-I,

but is that really, or is that just because that looks cooler? So my full name, again, my legal name is Jacqueline or Jacqueline. I'm not French, but my mom loved the spelling of Jacqueline. So Jackie is, no matter how I spell it, it's, it would be my own interpretation because it's just a shortened form of my actual name. And I was probably in grade six when an uncle of mine who was a high school teacher said to me that because your name is the French version of Jacqueline, he said you should use the French version of Jackie. And he showed it to me. And in grade six, you're like, oh, that looks so

pretty and different. You want to be a little bit different. So I went with it and then I just stuck with it because it does it again, it stands out, right? When you accepted the invitation to be on Toronto, Mike, did you realize it was 90 minutes on your name? Was that? I did not. Okay, because I'm not quite done yet. And then we have a lot of ground to cover because before you entered the political arena, there's a great media background i want to talk about but you have a name so i'm doing my homework last night and there's a very popular australian netball player by the name jackie delaney like same spelling and everything it's completely the same and i don't know what i don't actually know what netball is maybe you do

but she played for the adelaide thunderbirds in the Commonwealth Bank Trophy League so that's who you're competing with in the search engine marketing I know she comes she still comes up on top she's uh quite searched she's quite popular in Australia from what I can tell do you know what netball is I I think it's similar to volleyball I want to say I don't know I should probably look that up it's funny to me that Australia, which is, I think two-thirds are populous, but have a similar history to us and that they have this whole sport

that's very, very popular and we have no clue what it is. I can't even visualize it. I picture a basketball hybrid, but anyway, netball is a big deal in Australia. Yeah, I know. Look, I did the same thing as you. I Googled it. Well, I Googled myself one day and that's what came up. So it's always amusing to me.

That and the other thing that keeps coming up that I really wish would go away is there is a particular photo that was taken when I appeared with our good friends whose show I appeared on earlier today, when they first started out podcasting several years ago, uh, I was, I was one of their guests and there's a photo that was taken and it was taken by somebody's cheap phone camera. Like the lighting's horrible. It just, everything about it was bad. And that photo somehow made it online. And for some reason in an image search, that photo keeps coming up and it's like the worst photo. And I'm just like,

okay, well you're talking to the producer of that show. So, uh, but although I wasn't producing then, or I never would have allowed that picture to be published, but, uh,

we're talking about humble and Fred, of course, uh, and you're a regular on their program. I can call you a regular now. I think it's been four appearances in 2022. That's as regular as it gets over there. And if that is any image hosted by any server that we control,

I can promise you I will delete it after this episode. Oh, my gosh. I would love you forever. Thank you. Hey, that's all it took. Okay, I'm in. Okay, no, that's no joke. Obviously, if somebody's copied it and hosts it somewhere else,

I can't delete it. But if it's on our server, have the root password i will delete it that's my see i like you already i'm a man of action over here so uh when you were uh i think it was yesterday i was promoting that you were making your debut today and i joke it was oh yeah you jokingly tweeted uh like should i be concerned i think and uh i know it was a joke but i have a reply i want to read this came from trevor on twitter yesterday and trevor wrote while mike is clearly on the progressive side i think that's because i bike so whenever i talk like this that's me interjecting that's not trevor okay while mike is clearly on the progressive side his fairness

and openness in interviewing allows the guests to say their piece. I was most impressed by his Bruce Dobigan interview where Bruce sounded thoughtful despite the backdrop of his batshit crazy alt-right Twitter feed. So I wanted to just read that because I read it and I told Trevor, that's going on my LinkedIn profile. That's amazing. Yeah, I saw that one too. And I was about to click like, and I'm like, I don't know if I should because he says some things in there that I'm like,

ah. The bat shit. Okay, yeah. But I did review your Twitter feed. We'll talk about all this because you're a proud conservative if I may put words in your mouth. And there's nothing wrong with that. I feel like there's nothing.

I can enjoy it. Jerry Seinfeld here. But there's no batshit crazy alt-right in your Twitter feed. So we can get into that later. But it's all a reasonable opinion of Jackie Delaney. Yeah. Look, I make no apologies for who I am or to which party I'm affiliated. And I don't think conservatives should.

I actually think that's a trend in the past few years that we need to move away from. That's not saying there aren't things or people associated with our party that we shouldn't stand up and say, yeah, no, I'm not down with that. with our party that we shouldn't stand up and say, yeah, no, I'm not down with that. But no, I absolutely make no apologies for being conservative. As a matter of fact, it makes me dig in even more when somebody expects me to apologize for that. Right. Now, so the way I'm going to do this is we're going to do media. And then there's the, what I call, I believe in, again, this is your life story. I'm writing your life story, Jackie. So I write it up as like, there's media, then there's the transition media, which is Sun TV, and then there's the conservative politics world.

And we're going to get into all of this, and then we're going to find out, like, you know, were you always conservative? We're going to get into this. But we're going to start with the line from your, I think it's your Twitter bio, but it's transplanted Newfie in Ottawa by way of Toronto. So my question is,

when did you leave Newfoundland for the big smoke here? I left Newfoundland so we're going back a ways now, but I believe I was 18 when I left Newfoundland and moved to Halifax.

Worked in the bar business in Halifax as a server, co-check girl, all that stuff until, is that Newfie Screech? Yeah, well this was a gift from Heather Bambrick when she dropped by. Oh, that's hilarious. You know that Newfoundlanders don't touch that stuff, right? Okay, well, I don't know this, but is this because it's for tourists?

This is a tourist trap beverage? No, it's because it's vile. Oh, like it's... Here, I'll put it here at the Great Lakes. And later we're going to talk about a different brewery. Uh, actually that was in the news. But, uh, around here, we only drink Great Lakes beer. Okay. So no, no steam whistle here, but I'll put the screech there, but please continue. Uh, yeah. So I left, I moved to

Halifax, worked in the bar business. I had a little pit stop in Fred Orson, New Brunswick for about a year and then ended up in Toronto. And in Toronto, again, worked in the bar business for a couple of years and then went to college, Humber College, showed up to Humber College, the Etobicoke campus, and enrolled in the radio broadcasting program there. Okay, time out. We have a note from somebody regarding that. But firstly, I need to tell you, I can walk to that Etobicoke campus from here. Like that's where I live.

Okay, so I know. Okay, I know what area. The neighborhood's called New Toronto. It's, yeah. And I bet it's really grown up. Yeah, well, I think you would. Yeah, it's very different. I've only been here eight years, and I've noticed a great difference in eight years, so I can't imagine what you'd notice. But previously, we just knew that as the place where they filmed Police Academy.

Oh, I didn't know that. Yeah, like when you see the Commandant Lessard and the actual academy is the, it used to be like a, I don't know if you can say this word anymore. I hope my lefty friends don't cancel me, but I think it was known as like a lunatic asylum or uh it was definitely uh had a name like that for a while the lakeshore campus uh and before it became humber college obviously anyway that's the buildings that they use for the police academy but here's the note yeah go ahead are you close to the lakeshore

campus or the etobicoke the oh oh sorry i said it wrong no you didn't campus or the Etobicoke? Oh. Oh. Sorry, maybe I said it wrong. No, you didn't say it wrong. Etobicoke, I forget Etobicoke goes north of Bloor. Okay, my apologies. Okay, listen. You're talking about near the horse race, near the Woodbine. Yeah. Okay, my bad.

I'm talking about, I'm not near there. I'm near the South Campus by Lakeshore, so I screwed up. Okay, so scratch all that. But here's an interesting note on your Humber career. Ryan Doyle, who's also an FOTM, Jackie, you're now an FOTM. That means friend of Toronto Mike. So welcome to the club. But Ryan Doyle writes, Jackie comes from the best radio class Radio Humber has ever produced. Looking forward to it. So hello to FOTM Ryan Doyle and what do you say about that of course Ryan says that a because he's right and b because he was part of that class that's

how Ryan and I met each other I believe Ryan was 18 I think he was the youngest one in our class I think he was 18 and I was 27 at the time so So I'm aging both of us now. But we did actually have a very successful class. And by successful, I mean people who went on to have careers in radio and television. I think I would have to say, I mean, I obviously don't know the research on this, but I would have to say ours was one of, if not the most successful by that metric. Could you drop a few names? Yeah, I guess you are are now let me hear some names if you don't mind well i'm just gonna say joe andrews who uh was running the program at the time would would know better than anyone um be interesting to reach out to him one day actually not but myself ryan doyle um there are a lot of behind the scenes uh names of people who went on to to do really well um also um there's a there was an actually no he would have been in the class ahead of us do you remember the edge from from the wwe yeah or wwf yeah okay he was actually in the class ahead of us um so he he obviously did well for himself but ryan's probably cringing right now,

saying, Jackie, you're talking about this person and that person and this one and that one and this one. Well, we'll move on except to say, are you still in touch with Ryan? Are you guys still in touch? Yeah, like not regularly. We don't pick up the phone every week or whatever, but our paths certainly cross.

I think actually Ryan and I were talking every day last year when um when the when parliament was dealing with the sports betting legislation right uh because ryan's of course very um involved in that and that was certainly something that he was very happy to see come to canada um so just yeah you know keeping him uh keeping him up to date on kind of how that legislation was moving through Parliament. Because a lot of people, and I spoke to Howard about this earlier, and I didn't get into it too much, but a lot of people really don't understand how Parliament works or how a bill kind of really does make its way through Parliament. its way through parliament and even some who may understand the different stages don't kind of understand how it can get tripped up in parliament because of politicking and just some things that go on and why was it delayed here so uh i always love talking to people you know why we don't know because the americans had an amazing schoolhouse rocks cartoon about it and we didn't get one like

i feel like uh we know we know things from the schoolhouse rocks we know american system stuff yeah we're bad for that as canadians and also like just the amount of american television that we consume whether it's uh the dramas like we you know the west wing and house of car it shows like that but also the news that we consume as Canadians. We will tune in to a Supreme Court justice confirmation hearing in the States, but do we know anything about our own justice system or how our judges are appointed and even discussions about political races? No, no, we prefer to tune in to the Americans. Oh, Jackie, you're absolutely right with regards to a couple of people

we've mentioned already twice, Humble and Fred, where they'll be talking about, and I don't even know these names, but something Marjorie Greene. And they'll be going on about all these characters in the American system because they'll be watching CNN or Fox News or both and gobbling up all this stuff. And they'll go on and on about it. Meanwhile, I'll just say, speaking for myself,

I actually only, I don't really consume any American news. So it's like, I don't know these characters, but it's like, yeah, it's interesting how we think it's all more exciting on the other side of the tracks there. Yeah, we do it a lot. Look, I know some of these names. I know who Marjorie, I think it's Marjorie Taylor Greene. That sounds right.

I know who she is vaguely. Like, I know that she'sie I think it's Marjorie Taylor Greene. I know who she is vaguely. I know that she's, I believe she's a Republican. For sure. Yes, maybe from Arizona? See, that I wouldn't know, but I do, all I know is they seem to go off about her because she's maybe she's one of those let me quote this, hold on, batshit crazy

alt-right. A bit of a wackadoo. Yeah, she's a bit of a wackadoo. Right. But these a bit of a wackadoo. Right. But these are the characters. I'm personally more interested in my own backyard and what's going on in my own country. But we'll get into that soon. But you're at radio at the Humber College near the racetrack,

in Rexdale, I guess that is. And what's your first media gig out of college? I guess that is. And where, what's your first media gig out of college? What was, had just become Talk 640, or was it Q107? It was kind of both of them, because it was the one year that Maple Leaf Hockey was being broadcast on Q107. And I would go in, when those games were being broadcast. It was my job to go in. And at that time, radio still had the carts for the commercials. And for anybody who doesn't know what carts are, they were like 8-tracks. And you probably don't know what 8-tracks are either.

I do. I'm older than you think, Jackie. Absolutely. No, no. But for some people listening, you probably wouldn't know what they are. So I would have to take the log and I would have to see which commercial spots were coming up, pull the carts and line them up so that the board op was able to just, you know,

whip them into the machines and then whip them out and he would throw the used ones to the side and I would then re-cart them. So it was just my job to just make sure that the spots lined up and I did that for a year. And then my first paid gig in radio, because yes, kids, back in those days we did internships without being paid. And they still do. They still do.

And radio. Okay. Cause I know in a lot of industries they don't, right? There's no such thing. You're right. Except radio dev. I think Humble and Fred currently have an unpaid intern actually from, I think from Humber, but yeah. Oh, good for them here here we need more of that um so my first paid gig was at the fam 590 and that's why i got into radio my my whole goal my sole goal of going to humber college was to work at the fam 590. I wanted to be a sports reporter. So I started there as a traffic reporter,

ended up doing some sports updates, and then I moved into news and then ended up at News Talk 1010. Okay, so, okay, let's slow that roll for a minute here. Firstly, another FOTM reached out, wants me to say hello to you. I think this is from the Q640 days,

but Jeff Domet. Jeff, oh no, I feel so, Jeff Domet, did he go by the name Domet? Well, Humble and Fred would have called him Chicken Shwarma, I believe, would be like. Oh, my goodness. Oh, my goodness. Hi.

Oh, that's so cool. That's terrible that i don't buy that yeah i was i was good do i introduce him as shawarma i was thinking to myself like in real time here i'm like no give him like the respect he deserves as a grown man here call him jeff domette and then uh then i realized oh no we have to call him shawarma oh i'm so sorry but hi so okay so the so how long this q107, it's funny because I watched some of the Leaf game last night and the Leafs were in Philadelphia. And Philadelphia has a player named Morgan Frost. So the cameras show Morgan's father in the stands and you know who that is.

Andy Frost. Andy Frost was in the stands there. So you would have worked with Andy? I did. I did work with Andy. Yeah, so Joe Bowen was the play-by-play. And I think Andy, I guess Andy hosted the pre-game show, if I recall correctly.

Yeah, either pre or post or both. I don't know. But yeah, the wraparound stuff yeah yeah so I got to meet Andy I mean look I I was fairly new to Toronto I don't had only lived in Toronto for a year or two uh prior to that but I mean I'd been there long enough to know you know Andy Frost and Joe Bowen and I'm like meeting these people and working for these people and getting on the job training from these people. I was very, very blessed in my radio career to, to start off that way. Like that is, that's not something everybody has an opportunity. Same thing right now with the

intern who's working for Humble and Fred. That's a golden opportunity. That's incredible. You can't pay for something like that. Right. Now it's almost you can't pay for something like that right now it's almost looking back it's almost interesting that to think that we had a season of maple leaf hockey on the radio on the fm band like to me it's like bizarre like that was on the fm dial uh yeah that was kind of a failed experiment that didn't last long and And I know this is, again, what I know from chatting with a bunch of these industry people is I guess Mojo Radio had the games for a while, but Mojo was like Maxim Magazine on,

like it was, you know, a little bit misogynist and possibly maybe debatably. And Ken Dryden, who was the president, I guess, of Maple Leafs at the time, had an issue with their product being aligned with this Mojo branding. So I don't know if this is around the same era or not. That probably makes sense then because a lot of people, myself included, were looking at it like, why would you put this on Q107 instead of putting it on Mojo where it would have had a natural fit? Right. Because that station was so geared towards males.

But I guess that actually makes sense. In fact, Fred Patterson will say that Ken Dryden's the reason that Mojo ends up failing because they had to tone it all down because of the affiliation with Maple Leafs. Interesting. So cancel Colby even back then. Yeah, I guess, you know. But you can almost see it from the Maple Leafs. Interesting. So cancel Colby even back then. Yeah, I guess, you know.

But you can almost see it from the Maple Leafs which is trying to sell this family entertainment. They don't, you know, I remember when I had Ripken on the show, he said like the first topic

he remembers on Mojo Radio was Spider Jones asking the question to an audience, do you remember your first boner? Spider did that? That actually sounds nice. jones but he and he i just talked to spider two weeks ago he uh didn't like that going there and he was never comfortable with the

subject matter like that so and that that actually doesn't surprise me about spider because i adore spider jones he's the cool kitty that brought the nitty gritty back to the city. Yes. Right? That's like etched in my brain. But I worked with Spider at the Fan 590. And I adore him. He's a class act. He's such a gentleman.

He's just absolutely lovely. I can't say enough kind things about him. So, yeah. You know what? Sometimes you do things that it's like you have to put food on the table. You have to have an income. And sometimes you do things that you look back on and you're like, ah, I really wish I didn't have to do that, but you have to, it's a job. Okay. So we got to get to the fan five minutes. I'll just ask you, uh, did you work closely with

any of the Q107 legends we've known from the several decades? We talked about Andy Frost, who's no longer there, but what about John Derringer, who's been there for a hundred, hundred years or so at this point? I worked with John Derringer later in the Q107 experience and later in my career. Okay. Working with John Derringer was one of the things that lent itself to my leaving radio altogether. That was the worst experience that I had in radio. Would you be willing to elaborate? Like, what do you mean? Because John is, and I've never had him on the show,

but I have asked him on the show, and he's politely declined. But he's one of the radio legends of his generation in this marketplace. Yeah, well, the way he treats female co-hosts is also legendary. Okay, so, all right, I will... Put it this way. There are a couple of great write-ups in what was then Frank Magazine. It's funny because I recently moved

and I was going through some of my you know belongings that i had poked away and found a couple of frank magazines and i'm like okay i would have kept these for a reason so i started going through them and they they had to do with that that experience um one was somebody had written about it in Frank magazine. And then the following edition, another female personality with whom John had worked in Montreal went by the name Peppermint Patty. She wrote an open letter, and I believe it was called an open letter to her ladies in arms. ladies in arms and said in this letter, she said, you know,

to Jackie Delaney and Andrea Ruse, and she mentioned a couple of other names, and perhaps I'm terrible for even bringing up these names. You know, they probably wish I didn't. So I will just speak for myself in saying that she said, you know, I too have been through the

trenches. So yeah. Okay, um, yeah. Okay. Now what, here's one thing. I have an issue with Frank. I, I'm a Frank. I love the spirit of Frank, but my problem with Frank magazine is that there's a bunch of like truths and then wrapped around some piece of like bizarre fiction. Like I, I find Frank is a bit like, I know it's satirical and everything, but it's, so it's sort of, it's tough to like treat frank it's not exactly mclean's magazine do you know what i mean it's uh look i i put in frank magazine at other times as well where it hasn't been so friendly and i've been the target of the ridicule so i totally get it um but the only

reason i reference it is because um like if listeners want to know what you're talking about. Right. So what's in Frank Magazine is a matter of public record. So I can point to that because it's a matter of public record. But other than that, I'm not at liberty. I know. And I'm not even, I just, I'm just, I've never, I've never heard this on there.

So I, um, it's cause that in this day and age of like the me too era, et cetera, I don't know how that remains a secret ever, if you will. You know what I mean? Like it's, you know, if, if there's like a secret, uh, Twitter DM group out there with like, you know, female co-hosts or members of the John Derringer show where they chat about all this, like that would be news to me, obviously. Look, I'm probably going to regret even saying this. Well, we can move on. I was just wondering because, you know, if you weren't at Q, I'm going to ask about John because, you know, he's Mr. Q7.

I have remained very quiet about it for all these years for a few different reasons. I, one of them being, I don't want to endure anyone's wrath. I'll be honest. And now I, it's, it's funny. It's like, I, I, I'm okay. I have no problem with you bringing it up. And I, I could have chosen not to even respond uh in the way that I did but there's a pit in my stomach where I'm like oh you know what this yeah but look I'll just say

as I said to start it was my worst experience in radio and um yeah and and make no mistake I'm not I obviously have no interest in making you uncomfortable. So I mean, no, I, yeah, I second, I didn't, I only brought up, I didn't know what I was going to get. I just brought up his name because you worked at Q and just like I was bringing up Andy Frost's name, because these are like the two pillars of the last couple of decades at Q107. But here let's, let's, let's talk. Let me say this. And I have no problem with you bringing it up. Fair questions. Let me say this. Andy Frost, on the other hand, was one of the best, you know, getting to know Andy was one of the best experiences, getting to know Joe Bowen was one of the best experiences. You know,

working with Bob McCowan in, you know, part of my career was an incredible experience. I've had so many amazing mentors in radio. And I said, as I said, I was very fortunate to start out in Toronto, which is almost unheard of. But yeah, I got to, I got to work with some great legends. And one of the greatest of all that I met, one of the first people I met, who I ended up finishing my career working with in radio, who I am now still friends with and still keep in touch with, and he's now here in Ottawa, was Bill Carroll. So I never got to work with Bill directly because at that time he was at 640 and he

was doing the news, but he was always so kind to me and so gracious and would say to me, like, I, I think, I think you've got a future ahead of you in this business. And he was the last person I worked with on air. I worked with him on the morning show on 1010. And then I was done with radio and television after that. And he moved on to LA. Okay, right. He went to the other 640 in LA, as I recall.

Now, there's a few questions about your time at 1010. But just quickly back to Fan 590 here. So, and I guess when you're on Fan 590, that's that at the time, the company that owned Fan 590 also owned Easy Rock, when you're on fan 590 that's that at the time the company that owned fan 590 also owned easy rock right yes correct yeah it was was it telemedia i think so no okay it was either telemedia or yeah i think it was actually i don't think it started out as telemedia anyways yeah you know what it's like so yeah i know i know now because today it's rogers and now easy easy rock is new cap like it's hard to keep track of it all but an easy rock is actually boom

which is new cap but anyway we digress so you would also hear jackie delaney doing traffic on easy rock as well when you're at the fan 590 right that's right yeah i would do afternoon traffic on the fan and easy rock and it was funny because most am and fm stations are located in the same building but easy rock and the fan because at one point they weren't owned by the same company um the fan was located at 40 holly and easy rock was in a totally different building it was located at 40 eglinton and there were times where so i was able to do traffic for both stations um I guess we would have done it over an ISDM line but I was located at the fan right and then I would switch over my control board and do it for Easy Rock but there were times where something would happen you know

from a technical standpoint and I would have to run up to Easy Rock and I was like oh man it's gonna be so much easier if these stations were in the same building so uh yeah there were there were some funny times and I worked there with Andrea Bruce and Daryl Henry who I still keep in touch on Facebook and they had a show called Entertainment Express and I loved them I thought they were fantastic together absolutely Daryl Henry uh I know quite well of course but. But yeah, absolutely. Now, I have a question that did come in about your time at the Fan 590. By the way, I just want to shout out Daryl Henry because I wanted to find out what number he was. But he was episode 1026.

So this is only a few weeks ago. He was here sitting in the Toronto Mike studio. You're in Ottawa right now. That's why you're excused from not having to be here. But that's a long way. But Daryl Henry was great. We talked all about his career. He's at CHFI now, but starts off at Hits FM. And we covered Easy Rock and everything. It was fantastic. So shout out to Daryl. Absolutely.

And shout out to Andrea Roos, who, by the way, she's not on radio anymore. But she does a lot of voice work. And every now and then, I know she does a lot of character voices. And I don't know that it's her. But every now and then i know she does a lot of character voices and i don't know that it's her but every now and then i will hear a commercial spot on tv and i instinctively know that it's andrea that's great so that's happening to me now with tish eiston like i'll hear this voice and i'm like that's tish eiston anyway jamal is a listener who said he'd love to hear your thoughts jackie on working at the Fan 590 with Barb DiGiulio. And if she felt, this is you, if you felt women were treated seriously on a sports radio station, I'm glad Jamel is asking this because it's been a sausage fest for a very long time and it couldn't have

been easy for you to be in the doors there. And then, you know, how do you then parlay that into an actual radio career at a sports station at that time, or even now it would be difficult. Look, there were absolutely moments I know, uh, with some listeners and also some of the other, um, people that work there who, I don't know if didn't take me seriously or as much as maybe as a woman, I had to prove myself a little more than I would have if I walked in the door as a male. And I think, and I think that does still happen today.

And I think what it is is if you walk in the door as the male, it's automatically assumed that, you know, sports, whereas if you're a female, you kind of have to prove it, which I don't know that that will ever change. But it's interesting because I know a lot of men who they'll say to me,

I had lunch with somebody last week and I started talking about something with sports. And he's like, I got to be honest with you. I don't follow sports. And that's funny too, right? Because I think it's kind of doing a disservice to men as well to just assume that they follow sports. I can't speak for Barb's experience, but what I observed was that Barb was very well respected. Again, I'm sure she ran into lots of listeners who didn't respect her, but certainly with her co-workers. And again, I'm sure she paid her dues as well because she was there, you know, before I was.

But for the most part, from what I observed, the men at the station took her very seriously, and as they should. Barb was, you know, extremely good at her job, and probably more importantly than that, especially now as I look back on it, she is honestly one of the nicest people. She's genuinely a kind, one of the nicest people. She's, she's genuinely a kind, gracious person. She's authentic. She's funny. One of the things I love the most about Barb DiGiulio is her laugh. She has the best laugh and it's so authentic. And when Barb laughs, it makes you want to laugh. I, yeah. And I've, I've spoken to her a few times over the last few years. We spoke during the pandemic just about, you know, the struggles that different people were feeling. And again, not a person I stay in touch with where, you know, we have weekly calls or whatever. But certainly we have reached out to each other over the years.

And yeah, I'm just I'm a big fan of Barb DiGiulio. No pun intended. You're a big fan. I'm a big fan of Barb DiGiulio. No pun intended. You're a big fan. No. I'm a big fan as well. And she even submitted something lovely for my episode 1000 showcase. The showcase spectacular, as I'm now going to call it.

But Barb's amazing. So we just talked about, you know, you talked about Spider Jones and Barb. It sounds like a good crew there. You talked about Bob McHale. Was Bob McHale in the same, if he was having a one-on-one chat with you in the lunchroom or something,

as he was on the air? Because famously, we hear that Bob puts on this curmudgeon mask when he's on the air, this persona. That's funny, because Gilbert Godfrey just passed away. And Gilbert famously, he had a persona when he had a mic in front of his face that was different from how he would talk with his wife and kids in the home or whatever. What is the real bobcat like yeah i would say i would say there's definitely an element of that i always joke that um you know people would say when he was when he was on tv um when he was doing the sports night gig and it would be simulcast and people would you know go why is he wearing sunglasses inside and i would joke and be say it was because he's putting on his you know, go, why is he wearing sunglasses inside? And I would joke and be, say, it was because he's putting on his, you know,

his curmudgeon. I wouldn't use the word curmudgeon, but I would say that he's putting on his on-air personality. But in fact, you know, I believe Bob had said one time he had addressed that and he said it was because of the studio lights because they had to move in the extra lights once. There you go. There you go.

And you bought that line. You bought that line, Jackie. Come on. I know. Even I feel a bit like a curmudgeon when I put these on now. I feel a bit like. Do you? Yeah, it kind of makes you.

A little crankier, you know. Get off my lawn. You're cranky because you can't see because you're indoors with sunglasses on. No, look, I got to know Bob off the air. I know I said this earlier and I keep saying, oh, this person's lovely and that person's amazing, but it's honestly true. And Bob McCowan, I was so fortunate to three people actually at the fan 590 that I really have to thank for my career. Bob McCowan, Nelson Millman and Scott Metcalf. And I believe Scott Metcalf may still

be at 680 News. If not, I think he retired. I think he retired during the pandemic. I think. I think. Okay. All three of them. I, I almost well up with tears when I think about them because they were so good to me and took a chance on me, put me on the air. Scott Medcalf reached out he he had heard me doing a a cut-in because at that time i was doing the community cruiser and he said to someone who is that and they told me and then i went right down to the newsroom and introduced myself to scott and he's like you know how would you feel about doing some fill-in traffic reports so here i am i mean i was 27 at the time but I was in college right studying radio broadcasting

and he was willing to throw me on the air um you know no experience and by the way at that time and I still don't have my driver's license so I didn't I didn't drive right and I wasn't from Toronto so I'm doing I'm doing traffic reports for Toronto and how how I would do it, I would talk about the 401 and how I would know the cross streets about how the 401 progressed across the city is I would think about the subway stops. Because the main intersections, cross streets on the 401 that you would hit for traffic actually really line up with the subway stops across the Bloor-Danforth line. Now, when you had a name, I don't know, let's say Strawn, for example, I guess you had a

moment of like, is it Strachan? Is it like, how am I saying this word? I guess there's a few of those in this city. Yeah, it took me a long time. I would hear people say Strawn and then I would repeat it, right? Because one of the ways that we got our traffic information is we would call TTC control and they have a designated line and a designated person who just dealt with the media every day in the media calls and they would say strong strong strong and I was okay well you know strong and it was only one day

when I looked at a map and I'm like what what? Where's Strawn? And somebody pointed out and I was like, that's how you spell Strawn? Right. It was, yeah. So I didn't say it on the air. I didn't say Strachan on the air. Thank gosh that I didn't do that. But yeah, I mean, I said it on the air. I regret, but.

Shout out to FOTM Al Strachan, who is also a member of your conservative club media members here. Okay, speaking of media, when do you get to 1010? So is it after Fan 590 you go to 1010? Okay, actually, I have to think about that for a second. So I was at the Fan 590. Yes, yes. The Fan 590, they were making changes at the fan and easy rock and all of that. And they just didn't, what they said was they just didn't have the money to pay a

dedicated afternoon track recorder. So they were going to have somebody do a split, um, in the morning and in the afternoon. So I was out and I reached out to, I guess I reached out to Steve couch at 10, 10 and it was nearing Christmas. And the person they had doing their afternoon drive was taking time off. And, you know, they were just going to have somebody else from the station fill in.

And to this day, I do not understand why the program director did this and took the chance that he did. But again, like I'm so happy he did. But imagine afternoon drive at 1010 and I'm just somebody who's been doing traffic reports and cut ins at the fan 590. I call up this program director and he goes, actually, he goes, do you think you could fill in as afternoon drive post for the next few days? I'm like, sure. Why not? I mean, I almost peed my pants.

I was so afraid and intimidated. But I did it. But like, who does that? It's the biggest market in the country. It's your afternoon drive show. And that's a big, that's not some quiet station. This is the mighty 1010. Yeah.

And he, he gave me that opportunity. And I, you know, I'm like, I'm going to make the most of that. And my friend Ryan Doyle was there at the time. Because Ryan started at 1010 while we were both still at Humber College. And Ryan spent his whole career there. And, like, hats off to Ryan for that, by the way. Yeah, absolutely. No, he spent a long time there and like hats off to Ryan for that, by the way. Yeah, absolutely. No,

he spent a long time there. That's for sure. Here's a couple of names from 10, 10 who reached out when I tweeted, you were coming on John Moore. John wrote, I'll read it. And then you respond,

of course, but he writes, uh, how much did she love doing the afternoon show at news talk 10, 10 with me? Right. Because that you had put out the Any Questions for Jackie, and John wrote that in. And I replied, and I said, Oakley?

Just because I know John's a good sport. And I had worked with, when I ended up at 1010 full-time and I was doing afternoon sports i started off with john oakley and i'm not sure how long i was doing that with oakley before he then left well you know the funny story here is he left because humble and fred left 640 to go to mix 99.9 and they they poached oakley from 10 10 to take over mornings for Humble and Fred on Mojo. That's right. Okay, I forgot that that's why.

Okay, you're absolutely right. So he goes to 640. And then John Moore comes in. Because I think John was in Montreal up until that point. So he came from Montreal to then do the afternoon drive show. So then I ended up working with John. And I think I actually ended up working with john longer than i had worked with oakley um i think oakley was probably only for a couple of months if that so i adored working to see another one i love john i think there's only

one name so far you haven't loved on this program but okay uh one more name for you i hope you love this guy too um robert turner writes in reply to what john wrote um early edition reality tv bureau chief was the real launch pad yeah so i don't does robert still do early edition on 10 10 i'm not sure okay so early edition was the the time slot that would precede the morning show so i think it was on from 5 to 5 30 and i would be coming in so this was later when i was back at 10 10 because i went to 10 10 i think it was three separate times and um this was when i finished my career working on bill carroll's morning show so i would be in early to prep for the show and then i would join robert for a reality TV hits. So yeah, that's what Robert's talking about there.

And also I have to say, shout out to Robert because bless his heart. As I said earlier, I don't drive and the subway is not running at that time. And Robert bless his heart would come and pick me up every morning. Wow. Yeah. To,

to get me into work. So I owe him big time for that. Love it. See, this is like, this is your life, Jackie Delaney. You'd had no idea. Okay that. Love it. See, this is like, this is your life, Jackie Delaney. You'd had no idea.

Okay, so you mentioned, obviously, CFRB's The Bill Carroll Show, and I did a little homework. So you weren't alone, but I guess on August 27, 2009, 12 employees were let go at CFRB. There was this mass purge. I mean, come on. Paul and Carol Mott were amongst those who were let go like there were some uh you know and then you michael corin a whole bunch of casualties here right this is so then you were caught up in this fail swoop fail flail swoop

what is it uh communication person fell swoop okay i've been butchering that for 40 years or so okay so it just i guess you just get caught up and it's all over on august 27 2009 oh my god i will never forget that day that was one of the funniest days in my career it was funny then then it wasn't funny but now it's funny again um so you know we were there in the morning we're there very early and uh several of us start getting an email from our then program director, Steve Couch, saying, hey, I need to meet with you after the show this morning. I'm going to discuss some programming notes. It was all very pleasant and everything. And I'm like, what the hell is this about? What does Couch want now?

Right. Because typical program director, you get annoyed by them. So I'm like, what does couch want now right uh because typical program director you get annoyed by them so i'm like what does he want now because when you're done in the morning shift all you want to do is go home and nap you don't want to be sticking around for you know a meeting with the program director right so then somebody else in the newsroom says oh i got the same email and then someone else goes i got that too and i said, oh my God, we're all being fired on mass. And everyone's like, oh, yeah, that's so funny. Well, it wasn't a joke. They actually called us all into a boardroom.

And as we go in there, Paul and Carol Mott are in there as well. And they're very upset because they're just like, you know, what's going on? We're being hauled in for this meeting. This is not good. And that's when I was like, ooh, this isn't good. So then the then general manager comes in and he starts to speak. And I don't know if it was, I think it was Carol Mott who interrupted and said, well, hold on a minute.

We're Steve Couch. He's the one who sent out these letters telling us to be here. He wanted to meet with us. And, uh, we were told, oh, you know, Steve, Steve isn't here. So long story short, they said, um, we're letting you all go. We're restructuring. We're letting you all go, uh, here, uh, here are our lawyers, but also we know this can be tough on you. So we've hired a transition team and they're going to help you through. And they brought in these HR types. And I just,

I stood up and I'm like, do you have an envelope for me that explains my severance package? And they're like, yeah, we're going to get to that. And I'm like, no, no, just give me my envelope. I'm not here for the HR spiel. I don't have a job anymore after today. I just need to know how much money you're paying me. Thanks. And I took the envelope and walked out. Here's the interesting thing. The reason Steve couch wasn't there is because after he hit sent on all of

ours, they handed him an envelope and said, you're gone too. Bye. Wow. Yeah. So it was the, I just wanted to go home and nap honestly i'd been through i'd been through that drill before so i just wanted to go home and nap but yeah and okay so i obviously i want to get you to sun news here that's next here but you said you did you this is when you return to q because it sounds like q turns you off radio and am I getting my Jackie Delaney story correctly here uh you you

so I didn't go back to Q the reason I say that's one of the things that turned me off radio and that had happened uh a few years prior um so it wasn't a direct result of that it's just that that for me was a pivotal moment that started making me look at radio very differently and really did turn me off um morning radio for sure and the fact that I even went back in that morning radio was my last gig I loved working with Bill um so that was a good experience but once that was over that's when I started asking myself do I really want to keep doing this? You know, again, the job insecurity, but then also dealing with certain personalities. And I just thought, I'm getting to the point in Toronto radio where it's, you know, yeah, I'm, I just don't want to risk working with another one like that. So I just thought it's time for me to transition at radio.

Okay. So here's a good question from Steve at this point. So you were at 1010. Now 1010 is, I would call it a conservative talk station. This is how I view it anyways, from my bunker here in South Etobicoke. So I,

my question is, well, Steve's question is, were you always a conservative or, or what I would ask on the end of that is, were you, I won't use the word indoctrinated because there's all these bad connotations to that, but was it your time at 1010 that sort of opened your eyes to a different perspective? Like, when did you become a conservative?

I didn't really think of myself as a conservative. I voted, when I was younger, I voted liberal. Um, I remember the first time around with Mike Harris, I thought, oh, you know, absolutely not. Um, I, I, I thought he, he was horrible. And then after he was in office for his first, um, first mandates, uh, that's what actually made me conservative. I actually liked what he did and agreed with a lot of what he did so that the next time around, I actually voted for Mike Harris. And that's how I first started voting conservative. Interestingly enough, federally, the first time that Stephen Harper won, I remember having knock-down, down drag out arguments with somebody i was working with in radio at that time just about why i couldn't vote for

stephen harper and he was like but you're gonna vote for the liberals after that you know the these scandals and i'm like yeah you know devil devil you know and um when stephen harper won that first time with a minority i thought okay this great. Now I can see what he's all about. But he has a minority, so there's, you know, more of a check on him. And the same kind of thing happened with him that had happened with Mike Harris. I liked what he did. So I voted for Stephen Harper, and I've never voted anything other than that. I was never a card-carrying member of any party until I left radio and went to work for Tim Hudak.

And I wasn't forced to do so. I wasn't even asked if I had a party membership when I was hired. But through that process, I took out a membership because I wanted to take part in the leadership selection. You have to be a member to do that. Right. Okay. So where does Sun TV come into play? Diamond Dog, for example, this is verbatim.

You saw it on Twitter, but gotta be some great dirt about the Sun News venture. I know that I do know Sun News Network debuts and I will put, you're not the first person from Sun News to become an FOTM because Alex Pearson is an FOTM, so you're not the first. But Sun News Network debuts at 4.30 p.m. on April 19, 2011. And I'm just going to shout out a few people who were there, and then hopefully you'll speak to how you got the gig. Charles Adler. David, is it Aiken?

Aiken. Yeah, I should know this. Theo Caldwell. Jackie Delaney. krista erickson ezra levant i wonder what happened to him brian lily alex pearson of course and uh helam verma uh how did you get the sun news gig so before sun news network it was sun tv it was an over the air channel on channel 15 and it it was local, only in Toronto. It had been, I think, the A channel or a version of the A channel at one point.

Toronto One, it was called. I know. That's where Roz Weston gets his start. Yes. Yes. Roz and I co-hosted a show called Last Call on Toronto One. Of course I remember Toronto One. Of course.

Yeah. So we did Last Call. Billie Holiday had started it with Roz Weston. And then she left because it was too difficult doing radio and television. So then I was brought in to co-host with Roz. We actually had this bar called YYZ. I have some great moments from that. So anyways, it was sold to Sun Media, the license was.

And they were operating it as an OTA called Sun TV. And they had a show, a half an hour news magazine show called Canoe Live. Because they had that big canoe branding that they were doing. Canoe.ca, I remember it well, absolutely. Yeah, so I was brought in at some point after I left radio. So I was done with radio and I was brought in to host that because I was hosting a limited series there called Argos Access with Pinball Clemens. So they asked me to start hosting Canoe Live.

Unbeknownst to me, Quebec War was already in talks to turn it, to convert it into Sun News Network. And Corey Tanik was brought in as a consultant. And Corey met with me. Again, at the time, I didn't know why. But what they were doing is they were already looking at potential on air people and they were looking at the currents on air people. So, um, I basically was a holdover from it being Sun TV. There was myself, Gareth Wheeler, um, was, was there and he started at Sun News Network because he was at Sun TV. So they,

was, was there and he started at Sun News Network because he was at Sun TV. So they, they kept Gareth as well. Yeah. So that's how I ended up at Sun News Network. It's because I was already there. I was an existing on air person. Did you, is it true that, cause I did read this, but you'll now tell me the real deal here. Ontario Federation of Labor President, Sid Ryan, did he forcibly grab you? He did. He absolutely did. What he did to me on air would never be tolerated. Um, had it been any, I think had it been anybody else at that time,

but nevermind in this day and age, he, and listen, it's not an exaggeration. I'm not a person, a woman who runs around and, you know, screaming about, Oh, he, he abused me. It's, it's not an exaggeration. I'm not a person, a woman who runs around and, you know, screaming about, oh, he abused me. It's not my style. I'm pretty tough and pretty thick-skinned. But it was during the Occupy Toronto protests that occurred in, I guess it was 2011. Or, yeah, I guess it was 2011. And where they had taken over the park for, I think, at least six weeks. So, by the way, when people talk about the trucker convoy in Ottawa, please, it's not unprecedented.

We had occupied Toronto for six weeks. At any rate, it was ending. It was the last day. The police had moved in, as they had been with all of these different Occupy protests across North America. The Toronto police moved in to clear out the park and it was very peaceful. It was actually going very smoothly. So I said that day to the news director, let's take the truck down and I'll do my show live from the park. So we did that. And at the time uh the Ontario Labour Federation was holding a convention in Toronto so Sid Ryan um brought a slew of delegates down to this park where this was peacefully being cleared out and he spoke in the middle of the park and then they started marching around the perimeter

of the park and Joe Warmington had gone to sid and said jackie's doing her show because he'd been on my show before and he's like you know as you're marching around would you stop and go over and speak to her and so it's like yeah no problem so this was like it's not like he was ambushed or anything this was all planned he was asked he came over right sid comes over my first question to him which i thought at the time and still believe it was an extremely fair question. I said, Sid, the police have been here this morning clearing this out and it's gone very smoothly and it's been been very peaceful. And now you show up and you're trying to rouse the crowd. I go, don't you think it's a little irresponsible of you to kind of, you know, rouse this crowd right now?

And he's like, no, no. Did you, did you hear my speech in the park? And I said, okay, I didn't hear your speech in the park, but I'm asking you, is it not a little irresponsible? He grabbed me by the arm. He shook me and he said, you know what you are? You're a shit disturber. That's what you are.

And he's got a hold of my arm the whole time. And you even see me in the video. I'm like, I'm laughing, but I kind of pull away. Right. I didn't think Sid was going to hurt me, like physically cause me pain. But it was extremely jarring. Extremely jarring. And regardless of the, yeah, regardless of the era, you have the right to do your job

without somebody physically, you know, assaulting you like that, regardless of politics, regardless of all the variables at play. That's unacceptable behavior. Absolutely. And that's why today, too, like when, you know, I am going back to the trucker convoy, when a lot of people were talking about, you know, the abuse that was being hurled at media, I absolutely agree that that's unacceptable. They're there to do a job. You don't have to agree with them. I don't agree with a lot of media and I call them out,

but you don't get to call people names. You don't get to make threats and you certainly don't get to make physical contact with them. I just wish there was some consistency because as I said, when it happened to me, crickets, crickets from other media. So shame on you. You know, you're right. Sorry, I'm sorry for interrupting there. But it's just as wrong, should that happen to somebody at, you know, CBC,

it's just as wrong when it happens to somebody at, you know, Sun TV. Yeah. Look, some people watching may bring up an incident that happened with a rebel reporter here at the trucker convoy where she was, I believe, I don't want to say tear gas because it wasn't tear gas. I'm not even sure it was pepper spray. There was definitely some obnoxious substance that was released by police. And she definitely looks to have gotten some, you know, in the face. And she may or may not have been hit with a baton. The difference with that is she inserted herself into the protest.

She intentionally went to the front line right up against the police. And I don't believe she was clearly marked as media. She had her mic flash. But still, when you insert yourself into the story like that, you become an activist more than a journalist. So I will make that differentiation as well. Okay. Now here we are, now we're pivoting to politics here. But actually, I'm just going to take a moment to wish you, Jackie Delaney, a happy 420. Will you partake today as it is 420? I totally forgot about that.

That's funny that you mentioned that. I will not be partaking. You don't partake. I'm a conservative. It's just a personal decision. Right. No, I hear conservatives partake too. So it's...

Yeah, for sure. No doubt. Some say more so. Okay. So I joke. So if any FOTM listening is going to celebrate 420 today, just make sure you stop by Canna Cabana because Canna Cabana was treated, was created by and for people who love weed.

So whether you love to smoke it, buy it, chat about it, or share it with your friends, go to cannacabana.com and find one of those hundred plus locations across the country and support these great companies that help support the real talk and fuel the real talk here on Toronto Mike. And I'm going to shout out just a few more of those great companies. One is Palma Pasta. So

you're in Ottawa, but when you return to the GTA, Palma Pasta, that's authentic Italian food. They got four locations, three in Mississauga, one in Oakville. Go to palmapasta.com. Man, best lasagna you'll ever have. Just ask Peter Gross. And stickeryou.com. That's where I get my stickers. This is something you can do in Ottawa, Jackie, because it's online.

Stickeryou.com. Get your decals, your stickers, your temporary tattoos, a bunch of great stuff. Good people, great service delivered right to your door. And shout out to Ridley Funeral Home. Brad Jones, the funeral director there,

has a new podcast called Life's Undertaking. It's really great. We just dropped a new episode late last week. I urge you to subscribe. And again, shout out to Ridley Funeral Home. Why does it end for you at Sun? And how do you pivot to politics? And what the heck are you up to these days?

At Sun, I think I stayed there for about a year. And I just didn't like the editorial decision that, or the editorial direction, I should say, that the network was taking um I yeah I I just didn't like the lack of control I guess over um the product that was going out with my name on it because in radio and this is one thing I didn't know about radio and television is there is a big difference between how those shows get packaged and how that content is decided in radio. You have control over your show. You also have control over your own newscast. So like as a, as a, you know,

as a news anchor and radio, you write your newscast. You have a news director there who's obviously there to help and, you know, to, I guess, say, okay, this, you know, this is a breaking story. We need to focus on this and gather the team when there are situations that need it to be addressed by the team. But overall, you're very much left to your own devices as an on-air personality in radio. It's not that way in TV unless you're Peter Mansbridge and you're the executive producer of the show. Right.

So that was a very difficult adaptation for me. And it's not one that I took to very well. But be clear. Are you saying that Sun TV, was it, was it too far to the right for you to, for you, or was it too like,

I'm trying to understand because, because we think of Sun TV as very conservative television like the Fox News of Canada is how it was kind of spoke about it's not so much that it was um too far to the right it's just that kind of the treatment of of stories as well like it was there were just certain things that became more gimmicky for me than I would have, would have enjoyed. And like I said, I just didn't, I didn't get final say on what went out. And the name of the show was Newswire with Jackie Donini.

I mean, it had my name in the title and it had my name on the logo. And I was the one that got it if, you know, people didn't like what was said or how we were doing things. And I just felt that if it had my name on it, then I wanted to be comfortable with what was going out. And like I said, that's not exclusive to Sun. I mean, that's something that happens, you know, across the board at networks but yeah for me i just i didn't i didn't take well to that so is this where you leave for the uh like i i i guess i'm looking to understand exactly what you're up to now like you work for the a senator is that correct i do yeah so i started I do, yeah. So I started off in politics working for Tim Hudak. I was hired as Tim Hudak's press secretary.

And that was, I had a blast. It only lasted a little over a year because we went to a general election and we lost and then I was looking for work again, which is what brought me to the Senate. And I've been at the Senate ever since. I'm working for my second person. I started there working for who was then the government leader. But then when we were no longer in government,

I went to work for an individual senator. And I've been working for him, Senator Leo Houssakos from Montreal, for about seven years. Okay. Yeah, and loving it. Well, that's the kind of longevity and stability you don't get in radio anyways so yeah and that's why i made that that decision like after after i'd been twice um out of work for more than a year yeah with radio television i just thought ah you know what

i need something that's a little more stable now some people will tell you that politics is no more stable either and in many jobs as a political staffer, it isn't. You're really at the whim of the electorate, right? Because if you're no longer, you know, every four years, the person you're working for is up for re-election, unless it's a senator. Yeah, so I'm like, wait a minute, I did the math on this and I'm like, wait a minute, this actually works out really well for me. And a senator is there until they're 75 and my senator, the senator I work for

is 54. So, yeah, I'm good. That's amazing. Okay, that's amazing. So there is a question, of course, because you're working for a senator

and this comes from Matt Chu via Twitter and it was, actually, I think it was DM to me, but it was, hey, Mike, does Jackie have any insight into the actual reasoning for the Senate's existence in 2022? If we abolished it, how would my life change? I think it's a waste of money. Can you speak to the sentiment?

Because I've been hearing that many Canadians share this opinion that Matt, she was sharing here. It's look, it's a it's another check on government, especially a majority government. And the Senate has when you look at, I would say right now, currently, the legislation on physician assisted dying, a lot of what you see in the current legislation is thanks to the review that was done by the Senate, in the Senate, by senators. And I know a lot of people think, oh, but they're appointed, they're not elected. That's actually what gives senators their independence

and their ability to study legislation differently than the House of Commons, is because they're not beholden to a party leader to sign their nomination papers, right? You're not going to have a party leader exert pressure on a senator by saying, if you vote this way or don't vote this way, I might not sign your nomination papers next time around. So I know a lot of people think that not being elected is a negative. It's actually a

positive. It's what gives them, you know, that security of tenure is what allows them to take a step back from the partisan machine and say, hold on a second, is this what's right for Canadians? And I'll put it to you this way. I bet you there are a lot of Ontarians right now who wish there was a second chamber to review some of Doug Ford's legislation. So I'll put it to you that way. That's for sure. Okay.

Well, thank you for addressing that because a lot of people think if you deleted the Senate, because we also see it as a place where long-time members of the media seem to almost be rewarded in some regard with this appointment. You know, there's a number of former... I'm hoping, I'm hoping, no. That's the real, that's the real plum there. But I'm going to just address it. When I googled

Jackie Delaney, after I read all about netball and what's going on in australia i eventually will come across a toronto star article and i'm going to read it and just tell me what this is about but i'm going to read it verbatim here this is the toronto star a conservative staffer known for going for the jugular against critics including the media has left andrew sheer's office citing a health issue. Jackie Delaney was hired as the Conservative Leader's Manager of Media Relations and Issues Management about five weeks ago, just as Scheer began touting his plan to stand up to this government, the media, and the privileged elite. A senior Conservative source tells CBC News that Scheer was advised that going head-to-head with the media is a good strategy in the lead-up to the election,

and Delaney was hired to help execute that objective. Jackie, what's this all about? What is this? It's never an easy explanation, is it? Look, I've no doubt that Scheer was told that, but he wasn't told that by me. And I certainly, when they hired me, they didn't say, this is what you're being hired for. It was a year out from an election. And you usually start to bolster things about a year out from an election. So, I mean, that was normal.

I was working for Senator Houssakos. I went over to work for Andrew Scheer's OLO on secondment. Or actually, I think I might have taken a leave of that. Either way, I took actually a substantial pay cut to go and work for OLO, because again, we were a year out from an election. That's what you do. The fact that I was hired was, I think, was more coincidental with this war on the media. I was hired was I think was more coincidental with this war on the media. And then I know some people think, so some people think what happened was I was hired for that,

that I was supposed to be the architect of that and that that didn't go well for us. It very quickly didn't go well for us. And then I was shoo shooed out of the office. Sacrificial lamb. It does completely read like that. Yes. Right. So what happened was i went to

work there for whatever reason maybe that was their reason for hiring me but i can tell you what happened to me personally i had a major health scare where i ended up being taken out of hospital by ambulance uh it was shortly after a very close friend had passed away from a heart attack um and i remember all of us sitting around and saying, you know, guys, we're at the age, we can't ignore these things. If you're feeling something, you go, you get it checked. And I was told by a doctor, you cannot be in a stressful situation right now until we figure out what this is.

And I just thought, well, then, OLO, a year out from an election, it's probably not the right place for me. Right. It's amazing. Sorry. So, firstly, I'm glad you're okay now this uh health issue okay good that's the main thing uh but it does totally i read this piece several times it reads like i watch veep okay yeah you can talk about west wing or not but the best stuff comes out of veep okay and it was like you know somebody has to go down it has to be somebody has to be a

high level person will have to go down for this to get this you know we have to throw this meat to the lions or whatever and you in that role at that time would make sense to be that uh it's like i called it a sacrificial lamb or whatever and they would probably on veep they would invent a health issue yeah look it told like it happens all the time so i i don't necessarily blame them Where I didn't like that story was that the person who wrote that story reached out to me. Because they're also reaching back. They go for the jugular. They reached back to a tweet from like months earlier where I was referring to something specific. And I was saying, look, this is why I'm so tough.

This is why I'm so quick to pounce on things. And I used the phrase, go for the jugular. We've all used that phrase. Give me a break. I was. And that, you know, and then that was made into something that it really wasn't. Right. Because that tweet was completely irrelevant to what was happening at the time.

But that reporter reached out to me and said, you know, we're chasing this story. And I said, first of all, I'm a staffer. Really? Why is this important? Since when do you, you know, chase staffing stories of like mid-level staffers? And she's like, well, we're going to do the story. So this, you know, this is your opportunity. And I said, look, you know, health reasons.

And she goes, well, you discuss what it is. And I said, I really don't want to. But then finally I said to her, I said, you know what? Can I talk to you off the record? She said, yes. And I actually told her everything. I told her about being taken to the hospital I told her about the fact that I was referred to the heart institute I told her about the fact that my parents didn't know and that I didn't want to tell my parents until I knew what it was and had a clean bill

bill of health and I said that's why I'm not discussing it. And she said, okay, let me think about it. And she came back to me an hour later and she's like, yeah, no, we're going to run it anyway. And I just thought, really? And you wonder why conservatives feel the way about certain media that we do? And they ran with that story. So I don't have a lot of respect for that journalist and I don't have a lot of respect for that story. And you feel that was because that was the Toronto Star that did that story, and you feel that they were anti-conservative in their rhetoric

and, yeah, political alignment. Yeah, look, there was his story, and there was a similar one that ran on CBC, and I don't have a lot of respect for either of them because, I mean, with the Star in particular, I was actually literally in tears on the phone and by the way yeah um there was something else that happened around that time like i had given my notice and then two weeks later i'd given it so at the three week mark i gave a two week notice and we went out for lunch everybody from the office we all went out for lunch farewell and uh the toronto star was preparing that story

and i when i got a call but i go what are you talking about like i'm leaving and then that that got spun into she's leaving because of this and it's like no i gave my my notice two weeks ago it was really yeah anyways i know i had to that's why i wanted to know that i've got you on the line here i can actually find out what the heck that was about okay now you mentioned twitter going for the jugular and to resident wants to know i'll read his words i'm curious how much do politicians actually care about what happens on twitter seems like a lot of attention is paid to social media by political staffers but then you hear the exact opposite from the actual politicians,

in brackets he says, that they don't pay much attention. So what's the deal with Twitter and politicians in this country? So as I said in response to that, Twitter is an echo chamber, and it really, really is. And I think that political staff

pay way more time and attention to it than anybody else, myself included'm i love me some twitter right um twitter is actually the where i get a lot of my news i stopped watching uh broadcast news a couple of years a year and a half ago maybe i don't watch broadcast news i don't watch broadcast political shows for the most part i tweeted a clip of one last night only because somebody told me, oh, you have to see this clip. So Twitter is where I find out a lot of news. As far as that question, I think social media in general is a tool. It's a fantastic tool. Speaking of the clip I watched last night, you know, a friend of mine, Dimitri Suda, said it, the way you even campaign, that a politician campaigns now, like let's say for leadership, used to be in order to sell memberships, you had to go

out and knock on doors and literally knock on the door, knock on the door, knock on the door. Now, you can put out a tweet and link to where to buy a membership. And you know, instead of having to go door knocking, repeat that same message over and over and over again, you go on Twitter, you post a link, boom, you know, you have untold numbers of people who get a membership that way. So it is a very useful tool. I don't think, I don't think you should rely on Twitter to get a sense of what the people are feeling. I think that would be a very inaccurate measure of what people are feeling because it is an echo chamber.

Well, because you curate those you follow. But I will just point out that this guy who's been accused of being a left-wing pinko, this guy follows Jackie Delaney on Twitter. So it's not the echo chamber you think it is because anyway, I read your tweets as well. But now I'm curious about something you've been tweeting about lately. And now I want to know your involvement in this so it's not the echo chamber you think it is because anyway i i read your tweets as well but now i'm curious about something you've been tweeting about lately uh and i'm now i want to

know your involvement in this because you work for the senator and what is your involvement with the uh current uh conservative party of canada leadership race i've made no secret that i'm supporting pierre polyev i think that's evident from my tweets. I am not an official member of the Poliev team. I don't have a role per se on the campaign team. Um, and I'm, I'm going to stick with that and I, and I will defend, um, defend him and promote him as leader, because I do think that out of this crop of contenders, Pierre is the best choice for our party and the best choice for Canadians. I don't agree with everything Pierre says. I don't agree with everything anybody says. And I, and I think, I think if anyone does, you have to check yourself because no two

people ever agree on anything. anything, nor should you. Like you should have some critical thinking. But I agree with what Pierre's vision is for the party and I agree with what Pierre's vision is for the country. Who are the, I feel like this is like a reality game show we're saying, who are the finalists in this leadership race? Can you quickly name check them? So far, I think the verified candidates are close to verification, i.e. they have their signature submitted and or their fees submitted. And I'm not sure.

I haven't checked the website lately. submitted uh and and i'm i'm not sure like i haven't checked the website lately but i mean um pierre poiliev leslie lewis um jean chavez and patrick brown i think are all officially in at this point but there are other people running uh romanison, who's the sitting MP. There are a couple people from out west who I've never heard of. And I don't think we'll hear from again after this,

but God bless them, because putting your name out there is no easy feat. So again, I'm not a card-carrying member of any party either, and I'm just watching this in the news just like I would watch anything in this country of this magnitude, but it seems like you're backing

Pierre. He's your guy, it sounds like, but I'm also thinking like that's not a... I don't consider this from my perspective, again, politics aside, that's not a strong field. Do you know what I mean? Somebody's got to win that race aside that's not a strong field do you know what i mean uh somebody's got to win that race it's not a strong field and i i would i would suspect

because of your uh the the fond memories you have of working with tim hudak that patrick brown is a non-starter this is i'm in your brain now patrick brown's a non-starter for me for many reasons well do you want to elaborate on that we can't't, can't just be, we got to share some of this. It can't just be John Derringer here. What, what is it you don't like about Patrick Brown? Well, I don't think he can be trusted and I don't think he can be trusted on many fronts. Not the least of which is,

I know there was a lot of hoopla right before he decided to run because this outstanding lawsuit he had with CTV about a story they ran that led to his demise as mayor of the Ontario PC party. I was like, Oh, well this case, look, see, we've settled it. So they were wrong and it was a smear job and, and, you know, there was much celebration and, and look, I thought it was good for him that he won the suit because I thought there was some not great reporting in that story,

but that doesn't mean that everything about that story was wrong. You know, there were elements about that story that absolutely were on the mark, and that should have been troublesome for a leader. But then there's the other stuff that nobody seems to want to talk about that happened during Patrick's tenure as leader with the Ontario PC party. The nominations, Patrick had at least four nominations, I believe. I would have to look it up,

but when the interim leader, Vic Fideli, came in, he had to overturn several nominations because they were, well, some people would use the word rigged. They were certainly questionable. At least one of them was investigated by police in Hamilton. Then there was the whole one that everybody forgets about where a candidate for brampton there was an exchange of shares in a restaurant and some arrow plan points

in exchange for i believe it was 350 000 that pat Patrick then used as a down payment for a house on Lake Simcoe. So you're exchanging money for a nomination and, and then like, that's bad enough. But then that house he rents out as an Airbnb and doesn't disclose the income. So he was found in to have breached the ethics code for both of those things. And nobody's talking about that.

That's crazy. And even now, as mayor of Brampton, go look that up. The Brampton Pointer, I think, is the newspaper in Brampton. Go Google Patrick Brown and Brampton Pointer. They have a great article where they lay it all out. Because even now, as mayor of Brampton, he's up to the same stuff. I don't want that as my leader. I don't.

Now, please pronounce Pierre's last name for me. Polyev. Polyev. Okay, I'm working on it here. Okay, so I have a couple of questions about Polyev here. What would you say, though, before I ask the question, what would you say about the fact that when I meet in the secret, uh,

left wing pinko DM group, and we all discuss things that the, the progressives and air quotes here, cause I don't want to be accused of any, uh, bias here, but, uh,

are hoping Pierre wins because he's so, so far to the right. Where's the right? This way. Well, John Sheree is far more moderate. I would, if you're going to win an election in this country, that maybe a Justin Trudeau would privately,

secretly, if you could read his private thoughts, hoping it's against somebody like PP. I actually think it's the very opposite. think they welcome it being jean charre because there's there's not much to differentiate charre from trudeau so if voters have a choice why are they going to pick why are they going to pick the guy that they already like why are they going to pick the cheap knockoff of the guy we already have so if you want voters to vote for someone other than justin trudeau you have to give them an option that isn't Justin Trudeau or someone that's,

you know, emulating Justin Trudeau. And I think that's Pierre Pogliev. Okay. And also I would, I would say to people, well, hard right.

In what way? In what way? Okay. So little things like only because I, I saw your tweet yesterday about the, what's the name of the brewery that hosted this event yesterday? Steam Whistle. Steam Whistle.

Boo, only because it's a Great Lakes Brewery podcast, which that's where you get your fresh craft beer in this city, but in this province. But Steam Whistle was handing out these letters to attendees just to say like, hey, we book this like we book anyone's wedding or bar mitzvah or whatever. to say like, hey, we book this like we book anyone's wedding or bar mitzvah or whatever, but we do not endorse this candidate or agree with his political beliefs or whatever. And that, you wrote something like, who hurt you, Toronto, or something to that effect? Yeah. That's exactly what I said. Right. And I'm thinking here, and I'm in a neck of the woods in this city that would flirt with a conservative candidate.

We have elected an MPP from Doug Ford's party there. So I'm not downtown or whatever where there's no chance, no hope, no prayer. But I would say it's a fair bet that no Toronto riding is going to elect a candidate, regardless from the CPC, regardless of who wins this leadership race, like Toronto is not interested in a Conservative MP in any of the 416 ridings. I think you'd probably concur with that. Yeah, look, we've won in the GTA before. Yeah, GTA, yeah, yes.

And we'll do so again. It would be great to pick up a couple of seats. Don't be so sure that we can't win a seat or two in GTA. I think that's the biggest thing right now that a lot of people are underestimating, not with just Pierre, but with Canadians in general. I said it about the trucker convoy too. I think a lot of people are underestimating the level of anger being felt by a lot of Canadians, of anger being felt by a lot of Canadians, but also the types of Canadians who are feeling that anger.

It is, you know, I know a lot of people like to chalk it up and like to chalk up conservatives just being angry old white men. And that's not what you're seeing at Pierre's rallies. You're seeing, and I know there was some discussion last week because of a shot of, you know, one rally in particular. But you're seeing people coming out to Pierre's rallies the same as there were people at the trucker convoy who they're not just angry old white men. They're young. They're women.

They're not all white. They have, you know, very religious backgrounds. Yes. You know, so I think that's I think people are underestimating the whole Steam Whistle thing. I'm sorry. It makes me laugh. You know, they're upset. So apparently Steam Whistle is doing this event.

Here's Steam booked it. Yeah. They were getting a lot of pushback from Torontonians saying, how dare you? Sure. He backed the trucker convoy. And the whole reason people find that so offensive is they say these people wanted to overturn the government they were a threat to democracy okay so we have a problem with something that you think is the threat to democracy but you don't see that trying to cancel a politician or saying to a politician that

you can hold an event here you know in the process of a leadership you don't think that's a threat to democracy? So that hypocrisy will always make me laugh. No, they did book the event, which is the most important part of this story, is that they did book the event, and they have the right to ensure their patrons know that that's not an

endorsement, because it could be read by someone. Yeah, but they don't do it for anybody else. They said in their letter that they've had various political events in the past, and they'll continue to. But this is the first time they felt the need to hand a letter to their patron saying, but we don't endorse him. It's like, really?

No, Jackie, Jackie, Jackie. Firstly, just to clarify something earlier, because I said Toronto and you said GTA, and I just want to say that I do believe there's a couple of ridings in the GTA, that G is very important here, that may elect a Conservative MP. I'm speaking actually of like 416, John Tory being your mayor,

which would be, you know, Scarborough all the way across to Etobicoke here. And I don't believe any riding in the city proper is going to elect a Conservative MP. But back to Pierre real quick here. With the religious angle, and then a couple of specific things he said yesterday. The problem I have with the religious angle,

and I am a happy atheist here. I'll just declare that off the top here. But I was raised Catholic, but long ago abandoned that nonsense. But I always feel a hint of, a hint i'm gonna be careful here but i don't know it's my show but i can't like a hint of homophobia in the mix uh it's like it's like i know that religious people you know you can't get married in the church for example right it's gonna be a civil ceremony there's always a hint of uh same-sex marriage being wrong. It's a sin. And there's always a socially, social parts that come up the

religious angle that make me uncomfortable. Okay. So a couple of things on that. First of all, I might have, must have missed something because I, I mean, I know Pierre has said God bless and he's spoken about religious freedom, but he means religious freedom across the board. So I'm not quite sure what religious references to which you're referring. Secondly, Pierre has been quite open. He has no issue with same-sex marriage. He looks at it like you should be able to love who you want to love and marry who you want to marry.

He's been very upfront with that. So I'm not... Yeah, that I don't... It's not even a issue. Then two specific things he said at this brewery yesterday because I was following it on the Twitter, the aforementioned Twitter, which we both enjoy. A couple of points. One is that

I should have attributed this to the tweeter who was at the event, but it was a journalist. The crowd explodes when CPC leadership candidate, Pierre Polieve? Polieve. I got to write it out phonetically. Polieve says he'll save

a billion dollars by defunding the CBC. I'm just curious, Jackie, because you're from the media and now you are working for a senator and you're very involved in the CPC leadership race. Do you think the CBC should be defunded? Sure, yeah. Look, either you open your books totally so we can see where taxpayer dollars are going

and how they're being spent, and by the way, you just rely totally on taxpayer funding, or you say thank you but no thank you and you rely on ad revenue like everybody else has to. Right now the CBC has both. The CBC is entitled to ad revenue and entitled to taxpayer money. It's not a level playing field for other media outlets. On that alone, on that alone, I think they should be

defunded. But also, they don't open their books. We don't know how much Peter Mansbridge was making. It's true, because TVO opens their books. Well, they have the Sunshine List, and that's I think you have to make over six figures to get on there. But, so, shout out to FOTM's Steve Paikin, who always

leads that list. But, it is a great point that why is it we know what Pagan makes from TV Ontario, which is owned by the government of Ontario, but we don't have a clue what the CBC people are making. It is a great, great point. They were hauled before a parliamentary committee a few years ago, the Transport and Communications Committee, and Senator Houssakos, for whom I work,

was a member of that committee at the time. He's currently the chair of that committee. And that committee was doing a study on CBC. And even that parliamentary committee couldn't find out how much Peter Mansbridge was making. That's outrageous. That's unacceptable. Why is that acceptable?

I'm, you know, I'm concurring, absolutely. And the last thing here from Pierre, and I'm going to ask you about real estate and then we're going to say goodbye. I'm sorry this is taking so long, but'm just enjoying myself here you know and now i've got you it's like i've got you held hostage here but no i like it okay good because i'm like oh we're at 90 minutes well where did it go pierre uh he said yesterday i'm gonna just call him by his first name now because i don't want to butcher his name three times but pierre says that if trudeau

if the trudeau government gets its way in can, and this is a quote now, we could have, quote, the most controlled internet in the world. Now, is that just some hyperbole rhetoric in a campaign meeting to jazz up the attendees? Pierre doesn't mean that. He can't possibly believe that. Bill C-10 last year, or last parliament, it's now come back in this parliament as C-11.

I'm very familiar with it because, again senator husakos was the uh critic of it in the senate so i you know have um an extensive knowledge of what's in that bill the government likes to uh depict it as no no this is just us we're reforming the you, we're modernizing the Broadcast Act to try and bring it in line with, you know, the technological realities of our time. It's not true. Actually, instead of modernizing the Act to make it more relevant to, you know, the landscape that we have today

with the advent of social media and social media platforms, they actually want to take social media and our broadcasting landscape today and bring it backwards to fit, you know, our old concepts of what it should be. So they're actually doing the very opposite of what they're saying they're doing. And it's not just conservatives. And it's not just Pierre Poulliet who's saying this. Michael Geist is the furthest thing you'll get from a partisan. And go read Michael Geist on this. He's been a very loud opponent of this legislation for good reason.

What it does, and Pierre talks a lot about gatekeepers, and it's interesting because that's a phrase we used a lot last year in reference to C-10, now C-11, is it's about protecting the gatekeepers and it's interesting because that's a phrase we used a lot last year in in reference to c c10 now c11 is it's about protecting the gatekeepers it's about protecting the gatekeepers at the crtc it's about protecting the gatekeepers uh who are the media funds and the media conglomerates it's not about protecting the viewers and the consumers and it's not about protecting um you know the people with user generated content like a Justin Bieber under this new legislation. Justin Bieber would never we'd never have heard of him. So that's a problem. OK, so be specific there, because that's a real example.

Now you've got attention. They're like, oh, yeah, I remember there's a YouTube phenomenon, this kid from Stratford or whatever. So be specific under this legislation. Why is it or how is it that we would never have heard of Justin Bieber? So someone like a Justin Bieber or a Lilly Singh right now is able to go to YouTube. They're able to create an account

and just put their own content on it, right? They don't need to work with any producers. They don't need to work with any songwriters. Or even as they get more popular and they start to work with producers and songwriters, they can choose who they have to work with the producers or writers of the choosing of that guild, let's say. And if they don't, then algorithms can be put in place that would push Justin Trudeau's content down. So when you open YouTube and you're watching a video, and then you see the suggested videos, right? You, oh yeah, I want to click on that one. These algorithms would push those preferences down or those suggestions down.

Same thing with Netflix. What counts as Canadian content? The definition, I think a lot of people would be very surprised that what counts as Canadian content doesn't actually benefit necessarily Canadian writers. It benefits the various production houses, but it doesn't benefit the writers or the writers just starting out. So it is all about the gatekeepers. And yeah, so Pierre's not the only one who's talking about that. And it's certainly not conservatives who are the only ones that have an issue with this legislation. I love that in that well-spoken rhetoric there, you actually conflated Justin Bieber with Justin Trudeau at some point, which I think is, but it's fine because we all know

you meant Bieber, but a lot of Justins, a lot of Justins. Okay, Malfurious has a good question. So firstly, he says, I'm always fair. I hope I'm being fair here. You know, I haven't made anything gone too far. More than fair, absolutely. Here's a lame question for her. You're the her in this situation, by the way. She's in Ottawa and on the front lines. Do MPs actually get along behind the scenes?

Because in front of the camera and on social media, they behave pretty poorly to each other. And he puts in parentheses, this goes for all parties. Yeah, I mean, it depends on the individuals, right? Some individuals do, some individuals don't. Typically, if there's someone you don't get along with, you just don't fraternize with them. But lots of people fraternize across

uh party lines um who you choose to fraternize with is based more on those interpersonal relationships than it is on the party um with which you're affiliated now obviously you're gonna you're gonna lean more towards people that you see more regularly. So I obviously see conservatives, other conservatives, more than I see liberals. But I have a few friends who are liberals and vice versa, and everybody does. Look, we're kind of all in this together. I kind of liken it to when I was a sports reporter

and I worked for the media outlet I worked the media that I worked for, um, I had more friends at other media outlets because we would all see each other more, right. Because we were all covering the same games and the same events more so than we were at our individual studios. So even though we worked for different media outlets and competing media outlets, we all actually hung out together more than we did with people with the station that we were affiliated with. So it's a similar thing. I just spend more time with other conservatives. So naturally, that's going to be my larger circle of friends.

You know where I thought you were going to go there when you were talking about your Fan 590 days is that you were actually a Montreal Canadiens fan having been born and raised in Newfoundland. But there you were surrounded. You had to act like a Leafs booster in some regard. Never. I never did. Everybody knew exactly where I stood and exactly which team that I was cheering for. You and John Gallagher, that's all. Right? We're the outliers. Shout out to John Gallagher. Okay. So last question is unrelated to politics or media. It's about real estate. So I want to know how the hunt for an Ottawa condo is going. It went very well.

I'm in my new condo. Oh, okay. So a little backstory for this. So I mentioned I'm Googling Jackie Delaney and I'm learning about netball. And then I'm learning that you were in a newspaper write up about real estate. Yeah, it was a CTV,

the local CTV affiliates reached out to me to do a story on it. And then they did a, they did a write up about it as well. So you probably saw that right up, but there was a video that aired as well. Right. Because they were doing a story just on the the market and the the lack of inventory and i had been looking i guess that

story was done in late january early february and i had been looking since november um so they they have a real estate agent that they they speak to a lot and it was his agency that I was going through. So he said, look, you know, she's a, she'd probably be a good one to have on to discuss it. And it was so funny because the day after I did that interview, uh, the next day I came and looked at this condo that I'm currently sitting in. Right. That's amazing. Okay. So it's funny because real estate, this is a topic we all love to discuss because I think it's completely out of control. Because the house I'm sitting in right now, we bought, my wife and I bought, I would say like eight years ago. And we could never, ever, ever afford this today. Like we can't afford our own house.

And I think there's so many people listening to us now in the same boat, like I can't afford my own house. But then to have an inventory issue on top of it, like it just, yeah. I mean, there was just no inventory for you. There wasn't. And I didn't want to settle, right? Like this is my first home, by the way, I've always been a renter and I didn't want to settle or feel like I was settling. I didn't want to. So I had a really good interest. I was locked in at a really good interest rate. And I had that locked in for 90 days and it was going to expire in, I think, February 22nd. So I knew I was up against that clock. But I didn't want to buy something just for the sake of buying it and getting in at that interest rate. But I didn't have a lot to choose from. And it's funny because even this, the one

I did end up buying, I remember when I first reached out to my agent and I said, oh, did you see this listing? I think I want to go look at it. And she's like, I don't know if you're going to like it. I think it might be small for you. And I was like, no, I want to go look at it. And it ended up being bigger than either of us expected. So it's funny how it just worked out.

But you know what? I know the struggle that people are dealing with and I feel for them because I don't think everybody's going to, you know, have that 11th hour stroke of luck the way that I did. Well, not only that, the fact that you could get in them and in Ottawa, I know it's not quite Toronto, but still it's got a similar, yes, get in there. And the fact that you were able to get in the market at all, just speaks to many, I guess, many years of savings and investment, et cetera,

because the, I guess, many years of savings and investment, et cetera, because the, you know, the average Joe and Josephine simply can't earn and save fast enough to get ahead of this. Like, unless you have a, I don't know, a rich, I would say a rich uncle, but a parent or parents who are going to be like, here's $250,000 gift for your first home. Like without that, which is how many of us have that? i don't know how you get in in 2022 i don't know how you get in the market in toronto no and even my mortgage uh my mortgage lender my agents when i was speaking to her we were discussing like you know um the down payment and the amount of the down payment and having to go through chmc and and all of that

um and she was saying yeah she, she goes, unless you know somebody who can help you with that mortgage payment, what I ended up doing was maxing out my RRSP withdrawal, which helped a great deal. And I figured, you know what, I'd rather max that out and have to pay myself back than have to pay somebody else back. So that's what I ended up doing.

But I'm 53 and I'm just now owning my first home. Well, congrats. But congratulations, because you got your own condo in Ottawa I ended up doing. But I'm 53 and I'm just now owning my first home. That's sad. But congratulations because you got your own condo in Ottawa and it sounds like you've got let me do the math, 21 more years of service or whatever that Yeah, so it lines up perfectly. Everything lines up perfectly.

Well Jackie, I thoroughly, I want to just for the record tell everyone listening I thoroughly enjoyed this conversation with a conservative. Whoa. Terrible. So I did too. So much for having me on.

I really enjoyed this. And the time actually flew by. It's crazy. And you did double duties this morning. So now you deserve a go out there for a walk and stretch those legs. But thank you so much. You're now an FOTM. stretch those legs. But thank you so much.

You're now an FOTM. And that brings us to the end of our 1037th show. You can follow me on Twitter. I'm at Toronto Mike. Jackie is at Jackie Delaney. Follow her on Twitter. Our friends at Great Lakes Brewery are at Great Lakes Beer. Palma Pasta is at Palma Pasta.

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See you tomorrow. See you tomorrow.