Sheila Gunn Reid and Keean Bexte join David Menzies to expose Canada’s press freedom erosion: RCMP Sergeant Terry Guillain barred Bexte from Trudeau’s residence, mirroring Hong Kong-style media restrictions, while Rebel News faces lottery-like odds for phone scrums. Gunn Reid dismantles GBA+’s jargon-filled infrastructure mandates, calling Trudeau’s "men influx" claim absurd, and contrasts the safety of male-dominated oil hubs like Cold Lake with progressive cities. Menzies highlights Toronto Mayor John Torrey’s $880 fines for solo park-goers while ignoring his own mask violations and unchecked homeless encampments, revealing a glaring double standard. Their critique underscores how performative policies and selective enforcement undermine both democracy and public trust. [Automatically generated summary]
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Welcome to Rebel Roundup, ladies and gentlemen, and the rest of you, in which we look back at some of the very best commentaries of the week by your favorite rebels.
I'm your host, David Menzies.
Kian Bexty went to Ottawa in person the other day.
He wanted to ask the Prime Minister some questions.
Instead, he was physically removed from the premises.
Kian has plenty to say about Justin Trudeau's latest clampdown on reporters who have the temerity to ask tough questions.
What's a gender-based analysis when it comes to infrastructure projects?
I haven't the foggiest.
So thank goodness Sheila Gunread will drop by to enlighten us all.
And finally, letters, we get your letters.
We get your letters every minute of every day.
And I'll share some of your responses regarding Toronto's day of infamy.
Ooh, you see, a bunch of cooped-up condo dwellers decided to go to Trinity Bellwoods Park for some fun in the sun.
And alas, they broke Wuhan virus etiquette, which prompted outrage from elected officials, who, by the way, make it a habit to break Wuhan virus etiquette rules themselves.
Those are your rebels.
Now, let's round them up.
I'm going to ask you to read you pictures right now.
You want to review my pictures?
If you don't show me, I'm going to ask you to escort you out.
I'm not showing you my pictures, man.
Okay.
This is in Hong Kong.
Okay, let's go.
You're not welcome on this site.
I'm actually going to be able to do it.
No, I'm telling you, taking charge of the site, you're not welcome.
Okay.
I'm going to ask you to leave.
Oh, you'll be escorting out.
Yeah, I don't have an intention to leave.
I want to ask you a car here.
Sorry, what?
Do you have a car here or did you walk in?
I walked in.
Okay, let's go.
Are you going to arrest me?
I'm going to escort you out.
So he's not arresting me.
Okay, let's go.
Don't touch me.
This is Ottawa, Canada, 2020, when Justin Trudeau is having his RCMP throw out a journalist for no reason, because I wouldn't show him my phone!
I wouldn't show him what pictures I've taken.
You're twisting my arm harder.
How do you sleep at night knowing that you are leading to the death of this democracy?
What was his name?
Sergeant LeDuc.
And there you have it, folks.
Sergeant LeDuc of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.
But if you ask me, he kind of reminds me of Sergeant Stadanko of Cheech and Chonglore with a dash of Sergeant Schultz thrown in for good measure.
And with more on the Rebel News crackdown in Ottawa is our roving reporter and all-around badass Kian Bexty.
Welcome to Rebel Roundup, my friend.
Hey, David, thanks for having me.
Always a pleasure.
You know, that was absolutely stunning footage, Kian.
But, you know, if you don't mind me saying so, I think you made a strategic error with your approach.
You see, you were claiming to be a journalist who wanted to pursue freedom of the press.
No wonder you were strong-armed and given the bums rush.
What you should have said is that you were an irregular migrant seeking government benefits, and then Sergeant Leduc would have provided bellhop service for you.
What do you think?
Yeah, I think you're right.
Or pretended, maybe I should have just had a crop railroad to stand on so that they wouldn't touch me.
You know, Kian, bring us back to that day when you went to the press conference.
Is this what you anticipated was going to happen, that you would get strong-armed?
Did you also anticipate that members of the media party would just turn a blind eye and not even acknowledge your presence?
Or were you expecting something different to happen?
Well, I'll walk you through the day.
I was a little bit surprised that we got as far as we did.
We kind of figured we might be able to do something outside of the gate to sort of film a quick video.
But when we got there, we were actually welcomed in by the security of the Rideau campus area.
I don't know if you know how the area works, but basically the Governor General lives there and so does the Prime Minister.
It's a really big campus.
And we were allowed in all the way up to the front steps of Rideau Cottage, which is the specific house that Trudeau lives in there.
And it's right next to the, it's right next to the hockey rink, if you can believe it, the place actually has its own hockey rink.
So we get up to that gate.
We're standing there with the media.
And the media sets down all of their bags, kind of like they did at the Debates Commission.
You might remember when they brought that dog in to sweep all the bags.
So we didn't have footage of it because we had to put our cameras down and all of our bags down.
But the RCMP swept all of our stuff to make sure that there was no explosives in it.
And we were given the all-clear.
And then we stood in that line with the rest of the journalists to get in.
And we were about to because we were allowed in by security.
But when Terry Guillain came, he was like, nope, not that guy.
He pointed me out specifically to the RCMP and ordered them to keep me out.
And you know, let's talk about Terry Guillain, Kean, because your initial encounter with him was during Last year, I believe it was in Saskatchewan.
He threw you a body check in a rink, which was completely offside.
I'll tell you, in January, I was covering the mining convention here in Toronto, and Trudeau was going to give remarks there, as well as some other liberal MPs.
And Terry Guillain made a B-line to me.
I got my cell camera out because I thought, here we go, the bum's rush time.
And I got to tell you, Kean, he was sweet as pie.
He was just going over the protocol roles.
And I thought, wow, it was like a come to Jesus moment, but maybe it's just that was just a one-off because I assume the government doesn't have control over the Metro Toronto Convention Center because obviously he's back to situation abnormal when it comes to letting you into a press conference.
Yeah, I think he personally hates me.
The first time, you're right.
The first time I met him, I was in northern Saskatchewan when he so kindly body checked me in that hockey rink where Trudeau was addressing Indigenous leaders.
And then the second time and the last time that I met him was actually outside of the press gallery, the press briefing room at the White House, which obviously you have to be a journalist to get in.
So there were a whole argument.
Like, I actually spoke to him there.
I asked him how the RCMP investigation was going into him body checking me, to which he didn't answer.
He just sort of grinned at me.
So the last time I saw him was at the White House, and then I saw him outside of Prime Minister Trudeau's house, and he's like, no, we're not letting you in here.
I can get better access to the President of the United States.
You know, Kian, let's talk about the White House because I think you've raised a really relevant point here.
President Trump, he doesn't hide his contempt for the New York Times, the Washington Post, CNN.
The list goes on.
But he doesn't exclude those reporters from press scrums.
You know, they get into lively discussions, and sometimes that's the most entertaining thing that you see is the scrum in action, not what you read the next day.
But we have a prime minister that, well, if you're going to give me hardball questions, I'm sorry.
White House Scrums & Press Freedoms00:03:10
You are disqualified.
Don't you find this egregious?
Yeah, of course I do.
I just don't know what do we do?
Like, how do we fix this?
It seems like we're backed into a corner.
And it feels like I haven't felt this feeling of just sort of like exhaustion and disbelief paired with like this thought that there's just nothing that we can possibly do to fix this since I was in Hong Kong when I knew that there was a countdown clock going until China restricted their democracy permanently.
And there's just nothing that Hong Kongers could do about it.
It was going to happen.
They were losing their freedom step by step.
And eventually they get to the point where they were basically 100% in an autocratic country, under the Chinese communists.
And here in Canada, we're seeing these same steps progress from Justin Trudeau barring reporters from debates to every other instance of him censoring media and journalists to now finally him using police force to remove journalists.
The only other place that that's happening in the last few days right now is in Hong Kong and it's just sad to watch.
It is indeed.
And you made a great point about you having more press freedom in Hong Kong during a protest than you do in Ottawa in 2020.
And of course, behind the scenes, Kian, we well know that Trudeau and the likes of Minister Debo are working on getting some kind of a news agency registry.
That's a deliberate attempt to put us out of business.
We know that.
But I guess in terms of what we do, I guess we have no other choice but to go to court with our young legal eagles.
They kicked the butts of the government's five lawyers last year to get us, you and I, into the parliamentary debates.
And I guess we're going to have to rely on a judge to do likewise in order to get to these scrums.
Because I should tell the folks, this is very relevant.
For weeks and weeks and weeks, you and Sheila Gunn, occasionally me, have gone on to these telephone scrums to get a question to the prime minister, which are allegedly random generated.
And we never get chosen ever.
We have better odds winning the Lotto Max jackpot.
So I guess it's going to have to be an act of law.
What do you think, Kian?
Yeah, I mean, it seems, you know, the judges in this country are a little bit hit and miss, but we've had a few wins lately at Rebel News from that debates commission.
And then in Toronto, when that judge, the Supreme Court of DC, the justice, God bless her soul, told Meng Wanzo that, oh, no, you actually can't commit fraud in either the United States or Canada.
We're going to extradite you if we want to.
There are some pretty reasonable judges in Canada, and it really, that is the only thing that gives me a little bit of solace right now.
So hopefully the justice who is overseeing our case with the Privy Council office, and to be fair, we've already won our first shot at it.
They gave us an expedited hearing.
Gender-Based Analysis Needed00:14:20
Hopefully they understand how important press freedoms are in this country.
But David, I'm sorry, I actually have to run.
I'm at the airport, if you can tell, and I have to board my plane in two minutes.
So I'm going to have to hang up here.
All I can ask, Kian, is don't get arrested.
Kian, thank you so much for winging it.
So many other questions for you, but when you got to go, you got to go.
Thank you, my friend, and travel safely.
Will do.
Thanks so much, David.
You got it.
And that was Kian Bexty at some airport somewhere in Canada.
Like I said, hope he doesn't end up in handcuffs or anything.
Keep it here, folks.
More of Rebel Roundup to come right after this.
How's that sitting in our pipeline approval process?
So I'm really glad you asked that because I think people are like, well, what is this gender thing?
Well, imagine that you have a huge number of people going to a remote community, many men.
What is the impact on the community?
What is the impact on women in the community?
And actually, once again, smart proponents understand this.
So they're going to put measures in place.
That's all it is.
It's just taking a smart approach to thinking about, okay, what's going to be the impact of a major development in a particular area?
That person is Canada's former environment minister, now infrastructure minister, explaining the need to shoehorn gender concerns into the approvals process for major energy projects here in Canada.
Minister McKenna is implying that a sudden influx of economic activity to a region driven by a largely male workforce, you know, our brothers, dads, and husbands, would somehow endanger the women in the places they're working.
And so now every new project has to undergo something called a gender-based analysis plus.
I still have many questions about what this whole thing entails.
And apparently so does the public.
They, like me, have been filing for access to information to find out what this new gender pipeline's nuttiness involves.
This here is a proactive release, meaning someone else, we don't know who, asked for this information through access to information and they received it.
And now that information is being proactively released to the public.
It's from Natural Resources Canada.
The filer asked, I'm looking to access any draft or final versions of the gender-based analysis that took place for Site C and for the Trans Mountain Expansion Project, as well as any documents pertaining to the analyses.
What we see here are hundreds of redacted pages, leaving behind just 37 pages in total, and most of those pages were either duplicates or left in to explain why the hundreds of others were redacted.
This, on one of the Liberals' flagship policies, on two huge energy sector projects that the Liberals have promoted on national TV in Canada and on an international stage, the way Trudeau did at the G20 meeting in Buenos Aires in 2018.
It all seems a bit ridiculous, odd and unlikely.
Just 37 pages of analysis available to the public on two major projects combined.
Either the Liberals are not turning over all the information or they don't know what the gender-based analysis plus is either, but they know it sounds kind of feministy.
Remember the good old days, folks, when an infrastructure project meant land surveys and engineering studies and then finally shovels in the ground to actually build that bridge or pipeline or railway?
Oh, but that was then and this is now because these days in Justin Trudeau's Canada, a gender-based analysis is also needed.
What's a gender-based analysis, you say?
Great question.
And here's the lady to give us an answer, the one and only Sheila Gunread.
Welcome to Rebel Roundup, my friend.
Hey, David, thanks for having me on the show, but I don't have an answer.
I've been looking at this stuff for almost three years and I don't have a clue what a gender-based analysis plus is, and I don't think the bureaucrats do either.
Well, I did describe you as a lady, Sheila, so hopefully I got that part right.
But that was my first question.
Like, let's cut to the chase.
Stripped of all the political jargon and the $3 words.
What in blue hell is a gender-based analysis when it comes to construction projects?
What are they trying to say to us, Sheila?
I think, now, again, I want to tell you, I've studied this for almost three years and none of it makes any sense.
Like you say, there are a lot of big words in here that you, and not like usable big words, but things like intersectionality and, you know, it's really quite crazy.
But from what I understand, the gist of it is every single infrastructure project, government policy, regulation, energy project, what have you, has to be examined through a gendered lens, meaning that they all have to undergo this additional, onerous, lengthy,
subjective study about how each project and policy will impact different genders, sexual identities differently.
And I don't know what the point of it all is because everything impacts everybody differently.
So, you know, when you're looking at pipelines, it shouldn't really be like, how do ladies feel about pipelines?
The point should be, is this going to create jobs for everybody regardless of their sexual identity or whatever?
Does it give them jobs?
Because for me, that's my gender-based analysis.
My women's issues are jobs, taxes, job creation, debt to GDP ratio.
Like, those are my women's issues.
But a lot of this is very subjective, and pipeline projects can be held up now simply because of how a certain group might feel oppressed by them.
You know, Sheila, to me, it's all so much gibberish.
And I'll dial it back to a local counselor here in Toronto, Christian Wantam.
When the city's budget was being discussed last year, she was talking about infrastructure projects, this being road projects, going through a gender-based, I think she used the word focus.
And I mean, Kristen Wantam, nice lady, but so far to the left in left field that she's actually in the concession stands.
You know, when I look at her writing, which includes the gay village, you see where the stop signs and the traffic signals are, instead of a solid white line, you have the rainbow-colored line to represent gay pride or the blue, the light blue and pink line to represent the trans community as opposed to solid white lines.
I mean, to me, it's just all so much virtue signaling.
And, you know, again, I'm flummoxed by what they're trying to achieve by this gender-based analyses.
Well, yeah, it's also performative, isn't it?
It's like a political theater of tolerance.
The idea that if you have a different gender identity or whatever the nomenclature is these days, that you require a different kind of marking, traffic marking, so that you understand it is absolutely ridiculous.
It's performative tolerance just for the sake of performing about how tolerant you are to the rest of the world.
We are so tolerant that even our markings on the streets are gay.
It's ridiculous.
And, you know, when we got these access to information documents that the story is on, it found that even though when the liberals try to rig these projects, these pipeline projects or resource projects by putting them through this completely subjective gendered lens, at the end of it, women still care about the same things as men.
Is this thing going to provide economic opportunity for myself and my family?
And hey, can I get a job working on it?
Because that would be really great.
That's the stuff that women actually care about.
And it doesn't matter if the woman is Aboriginal or white or whatever.
We all care about the same things.
Can we feed our families?
Will this thing help me get out of poverty?
If the answer is yes, then give her.
100%.
And let's be frank, Sheila, that there are women who are in the trades.
I mean, it's still a male-dominated field.
But what I've always found offensive about this debate, and you've certainly covered this on several occasions, is this incredibly offensive presumption that mostly males going into a community,
so you were talking our fathers, our brothers, our uncles, they're going to be predispossessed for some reason to sexually assault or grope or do something otherwise inappropriate to women living in that community.
And this is being driven by the prime minister who groped Rose Knight thinking she wasn't one of the important journalists.
This is appalling, Sheila, and it's not based on any evidence as far as I can tell.
Well, I mean, as a woman whose son works in fabrication and whose husband works in the oil patch, let me tell you, I feel more safe in, let's say, Bonneville or Cold Lake, Alberta, major oil field hubs, than I do in the depths of progressive Edmonton.
And that's just how it is.
People forget, and I think it's because Justin Trudeau is so far removed from these manly type jobs.
And let's be honest, they are manly type jobs.
There are a lot of women more so now than ever working in the trades.
But these are often very physical jobs, very demanding jobs.
These are guys who are leaving their families behind, sometimes for 300 days of the year, working night and day in some of the harshest conditions on the face of the earth to provide for their families and, in turn, providing economic development in the towns in which they work.
And I think it's despicable for Justin Trudeau to go on an international stage like he did when he went to the G20 meeting in Buenos Aires and say that this gender-based analysis is necessary because an influx of men into these communities is bad for women.
I think it's really quite disgusting, but it speaks to just that insular Laurentian life that Justin Trudeau and the reporters who report on this stuff completely without a skeptical eye.
It just shows how insulated they are.
Last question, Sheila.
Let me throw this by you and see if maybe this is a gender-based analysis because I still don't know what we're talking about.
I live in the 905 north of Toronto and there's been some major transit construction projects going on digging up Bather Street and Young Street.
And there are these signs, these caution signs, and it says, please slow down.
My dad works here.
But what happened in the last several months is half of those signs, and you can tell they've been jerry-rigged, now say, please slow down.
My mom, they've got the word mom replacing dad works here.
Is that a gender-based analysis?
And by the way, if it is, that's just dad and mom.
Why have we left out a sign saying, please slow down, my transgendered caregiver works here?
Your thoughts, Sheila.
Yeah, aren't we not supposed to say dad and mom?
Isn't it like a people-kind parental unit or something?
Is that too long to put on a sign?
I mean, this idea that we can actually, just by changing the language, change the facts of the situation is kind of ridiculous.
Men work construction overwhelmingly.
That's just how it is.
Women gravitate to other work, and that's fine.
I like physical labor, but I don't want to work construction or road on a road crew.
I just don't.
And, you know, able-bodied young men gravitate to that kind of work, and that's fine.
It is overwhelmingly the dads doing this work.
And you can change the sign all you want, but that doesn't change the facts of the situation.
And it just, it reminds me of something Mayor John Torrey did this week when he was celebrating some horrible thing called menstruation awareness day or something like that.
And he completely erased women from the announcement, the completely unnecessary and kind of gross announcement.
He erased women from the equation and said, I think it was people who menstruate.
This idea that you can actually just, by virtue of rewriting a sentence and replacing a few words to be something more vague, that we can change the reality of it all is ridiculous.
And I think that's how these gender-based analysis questions that they're putting out in these surveys that they're giving, they're going wrong for the government because it doesn't matter how the government tries to rig these surveys and analysis.
People care about the things they care about, and overwhelmingly, that's getting to work.
Wow.
Well, Sheila, we're going to have to wrap it here.
You know, I actually feel sorry for John Torrey.
How can someone so spineless and so testicular challenged even walk upright?
Unbelievable.
Anyways, I'm going to this weekend have a Jenner analyzed pizza and beer, I think, to celebrate the hot weather.
Sabrina Miller's Grass Theory00:04:31
So, Sheila, thank you so much for weighing in on this recent round of madness that we endure every day here at Rebel.
Thank you.
Thanks, David.
Have a great weekend.
You got it.
And that was Sheila Gunread, who, when I put through a gender analysis thingamabob, turned out she's a 100% woman.
There you go.
Keep it here.
More of Rebel Roundup to come right after this.
Well, folks, I'm at ground zero when it comes to Toronto's day of infamy regarding the Wuhan virus.
Now, you may recall on Saturday here at Trinity Bellwoods Park, thousands, literally thousands of people came out and enjoyed a beautiful, hot, sunny spring day in the park.
And why wouldn't you?
They have been cooped up for a couple of months now.
Well, that triggered the mayor and the police chief and the Toronto medical officer, Cruella Davila, I mean Ellen Davila.
And they condemned this gathering and they were saying that this was irresponsible and that this was only going to spread the virus.
But is that a fact?
I mean, really?
We know that 82% of the Wuhan virus deaths in Ontario are at seniors long-term care facilities.
If you're relatively young and relatively healthy, you have just about a 0% chance of dying of the Wuhan virus.
Oh, and by the way, in the Department of One Law for Me and One Law for Thee, well, the ever-deaf John Torrey, the mayor of Toronto, he just couldn't resist doing another photo op where, yeah, you guessed it, he violated the rules.
Here's the front page of today's Toronto Sun.
Ah, not you too.
My only problem with that headline is it should be awe, not you too again, because we all remember back in April how he had a photo op with 10 healthcare workers.
But as you can see, John Torrey's not wearing a mask.
He's wearing something.
I don't know, it might be some kind of medical device to cure a double chin or something like that, but it's certainly not covering his mouth and his nose.
So why is it that Mayor Torrey, even with photographic forensic evidence, doesn't get one of those $880 tickets?
Whereas if you followed our series, folks, fightthefines.com, you know that people sitting by themselves in the park have received those tickets.
In fact, law enforcement did a huge crackdown on Sunday, the day after the mass gathering.
And at one point, two law enforcement personnel gave an $880 ticket to a person who was solo and sunbathing.
Does that make sense?
Indeed, welcome to Hogtown during a heat wave, folks, where the unofficial motto would appear to be, one law for me and one law for thee.
In any event, here's what some of you had to say about the ODS double standard in Toronto when it comes to Wuhan virus etiquette.
Rick S. writes, all the homeless people should camp out at John Torrey's house.
Yeah, that would be a laugh, Rick.
That was the other part of my report, by the way, namely how Toronto is becoming a San Francisco-style sanctuary city with literally hundreds of tents housing homeless people popping up all over the city.
Naturally, no Wuhan virus etiquette is being practiced in those encampments.
But then again, I'm pretty sure none of these filthy tent cities are anywhere near Casa Torre.
So don't expect the mayor to get proactive on this file.
David Prisak writes, just claim you're not a Canadian citizen and they will give you a hotel room, free health care and everything else.
Yeah, good point, David.
That's indeed how it works under Wroxham Road rules, right?
Nancy Pearson writes, the sunshine and fresh air will do more for you than locked up in a stuffy house.
You know, I agree wholeheartedly, Nancy, and so do our fearless leaders like Premier Doug Ford and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who preach to us not to go to the cottage for some R ⁇ R.
And then the next thing you know, they are making a beeline to cottage country themselves.
Unbelievable how tone deaf they are.
Progressives Preach Green, Yet Sunbathe00:00:28
And Sabrina Miller writes, the sunbathing dude was obviously infecting the grass.
Hey, you know, you might be right, Sabrina, but I don't get it.
The progressives are always telling us to go green, right?
But that's Toronto in 2020.
You can smoke the grass, you just can't lay on it.
Well, that wraps up another edition of Rebel Roundup.
Thanks so much for joining us.
See you next week.
And hey, folks, never forget, without risk, there can be no glory.