David Menzies argues Jean Charest’s open letter to Conservatives—calling Poliev a "freedom" advocate while dismissing his convoy support—exposed hypocrisy, ending his leadership hopes. He contrasts Charest’s shifting stance with Poliev’s and Bernier’s authentic opposition to COVID-era restrictions like vaccine passports and Scotiabank’s firing of Gary Duke for questioning Pride Month policies, labeling it "woke tyranny." Naomi Wolfe’s 2020 move from NYC to upstate NY, fearing Cuomo’s lockdowns, underscores broader concerns about media bias and authoritarianism, leaving Menzies demanding a Conservative leader willing to resist overreach. [Automatically generated summary]
Tonight, Jean Charé just penned an open letter published in the Toronto Sun.
You know, folks, I think he just killed his chances of ever becoming CPC leader.
It's Friday, August 26, 2022.
I'm David Menzies, and this is the Ezra Levant Show.
Shame on you, you censorious bug.
Jean Charest recently published an open letter in the Toronto Sun newspaper.
It was addressed to, quote, my fellow members of the Conservative Party of Canada, please accept this as my final pitch to those of you who have yet to cast a ballot in the leadership race, end quote.
And you know something, folks?
I want to personally thank Mr. Charay for his pithy prose because he has demonstrated beyond a doubt, in his own words no less, that he is yet another closet liberal who likes to wear conservative clothes, you know, like the already rejected CPC candidate, sneaky Patrick Brown.
You want proof?
No problem.
Allow me to analyze some of the comments made by Jean Cretchin, or I mean, sorry, Jean Charé, because as I read his letter, all I could think of was that age-old phrase hoisted by his own petard.
The first nugget that had the needle on my internal bullshite detector veering deep into the red zone was this, quote, we need a healthy debate about ideas within our own party.
That is the base upon which we earn the support of Canadians and attract high-caliber candidates.
A competitive race is a good thing, end quote.
Oh, really?
A competitive race is a good thing.
Is this the same Jean-Charis that stated back in April that Pierre Polyev should be disqualified as a CPC candidate for supporting the trucker convoy?
Let's check out that piece of video evidence.
He's attracting big crowds, sir.
Like, I'm telling you, you're seeing a thousand people there, and I've seen some of your crowds, 500 in Quebec, but smaller crowds, he's got momentum.
He's talking about axing carbon price, cutting things, getting rid of the gatekeepers.
Now, you've become very much more openly critical of him.
Now you're here in Ottawa, specifically about his support of the truckers.
Yes.
Why?
He did not support of a blockade.
He says he supports freedom.
No, He says he supports freedom.
Excuse me.
I mean, were you mistaken?
I mean, he actually didn't support the blockade.
What you saw, what he did was.
He was out there supporting the truckers.
You sound like you drank the Kool-Aid here.
No, no, he was out there with the truckers.
Everyone.
That's his view.
Evan, everyone knows that Pierre Pollier supported the blockade.
And I don't care how much spin you put into it.
Here is someone who makes laws and says I can break laws because I'm above the law.
Well, I'm sorry.
If you want to be a leader of a party, if you want to sit in the House of Commons and make laws, you have to obey them.
The laws of the land are not a buffet table from which you choose what you want or do not want to support.
And if you say to Canadians, I want to be the leader of the Conservative Party and I want to be the chief legislator of the country, but I don't have to obey the laws, I'm sorry.
That's not just a failure in leadership.
It disqualifies you, as far as I'm concerned, as being someone who thinks Earth aspires to be a leader of a party.
But, sir.
Wow, Jean-Chara doesn't want a healthy debate.
Rather, he is an adherent of cancel culture.
Conservatives, by definition, should be outspoken in their opposition to cancel culture and wokeism and political correctness.
But not this fake Tory, a man who will never be able to live down that period of eight years on his resume in which he served as the liberal premier of Quebec.
Goodness.
The open letter goes on: quote, I've spoken to thousands of members and party activists, and it's clear to me there are policy areas where conservatives should be champions: national unity and addressing Western alienation, healthcare reform, religious freedom, and reproductive choice, families, law and order, defense, security, and economic growth, and independence, end quote.
Now, I do agree that all of those topics are very important indeed.
What I take issue with here is Charé claiming that he has spoken to thousands of party members.
Hey, the camera does not lie.
Check out the thousands, hundreds, dozens.
Would you believe a handful of people who showed up at the Jean-Jaret campaign kickoff a while back?
Here, but I just wanted to say hello.
My name is Patrick Ria.
I am one of the local volunteers here for Mr. Charé, Jean-Charé.
And it's a great crowd.
Lots of friendly faces, faces I haven't seen in a long time, and some faces that I, well, I guess I haven't seen anyone in a long time.
COVID's really gotten in the way of that, right?
Wow, not exactly a Donald Trump rally, eh?
Yet the MC called that gathering a great crowd.
Are you kidding me?
It looked like there were more media types than there were actual Jean-Charais supporters.
And what the hell was that venue?
A mechanics garage?
Gee, maybe Sharé was getting an oil change for his Model T. Hey, I'll give him points for time management and multitasking if that is indeed the case.
Sharé goes on: quote, COVID magnified a feeling of unease and alienation that many Canadians were already feeling, and Mr. Polyev captured part of that sentiment.
It wasn't dumb luck that Maxime Bernier was able to cultivate enough support for a new party and run in the last federal election, just as it's no accident that Mr. Polyev was able to sell memberships to Canadians with an affinity for Maxime's style of leadership.
Resentment has been bubbling up across segments of our population for a long while now, end quote.
Yeah, but guess what, Mr. Shere?
You are adding to that resentment by taking issue with Mr. Polyev and Mr. Bernier going to bat for ordinary Canadians.
Look, Andrew Scheer is a nice guy, but he was so wishy-washy when he ran the party back in 2019.
Aaron O'Toole, meanwhile, did so many policy backflips last year, ranging from the carbon tax to the gun grab, that he made Nadia Komenichi blush.
In fact, the worst thing I can say about you, Mr. Shere, is that you are good friends with that lying liar, sneaky Patrick Brown, a grifter who once displayed your poster in his bedroom.
Oh, talk about creepy.
There is so much more nonsense to be found in Shere's open letter, but I'm going to cut to the chase, folks.
You see, the most egregious and outrageous part of the letter is this one statement.
Quote, most of the voting public believes there are much bigger issues than freedom at stake in this country, end quote.
What?
First of all, he puts the word freedom in quotation marks.
That means he's being dismissive of this word and what it stands for.
How dare he?
Ask yourself this, folks.
Are you more or are you less free today than in 2015 when the Trudeau liberal control freaks were first elected?
And make no mistake, the COVID-19 pandemic, that was a gift for these hooligans.
The coronavirus has allowed them to clamp down on our rights and freedoms in a way that would make a Banana Republic dictator envious.
Oh, by the way, Justin, I'm not singling out your dearly departed friend, Fidel Castro.
Maybe more than a friend.
Anyway, I want to repeat Sharé's imbecilic statement that left my jaw on the linoleum.
Once again, quote, most of the voting public believes that there are much bigger issues than freedom at stake in this country, end quote.
What could possibly be more important than freedom?
Freedom is the most basic of human rights.
The opposite of freedom is tyranny and slavery.
And this Laurentian elite dismisses freedom as if it was some sort of disposable Kleenex?
Ask yourself, is this who you want as the next leader of the Conservative Party of Canada?
Is this who you want as the next prime minister?
But if Sharé thought this Hail Mary Pass was going to win over those Conservatives who still might be on the fence in terms of who they're going to support, then he is sadly, sadly mistaken.
In fact, this open letter would appear to be a fatal self-inflicted wound.
I went through the online comments section on the Toronto Sun website.
I have yet to find a positive response to Sharé's claptrap.
And keep in mind, the sun skews right of center.
Conservatives buy the Toronto Sun, but they sure aren't buying what Jean Charé is selling.
Here's a sampling.
Trevor Tup writes, this guy has obviously not been paying attention the last two years and more.
Maybe the electorate has awoken from the usual bromides and platitudes these guys hand out as the red hot issues.
Maybe people have finally realized that our fundamental freedoms are under attack by such as the like of Jean Charé and other Laurentian elites.
John Hinckley writes, Jean, give me a break.
You're no different than Aaron O'Toole or what's his name who preceded him, mealy-mouthed psychopants who are afraid to take Trudeau to task for his many, many ethical and moral transgressions.
C. Jackemchuck writes, liar.
And Stephen James writes, my grandmother wants to know who does your hair, Jean.
She thinks it's lovely and wants the charay cut.
Ouch.
Now, I would never judge the worth of any candidate by their hairstyle, but when it comes to Jean Charé, that hairdo does remind me of another funny man, namely Larry Fine of the Three Stooges.
In fact, the resemblance is downright uncanny.
And if Mo was the meanest Stooge and Curly was the funniest Stooge, surely Larry was the dumbest Stooge.
Check out the video evidence.
Call a real pal.
Yeah, we can camp near a lake and catch all the fish we can eat.
You know fish is great brain food.
You know you should fish for a whale.
Geez, Talk About Bankers' Hours00:15:28
Get out of here.
What's it say?
Ah, shit.
Shut up.
What that means?
You two.
Come on.
That's fine.
Give me a hand.
Yeah, Grandpa, we got no time for kibitzers.
Come here.
I'm sorry, Moe.
I didn't know your face was there.
I didn't know yours was there either.
Go on.
Bottom line, folks, there is one single solitary paragraph in Shere's open letter that I wholeheartedly agree with.
Namely, quote, Canadians are looking for a leader who is ready to take on the responsibility of prime minister and all the responsibilities and the tough decisions that come with it, end quote.
You are indeed correct, Jean.
After seven years of misery under the Trudeau Liberals, Canadians are looking for a brave prime minister to make tough decisions in order to repair this broken and divided country.
However, that person is not you, Mr. Sharae.
Canada's big banks becoming increasingly political.
Case in point, we looked on in revulsion last February when some Canadians actually had their bank accounts frozen for the egregious crime of making monetary donations to the Freedom Convoy in Ottawa.
And even before that took place, we experienced political interference right here at Rebel News last December.
That's when the Royal Bank of Canada declined to approve our mortgage application pertaining to a Calgary property.
This had nothing to do with our financial wherewithal.
Rather, the Royal Bank apparently doesn't like our editorial stance.
Remember Ezra Levant's commentary at the time?
I'll be blunt with you.
The bank has been, you know, trying to pry away from certain clients where they're kind of out there in the media and very strong opinionated.
I'm embarrassed.
I was turned down for a mortgage last week by the Royal Bank.
That's pretty embarrassing.
I'm almost 50 years old.
I've been a Royal Bank customer for 22 years.
What's wrong with me?
Except I wasn't rejected because I'm a failure.
In fact, the Royal Bank Mortgage Officer, who reviewed my application in detail, said it was very strong.
But he's just a regional banker in Calgary.
He said the decision to kill it was made at the Royal Bank's Toronto head office.
He told me my mortgage application was canceled because Rebel News has the wrong opinions.
Shocking.
Well, now comes yet another example of a bank carrying out a jihad against a client for the egregious crime of wrongthink.
Yes, apparently, having a politically incorrect and non-woke mindset is sinful in the eyes of Canada's big banks.
And folks, just will you hear the details pertaining to this particular story?
And joining me now from Grand Prairie, Alberta is Gary Duke, who used to be a Scotiabank client until the bank decided to, well, fire him.
Hey there, Gary.
How are you doing there, my friend?
Hey, good.
Thank you very much.
Thanks for introducing me.
Well, it's a pleasure, Gary.
I wish it was a better subject matter.
But Gary, what pray tell did you do that made your local Scotia bank determine that they no longer want to do business with you any longer?
Well, I just tried to get online with an app to do some banking online.
And basically there is a rainbow app, so I said, is there any way to get this rainbow app off my phone?
And he responded in quite a shocking way that kind of surprised me.
And when you say he, are we speaking now?
We talked off air, you had dealings with Mitchell Toft.
He's the assistant manager at the branch.
Right.
Yeah.
So it was through an email discussion that I asked him, like, if there's any way to get the app off.
And he, yeah, he responded.
He did not respond for a couple of days.
And then when he did, he basically hunted me from my bank.
Okay, so, and I mean, I don't know, I don't know whatever happened to can we agree to disagree, but you sent along the text that Mr. Toft sent to you.
I'm going to read it verbatim.
Gary, Scotiabank strives to provide an inclusive environment for all members of the LGBTQ plus community.
And during Pride Month, like every other financial institution, we have chosen to show our support in a variety of ways, including visual signs such as rainbows on our app.
Your request/slash complaint will not be entertained as it does not align with our principles.
Your comments are not appreciated, nor will they be tolerated, which is why we have chosen to terminate our relationship with you.
You may gather the funds from your account, and a termination notice will be mailed to you advising the date you have until to retrieve any funds.
Any funds in the account upon the date of closure will be put into a bank draft and mailed to the address we have on file.
Well, holy smokes, Gary.
I mean, right away he went to the nuclear option just because you complained about a rainbow illustration on the app.
Why do you think he responded this way?
Well, I think it's the culture in general that we have right now.
You know, give him the benefit of the doubt, he might have thought I was a troll and possibly testing him to kind of keep up the standard that they're trying to promote nowadays out there and the woke kind of wokeism.
So that could be that he was concerned that if he didn't say the right thing, that he would be rep, you know, he would be attacked from his end.
So I understand that, and that's the fear a lot of us have for not even wanting to speak out nowadays is that whole thing, right?
But Gary, I think there's some perverse irony here.
His first sentence is, Scotiabank strives to provide an inclusive environment.
Well, not all that inclusive.
I mean, if you have something against the rainbow imagery, they are exclusive, meaning go take your business elsewhere.
And I understand, Gary, you had a 10-year relationship with this bank.
You once had your mortgage with it.
I just think this is so over the top, especially since you weren't doing a demonstration in the bank.
You weren't hounding them.
You were just voicing your opinion of your displeasure.
And for that, you've got to go elsewhere.
Seems severe to me.
Yeah.
You think?
Absolutely.
Yeah.
And it kind of goes along with all the stuff we're hearing on the media with people like tenored professors being fired from universities that you guys actually ran a story on that.
And just counter anyone who disagrees with the narrative nowadays, including the vaccine passports, which was another issue that I've had over the past year.
Losing well over $100,000 in income because people counseling me because I don't want to take a vaccine.
And I sent you those letters as well.
So you probably saw that.
And the fact that I couldn't go on an airplane.
So it's just consistent with what's going on lately.
And they figure that the more they do it, and the more they get away with it, the more they're going to continue.
Yeah, where is the inclusivity?
You're quite right, especially in the days of COVID.
We do have two-tier Canadian citizenship, whether you're vaxed or not.
Absolutely.
And also, getting back to this particular issue, Gary, you know, the LGBT plus, et cetera, community, they have long said we want more acceptance.
We want more tolerance.
Okay, I understand that.
But recently, it seems to me it's about tolerance.
It's more than tolerance and acceptance they want.
They want affirmation.
They want everyone to get up and say, it is great what you're doing.
And if you don't do that, you are therefore homophobic, transphobic, biphobic, etc.
Do you get that feeling yourself, Gary?
Yeah, absolutely.
It's definitely hypocritical.
They're not across the board being in any way like, I can't think of the word right now, but my brain is shutting down.
Sorry.
Well, no problem.
I mean, I just, again, I think it's ironic that a community that screams about tolerance in many cases.
It's insistent.
Yeah.
They seem to be intolerant.
I agree 100%.
And sorry, it's just that's my concern.
And for those who, you know, it's basically scare tactics and bullying tactics and that kind of thing that they want to force others to believe what they believe.
And if not, then you're out kind of thing.
Cancel you.
So I'm concerned for the future.
I'm concerned for the future for my children who are my grandchildren included who are going to be dealing with this stuff.
And if you don't agree with the system or Prime Minister Trudeau or whoever who demonizes us, including Kenny, humanizes us continually, right-wing and fringe minorities and et cetera, you know, racists and all the homophobic and anything they can think of to try to get us in this little area to try to squish us, right?
Oh, absolutely.
I'm sure George Orwell is turning over in his crypt.
I mean, you know, talk about a 1984-like thought crime.
But, you know, Gary, we did reach out to Mr. Toft.
It was pretty much a fool's errand.
We spoke for about three minutes, but he didn't say much.
Let me throw to that phone interview right now.
So there you have it.
He wouldn't give any details.
I was just trying to give him a chance to give his side of the story.
He certainly didn't disagree with any of your facts.
And in fact, he's got his response to you in writing.
We reached out, of course, to corporate communications.
The lady there said, because it's a Friday in the summer, she didn't know if she could get back to me in time.
Geez, talk about bankers' hours.
Well, folks, just as our interview with Gary Duke wrapped, I did indeed get a response from Scotiabank regarding his case.
Not much of a response here.
You be the judge.
Quote, Scotiabank cannot comment on individual customer matters for privacy reasons.
We are committed to building an inclusive environment and culture through active allyship and believe that all employees, customers, and the community should be treated with equal respect and consideration, end quote.
Thank you.
And that's from Katie Ruskina.
She, her, manager, media relations and issues management with Scotiabank.
So once again, as you see, they believe that all employees, customers, and the community should be treated with equal respect and consideration.
Not quite sure how being fired as a customer is an act of respect or consideration.
But there's the official position of Scotiabank on this matter.
Well, folks, lots of response to my Patrick Brown monologue from last night.
Yeah, guess what?
Shockers, Patrick Brown is involved in yet another scandal.
Dislike button RIP writes, Menzies is PB's worst nightmare, LOL.
Well, I'll tell you, my friend, you know what would be a real nightmare?
Could you imagine if Patrick Brown was still in the race to be Conservative Party leader?
Could you imagine if through some cosmic fluke this man became the prime minister in the next election?
I mean, if you think Justin Trudeau is corrupt, Patrick Brown would make that guy look like a piker.
See, Trudeau's lazy.
Patrick Brown works really, really hard at being a grifter.
And then on our interview with Mark Murano on his latest book, Debunking the So-Called Great Reset, Ijitter writes, I've been saying it since the scandemic began.
This is their all-out push, their tet offensive.
They're not screwing around with putting pieces into place.
They intend to be victorious at the end of this.
They expect for Satan Claus Schnarr's new world order to be fully in effect when the smoke clears.
Well, you know, I don't know if we have to bring Satan into this.
I think Claus Schwab and the various elites are doing the devil's work quite well on their own.
But really, this is the textbook definition of Marxism, isn't it?
All about breaking things down, tearing things down, and rebuilding a new society in the shape of a communist utopia, which, of course, never comes to fruition.
As the saying goes, look good on paper.
And S. Strick 63 wrote, who elected this idiot?
Well, that's the thing.
Legacy Media Crisis00:04:58
He's not elected.
He's a non-elected, unaccountable bureaucrat.
I assume we're talking about Claus Schwab here.
All the more reason to take whatever he says with a shovelful of salt.
Well, folks, that's the Ezra Levant show for tonight.
Have yourself a great weekend.
The big boss man Ezra He'll be back on Monday.
In the meantime, as always, stay sane.
American media and British media as well through these other entities got purchased and corrupted.
Millions of dollars, Mrs. in the Columbia Journalism Review, went from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to legacy sites like The Guardian and the BBC for COVID education.
And that means smearing people like me or other very distinguished dissidents like Dr. McCullough, Dr. Malone, Dr. Alexander.
And also the CARES Act is a billion dollars of our tax money, much of which goes to basically paying influencers and paying off community groups.
I mean, all the way down to the level of little dance troupes or little churches and synagogues and certainly little news outlets.
So the news business is in a precarious state, and here's millions of dollars flowing if you just, you know, follow the COVID line, follow the talking points.
They thoroughly corrupted our media.
It's sad for our legacy media and it's sad for the consumers of media that are consuming legacy media because they're being lied to consistently.
But it's kind of beautiful that a lot of alternative news outlets are booming because people know they're being lied to and those legacy media are corrupted.
Naomi Wolfe is a celebrated liberal author and journalist who's never been afraid to say something controversial.
She's a Rhodes Scholar, a graduate of both Yale and Oxford.
Wolf has worked for President Bill Clinton and presidential hopeful Al Gore.
She spent her career as a darling of the liberal corporate media until very recently, about two years ago, when she began to question the narrative surrounding COVID-19.
Since then, her mainstream media coverage has been smearpiece after smearpiece.
Wolfe's new book, The Bodies of Others, is filled with clear-eyed, sober insights of the workings of the new public health regime, where it came from, and where it's going.
I traveled to the mountains of upstate New York to talk to her about the lockdowns, the vaccines, big tech, and censorship.
Here's the conversation.
Your house is far from civilization almost.
We have a bear coming around here.
First, I'm going to ask you what prompted you to move away from the city and away from everyone.
We're in the forest right now.
Yes, we are.
And Jeremy's right.
I just saw that my nemesis, this teenage black bear who kept me locked upstairs for an hour a couple of weeks ago with a BB gun because I grabbed the wrong weapon, kind of circled the house continually.
So I had a traumatic experience with the bear, and the bear has just appeared crossing the road again.
So it's all very exciting here in the woods.
Why are we here?
We're here.
Well, I bought this place in 2001 after the 9-11 attack because I just, I've lived in a lot of conflict areas and war zones as a journalist and also just my family spent time in Israel during two of the wars when I was growing up.
And so I was very aware after 9-11 with two small children that it's hard to get out of Manhattan if there's a crisis.
Bridges, tunnels.
It's so easy to isolate.
And I also have finished every one of my books up here because it's a very inspiring place.
But I guess we moved up here full time in March of 2020 because my husband Brian O'Shea also has been in many conflict areas as a soldier, embedded with special forces and as a former member of military intelligence, the military intelligence community.
And so both of us recognized in March of 2020 right away, actually when Governor Cuomo said he was closing Broadway, we both recognized that something very bad was about to happen because no one anywhere closes down commerce and education and basically human assembly if it's not a totalitarian regime.
So we didn't know if what was going to come was going to be politically really bad or a really bad act of God or nature.
But we both instinctively, on March 8th, were like, we're getting out of the city right away and came up here full time.
Due to YouTube censorship policies, we can't put the rest of the interview here.