Rebel News’ David Menzies dissects Ukraine’s stalled war—100,000+ young soldiers lost, half its 2022-seized territory reclaimed—while criticizing the U.S.’s sudden shift toward negotiated peace, questioning Western war-weariness and Polyev’s Conservative Party’s weak response to pro-Hamas protests. He praises Rebel News’ boots-on-the-ground journalism, like Menzies covering a transgender rugby player or Alexa Lavois at Quebec rallies, while mocking Polyev’s evasive "terrorism" stance and MAGA-aligned Ukraine aid withdrawal. The episode underscores how populist media thrives by exposing mainstream media gaps and government inconsistencies, even as demonetization forces reliance on subscriptions and events like Rebel News’ Caribbean cruise or Tamara Leach’s Freedom Train concert. [Automatically generated summary]
According to the Ukrainian government, so this is not guesswork by outsiders, the average age of Ukrainian soldiers in the field right now is mid-40s, which is terrifying because that suggests that a whole generation of young men have been killed in the meat grinder of that war.
Absolutely heartbreaking.
And I say this at the same time that the United States government, can you find that tweet, you know, I'll probably find it faster.
Where out of the blue, the United States government, which has so resolutely refused any talk of negotiation or any talk of ceasefire, suddenly, here, I'm going to put it right in the Slack channel there, suddenly is talking publicly about a negotiated settlement.
That's got to, that's such, yeah, you found it there exactly.
So this is from the U.S. A mission to NATO.
So this isn't just any old part of the U.S. military.
This is the part that is engaging with Europe and the other allies in Ukraine.
Let me read it to you.
Ukraine has taken back more than half of its territory seized by Russia's forces since February 2022.
Now, I should say most of that taking back happened a year ago.
In this tough and dynamic battle, it's not really that dynamic, though.
The front lines have been static for almost a year.
Ukraine's forces are fighting bravely every single day, and they continue to inspire the world with their bravery and courage.
We will continue to support them to be in the strongest possible position at the negotiating table when the time comes.
We continue to stand united with Ukraine while they defend their freedom.
And then look at the infographic there.
We are focused on setting the conditions for a just, durable, and sustainable peace.
This is a completely new message from the United States.
It was victory.
It was repel the Russians.
There was even talk about taking back Crimea, which was the part of Ukraine that Russia seized and annexed.
They were talking about, there were audacious proposals.
I don't know how serious they were, of going into Russia proper.
There was a point in time when Zelensky himself was talking about regime change in Russia.
And now the U.S. government, and I have no idea if they consulted about this language with Ukraine in advance.
I mean, you can take it or leave it when they talk about fighting bravely, retaking land, tough and dynamic battle.
But that one sentence, we will continue to support them to what?
To victory, to expel Russians from every acre of land?
No.
The goal, according to this tweet, which has 4.9 million views, Is to be in the strongest possible position at the negotiating table.
What negotiating table?
Who said anything about negotiating tables?
That was absolutely forbidden in the vernacular of the U.S. military until just a month or two ago.
I find that absolutely astonishing.
And although some people who actually wanted Russia to be expelled from every acre and perhaps even the retaking of Crimea, although they will be perhaps demoralized by this, and I mean, I think of Trudeau's speech when Zelensky came to Canada, we will be with you to the end.
No one actually ever said what that end was.
And now the U.S. military, which is basically bankrolling and arming the entire battle, is saying, we'll tell you what the end is right now.
The end is a negotiated settlement, and we're going to try and do our best at that negotiated settlement.
I find that a stunning about face.
That is a 180-degree turn.
But, you know, let me tell you something.
Do you have that clip of when I went to Davos nine months ago, 10 months ago, whatever it was?
Or maybe it was on the previous trip, actually.
No, it was that one.
Sorry.
I've only been to Davos once.
I'm trying to confusing my trip with someone else's.
We did so much journalism there.
It's a bit of a blur.
I went to the Ukraine pavilion at Davos.
And, you know, Davos, the World Economic Forum, we, of course, were not accredited journalists.
They would not accredit us.
So we were sort of milling around the outside.
The World Economic Forum takes over the entire town of Davos.
So the conference center and the hotels and certain things are private and you need access to get in there.
But there are parts just along the main streets of this town that are taken over for the week by companies or governments and turned into sort of like a world's fair kind of thing.
And one of them was Ukraine.
And I don't want to play the whole video for you, but I went into the Ukrainian pavilion.
This is obviously the Ukrainian government, so it is their point of view.
Russia was not allowed in Davos.
That's what I was told several times.
So this was the Ukrainian point of view.
Critics would call it propaganda.
But I went in because I wanted to hear what they had to say.
And let me play a little bit of it for you because a lot has changed in the almost one year since I was there.
Take a look.
Ezra Levant here on the streets of Davos, Switzerland.
This is the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum, which is a unique blend of big business, big media, and big government.
Well, one of the biggest governments in the world these days, courtesy of the U.S. taxpayer, Canadian taxpayer, British taxpayer, is the government of Ukraine, which is in an existential battle against the Russian Federation.
I say it's an existential battle because, of course, Russia seeks to annex certain regions of Ukraine that Russia claims are ethnically Russian and that Russia claims are being punished, being persecuted by the Kiev-based government that has a different history.
I mean, Ukraine's borders have changed over the years.
There's different ethnicities, and it's quite a brutal battle.
It's not the first time Russia has invaded Ukraine.
They did it in 2014, but this time, NATO, and in particular, the United States has flooded the zone with money and with weapons.
And it's turned into a brutal, long-running battle that I'm sure has caught Vladimir Putin by surprise.
Makes me nervous, the whole thing, because, of course, both sides have nuclear weapons.
And I don't know if you could ever have a total victory over a foe that has nuclear weapons, especially Vladimir Putin with the imperialistic pride that he wields.
That's a background.
You already know that.
But here I am at the massive Ukraine pavilion.
Now, as I've showed you by walking these streets before, there are other countries here and other states of countries, for example, in India, that are promoting themselves.
We talk with him.
We'll show you some of the imagery that was shown.
Yes.
Hello, everyone.
My name is Alechmanochenko.
I'm from Ukraine.
And this is two projects: Ukraine is U and Ukraine House Divos.
It's dedicated to show that Ukraine's role in the world, to show the Russian crimes in Ukraine, to show to reveal Russian crimes to the world.
This is the main point of today's meeting, and we're happy for housing us within the framework of World Economic Forum.
So is the president of Ukraine making a presentation either in person or by video link?
Yes, President, don't leave the country because of exception was like a visit to Washington, D.C.
And he is addressing the guests by the video.
It will be and the head of the office president had an address to the guests.
And also, First Lady of Ukraine was there yesterday.
She was here in person?
Yes, and also some very distinguished guests visited.
I don't want to play the whole thing.
It was a long video, but I want to tell you the two things I thought there.
First of all, they had images of atrocities.
That's how they describe them, of civilian apartments attacked.
And it's interesting to contrast the world's reaction to those apartments being blown up versus Gaza.
That's just a thought that popped into my mind.
Obviously, that was not on my mind then because the Gaza War was not until October.
But I talked to advocates for the Ukrainian government, including that young fellow, and I talked to an international lawyer.
And I won't take up more time.
I don't want to play the whole video.
It's a lengthy video, but you can find it on our website, WEFREPORTS.com.
Anyways, I talked to this international lawyer who was saying, not only are we going to beat Russia, we're going to take Russia to the war crimes court.
And we're going to take Putin and the oligarchs and the army to the war crimes court.
And we're going to get them like we got the Nazis.
And we're going to make Russia pay to rebuild all Ukraine.
We're going to seize hundreds of billions of dollars of Russian assets.
And it was such a maximalist goal.
I mean, I was very attentive.
I let them speak at great length.
My questions to them were very gentle in response.
I didn't want to pick a fight.
I just wanted to hear what they had to say.
I guess my point is that was January 2023.
So that's 10 months ago.
So 10 months ago, the stance of the Ukrainian government was not only are we going to kick Russia out of every square inch of Ukraine, but we're going to topple the regime, put them on trial for war crimes, take all their money and rebuild Ukraine.
And now NATO is saying, no, actually, we're just going to try and get you as presentable as possible for a peace negotiation.
I think that is an incredibly underreported story, an underreported story, wouldn't you say?
I mean, the number one foreign policy issue of the entire West for two years has been Ukraine.
People still have the Ukrainian flag as their icon on social media.
I was at Pierre Polyev's press conference yesterday, and one of his staff was wearing a Canada-Ukraine flagpin.
Vladimir Zelensky was just in Canada a month or two ago.
To go from, you know, we're with you till victory in the end.
We're going to put these Putin on trial for war crimes to, hey, Ukraine, get ready for a peace deal is quite astonishing.
And I don't know if it's the fact that the U.S. election is less than a year away and American public opinion is falling away, or if it's simply a recognition of the fact that Russia has an enormous military, not just in terms of troops, but in terms of replenishing ammunition.
They've got the military-industrial complex, the infrastructure to keep, you know, as Professor Mearsheimer says, Russia has a three-to-one person advantage, you know, population advantage over Ukraine, but it's a 10-to-1 artillery advantage.
And of course, then there's the fact that Americans are feeling overstretched and maybe war-weary, even though U.S. troops have not been involved in the war in Gaza.
It certainly has taken up a lot of the share of the mind of the American public.
And I thought that was really an underreported story.
And don't mind me, I didn't even plan to talk about that, but I was just thinking about that startling tweet.
Would you agree with me?
I mean, that is a complete about face.
Can you call up that video?
We played it several times of, I think his name is Kirby, the U.S. spokesman on military and State Department issues.
I think he works for the White House, though.
And he, this was like this year where he said we will not even allow talk of a ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine because that would grant that the status quo is somehow acceptable.
So look at this is, and we'll move on after this, but I just want to show you how just a few months ago, the U.S. was saying we will never accept the status quo, not even temporarily.
Take a look.
Hey, that if coming out of this meeting, there's some sort of call for a ceasefire, well, that's just going to be unacceptable because all that's going to do, Mike, is ratify Russia's conquest to date.
All that's going to do is give Mr. Putin more time to refit, retrain, reman, and try to plan for renewed offensives at a time of his choosing.
We hope, and we've said this before, that President Xi will call and talk to President Zelensky because we believe the Chinese need to get the Ukrainian perspective here.
You know, it's so interesting, isn't it?
So that he was taking a very hard line, even though there was an enormous number of Ukrainian men who were killed.
I was talking to Conrad Black, and he thought it was about 100,000 young Ukrainian men.
I think the number is much higher than that.
And of course, millions, I've seen a number of 8 million Ukrainians have left the country, is one report I've seen.
Of course, there's the Ukrainians who have been simply annexed by Russia.
So the country, it's just a terrible, disastrous outcome for Ukraine.
And you can see there that that White House spokesman was adamant.
Foreign Nationals and Free Speech00:05:38
No ceasefire ever.
That just gets the bad guys a chance to recoup.
How different, how interesting that that line was the gospel for a year and a half.
Now it's gone.
But Israel is the one being pressured to ceasefire, including by the Biden administration, even though their rhetoric is more friendly.
Speaking of the Gaza war, I left the office yesterday and I did a little reporting myself, which I, whenever I do it, I'm glad I've done it.
I got to get out of the office more.
Pierre Polyev, leader of the Conservative Party of Canada, was at a local Toronto synagogue where he was announcing really nothing new, frankly.
He was talking about how he wanted to declare the Iranian Republican Guard a terrorist group, as other countries have done.
He was talking about expelling 700 Iranian agents from Canada based on a global news study, investigative report.
He wanted to speed up the security infrastructure for that's where they get alarms and video surveillance cameras for religious institutions.
So there really wasn't anything new there.
But I went and I asked a question about our deport Hamas idea.
Let me show you how that went.
I just want to show you my, and I tried to get a second question in, but they would not let me.
I tried.
Here's my question and Polyev's answer, and I'll talk to you a little bit about it.
But then I want to show you what some of the other journalists there, there were a bunch of other journalists.
That was actually far more interesting to me than the speech itself here.
So here's my question to Polyev and his answer.
Hi, Mr. Polyev.
That's Levant from Rebel News.
You mentioned certain things that rise to the level of a crime, but there are many things that aren't quite at that level.
For example, people marching, calling for an intifada or using language that may not rise to the level of a criminal prosecution.
And you've said before that you respect freedom of speech, even for odious views.
But what about people who are not Canadian citizens, who are foreign nationals, perhaps here on a student visa to go to our schools, and instead of studying at university, they're participating in these hate marches, intimidating people, Jewish restaurants, calling for the death of Jews.
Again, not criminal level, but these are foreign nationals.
Would you support canceling the visas and deporting foreign nationals who, instead of doing what they came here to do, are spreading hate at these pro-Hamas rallies?
Thank you for your question.
You raise a number of different issues.
One, if someone comes here on a student visa and they're not actually a student, then on that basis alone, they should go home.
We don't want to have, one of the problems we have with the student visa program is that it has been used as a fraudulent point of entry, particularly for corrupt employers trying to get labor from abroad.
So in general, we believe that we should shut down all the fraud in the student visa program.
And anyone who claims to come here to study that is not actually studying should not be here.
With regards to protests, I do believe in freedom of speech.
I believe people should be allowed to say things I disagree with, even things that I find appalling.
That is the price of living in a free country.
The alternative is to have state censors who then decide what kind of speech is acceptable and what is not.
And then who chooses those state censors?
And then those censors will pick and choose based on their own political views which speech is allowed and which speech is not.
That's why I believe in freedom of expression.
You mentioned, for example, if someone stands up and calls for violence against a particular group, they can, under the current criminal code, be charged with incitement.
Those provisions already exist.
And I would encourage law enforcement to make sure those provisions are upheld for any and all people who incite, deliberately incite violence against an identifiable group, because that has been criminalized for many years.
And anyone who is convicted of that, who is not a citizen, should obviously not be in Canada.
You know, I appreciate as far as he went, but he didn't go very far.
I'm not talking just about a hate crime, which is a difficult crime to prosecute.
It's very rare, and it does offend the notions of free speech.
I'm talking not about violating free speech.
I'm talking about people who come to Canada's guests, temporary guests, to be students or workers or whatever, people who do not have tenure here, who do not have a citizenship status, going to these hate marches.
And if they were Canadian citizens, maybe you have to live with it.
unless they do go to the point where they're threatening someone, actually doing a crime.
But if they're foreign nationals, basically tourists who are allowed to stay a little longer to get a degree, why should they be allowed to go to these hate marches?
I've seen a lot of these hate marches.
They are overwhelmingly either new Canadians or people who aren't Canadian at all.
So why should they be allowed to get on a plane, come here either temporarily as a tourist or saying they're students and then vomit out anti-Semitic bigotry on our streets, terrifying and terrorizing actual Canadian citizens.
Apple's Tax Controversy00:14:35
So I think he wiggled out of that one a little bit, but I think we should keep at it.
I think it's a fruitful line of questioning.
So I was the only question.
There was a reporter from the Canadian Jewish News who asked a question about these hate rallies too, and it wasn't a particularly thoughtful question.
Polyev answered it very briefly again with freedom of speech answer.
But there were about half a dozen other reporters there, CBC, CTV, Canadian press.
And I thought their questions were more the most interesting part of the day.
None of them had anything to do with what Polyev was there to talk about.
None of them had anything to do with security for Jewish community and as the Hamas front comes here.
None of that.
It was carbon tax questions.
They were furious that Polyev didn't want a carbon tax to be inserted in Canadian aid to Ukraine.
They were so, why won't you allow a carbon tax in Ukraine?
Like it was crazy.
There were some vendetta questions or like it was just the questions were so bizarre.
A couple of them were about the fact that Polyev briefly said, as did many others, that the explosion of the border crossing at Niagara Falls looked like terrorism.
And Polyev was actually citing CTV.
I want to show you, maybe you've seen this clip on social media, but you probably just saw the CPAC camera, which was fixed on Polyev the whole time.
I had my camera and I pointed it at the Canadian press reporter.
And so we did a new little video at it.
I want to show you this.
This wasn't quite Apple Orchard Pierre Polyev, you know, when he had that apple and he was schooling that reporter in the Okanagan.
It was pretty close.
And I think that Pierre Polyev should carry an apple with him, maybe in his pocket.
That might look a little bit funny to have a whole apple in your pocket.
But maybe he should have an assistant nearby with an apple.
And when a question like this comes, he should say, apple, and then an assistant who is an apple assistant, who does nothing else other than he or she carries the apple, waiting for the apple.
And then the apple is run on to this.
Almost like, you know, in tennis matches, there's people who run to get the tennis ball super quick.
It's really fun to watch those ball kids run and get the ball super quick.
There's a one job.
Get someone with that kind of speed and attentiveness to be Pierre Polyev's apple handler.
And the moment you see a question like this, you're getting ready.
The apple is taken out of the apple bag.
You're getting ready.
You're getting ready.
You're looking at the boss, you're looking at the boss, you're waiting for the moment, and then he says, and maybe he doesn't even say it out loud.
Maybe he just goes, maybe he just mouths it.
And you say, oh, that's my cue.
And you run with the apple, and Polyev takes the apple, he takes a bite, and then he answers, and it goes like this.
Hi, Paola Lariggio with the Canadian Press.
Do you think it was responsible for you to call yesterday's explosion by the customs, by the checkpoint at the Rainbow Bridge, terrorism, when no U.S. or Canadian officials said that was, like authorities said that was the case, and when the New York governor also said there was no evidence to suggest terrorism activity?
Actually, you're wrong.
Are you with CP?
Okay, so CP, by the way, CP, just for everyone's knowledge, did have to make three corrections for falsehoods that they put into a single article.
I think that might be unprecedented.
I'm actually thinking about checking with the Guinness Book of World Records to see if there's ever been a news agency that has had to issue three corrections for patent falsehoods that they admit they had been made in one single article.
And now you've made yet another falsehood in your question.
Where you are wrong is that CTV reported that the government of Canada was presuming that the incident was terrorist.
So, yeah, and that's what I said in my remarks.
You're right.
It was a media report.
But it's citing media reports and not.
Which is what I said in the House.
I said there are media reports.
And you think that's a responsible thing to go on to make that kind of a statement at the time without speaking.
What kind of statement?
Calling something terrorist.
I didn't.
I said there were media reports.
That's the distinction we're making?
Okay.
No, there's no distinction.
What I said, and I was right, was that there were media reports of a terror-related event.
By your admission, there were media reports of a terror-related event.
And that media report, according to CTV, unless you're questioning their integrity now, came from security officials in the Trudeau government.
So do you think the CTV was irresponsible in putting out that tweet?
Do you think it was a responsible comment to make in the House of Commons?
Sorry, I'm asking.
I've already answered that.
Do you think CTV was irresponsible to put that tweet out?
That's none of my business.
That's not a premium comment.
Well, you just did comment.
Okay.
So, you know, I just hope you're not going to print something that you have to apologize for again.
Okay.
I liked it.
I mean, I was there for it.
It wasn't as delicious, so to speak, as the original Apple moment.
But I think, you know what?
I think you should have a little apple lapel pin or something.
I don't know.
Like really little, that you sort of have to squint and say, what's that?
Oh, it's just an apple.
How do you like bam apples?
I should tell you, that question was no dumber than the other questions that the rest of the media party asked.
And no, I thought it was astonishing.
I did my show on this last night, by the way.
I don't know if you're a subscriber to the Ashley Levant Show.
It's what we call Rebel News Plus.
We put it behind a paywall.
It's eight bucks a month, which isn't that pricey.
I know that's not a lot of dough to you, but it really adds up for us because, you know, that's how we pay most of our salaries here is with that subscription.
Because as you know, we don't get any money from Trudeau.
We would never take it even if it was offered and it will never be offered.
And we've been demonetized by YouTube.
They won't even let us do super chats anymore.
You might recall when we started our daily live stream during the pandemic.
The super chats were actually an important source of revenue for Rebel News.
And so obviously YouTube cut that off.
And it's because YouTube itself is beholden to woke mindsets, but also beholden to advertisers like Pfizer and other pharmaceutical companies, and even more worryingly, to governments.
After Elon Musk took over Twitter, he released what he called the Twitter files, showing how the government pressured Twitter to censor even more than they would do so for their own ideological or commercial reasons.
I mean, of course, all these social media companies happen to be based in San Francisco, the most left-wing city in America.
So by their own nature, they're going to be very censorious of conservatives.
But then add in the pressure from, you know, hypersensitive advertisers and then the government.
It's extremely bad.
Which is why I am interested, nervous, angry, defensive, but also ready when Justin Trudeau says he's got a big announcement coming about a digital partnership targeting artificial intelligence.
I wish Justin Trudeau had any sort of intelligence.
Real intelligence, artificial intelligence, just any sort of intelligence would be a welcome change.
But whenever he talks about misinformation and disinformation, that's when I got a hold on my wallet because I know he's coming to pull a fast one on us.
This is the guy who said that Israel fired a missile at a hospital in Gaza, killing hundreds.
And it was later proven by multiple sources that it was actually an Islamic Jihad rocket that went astray.
It didn't destroy the hospital.
The hospital itself was not actually even hit.
There was a fire in the parking lot.
As far as we know, there were no casualties.
And Trudeau to this day has not corrected himself.
And his foreign minister, Melanie Jolie, her tweet on the subject remains up.
These are the people lecturing you on misinformation and disinformation.
And yeah, here's the clip from Trudeau.
We're also talking about a digital partnership that is going to make a huge difference, building on that as we work together to understand the impacts of AI, the impacts of disinformation and misinformation on the social media that people get to get overwhelmed by in so many ways that tend to exacerbate our challenges.
That's the big second announcement we're making.
You know, when he starts scoring like this with his head, you know, that's when you know a big lie is coming.
You know, 91% of liberal voters in 2021, if I'm remembering the abacus poll correctly, found Trudeau inauthentic and phony.
Am I remembering that right, Olivia?
I think it was 91%.
It was an enormous number.
Inauthentic and phony.
And the thing is, once people think you're inauthentic and phony, you can't re-fool them.
I really think the best analogy is when you're sort of enchanted or you have a crush on someone, let's say, maybe you're in love with them, and then you see something about them.
The mask falls, the veil falls, and you see their true nature.
You see them do something or say something, and you just instantly realize you were sort of tricked, and you can never look at them the same way, and you fall out of love.
But it's not just, okay, you know, things have cooled off.
You feel like you were tricked.
Like if you like someone and then you don't really like them, you don't necessarily feel tricked.
You just think, okay, you know, I, you know, he's not my cup of tea.
But if you actually were emotionally invested in Trudeau because you thought he was passionate and real and smart and hopeful and progressive, and then you come to learn, for example, the carbon tax issue, which is in many ways a dry financial issue.
But he claimed it was a passionate issue about caring for the world.
We all knew it was just a tax grab.
So he gets in trouble in Atlantic, Canada, because they have home heating oil out there, and they're going to really get walloped. by this carbon tax.
And so he says, okay, fine.
I'll save you money.
I'm not going to bring in the carbon tax for, I think, three years.
Well, what did that say?
It said, first of all, Trudeau was lying when he said it was revenue neutral because he says this is going to save you hundreds of millions of dollars.
So he showed he was lying.
But more than that, he showed that his whole passion was phony and inauthentic.
That he absolutely would throw away his centerpiece legislation if it meant saving a few liberal MPs out there.
I follow on Twitter Catherine McKenna, the disgraced former environment minister.
And she was so appalled by him, she fell out of love with him too.
And that's what I mean.
Yeah, show that Abacus survey.
I'll put that on the screen just for one second.
Those who have a negative impression of Trudeau and voted liberal in 2021.
So understand this.
These are people who voted for Trudeau just two years ago, but they've soured on him.
I don't like him as a person.
Only 23% are saying that.
But 77% are saying, I'm tired of him.
I just don't want to see his face or hear that substitute drama teacher sound.
He got Canada into this mess.
Two-thirds of people say that.
He has a clear vision of where he wants to take the country.
Only 14% believe that.
And then look at the next one.
This is the money shot here.
He's authentic and genuine.
9% say that.
Whereas look across the row there, 91% say he is inauthentic and phony.
These are people who voted liberal in 2021.
He's too cautious and doesn't promise enough.
Only 18% say that.
Whereas 82%, he makes promises he can't keep.
You think.
Thanks very much.
So I think what a lot of those show is those are emotional.
Those aren't saying, those aren't asking, does he have the right tax policy?
Does he have the right foreign policy?
Does he have the right policy on issue one, two, three, four, or five?
Should the tax rate be this percent or that percent?
These are not brain issues.
They're heart issues, right?
They're not testing science.
They're testing feelings.
And people feel burned by Trudeau.
They feel tricked by him.
They feel like he's a phony who lied to them.
And they're just tired of him.
They just want him to go away.
And that is not easily remedied.
Once you fall out of love that hard, I don't know if there's a road back.
And that's the thing.
And I won't go through the polls right now, but I like looking at them.
I like looking at polls from David Coletto at Abacus because I know his company is really a liberal company chaired by a liberal operative.
And the reason I say that is if they're critical of Trudeau, you know it's true.
I mean, if a right-wing pollster, I don't even think there is one in Canada, were to critique Trudeau, you'd say, well, that's just a right-wing pollster.
But when a liberal party pollster like Abacus says that, you know, you can take it to the bank.
Why They Want Trudeau Gone00:03:17
Well, it's 137.
I want to take a short break and run some ads.
Since the last time I spoke with you, we had our Rebel News Live conference and it was great.
And can you find the proud Mary clip of Tamara Leach?
Did I ever tweet that one?
So let's run an ad.
Let's run some ads, including for our Rebel News cruise.
But I want to show people what I thought was the most fun part of the Rebel News Live conference in Calgary, which was just a week ago.
Time flies.
I want to show you that music video of Tamara Leach and her husband Dwayne in concert.
It was unbelievable.
Here's some ads.
Come right back.
I'll show you Tamara Leach playing guitar.
David Menzies for Rebel News here in downtown Toronto.
And I got to tell you folks, next March, March 23rd to 30th, to be precise, we are going on a Caribbean cruise.
Can you imagine that?
And a lot of your favorite Rebels will be there, such as Sheila Gunreads.
We got Alexa Lavois, the big boss man himself.
Of course, he'll be there, Ezra Levant.
And how about this?
How about this for the Cherry on the Sunday?
Tamara Leach, Canada's number one freedom fighter.
She'll be on that boat too.
And look at the itinerary.
We're going to be going to Half Moon Cay in the Bahamas, and then we're going to jazz it up in Oko Rios, Jamaica.
And then there's Georgetown in the Cayman Islands.
And finally, Cozumel, Mexico.
Can you imagine that?
If you want more details in terms of getting aboard the ship, go to rebelnewscruise.com.
That's rebelnewscruise.com.
All the details are there, the departure dates, the costs.
And you know what?
This is not just a fun-filled getaway.
This is a way in which Rebel News raises some revenue.
Unlike the mainstream media, we don't receive a nickel of government funding, nor would we take it if ever offered.
So it's win-win.
Enjoy yourself in the Caribbean and Mexico.
And also support your favorite online news channel.
So that's RebelNewsCruise.com.
I hope to see you aboard.
Come on out, November 25th.
It's all aboard the Freedom Train in Niagara on the Lake.
You can check Rebel News for updates and also the Freedom Passport site.
Tamara Leach, who led the Truckers Convoy, will be sharing the stage with some of the finest international recording artists.
Like the Chops Horns from New York City, who's played with Alicia Key, Stevie Wonder, the Rolling Stones, and many more.
Plus, New World Sun, just off a European tour, and the legendary R ⁇ B Master, Leroy Emmanuel.
Get on the Freedom Train with Tamara Leach.
Saturday, November 25th at Niagara on the Lake Central Community Center, 680 York Road.
Get your tickets today at freedompassport.ca.
The Freedom Train is coming.
Know your rights.
Know your freedoms.
Hey, welcome back.
You know what?
Did you see that?
The Freedom Train concert is tomorrow in Niagara on the Lake.
Rollin', Rollin', Rollin' On A River00:11:56
That's amazing.
I hear turnout is incredible.
I cannot attend for a family reason, but boy, I wish I would be there in person.
And it's a great concert, but we had a sneak preview of two of the musicians.
And I can't believe Tamara Leach has so many different talents.
She's not just the brave political prisoner who was jailed for 49 days for leading the trucker convoy, who is currently on trial in Ottawa for mischief.
But she is in a rock and roll band.
And at the end of our Rebel News Live conference in Calgary, six days ago, she and Dwayne played a whole half-hour set.
It was great.
So I filmed this on my five.
Was in the first row.
Obviously, I'm the number one fanboy.
Let me just show you one of the songs that they played.
And I tell you, I just really, it's exactly what I needed.
Take a look at, I think this is Proud Mary, written by Credence Clearwater Revival, later covered by Tina Turner.
What a great song.
Take a look.
Okay, you guys should be able to sing along to this one.
It's another oldie woody beauty.
I gotta remember how it starts here.
Left a good job in the city, working for the man every night and day.
But I never lost a minute sleep.
Working out the way things might happen.
Big wheels keep on turning.
I said, Proud there, but keep on burning.
Rolling, rolling, rolling on a river.
I said, Rolling, rolling, rolling on a river.
Two, three, looking for the man.
But I never lost a minute sleep.
Worked out the way things might not be.
Big wheels keep on turning.
I said, proud there, keep on burning.
Rollin', rollin', rollin' on a river.
I cleaned a lot of plates in Memphis.
I pumped a lot of pain down in New Orleans.
But I never saw a good side of the city till I hitched around on the riverboat queen.
Big wheels keep on turning.
I said, proud there, keep on burning.
Rolling, rollin', rolling on a river.
I said, roll it, roll it.
If y'all come down to a river, I bet you I'm gonna find some people who live.
You don't have to worry because you got no money.
People on the river are happy to get big wheels keep on turning.
I said, proud there, keep on burning.
Rollin', rollin', Rolling on a river rolling, rolling, rolling on a river as they rolling,
Boy, that was funny.
Hey, you know what?
I just want to show you a flavor of that song.
I mean, I like that song.
And I think I fell in love with that song when I heard Tina Turner sing it.
And I want to show you a clip.
I mean, Tina Turner, it's one of her signature songs, even though she didn't write it.
The raw energy, the showmanship, the entertainment, just the talent, the power.
It's one of the greatest rock and roll performances of all time to see her do that.
And she's done it 20 times.
You can find it online.
Let me just give you a taste of one performance.
I just chose this at random and sent it to Olivia.
Just grabbed it off YouTube.
I don't want to play too much of it, but give me a minute or 90 seconds of Tina Turner just rocking to Proud Mary.
She starts nice and steady.
You know, every now and then, I think you might like to hear something from us.
Nice.
But there's just one thing.
You see, we never ever do nothing for the man day.
We always do it.
I never lost rough and I work and do it.
Easy.
But then we're going to do the finish.
Rough.
Proud Mary.
Bone burning.
Proud Mary.
And we're rolling.
Ooh, rolling.
Ooh, rolling on the river.
Listen to the story.
Left a good job in the city working for the man every night and day.
And I never lost one minute of sleeping.
Jump ahead to where you stop the way.
It's the detonate button.
Big job you're listening.
Working for the man every night and day.
I never lost the man and sleeping.
Roaring all the way back my health.
Big wheel, keep on timing.
Turn it proud for it.
Keep on burning.
Burning, rolling, rolling.
Rolling on the river.
I tell you, unless you were a paraplegic, you would be on your feet.
This song, there's something about it and the way Tina Turner plays it.
You just got to stand up.
You got to move.
How can you listen to this without moving?
Holy mackerel.
I regret I never saw her in concert.
Oh, I think she's stronger than Beyonce.
You know what?
I think Beyonce's overrated.
I mean, try and hold a candle, this lady.
Just the raw showmanship.
You know, one of my favorite roles for Tina Turner was when she played, I forget the name of the part, in Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome.
Have you ever heard of that, Olivia?
You know, she was just perfect in that.
It was a very unusual casting, but it was...
I gotta send you one quick clip.
Just, oh my God, I forgot how much I love Tina Turner.
So when Tamara Leech and Dwayne played that song, I mean, I was trying to behave.
Plus, I'm 51, so I don't want people to make fun of me for bouncing around too much in my seats.
Last concert I went to was Morrissey.
He's 64, but he can still sing like he's 24.
That voice is like honey.
Anyway, one of my favorite things that Tina Turner did was so unexpected.
It was she played, I forget the name of like some queen rebel or something in Mad Max with Mel Gibson.
Imagine being with those two icons.
Imagine what that would have been like filming Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome with Mel Gibson and Tina Turner.
play a minute of that and then we'll get back to business open it One man leads!
Two men injured!
One man meets!
There she is.
There she is.
And there he is.
There's Mel Gibson, post-apocalyptic.
She was tough and hard.
What this?
1985.
What's this?
You think I don't know the law?
Wasn't it me who wrote it?
And I say that this man has fucking the law.
Right or wrong.
We had a deal.
And the law says, bust the deal, face the wheel.
Bust the deal and face the wheel.
Bust the deal.
Face the wheel.
Bust the deal.
All right, thanks.
I just wanted to indulge my love for Tina Turner there.
That's 1985.
I was 13 when that movie came out.
But I think it still holds up just for sheer entertainment value, drama, and the Mad Max dystopian.
I mean, by the way, Mad Max Fury wrote is a great movie, too.
Just absolutely great.
And it's a reminder of how many amazing things Mel Gibson did.
And he's still an amazing filmmaker.
Live Streams on the Street00:14:59
And he's been demonized for his politics.
And he has had a few outbursts, granted, that were quite rude.
And some could describe his outbursts as racist, and I won't defend the outbursts themselves.
But I think he's a great filmmaker, a great artist.
I think he has strong ideas about freedom and about America.
And I think about him quite a lot when I think about the meaning of his movies, whether it was Braveheart or The Patriot or even Apocalypto or The Passion of the Christ.
I mean, he was in some movies that are just like junk food.
Like he was in, What's the one with where he uh oh shoot, I can't remember.
There's too many.
He's in some fun movies too, but I think he's actually a meaningful guy in Hollywood who actually thinks.
Well, listen, I want to tell you a change that we're making at our daily roundup.
We're going to turn it into a weekly roundup.
What I mean by that is the live stream, which we've been doing pretty much every day from 1 to 2 Eastern, we're going to do it just on Fridays now.
And let me tell you why.
We started the daily live streams during the depths of the pandemic when there was an enormous demand for news, and we weren't supplying enough of the news in our prepared videos and in my nightly show on Rebel News Plus.
And so every day I would sit here and I would talk over the daily stats and the daily lockdown.
And it made sense for a lot of reasons.
First of all, there was an enormous demand, but a tiny supply of contrarian news and views.
Second of all, in terms of what we were allowed to do, remember, we were all locked down.
We couldn't travel within the country.
That ban came into effect later, but being in the office, this was a way we could still do great journalism from the SEM.
And finally, and not unimportantly, when YouTube had not yet demonetized us, we were making about 500 bucks or more per day in super chats.
So it was a commercially important project for us to do, especially given that we take no government money and YouTube had demonetized our regular ads.
But the live stream in recent years is not those things.
We're not facing a daily news crisis, although we are, you know, there's always things happening.
We make very little money through super chats.
We're not allowed to do super chats, and we make some money on Rumble.
And I see someone has just chipped in $50, which is incredible.
And I want to say thanks to Stefan Ogg for $50.
He says, Ezra, love what you're doing.
Great to see you engaging on True Social and Rumble.
We all must support free speech platforms, Pierre2425, Trump24.
And Bess Araba chips in 20 bucks and says, love the show.
Not interested in movies, actors, or singers.
Keep up the good fight.
People hate it when I talk about movies.
But here's the main thing.
I watch the live stream and I see David Menzies on the live stream and he's fun and he's great.
He's one of my favorite guys.
But I can't help but thinking David needs to be out in the field doing news in the field.
And when I see Alexa on the live stream, I think, there's so much news in Montreal on the streets right now.
Alexa needs to be in the field.
And other reporters who were not hired to be pundits or commentators have been pressed into service to keep the daily live stream going.
And after thinking about it for some time, I've decided that those rebel talents should be deployed on other journalism.
Now, our dear friend Sheila Gunn Reed is based at home.
She has a home studio and she loves doing it.
And she is a great pundit and commentator, always has been.
So our new thinking is that every Friday, Sheila will host the live stream.
She may have guests, but typically she will run through the highlights of the week.
And she's in a position to know those because she's our chief reporter.
She deals with all the stories constantly.
So every Friday, Sheila will host a one-hour live stream, sort of reviewing the best of the week.
And we will still have ad hoc live stream if there is an emergency, if there is some huge breaking news, and for certain events like elections.
We love our elections live streams.
They're very successful, both financially and in terms of viewership, and we'll continue to do those.
But on any given day, we will have our reporters out doing reporting.
And I think that's an important thing for Rebel News.
I look around the independent news space, and I look at our colleagues and our competitors, and some of our colleagues and competitors do live streams, do commentaries, do chats.
But I think the thing that makes Rebel News special and different is our emphasis on on-the-ground video reporting.
I mean, think of David Menzies, and I'll mention him because he's done the live stream so much.
David Menzies shines when he is at a rugby game for a transgender rugby player who's smashing women, and he's saying, what are you doing?
And he's getting the candid comments from everyone there.
That's David Menzies at his best.
David Menzies is at his best when he's at a pro-Hamas rally and he encounters, yeah, I mean, look at this.
When David was out there, by the way, that had hundreds of thousands of views.
Actually, I think that video had a million views because it was so amazing.
In this case, there was a male rugby player named Ash.
Male pattern baldness.
He didn't look like a girl at all.
And David was there saying, what's going on?
And all these women were defending him.
It was crazy.
They called the police on him.
Don't you think that that is the proper use of David's time?
Remember when David went out there in Mississauga to a place we call Gaza Plaza?
Actually, I call the whole town that.
And met a young woman who was wearing machine gun earrings and machine gun shirt and saying nothing that Hamas did was approach.
Yeah, that's exactly her.
Put her on screen.
Remember that woman?
And don't you think that that journalism is not only where David shines, but that's what Rebel News has come to mean.
We will tell you the other side of the story.
Here's my thinking on punditry.
And of course, I'm a pundit myself.
Every night at 8 p.m. Eastern, I do a show.
We call it Ezra Levant, the Ez Levant Show.
It's on Rebel News Plus.
I give you my pundity opinions every night.
So obviously I'm not criticizing pundits.
But pundits, by definition, chew over material that a primary news gathering journalist got first.
A pundit is sort of a secondhand dealer in ideas.
But the person on the ground filming is the first-hand reporter.
And that's more important.
As I said in my speech at Rebel News Live last weekend, the greatest source of bias in news is not how a story is covered.
It's what stories are covered at all.
I mentioned earlier, I was at this event with Pierre Polyev yesterday.
There were six journalists from the regime media.
Not a single one of them asked any questions about Polyev's speech.
Not a single one of them asked any question that I think an ordinary Canadian would care about.
There was all their own vendettas or their own beats.
And that is the deepest form of bias there is.
And so when Rebel News goes and shows things on the ground, that's how you tell the other side of the story.
Not sitting in front of a green screen or in a studio and opining on what someone else reported, because then you're giving the real power to the CBCs and the CTVs of the world because you're actually letting them choose your subject.
This is a very long way of me saying rebel news is going to stick to our knitting.
We're going to do what we do best.
If you ask me what David Menzies does best, the answer is he goes out into the world and he finds amazing people doing crazy and fascinating things and he lets them have their say and he points the camera at us.
If you would ask me what Alexa Le Lenois does best, I'd say she commands the province of Quebec, whether it's Wroxham Road or the crazy anti-fair protesters in Montreal.
That's Alexa Lavoie's highest use to journalism.
Not, I mean, listen, I love hearing both of their thoughts about the world as pundits, but I don't want them taking out a swath of the middle of the day to be a pundit.
We will still give you the live stream experience that you like every Friday when Sheila Gandharaid does a wrap-up of the week.
And we will do live streams on an emergency basis, as we have for years.
And we'll do live streams when there is an election afoot or some other momentous occasion.
But rebel news, especially in the post-pandemic world, will be on the streets.
And I can tell you, as someone who lives in Toronto, that there is an enormous amount of news on the street every single day because the pro-Hamas activists have taken to the streets.
And so far, police and prosecutors have not stopped them.
Show for a second the shutting down of the major highway in Toronto.
Take a look at this.
This happened in Toronto.
It didn't happen in a studio.
It happened on the street.
Look at this.
This action is only taking four minutes.
We're not here to disturb anybody.
We just wanted to show solidarity and we're going to be on our way.
Four minutes.
That's it.
Embaya, brothers and sisters in Palestine and decide that we will never ever give an inch away from this land.
When they know young brothers and sisters like yourself, you are so concerned about a matter they thought they made you forget it.
But they are wrong.
Because as long as we live and as long as we breathe air, Palestine will never, ever be forgotten.
And this is the message that we send clearly to the Zionist Israeli regime.
No matter where we are, even if we are the other side of the world or the other side of any way, Palestine will never ever be taken away from our hearts because Palestine is in our hearts.
You remembering Palestine.
You gathering for Palestine.
You think you're Palestine.
I mean, look at what happened.
I think that's the Gardner Expressway in Toronto.
Correct me if I'm wrong.
It's an absolutely essential major street.
And you can see this was a carefully scripted, carefully planned propaganda moment.
Drones in the sky, still photographs from the sky.
I mean, this was a production.
And you can hear, and this gets back to my question that I put to Pierre Polyev, who is that man who is obviously speaking with a foreign accent?
Is he a Canadian citizen?
Or is he one of those 700 agents of Iran?
Or is he here as a guest in some way, as a tourist or on a student visa or temporary work visa?
And what is he doing shutting down this critical infrastructure for four minutes?
They brought in martial law when the truckers honked their horns.
My point, though, in showing this video now is, where is the news?
The news is on the street.
The news is out there.
And we will go to get the news.
And we will show you the news that we think is important, not the news that CBC, CTV, or the rest of the regime media thinks is important.
And that is our emphasis as Rebel News, gathering the news from the streets and, frankly, around the world.
If you want commentary, you'll get it every Friday from Sheila Gunread on the live stream or every night at 8 p.m. on my show, and Sheila has a weekly show as well.
I hope you agree with me on this decision.
Obviously, if you're watching the live stream, that tells me you like it.
Maybe even you love it, and you've come to rely on it.
But as the rebel commander, it is my belief that we must be on the streets, not just in Toronto and Montreal, but in Calgary and Edmonton and Vancouver and Ottawa.
And each of those cities I just listed does have a rebel in it, as well as Avi Yamini in Melbourne.
When I think back to the most successful journalistic moments that I have had in the nearly nine years of Rebel News, none of them have been me sitting at a desk giving you my views.
All of them have been me in the field engaging, interacting, especially with opponents, whether it was Albert Burla, the CEO of Pfizer, or Greta Tunberg, both of whom we encountered at Davos, or whether it's Sheila Gunreed at the UN global warming conferences, or Avi Yamini on the streets of the protests and the lockdown in Melbourne,
or Alexa Lavoie challenging Justin Trudeau at the leaders' debates.
Our golden moments have not been when we sit in the comfort of our living rooms or our studios chattering.
And I'm not saying there's no role for that.
I do it every night on my show.
The best moments of Rebel News are when we are out there engaging with the news and then sometimes trying to do something about it to make a difference.
That's what Rebel News is going to do going forward.
I thank you for your loyal viewership of our live stream.
I invite you to watch every Friday when Sheila Gunreed does it.
I invite you, if you want more commentary, to subscribe to Rebel News Plus, where Sheila and I have our shows behind a paywall.
And we need that paywall because that's how we pay the bills around here.
We have 45 staff that we have to pay for.
And that $8 a month charge, like I say, it's probably not a lot of dough to you, but it really adds up for us.
So that's the live stream for today.
Sheila will be back in this chair on Friday.
We will occasionally have other live streams as events warrant.
But until then, look for rebels on video and look for them on the streets.
Goodbye.
And keep fighting for freedom.
Right-Wing Rhetoric Turning Backs00:01:57
All parties in Canada stand with Ukraine.
So it is particularly troubling to see, even though we are seeing a rise of right-wing rhetoric in the United States with mega-conservatives across Europe in certain corners of right-wing politicians and parties starting to pull their support for Ukraine,
starting to parrot Russian disinformation and misinformation and propaganda, that suddenly the Conservative Party of Canada would choose to not stand with Ukraine in something that they need, that the Ukraine has asked for.
And to use the frankly absurd excuse that it's because Ukraine will be bringing in a price on pollution in the coming years.
Obviously, that's an excuse, but it's not the real story.
The real story is the rise of a right-wing American MAGA-influenced thinking that has made Canadian conservatives, who used to be among the strongest defenders of Ukraine, I'll admit it, turn their backs on something Ukraine needs in its hour of need.
That is the danger of the rise of the right-wing influence that is feeling its impact in Canada.
That's what not just Ukrainian Canadians, but all Canadians should be concerned about when the Conservative Party of Canada and Pierre Polyev turn their backs on history, turn their backs on our friends and allies, turns their backs on the international rules-based order and our support for the UN Charter and territorial integrity.