This is like when philosophy is in the news, we have to report on it. When Canada is in the international news, we have to report on it too. Because our leader, a sixty year old, gray haired man, is so based. They're calling him Karl Marx Karney. They're calling him Marx Karney, leader of bricks, who said that, No, it's now brick brickicks, brickicks. Canada's here, everyone, We're important. David French is talking about us.
Everyone's talking about us amazingly.
We thought he was just our run of the mill austerity technocrat, but no, he He's up there. He's using four syllable words, which is kind of a shock to hear out of a nation national leader.
It is fascinating to see the contrast between him and Trump, and I think that's part of it. I feel like it's very situational. I think people see Carney. I mean, I do think the speech was good, which is what we're going to talk about. Good from a technical point of view or an oratorical perspective, it was good. But I do feel like some of the aura. I mean, people are calling this like the speech of the century, you know, people are talking about this as the most important speech they've.
Ever heard in the generation. It's crazy, Like people are saying that this is that David that this is what who.
Said David French, the New York Times resident Iraq war apologists.
Yeah, he might have said that, like a bunch of people, a bunch of like important quote unquote pundits have said. You know, it's like the speech of the century. It's like a speech for the for a generation, for a time. It's like a historical moment. Like some people are saying that this speech is like there's going to be like a before the speech and then after the speech, like like Christ, it's like before and after the Carney speech. It's a new BC. It's like you know, after and it.
But really in this case, it's like before and after like the world economic or the rules based international order, right, because that's kind of what.
The speech was about. But yeah, it's crazy, And I think.
So when a bunch of people who are consistently diagnostically wrong on issues all agree that something is great, then this should be held up. We should think of this as an IQ test.
Yeah, this is the reaction of the speech was kind of over the top, and I do think it was good. But I also wonder whether it's just almost situationally because it's such a sharp contrast from Trump that that people whenever anybody, when someone just displays some oratorical, traditional leadership function in a way that is like a radical contrast, it maybe gives it an extra oomph.
But of course it did.
It did seem to describe something that resonated with a lot of people. So I'm talking, of course about the Davos speech.
If you if you're you know, not up to.
Speed, but the Davos World Economic Forum where all the globalists to go and meet and discuss the world domination.
Yeah, exactly, from the site of the New World Order. The new New World Order has been declared by none of than are our guy, our guy a couple of minutes. We should just let ezracline clean clean the come out of his underwear changes changes boxers. We're a smart country, We're a based country. It was actually I had to pause because it wasn't something you can just read or listen to with your phone out, because it did use for words. Yeah, the Trump Trump's response was having a stroke on stage.
I heard grateful.
It's like I heard heard Carnie he didn't sound so grateful, and he's like, Canada's I think he said Canada's alive only because of us.
Remember that Mark.
Isn't that crazy. He's like twenty years older than him. But Mark Mark gives Dad vibes and that's probably why he's so threatening.
Yeah, exactly, so we could run.
I mean it was kind of a high as you say, as you put it, a high syllable speech. He starts off by, you know, I think in the in the fifth paragraph or fourth paragraph, he's talking about Thucydides, you know so, and then he starts talking about that Czech dissident vast love novel, I mean, the Thucidities thing.
Did you ever read Thucydides pills or no?
Was it the Melian Dialogue?
I think so, it's it's it's the one that also ir people love talking about because.
They want and the week except what they must. Yeah, yeah, exactly, it's always that. That's the only thing from Thucidities I even know.
Yeah, and that's exactly the part that Carney quoted. And uh, of.
Course and uh and a Soviet Oh, I guess he's not a Soviet? Was check?
It wasn't part of the Soviet Union. It was part of the Eastern Bloc. You know those other countries that were like aligned and had.
They had a socialist socialist quote unquote government, Yeah, which.
Were basically Soviet puppets, but they were like nominally like not part of the Soviet Union.
Why is it all the best anecdotes and stories and parables about the about what ideology does and is they all come out of the last days of the Soviet Union, the Eastern Bloc. Yeah, before we analyzed the rhetoric of the speech, which is all I'm really capable of doing, Mark Karney. By giving this speech, he also demonstrates that he doesn't feel like he's personally in that much danger. Now, isn't that a lot of faith to put in the
stroke wridden, decaying mind of Donald Trump? Because if he decided my last act, my last act is Supreme Emperor, is going to be to invade Canada and take it as the fifty first state. There's not a lot that we could do to stop it, and it'd probably be over in you know, four days. Maybe we don't have automatic weapons, we don't have nukes. For years we've been bragging, ha ha, we don't have school shootings. But now now it's coming back to bite us in the ass. We
don't have automatic weapons. Our army is smaller than ice. Yeah.
You know.
One thing that's also interesting about this, like Carnie in Canada, how much he how popular he is. I mean, he was getting pretty popular even before this speech.
But it was interesting.
I was at a friend's place playing magic the gathering, and I have one friend there who is I would say, like very much in every man Canadian, like white white guy, you know who's I wouldn't say particularly partisan, but for a long time he was all in on Poliev, who is the Conservative leader. He was all in on Pierre Paul But he's the type of guy who's not really ideological. You know, he's just kind of like looking at his
pocketbooks and he's like, this is pissing me off. Right, So he was pissed off at Trudeau and like housing, you know, he's at the age where he's like, look, he was trying to buy a house and he was frustrated, and all the stuff that Pauliev talked about about housing policy resonated with him and he was like all in. And it's just interesting how now and even when Carney came into the picture, he was like, Okay, well maybe this is gonna be a tougher decision.
And then now he's like all about Carney. He like loves Carney.
He was like, this is exactly the leader we needed for the time, and like he's totally shifted.
So he wasn't the Poliev fan like, no, I just want to be able to shovel my driveway without seeing an Indian No exactly.
I mean, I think that that is one of the things, in my opinion, that marks Canadian politics as being quite distinct from American politics. We have a lot more swing voters in the sense of there's a lot of people in the suburbs of Toronto and other suburban areas that kind of shift depending on where the wind is blowing. And a lot of those suburbs are also immigrant communities too, like a lot of the Conservative Party, for them to
be successful, they need to win over immigrants. So that just kind of makes it so that the kind of conservative politics that can exist here is limited in its kind of identitarian craziness. I just think it's not possible for it to go for it to win and go that far on the identitarian craziness. I just think it couldn't It couldn't win.
It couldn't win.
Yeah, as desperate as they are to copy American conservatism, the race as a wedge issue kind of doesn't work. You have to find the other wedge issues.
It's kind of it's just not a good strategy accept in Quebec.
That there works.
Except in Quebec. They're a special case. Yeah they are. They are a special case.
But they're also weird because their nativism is like super left wing most of it, Like like.
What this I would want to see? Because if America invaded, the Albertans would put out American flags hanging out their window and cheer the tanks as they rolled through. Everyone else, Like, we wouldn't be happy with it by any means, but we kind of have to accept it because there's nothing that we could do except for Quebec. Quebec would not put up with that shit, and Quebec you'd have like you'd be finding the bodies of politicians and car trunks.
When the US might even be like we don't want to deal with these people, let's just let them have their own country.
Yeah, yeah, but this is a sign that Carney does not really believe what he said, because if you believed that there is nothing holding the rules based international order intact, then why wouldn't Trump invade our country and take it over. Like we don't have anything, we don't have automatic weapons.
Yeah, I mean, you know, even if we did have weapons, we probably still wouldn't have much of a chance. I mean, yeah, I think at this day and age, modern warfare is all about the kind of technology, and the US has crazy spooky military technology that can do fucking anything. So I don't really you know, I don't think that it's like us having guns, us being our I don't really know that that would make much much of a difference.
Yeah, after they invade, after the invasion's over, they'll just like send out a malware. So if you have Mark Carney's speech in your browser history, then they'll just wait till you're talking on your phone and blow up your head.
Yeah, exactly.
So I guess to the content of the speech, I mean, what did you take pills as a less you know, as a less political theory oriented person, what did I'm curious, what would what did you take to be the main message or the thesis of the speech. What do you think he was trying to get across?
Oh, I would like to say when we planned to cover this, we had someone who knew better what they were talking about, but they weren't able to make it. Now. Admittedly, the only way that I can evaluate this speech is aesthetically, because I don't know anything about ir or international trade or even what his country exports. So let's get the
caveat out of the way. But first point, Libitdally. We crave a leader, qua father and this, this, only this can explain why so many Americans reacted to this, just totally libitdinally horny for a father figure. Because they are being run right now by drunk uncle. They need to go from drunk uncle back to dad, who just says I'm not mad, I'm just disappointed. That's all they want to hear. And this also is what Canadians wanted to hear after having just it for so long, because Justin,
Justin could have never pulled off this speech. He doesn't have the tambour, not the right tamber.
Oh yeah, I was thinking about that when I was watching it as well. I was like, God, could you imagine him saying this?
Carney delivered it sounding and seeming intelligent, whereas if Justin tried just's Justin's like the older cousin who's trying to be cool, is more of his vibe, whereas Carney is like smart dat or even just sober dad. Maybe that's what.
Everyone wants exactly exactly. And I think I also feel that when I was watching the speech, I felt that, well, there were platitudes in a sense, of course.
There always are in these kinds of speeches.
It struck me that there was actually quite a lot of substance, right, whether you agree or disagree with the substance, there was real substance in this speech. There was like a real claim. It wasn't just like we're stronger when we worked together where whatever, like where this or that? Like he was making a real claim. It felt like, which is I think why it resonated.
So much with people. Yeah, with other world later.
Yeah, that's all that Justin was able to do.
That Justin was full of platitudes.
Diversity is strength, but our strength is.
Diversity exactly exactly.
And I but to your other point, no, I it's interesting that you found this to be substantial because I was trying to find what the substance was, and it's quite elusive. There's something else though about how he delivers this. Maybe this is just how speeches are written now, but it sounds like it was written trying to get clips, and the clips are ultimately what we saw on like on Twitter or whatever you're on. Because these these end speech or the end of the lines. Maybe I'll insert an example.
Yeah, and we are no longer just relying on the strength of our values, but also the value of our strength.
These end lines sound like they're made to be clipped.
Argue the middle powers must act together because if we're not at the table, we're on the menu.
Yeah, for sure, there was a lot. There was a lot of that.
I feel like, I thought, like the breathless enthusiasm, like trying to get on their knees to get just a dribble of come on their face. It's just saying like what's obviously true already, and that people are just so shocked that someone can say something that's obviously true.
Hedgemons cannot continually monetize their relationships. Allies will diversify to hedge against uncertainty. They'll buy insurance, increase options in order to rebuild sovereignty, sovereignty that was once grounded in rules but will increasingly be anchored in the ability to withstand pressure.
But that point that you just said, though, pills that people you know were creaming themselves because this guy was just saying something that was obviously true. But that's important.
And I think it's not just someone saying something true, or it's a politician at Davos. The world economic order is saying something that's true, right, And I think that that's that's what surprises people. I mean, I think I saw Glenn Greenwald, right, no fan of the globalist rules based international order, whatever that means, he was kind of shocked by the honesty, right, And that's kind of what
I heard. A lot of people, I would say, who are more have left wing, like broadly leftist intuitions about the world order. They were more like, Wow, he's just saying what we've been saying for decades, like, and he just came out and said it, right. And I think maybe this quote exemplifies it. I think this is probably like the quote that was clipped the most.
He says, uh, for decades, countries like Canada prospered under what we call the rules based international order. We joined its institutions, we praised its principles, We benefited from its predictability, and because of that we could pursue values based foreign
policies under its protection. We knew the story of the international rules based order was partially false, that the strongest would exempt themselves when convenient that trade, the rules were enforced asymmetrically, and we knew that international law applied with varying rigor depending on the identity of the accused or the victim.
This fiction was.
Useful, and American hegemony in particular helped provide public goods, open sea lanes, a stable financial system, collective security, and support for frameworks for resolving disputes. So we placed the sign in the window, We participated in the rituals, and we largely avoided calling out the gaps between rhetoric and reality. This bargain no longer works. Let me be direct. We are in the midst of a rupture, not a transition.
So that's I think the core because Canada and other countries are so dependent, are so integrated with the US economy, and now that they have a leader that's kind of using that integration to as a weapon that this is kind of creating an unacceptable situation. He's actually just noticing the thing. He's admitting basically that Canada knew this was kind of bullshit. Although he did say partial reality, right, he didn't say or he said partial fiction.
He didn't say a full fiction.
Yeah he did. He said partial fiction and never never elaborated on the part of it that was true. This is some mealy mouthed metaphysics from Mark Karney exactly. But I do want to know. I do want to ask him can ken the rules based order? Is this something that is true or false? It's like the old old metaphysical Greek question. If a circle has a hole in it, it's no longer a circle. It doesn't matter how small the hole is. There's a hole in the circle, it's
no longer a circle. If the international rules based Order is partially false, that just renders it false.
No, he's admitting that Canada benefited. That did it because they knew it was in their interest, not because they actually believe that the rules based international Order was you know, a thing, And yeah, I don't know, is there what was your feeling about that?
Huh, Well, thanks for asking, but I need to say again, if you want, if you want stock picks on this speech, I'm the worst person to ask. And I feel like my lack of knowledge is particularly significant here because we don't know who the intended audience for the speech is, Like, who could it be In an election year? It would be Canadian voters because the only thing we vote based on is not being America. So if he's saying, hey, we're not America, then yeah, we then he could be
speaking to us. It's not an election yere though, So is he speaking to the Americans? Is he speaking to the American press press or the people that can nudge Trump around saying, you know, cut out all this tariff bullshit because you're messing with the money. And if you mess with the money, we're going to go to China. So I guess his leverage kind of is, hey, you're a up, let's all go buy Chinese evs instead of Tesla?
Is that the strategy here? Because beyond that, I mean, I guess I kind of disagree with you and everyone else who says is a substantial or consequential speech because all he all he said concretely is hey, we can make deals with whoever we want. Which already was true before that, and beyond that, he's saying, Hey, we live in a simulation, and everyone in without their head in
the sound already knows that too. So I know, like personally, I know that I'm missing the dog whistle register, and I don't know like who he's actually talking to through these words. But it is moderately interesting that there's like a metaphysics to this in which the Breton Woods system exists because people have agreed to believe in it, not because they believe in it, and admitting that you don't believe in it is a big deal. But also to that,
I mean, big whoop. Everyone knows that money exists because we have agreed to believe in it, not because we actually believe in it. But I do want to know. I do want to know who the WII is, the we that no longer believe, the we who chose to believe and no longer do, because that's not us.
I don't.
Yeah, yeah, he's obviously talking about the leadership.
This guy, this fucking guy, he's an international banker with three passports. Is that the weave?
I mean, he definitely is.
Uh, you know, if you were to look up like who's a globalist in the dictionary.
I feel like Mark Karney would be, like, right there.
He was the central banker for two central banks, worked at Goldman Sachs in international finance. Like, he's a PhD in economics. He used to have citizenship from three countries, although he renounced Ireland and the UK when he became Prime minister. Like he is globalist, you know.
Yeah?
Yeah, and why Ireland is that like a tax haven thing.
I don't know why he had Irish citizenship, but obviously he needed a UK citizen to be the leader of the Bank of England.
Yeah, he's pretty he's pretty high flying for a Northwest Territories boy. This is not a typical coastal elite.
Yeah, I know, amazingly he's a prairie boy. But then I guess, I guess.
The other thing worth talking about is like how he opens the speech with this anecdote from this Czech dissident. It's from an essay called the Power of the Powerlessness, which was from nineteen seventy eights. This would have been when Czechoslovakia, which at the time was one country, right not split up when it like they were under communist rule. Part of the Eastern Bloc, and he makes this point
about how fictional orders are sustained through lies. And he talks about this example of the green grocer, which is in Voslov's or Hovel's essay, where the green grocer every morning would put up this sign, you know, workers of the world unite. And this is how Carne puts it. He says he doesn't believe it, no one does, but he places a sign anyway to avoid trouble, to signal compliance,
to get along. And because every shop keeper on every street does the same, the system persists not through violence alone, but through the participation of ordinary people in rituals they privately know to be false. And that's what Hovell called living within a lie. And that same thing Hobvell claimed
is what makes those kinds of systems fragile. Is if they are predicated on such a strong lie, then as soon as people start to take their signs down, as he's talking about it, then the whole system can collapse quite quickly. And this is something that I feel like
Slowo has talked about quite a bit. I Rememberjack used to make this kind of joke point about how if there was like a communist meeting, and then someone speaks out against the regime in the meeting, and then someone else gets up and says, how dare you speak against? You know, this leadership and this structure. Was like that second guy would get killed first because he's exposing that like that, like we're not allowed to dissent.
Right, Defending the lie is a way of admitting the lie exists, which.
Is exactly whereas the other guy's just being and like nominally in these you know, people's republics, they're supposed to be democratic, you're supposed to nominally, right, they pretend that you're allowed to have opinions.
So it's like the first person would obviously get.
In trouble because they're speaking against the regime, but the second one, who's exposing the fact that this is all bullshit by saying how dare you speak out against would be in more trouble.
Is kind of Geck's point.
I took the point that Carne would, now it's interesting to apply this to international relations, right, because obviously this is talking about how totalitarian regimes function. So his point here, I guess, is that countries, even though they knew that the rules based international order was kind of bullshit that it was. Really we were doing things to benefit from the US hegemony, and if we pretend that we agree with everything, then we're going to benefit and we won't get in trouble.
So we'll just go ahead.
And now that's not working anymore. But you know, I don't know if it's like a perfect one to one match.
Yeah, you got to imagine it's probably like it's loaded or some sort of faux pas. To compare the current global order and it's sort of decaying or decadent institutions to the late socialism, late socialism in the USSR, in the Eastern Bloc right, they're both decadent. They're both failed attempts that relied on a story instead of reality. Now there was something I was interested in here structurally, and
that is the recursion. Because all of the praise about the speech being delivered was how it's being honest, But the speech itself is also saying we're taking the sign out of the window. We're finally going to be honest, and what's the brutal honesty that we're going to hit the world with. Oh, well, the United States is exempting itself whatever it feels like, it's just like that's not the hardest, deepest truth if you if you live in El Salvador or Honduras or Guatemala or Chile.
Yeah, yeah, totally.
But I guess the same thing would probably apply it to talitarian regimes though, too, right, like they would like everyone kind of knows, don't you think. So it's like it's like not really a and maybe this is really epistemology comes in because it's like.
People, Oh, I don't know, I don't know about the word totalitarian.
Okay, sure, whatever we want to talk about.
Sneak your horseshoe theory in here. The hypernormalization of it. You need, you need to pretend like there's power when they're isn't actual power anymore. Like you're not gonna die for not having the sign in your window the way you would be if you criticize the the Nazi government in nineteen forty. So I don't That's why I don't like totalitarian, because it's just meant to say communism.
And well, that guy might get in trouble though for taking the sign down, like if he's the only one, like he might get in shit.
He's probably not gonna die, but he'd probably get in trouble.
I think though, the point of this kind of ideology where everyone pretends that the thing is still going on, happens when the thing isn't going on anymore. So you pretend that the power exists, You pretend that Workers of the World unit is still a truth after it's no longer a truth. If the government were totalitarian, they would just kill you for right.
Disagree, Right, I see what you're saying.
You have to save face in front of the other. That's when you pretend, no, this is actually a democracy and it's actually what everybody wants. So this applies to Mark Harney situation here that we don't we don't want to pretend that this is true anymore.
Right right now?
Of course, I like, I love I love when stuff like this happens because it shows the simulation.
I was curious about that.
Yeah, this is a situation that just perfectly fits my sociology, both both denying the obvious simulation and then the orotund masturbatory rhetoric about how brave it.
Is to.
Say something's false that everybody already knows it's false. This is perfect. So what does it reveal? What does it reveal? In terms of metaphysics. Now, it's already true that social systems must be simulations, which is to believe that there is a code or an organizing principle that runs the thing, and it has to be believed in. That matters way more than if it's true. If it's believed in, you
can create a social system around it. Like God doesn't exist, but you can create extremely complex hierarchies, social systems of investment based on belief in God. Also an economy. You cannot get people to believe in an economy unless they believe that there is some secret to value, that value exists somewhere, and belief here just means that you do the things that are required. So he says sign in the window. Like we can criticize money or the or
fiat currency. The conspiracy theorists love going after fiat currency. This is based on nothing. Even if you know that money's based on nothing. When you go to the store, you use it. It just matters what you do, what you do. You can criticize anything you want in your private time, but as long as when you go out then you use the thing, then you're propagating the system. You know, back in the day, if you don't believe in God, then that's fine as long as you're tithing
to the church properly, and they're keeping records. So if you don't tithe properly, the consequences are that you're I don't know, I don't know what they would do, exclude you from finance, exclude you from the social world in some way, which is a worse punishment. So it doesn't matter whether you believe in God in your head. It matters that you demonstrate believe in God by giving your tithe. And that's what I took out of this. But it
doesn't mean that Trump destroyed it, right. This is what I disagree with every anti Trumper in the New York Times opinion section, which is really funny about this because that's the thing that binds them together. But the Trump exposing that it no longer exists anymore means that it died at some point in the past. And this is to me the matter of the bait. Like Warhol signals the end of art. But Warhol himself didn't kill Art. He was just the one who exposed it for.
What I noticed it.
Yeah, Trump is the signal that the thing never held true in the first place, but he's not the guy who killed it. And funnily enough, this proves Francis Fukiyama the the most wrong philosopher.
Is that's interesting just to back to go back to like the novel example, though, are you saying that it was never true in the sense because the lie, right, the workers of the world unite in that is that like this regime is really about workers, right, And the lie or the truth is that it's not really it's actually about this like party having power, Like it's not really about democracy and workers, right, it's about So that's
the lie that gets exposed. That was that was already a lie, right, it was already not true.
Now this is where if you're gonna go with my theory, you can't really use the word lie and truth. That's why I use the word secret, because the secret you can believe in it without actually knowing whether it's true or false. If you believe in the true in the rules, you make the rules true. Yeah, So it doesn't matter whether it's true or not. It just matters whether people
believe in it. Any social system is like this. Any game is like this too, Like there are no objective rules for chess there's only agreed upon rules for chess. The power of the cult leader is not that he has connection to the other world. It's that his followers believe that he has connection to the other world. That's what makes a cult is their belief in his power, which gives him power. So workers of the World unite.
It's neither true nor false. But the power of workers of the World unite is that people believe in it. If people people don't believe in it, then it's not real. So it's not lie versus truth because that could be true, right, it could be true workers over the world. You know, you have nothing to lose with your change if everyone believed in it. The problem is that they did.
Yeah, yeah, And that's actually something I wish Eric was here, but he didn't show up today.
Is uh.
I was curious about the ways in which we think that. You know, maybe this moves things more towards the Hovel or the kind of thing about how ideology functions. But you know, to what extent does Hovel's analysis apply to a liberal democracy?
Right?
I mean, there's definitely lies, there's definitely ideology, but it almost seems like a reversal in a liberal democratic context where it's almost like like you can call out the untruth as much as you want, but the thing still functions somehow, Like it's it's kind of weird. It's like it's like it's like a bizarre I'm trying to map this out in my head because I don't quite have
it straight. But it's like because in this example of these communist regimes, everyone is not allowed to say the thing that's not true, and everyone's afraid to say the thing that's not true that and it's a threat saying the thing that's not true allowed could be a threat to the regime, Whereas in liberal democracies it's almost like everyone is saying the thing that is not true, but there's a bunch of people who are also saying things
critiques that are also untrue critiques, and it's almost like they're flooded. It's flooded with discourse. And maybe it's because it's so flooded it has no effect or something.
I don't know.
It's well, it matters who said it is. Anyone who's anyone who knows anything has said that for a long time that the United States can break the Geneva Convention without consequence whenever it feels like when it feels like opening a prison in Iraq, you know, yeah, but it matters. This is why everyone's teary eyed about it is because a leader actually said it. Yeah, the leaders are supposed to believe for us, because none of us are capable of believing in something so absurd.
Yeah.
Yeah, But that's what makes the pundits of the New York Times so teary eyed is because one of the actual Haparatics, one of the actual members of the party, one of the inner circle of the globalist world order. Yeah, that they don't even believe it. And that's the other thing I about saying we like, we we went along with this. We all pretended, but you're one of the guys, like your office at least you represent not just the nation but the entire system.
Well, he was also giving the speech at the World Economic Forum.
So the we is the people in the room too.
He's like looking at the other leaders, He's looking at the other people in the room who are part of it. I feel like he's kind of trying to signal to everyone there like, yeah, we went along with it for a while, but we but it's bullshit, or like at least it's and it's not working for us anymore. It's not to our benefit anymore. We should try to do something different. And what that different thing is is also a bit unclear.
But well, he came home and cut a whole bunch of government jobs, so something like that. Well, and then also, did you know that we have a lower corporate tax rate in the United States. That's insane.
That's recent. Eh.
I don't know if the low I don't know how much he lowered it by, but that's one thing he did last year. So yeah, he's a he and he's cutting cutting government spending in order to make that happen. He's in austerity tecto crap.
Or what they call a red Tory, you know, a kind of a still liberal but technically kind of a Tory conservative kind of guy.
Globalization.
I remember when I was in high school, I had an international business professor and he I could tell he was so like, uh, left wing, and it was good, it was cool, like it's that's not a bad thing. But it would I could see it would like slip into his lessons, Like he would just start ranting about the World Trade Organization and like and the IMF giving
you know, poor countries really shitty deals. I mean, that's what happened to Venezuela at one point, right, I think they got like a like a crazy like loan package from the International Monetary Fund that all those deals always said, you have to, you know, privatize everything if you want to get this money from US, which would kind of dictate a certain kind of ideological or economic ideological framework, it would kind of impose it on countries if they wanted loans.
Well, this, I think this has to be a sort of litmus test to see what kind of idiot you are, because he basically lists a bunch of problems of capitalism, predatory you know, predatory loans, getting mining rights or oil rights or mineral rights or land rights in third world kind of trees to do whatever you want there. And he's saying, well, this is unfair the way that the United States has implemented it. But oh wait, now we need a chance for our middle our middle power, That's
what I guess he calls us. We need our middle power companies the chance to dictate the terms of the global order, and we're going to go to China if America doesn't give our companies a good deal. So yeah, this is he speaks to the unfairnesses in the global system, but then just says, well, now we're gonna try somehow. Nothing's clear about this, but we're gonna try somehow working
together as a block. Rather than being deferential to American corporate interests, We're gonna, I don't know, seek out Norwegian interest I don't I don't have any clue this is. This is actually a big question, like what does he actually want here? Who is this good for? Because he's a fucking international banker. It's not gonna it's not for us that he's doing this.
Or we should do stuff.
We should do more stuff together, like Canada and Europe should be more interconnected, should should make more deals like that cuts the US out or something.
It's not a declaration of war on our largest trading partner, but it's not clear what it is. He's just saying, I'm a brave person. Is the whole is the signal or this whole speech? We're brave people.
And because every shop keeper on every street does the same. The system persists not through violence alone, but through the participation of ordinary people in rituals they privately know to be false. Pavel called this living within a lie. The system's power comes not from its truth, but from everyone's willingness to perform as if it were true.
When he says that one line, he says something like, it's not that the system's true. It works because everyone acts like it's true. That's not That doesn't apply to late socialism and the current hegemonic American world order. That is just that's how human, how human systems, all of them work.
We don't.
Language is not true. Language works because people believe that it can convey or represent truths.
I mean, I would say that that's he was like just saying something that people were shocked a leader would say out loud. But then when it comes to the substance of what he's saying, especially when it comes to the upshot or the recommendation, it's like, yeah, America, where we're kind of at the at the whims of you know, this hedgemon America, but you know, and.
It made sense.
We were getting a pretty good deal out of it, and now we're not getting a good deal. It's funny because from Trump's perspective, I feel like he says all the time, He's like, well, They've just gotten way too sweet of a deal from us in the past, and now it's not worth it for us anymore.
He was also widely.
Quoted and I wonder what you thought about this. He said, Nostalgia is not a strategy right for the old order? Do you did you do you remember that it's another banger. It doesn't mean anything, but yeah, it's a banger.
It's a banger, but it doesn't mean anything exactly.
It's we are taking a sign out of the window. We know the old order is not coming back. We shouldn't warn it. Nostalgia is not a strategy, but we believe that from the fracture we can build something bigger, better, stronger, more just. This is the task of the middle powers, the countries that have the most to lose from a world of fortresses and a most to gain from genuine cooperation.
That's another thing where like, okay, obviously the global international order is you know, fake for all these reasons we've been talking about, and I think Carney's right to point out the way it's been used on weaker countries to the benefit of the stronger, and especially to the benefit of the United States and.
To our benefit. Our mining companies. Our mining companies owned like all of Central America.
Yep, they had lots of gold company. Canadian gold companies own a bunch of mines all over the world.
Yeah. So when he says we're gonna build a more just system, like, what does what does justice mean coming from a banker that we're going to relinquish our mining rights in Central America, South America and Africa? No, of course not. So what does he say? I guess he's calling for solidarity among the middle powers to continue to exploit the weaker country. It has to be that, right. Mining companies are like like forty percent of the TSX.
If he were to say, okay, we're we're gonna be a just country from now on, that would be it would be suicide, be suicide for our economy.
But uh and then but then when he says it's not coming back, Uh uh, I guess I feel like it could though, Like if Trump leaves office and just some new guy like no normal president gets elected.
I feel like it could just come back. I don't know, Like why.
Not, Well, no, I don't. This is just a material fact that the peak, the peak of the American economy relative to the rest of the world was in like that it ten seventies or something that's like that, that's true, coming back.
That's true, that's true.
And I guess even and Carney's response to me it would probably be like, but now it's just been exposed as a fragile situation. Next then next JD. Vans will be elected and it'll be back to the old ways, so you can't rely on it anymore. Like there's no all these norms that American presidents were following when it came to like international trade strategy, trade policy have been broken so that there's no more norms, so we can't rely on any anymore. So it is over in that sense.
I guess.
Well, now we have the other metaphysical question. If we show that the simulation is false, which any normal person has known for a long time, but now that Carney is admitting it, this is a signal, a worse signal for the simulation. Now does the simulation give way to reality TM or does it give way to another simulation?
Because you can see you can see that Karney does not believe that the system is over, because if it were, then he would not have given this speech, because if he believed that the United States can do whatever it wants, then he should be worried now about being black bagged. They could send Jaysock into his house at Ottawa and kidnap him. That's something that they could do. They could annex our country. It wouldn't be that much of a problem.
And I mean in terms of reality. You know, if you ran this as a computer simulation, we wouldn't we wouldn't have a chance. He wouldn't have a chance. But the fact that he dares to say this proves that he doesn't think that the simulation is collapsed, that we're not on the brink of Trump actually doing whatever he wants. So there is still there remains a magical force that that is holding Trump and America in its decayed decadence state.
It's still holding them back, so they don't So we are not in reality.
Well there is no reality?
Oh really that's your position?
Now, Well, I mean, there is some reality, but I'm just saying that there's no there's not going to be like a yeah, there's going to be some other spontaneous whether spontaneous or manipulated, like ideologically mediated, you know, form of agreement in the global order.
Right, It's just.
You know, it's always going to be some fictional aspects of it, I guess, I feel.
And that's really what he's going for, Like, if this means anything, he's calling for solidarity, not obviously worker solidarity, but solidarity among the middle countries to act as a block and to not capitulate to the United States, which means it's not really clear what it means, trading a little bit more with China. I guess group deals with China, and Canada's going to go with Europe.
And we are also geogray geographically.
I mean, we're right by the States. It's just crazy not to like we're we're kind of fucked in that sense. It's like we're right beside it, and that was like part of our advantage. But now it's it's like, yeah, what are we going to do?
So, yeah, this is the thing, This is the key to the whole thing. And I don't know what it is because I have I'm ignorant to the way this stuff works. But Mark Kearney is trying to get someone to do something. Who is that someone and what is that thing? Like Europeans probably China, who knows.
I agree it was not clear what those things are. I would say, you trade, yeah, I mean he made an agreement to try to trade with China. I think he wants to diversify, but ultimately, like what is that really gonna do? And in this case, it seems like maybe it's going to piss off Trump.
The Trump, He's got his hands full right now. I mean, it's it's what a disaster.
I mean, I know we're not here to talk about it, but like, holy shit, what a disaster in Minneapolis, And like it's just what a shithole country America is becoming.
Holy crap.
Another simulation is cops.
Yeah, ice, ice officers, ice, ice, Gestapo.
Well, the simulation gives way of the Gestapo, and then you're left wondering, Okay, what's a real cop. It's just a it's just an ice officer with a different badge.
Yeah, exactly, exactly.
I have another theory to add to the pile, which actually I think it makes sense. Maybe this is all just a theater, a stage production on behalf of Mark Carney to speak to his other peers, the big money guys like Jamie Diamond, Jamie Diamond leveled dudes, because well, Jamie Diamond and Trump now they're having a tiff. But Jamie Diamond supposedly the first time the tariffs went around, like got on the horn and said, Bro, you're fucking with the money. You don't want to go this way.
So maybe if there's anyone like that left, maybe Mark Carney is signaling to them like, hey, I'm gonna lead, I'm gonna lead an exodus with all these people unless you get this guy back in line. That could be another potential audience for who's listening to this threat. Definite, then it would just be all it's a simulation of a simulation saying we're gonna pull out of this unless you bring it back.
Yeah, I think that's definitely a strong possibility. Like I'm sure he did that to try to send a message, maybe as a bargaining chip, but I don't know if it's gonna work. I mean, as far as I've seen, I feel like Trump kind of liked Carney. Well, he respects him because he's a money guy, and Trump is just like anyone who deals with money is like worth listening. I mean, it's I was gonna say before when we were talking about Trudeau, Like I remember when I was
watching the Carney speech. I had this sort of insight that it makes so much sense that Trudeau was just a school teacher. Like the way that he talks like it's just so like it feels like he's such a school teacher, like just some primary school or middle school teacher.
And it's like and then here's a real like.
You could say he speaks condescendingly, but it's like he likes you, yes, while being condescending, like.
A teacher, Yes, exact a teacher.
A teachers who's dumbing it down. But they're also kind of dumb, so they're not you know, they're talking to you like they like you while not really respecting your intelligence, but also not being intelli legit. We've solved it exactly.
He talked to the public like their children a little bit.
Yes, it's not lying, it's a it's not lying. It's a dumb person dumbing it down for your sake because he wants to seem like he likes you.
No, No, he was like a progressive, a hyper progressive teacher who's just like you know, the tone of his voice. It makes so much sense. And and like I don't even remember why I brought that up, but like just seeing the way that Carney talks about things. Yeah, like it's such a it's such a contrast to Trudeau. Oh no, that's and that's also why Trump didn't respect Trudeau. Also, He's like he could tell us like this guy's just a fucking teacher.
Like yeah, yeah. It's funny that we're now, like what do you call it upholding Denmark's claims to Greenland, because it was back this is a distant memory. Back in the early two thousands, it made national news that Canada and Denmark were like disputing some random island in the Arctic, like who actually owned it? And this was this was like a big deal before anyone was threatening just to
take the entire island. Now it was this tiny little island and Denmark landed some troops on it, and then Canada landed some troops on it.
It's funny that there.
Do you know that In two thousand and three, I think there was a like a Canadian TV movie that was like kind of a sci fi alternate universe where Canada becomes part of the States.
It's called H two O.
Because back then the big conspiracy was that the Americans are going to run out of fresh water, and Canada has like the second or third most freshwater in the world, and that America is going to just annex Canada to take our fresh water.
Wow, we're only second in that. I would have put us first.
Maybe we're first. Let's fact check that.
Brazil Russia has more. Brazil has the most.
Oh Brazil. Okay, you looked at up.
Interesting, Yeah, apparently we have twenty percent of the world's total freshwater reserves.
Yeah, what happened to the water wars? I thought those were coming up soon exactly.
So if anyone wants to see a funny made for TV Canadian movie, look up H two oh with Paul Gross I believe.
Okay, if you want, if that's what you're looking for, H two oh. Now back to the speech wrapping it up. All in all, I personally think this is a huge overreaction. It's an overreaction to rhetoric style and not looking at how that belies a lack of information. There's not really new information communicated in the whole thing, so it seems like the reaction has gotten way out of hand because of how low expectations are for politicians.
Yes, I agree. I mean I think when you look at the speech in its totality.
It's like, yeah, it's it's it's just like a speech with a bunch of shit in it that doesn't mean anything. It just happens to also say something true which politicians, especially at the World Economic Forum, don't say. And that in itself, I guess, was the notable part of it.
Right. And again that's why I think it's useful to.
Evaluate it comparatively to other similar things, right, not in isolation as like is this the best speech of the century, but compared to other politicians.
I mean it was. It was. I mean it made news for a reason.
I mean, I don't remember the last time a fucking Davos speech made news. And like I said, yeah, and it was funny. It got a standing ovation at Davos. I don't know if you if you watched. At the end of the speech, he goes and sits down and has a bit of a Q and A with some host guy, and the host guy I think said, wow, like a standing ovation at Davos.
I don't think I've ever seen that before.
Huh, Well, it's a or a bunch of infants. So we see someone stands up to the bully on the playground.
Or thinks that they are.
And that's, like I said, that's kind of the maybe the fiction. The fiction is we can't really do anything else.
There's swelling music in the background.
Yeah, that's rather the truth is, we can't really do anything else.
The powerful have their power.
We have something to the capacity to stop pretending, to name reality, to build our strength at home, and to act together.
That is Canada's path.
We choose it openly and confidently, and it is a path wide open to any country willing to take it with us.
Thank you very much.
We have a rhetorical performer over here.
Now, we have a rhetorical performing Dad with heavy, like with wise, dad energy.
Just disappointed. All right, it's a good place to cut it. Steal you air.
Man, bye bye. Well, I guess I have to cut it. How the hell do I do that?
Oh?
Yeah? Do I just stop it? Yeah? Stop?
Oh stop recording. Sorry, I'm bad at this. I don't normally do this part.