Critical WHAT Theory? And Canada's Aviation Mess.

Earl Mann  0:04  
Welcome to the Shurman report. Here's Peter Shurman.

Peter Shurman  0:11  
Well, hello again, episode three of the Shurman report, and a couple of little things that I had in the side notes on the margin to mention to you. And I should have probably said this clearly on the first episode when I explained who I was or reintroduced myself to you, as the case may be, I don't operate a newsroom, which means I can't tell you if war is breaking out of the Middle East, God forbid, right now, the second all I can do is comment on it from my perspective and hopefully yours or not, when it does break out. And I say when, because I think it's pretty certain that we're going to have some kind of an entanglement. The United States has sent a third battle group over there with another carrier. That was about three days ago. There's a lot of saber rattling. And this goes back to Iran, which, to me, is the worst country in the region. They're behind Hamas. They're behind Hezbollah, and they're there for themselves, of course, as well. And they're angry because they claim that it's Israel who used a drone attack to take out one of the key figures at the top of Hamas, who happened to be visiting in any event, if Iran goes so goes Hamas, what's left of it? So goes Hezbollah, and so goes whatever happens to be on the east side of Israel in Syria, maybe it's the remnants of ISIS, I wouldn't know, but they're bracing for it in Israel, and we are in the rest of the world. As you know, I talked about incipient World War Three the other day, and I don't think I was stretching the point. Also, we're looking constantly at what's going on across the border in the United States, because the US presidency is in full swing with Trump, former President Trump, and he believes anyway, and his supporters believe next President Trump arguing, and,

let's say, jousting, with the latest candidate to replace Biden, and That's Kamala Harris, who believes she's going to be the next President of the United States, moving up from the title of vice president. And the latest piece of news, which was a couple of days ago, that she wouldn't participate in a newly organized debate that Trump wants, which is on Fox TV in front of a live audience on September 4, she won't be going to that. He says he won't go to the one that he had already agreed to go to with Biden slated to be on ABC without an audience and with the silencing microphones on September 10, maybe there will be no more debates at all, or maybe there will. We'll wait and see, but I wanted to bring you up to date on those two points, and we'll continue to be as current as this kind of a setup makes possible. I am a news commentator, and I'd like to start today by telling you that I subscribe to something called PragerU. Maybe you do too, if you don't think about it, because Prager U is a growing organization aimed at disseminating opinions from experts on a range of subjects, and it was started by a guy named Dennis Prager, who's a well known American talk show host with a syndicated daily program out of Los Angeles. Many Americans and Canadians know Dennis because he speaks in various cities. I've seen him several times. Met him once, and later on, I had the privilege of introducing him in Toronto, which gave me a private half hour with him before he had to take the podium. I relate the story to you, not because I think it's some big deal, but because the experience may be a little more conscious of Dennis Prager, who he was and what he did anyway. He does what he calls fireside chats, literally from his home in front of a fire. And he also puts out these five minute videos on a variety of subjects with various people on those subjects of white interest and appeal, and the one that got me last week was from a guy named James Lindsay, who says the next big thing coming from the left will be what he's calling critical immigration theory, not critical race theory. We've heard about that one before. How does Mr. Lindsey know that's coming to the USA and therefore likely Canada? Because he says he knows how the left thinks this is more woke nonsense, as far as I'm concerned. Yep, that side of the political spectrum does indeed invent this stuff. Mr. Lindsey goes on to say that people on the left like so called Critical Theory. It's like what we, most of us, call critical thinking, which has, in my view, just always meant thinking in a straight line and covering facts in an orderly fashion that allows one to come to a good set of conclusions and do whatever the thinking was about. The suggestion is that if you put critical in front and theory behind any word bingo, you've got a new world view. So if you wanted to do it with bingo, it's critical bingo theory is this true? I have always believed that critical race theory is nothing more than nonsense released to the masses after floating around for decades, but seized upon by many following the death of George Floyd back in May of 2020. It. Went mainstream because a lot of the media leans left. No critical race theory on Fox News. I'm not plugging Fox News. They just happen to be on the right, and they don't buy this stuff. Well, neither do I. What it suggests is that almost every aspect of American life is affected by systemic racism. Why don't I believe in it? Because while we certainly do have racism in our society, who doesn't it is not systemic, a believer would therefore call me a racist. I'm not a racist. You don't agree with me. Write me a letter. There's critical colonial theory, which I haven't heard of, but I'll take their word for it. It sees the world as a product of colonial exploitation. I might yield to that idea that colonial acquisition of territory at the expense of others has some merit here in Canada, the others would be, in our case, indigenous people. For example, what we don't call we don't call them Indians. We call them indigenous people, the people who have been here for 10,000 years, one way or the other. Mr. Lindsay, refers to American exploitation in places like South America or Africa. Like I say, there was plenty of colonial exploitation, but no, America did not get rich by exploiting the people of those places. Oh, so I'm a racist again. No, I don't think so. You can do this with feminism. You can do it with whatever you like with immigration, the concept of critical immigration theory will be that we continue to exploit the poor immigrants who arrive on our shores. I believe we actually do a damn fine job of absorbing immigrants, or at least we did until Justin threw open the gates a couple of years ago, and over a million people poured in in the ensuing year, and the United States open southern border speaks for itself, and it has not helped. But can anyone truly say that these people are exploited systematically or systemically in the United States, or is it that they come in freely, knowing the risks and try to get a life many succeed, but immigration should always be a process, an organized process, not a wholesale open door policy. It's not fair to the country. It's not fair to the immigrants. It's not fair to the occupants who arrived in America or Canada or any other country for that matter, legally and by using the process, Mr. Lindsay says the concept of critical immigration theory is nothing more than wedge politics based on national citizenship and national sovereignty. He points out that American mass media have subtly changed language over the past few years, beginning with illegal aliens, moving on to illegal immigrants, and then they were undocumented migrants, to just plain migrants, which we have today. Same thing here. And by the way, no one is saying bar the door or stay away. I think it's just about putting some order into the chaos. Do you believe there was ever any critical thinking put into accepting so many new people in an organized manner? I don't remember those labels I just mentioned. Lindsay expects the next language change will be to undocumented Americans, and after that, just drop the adjective altogether. In other words, everybody is just American or just as Canadian as you are. Does that make sense? Well, to the left of center people who espouse these kinds of approach approaches citizenship like race or gender recognition are all social constructs. If you agree with that, are you agreeing to provide absolutely everything to every brand new immigrant that people who have worked in lifetime endeavors building lives in our countries are afforded. Maybe you can see why I don't care for the left to the other side, I would not have accumulated what I have if I weren't a citizen of a country that has exploited these poor people for the past century. Plus, it's also about our collective responsibility for allowing their countries of origin to be in such bad shape that they had to leave them in the first place. So we owe them, which is bogus nonsense, the theory suggests they'd all be doing fine in their countries of origin if we hadn't screwed them up. Are these facts or obvious truths, as the new theory will suggest? The reality is, you know, they aren't in the United States, Washington allows non citizens, including illegals, to vote in municipal elections. New York City spends millions on prepaid debit cards for asylum seekers. One New York paper daily, a daily paper says a family of four with two kids could get about $15,200 per year. On the one hand, you could say that's unlivable, and you'd be right. On the other what you should say is, where did these people come from, and what prospects did they have when they headed for North America in the first place? What planning was done, what review was conducted before they just arrived in Canada? It's not as urgent. As it is in the US, but there were people who had never been reviewed before, arriving sleeping on Toronto streets at one point, and still are, in some cases at the end of the day. This relates to what is called globalism the left, and that would include top governmental people in Canada and the US would take a positive view of global citizenship. Well, guess what? I have no interest in throwing my lot in with everybody on planet Earth. I worked too hard and I began with nothing, just like many other people, didn't you? Stay tuned.

Andrea Rooz  10:39  
Your with the Shurman report, daily news, commentary available at Apple, podcasts, Spotify, with video posted on YouTube and Facebook. Here's Peter Shurman.

Peter Shurman  10:57  
So I used to live pretty much right on the can of the US border. And when we flew anywhere, it was always an American carrier that carried us wherever we were going. And we used buffalo airport, which was about 45 minutes away from where we lived. It was much less for flights cost wise, drastically less for on site parking and the taxi time to or from the runway was less than five minutes getting on the runway to go or off it to head to the terminal. Canadian carriers are not cheap, even the cheap ones aren't cheap, and using Pearson Airport in Toronto, good God, who would actually argue that it's a behemoth that you'd rather avoid? Certainly I would. Well, the Canadian government has actually been working to address that, the Feds toughened up what's known as the Competition Act, and as a result of that, and 1000s of complaints, our Competition Bureau is having an in depth look at the aviation sector. For you Americans who are listening to this, that legislation is similar to your anti trust legislation. So the Competition Bureau, which administers it, just announced a market study that they're doing, and it focuses on three main issues. One, the state of competition. Two, the barriers to entry, and three, the impediments to the public making informed choices in aviation, sounds great to me, if the teeth in the revised legislation are sharp and ready to bite, the bureau acknowledges air travel as critical to Canadians. Okay, here's what Matthew Boswell, commissioner of competition, said, and I quote, We know many Canadians are frustrated by the cost and quality of the service being provided domestically. Our goal with this market study is to examine the current state of competition in Canada's airline sector and to determine what can be done to improve it. Thank God somebody is looking up. Well, go ahead, Matthew, this will be the first such study since the changes to the Competition Act. For example, documents can be demanded now from the airlines, versus just taking the word of people who spoke for the airlines, managing them. One discount airline flare is on side with the study. The CEO even said, again, quoting the only two entities who benefit from the current situation are Air Canada and WestJet, not the traveling public. All right, Mr. Wilk, we agree. In a June submission on the terms of the study, a spokesperson said the Canadian airline industry has similar levels of competition to other countries of similar size, to which I respond, What planet are you living on? Let's all of us hope that something, something meaningful, comes out of this. It has been long overdue. I'll be back in a moment.

Andrea Rooz  14:01  
You're with the Shurman report, daily news, commentary available at Apple, podcasts, Spotify with video posted on YouTube and Facebook. Here's Peter Shurman

Peter Shurman  14:18  
and the Shurmanator, which is my handle on Twitter, right back with you. If you want to look me up on Twitter, some of you may be watching us on Twitter. It's at Shurmanator, S, H, u r, M, a n, a t o r. And I should mention again that our website, if you want to check out the program and the parameters, or listen to a one that was done a couple of days ago, or by next week, it'll be one from last week, like this one, that's where you go. Peter shurman.com, do you believe in buy trade, invest in Bitcoin. Bitcoin, it was flying high in terms of value last week. I can't say that it's not flying high this week, but it it topped $70,000 at one point last week. Then we had that, that fall from grace of the stock markets, and it took Bitcoin.

And even to an extent, gold with it, there's a questioning of whether or not the United States government, and I suppose, by dint of the relationship with the two countries, the Canadian government shouldn't be or shouldn't have acted faster in letting the rates go down a little bit. Anyway, we'll find out soon enough. So it was flying. I still flying. I in the 50s. At this point, 50,000 US dollars. Bitcoin is trading in that vicinity, so running between 50,000 and something and 70,000 and something. And I see no reason why I won't go beyond that. And that's per Bitcoin. Now, if you're unfamiliar, there are no real physical coins. Bitcoin is it sounds like a coin by name, but it's not a coin. It's just a mathematical formula that restricts access and keeps your holdings private only to you. And there are we're gonna ask questions later. So get this number down. 19,776 187.5 Bitcoin. So 19,000,019 20 million Bitcoins, roughly, out there, and there are never going to be any more, and there are never going to be any fewer. So those 19 million and changed Bitcoins are in existence, and that is the unalterable limit, because there is no central control. It simply exists. So who invented it? A math genius, for certain, but no one truly knows, at least not in the public realm, the value is based simply on the demand for something that is a limited resource that is beyond government control. You can see why Bitcoin is flying high. Well, it seems there's an Australian man, a computer scientist, a computer genius, self described, who has been accused of falsely claiming to be the Phantom behind bitcoin. His case has gone to British prosecutors for wholesale perjury and forgery of documents. Well, that sounds dangerous. I didn't say that. I didn't say that a judge in London who presided in a civil case did anyway. The Civil Court judge had ruled in March that Craig Wright was not the man behind Satoshi Sakamoto. That is just a Japanese name long ascribed to the inventor of Bitcoin. It is actually a pseudonym for the Creator, or perhaps for the creators we don't know. The Crown Prosecution Service must determine whether charges are warranted, personally, and I am no legal scholar, unless someone or something was hurtful to anyone, their job is not going to be easy. No one from Bitcoin Inc, which there is no such thing, can testify because, like I said, Bitcoin Inc doesn't exist. Was anyone somehow defrauded? I guess that's what the prosecution has to discover. The civil court seems to think so. The judge said this, and honestly, it sounds a bit like something out of a Monty Python sketch quote. If what happened in this case does not warrant referral to the Crown prosecutors. It is difficult to envisage a case which would okay that judge had ruled in the civil trial that Mr. Wright did not invent Bitcoin and was not the guy behind the Nakamoto name or the creator of the Bitcoin software. So Bitcoin trades. Who cares? Maybe Mr. Wright, maybe the judge by then again, but then again, I should say, if I told you that I wasn't Peter Shurman, but that I was, for example, Mick Jagger, you'd expect the rendition of satisfaction right now, and you're not going to get it. That just would make me a liar and a fool, unless people believed me and allowed me to leverage that benefit, or to my benefit, if I was going to convince you that you should believe in it, you know, it's a crazy world. I just told you a non story, and it's interesting, but I don't think it's going to go anywhere back in just a moment to talk about climate change on a different level. You Peter,

Andrea Rooz  19:03  
you're with the Shurman report, daily news, commentary available at Apple, podcasts, Spotify, with video posted on YouTube and Facebook. Here's Peter Shurman.

Peter Shurman  19:19  
Well, you've probably heard of independent journalist Gwyn Dyer. Great reputation. He's a Canadian. He's written recently on climate change. Mr. Dyer, we are in agreement on that one, and I'm going to get into it in a moment. You may know his name because he's written extensively about war, World War Two, particularly. Anyway, Gwyn Dyer expects technology and listen to this, because I've said it for years, and sometimes it's not believed. Listen to Gwyn Dyer. He expects technology to lead us out of the climate change wilderness that we are in at this point, which I think is outstanding, because I agree with it number one, but because it sure as hell is not going to. Justin Trudeau carbon tax, or what he calls the carbon rebate, or whatever that the moniker might be this week. Why? Because the dent we could make in addressing climate change would be insignificant if there is no buy in from the Chinas or the Indias or the Russias of the world. And you know this as well as I do, there isn't all of this presumes as well that climate change isn't just a naturally occurring, cyclical phenomenon. Those opinions are mine, not Gwyn dyers, he says simply that technology got us into the climate crisis, and so it is technology that will get us out of it. That's a reasonable theory. His theory is that they will never stop working in a high energy civilization, but technology can allow for it without burning fossil fuels. When I say they, I mean you people. Dyer says, wind, solar, nuclear, are now big contributors toward that, along with geothermal energy drawn from underneath the ground in countries where that is readily available, which is not, certainly in the central part of our countries, available, however, there's an interesting twist to this. Now, if you go down deep, not a kilometer where, which you can do, I suppose, in Hawaii, where there's lots of volcanic activity, or Iceland, say where the same thing exists. But you can go down four kilometers or kilometers, some people say where we are. And down there, it's hot and dry rock, you'll find running 200 to 400 degrees Celsius under half the Earth's surface. And that means, if you inject high pressure water like fracking, does you create superheated steam that can drive turbines and make power. When the steam cools, it becomes water and is pumped back down into the ground again, no pollution whatsoever. Very, very clean way to make energy. The best thing about it, compared to solar or wind is you don't care if there's sun, you don't care if it's dark, and you don't care if it's a windy day or a calm day. The energy source is never intermittent. With geothermal. There's a pilot plant operating doing just this in Nevada right now. Boy, is that going to be interesting to find out about. Dyer's got a variety of other solutions that are not dreams, but things that do exist, which can reverse the effects we now experience and the fear that we have. Check him out. Gwyn Dyer, his new book is called intervention Earth life saving ideas from the world's climate engineers, and I think that's just a glimpse into what some smart people are doing for the rest of us, and if it all comes together, maybe we can become Chicken Littles on another topic, and not climate change. Have a great day. See you again tomorrow on the Shurman report.

Earl Mann  23:01  
The Shurman report available on Apple podcasts, Spotify, and the video version at YouTube, Facebook and always at Peter shurman.com thanks for listening to the Shurman report. If you'd like to connect with Peter directly, just go to Peter shurman.com you