40% of Canada's trade goes over the Ambassador Bridge that they have blocked.
What about the working people?
The hard working people who have gone to work every day during this pandemic and
now can't get to work or
can't work because there's no parts in their factory to work with.
>> Toni Lahren and Geraldo got involved in a heated debate about the so
called freedom convoy, which includes.
Canadian truckers demonstrating against vaccination mandates,
and other measures meant to protect people from coronavirus,
which means I think it might be time for a catfight.
[MUSIC]
Now what was fascinating about this exchange?
Well, there are many fascinating things.
Number one,
you have Geraldo on this streak of saying reasonable things on Fox News.
I'm curious when they're going to let them go,
because they don't really play with that.
So, we'll see what happens.
But more importantly, Toni Lahren has adopted a trend that we're
seeing in the right wing where they co opt populist pro worker language and
apply it to their own causes.
When in reality, they're usually not there for workers when they're striking for
better working conditions or for better pay.
So, without further ado,
let's hear what Toni Lahren had to say in support of these demonstrations in Canada.
>> I think we're starting to see those actually essential workers stand up for
their rights and their freedoms.
And these are people that are the forgotten Canadians.
And also here in the United States,
the forgotten Americans that normally just sit down, shut up and do their job.
Well, that is until for two years, you infringe on their ability to do their job.
You infringe on their medical rights and their health freedom.
Then they're gonna stand up,.
You've poked the bear, you have poked the beast and that beast is awake now and
people are gonna listen.
Governments are going to have to listen because these are the actual essential
workers that can shut down.
Canada can shut down the USA too a new kind of shut down that the elites will not
be able to ignore.
Listen, the demonization of the working class,
the blue collar folks that keep Canada and keep the United States and
keep the world running has to end and this is part of the frustration.
>> Yeah, I found that to be an interesting statement.
What does actual essential workers mean?
So when it comes to our frontline healthcare workers and
nurses, the very individuals who have not gotten a single
break during this pandemic asking people please get vaccinated.
Please our hospitals are overwhelmed during every covid surge due to
unvaccinated patients.
Please get vaccinated.
Do those essential workers matter at all?
Because she keeps saying actual essential workers and a common misconception that I
keep seeing play out both in corporate media and among the right wing is that.
The demonstrators are blue collar working class Canadians.
Well, no turns out that a lot of them are actually the owners of the trucking
companies.
I'll give you one statement from Harold Jonker who's a trucking company owner,
he said this to BBC.
We want to be free, we want to have our choice again, and we want hope and
the government has taken that away.
David Dole from the rational national was on the show yesterday and he was talking
about how this is mostly organized by the right wing, funded by the right wing.
And the individuals who are taking part in this are in
fact the owners of these trucking companies and others have now joined in.
But the people who have joined in are very much against regulations pertaining
to Covid.
>> Yes so look, people are complicated and this story is complicated both for
Geraldo and the Dole overall.
So in terms of the convoy, there's parts of it that I love and
I don't know if that surprises you, but it shouldn't because it's direct action and
it hits people where it matters in economic interests.
And that's why it's gotten so
much attention because once you affect the dollars and cents, it moves people, right?
And of course the part I don't like is that it's on the most absurd,
useless cause, right?
I want the right to make other people sick.
That's the thing you got organized for, Jesus Christ.
Imagine if we did a convoy for higher wages for truckers, that would get a lot
of people's attention and then maybe we could have a conversation about that,
that would actually help all truckers, right.
>> There's been so many strikes and
there's been a lot of labor militancy lately in the United States and
I haven't seen a lot of support,, from Toni Lahrens or anyone else on the right.
And look, Cenk to your point whether we agree with the cause or not,
I support protesting.
So I'm not against the notion of these individuals going out there demonstrating
and making their voices be heard, but it's the way in which they're carrying it out.
The fact that they're going out of their way to harass people living in Ottawa who
still want to wear masks, right.
They want to protest in order to protect their freedom, but
they don't in any way value or
respect the freedom of other individuals who feel more comfortable wearing masks.
Like what is the issue here?
And look, I think that Geraldo actually did a pretty decent job in debunking
much of what Toni Lahhrens had to say there.
So why don't we hear his side of the story?
>> Well, I think first of all, the Toni is way too kind to the freedom convoy so
called one man's freedom is another man's oppression.
Their behavior has been nothing short of thuggish in Ottawa they've kept people in
the neighborhood awake all night, revving their engines, blowing their horns.
They've deprived Ottawa businesses of tens of millions of dollars.
Now they're blockading the international bridges,
they are laying off people cutting their shifts short and automotive assembly
plants, because they can't get the parts from Canada to the United States.
They used their crowbars to threaten cops who are going to tow their trucks away.
They were blocking, they've told truck drivers that they'll
remember them when this is all over clear intimidation tactic.
These to give them the mantle of freedom fighters is absolutely appallingly naive.
>> Listen, the demonization of the working class, the blue collar folks that keep
Canada and keep the United States and keep the world running has to end.
And this is part of the frustration.
>> I just like the adoption of rhetoric that's
meant to value workers and protect workers.
It like, it really frustrates me because again, like,
where was Toni Lahren when John Deere workers were striking.
There's a concrete worker strike taking place in Seattle right now,
it's been taking place for nearly three months.
No attention on that at all, 0%.
They're not in any way, economic populists.
Okay, they think people who strike our bums usually.
>> Yeah, no, no, Ana there's such a great point, especially about the construction
workers, let alone so many other strikes that have happened that they derided.
Okay, so in reality, so, look, there is one
thing here that I'm happy about, which is that.
The right wing is beginning economic protests, whether they mean to or not,
whether it's on an issue, that makes sense or not.
And the reason why that's a good trend is because when the left wing does it,
the media just ignores it.
They think the left wing is totally irrelevant and to be hated and
despised and treated with disdain.
So the left wing does a teacher strike a construction strike?
Any strike at all?
And they're like, no, no, I'm not going to cover it.
No, I don't care what you're doing, protest and pipelines won't cover it for
months, right?
The right wing doesn't protest.
They have to take it seriously because they've been kissing right wing ass
for decades.
They don't know how to not kiss right wing ass.
So they're like, the right wing is doing this must be serious and important.
Let's give you both sides.
Well, okay, good now we on the other hand, are principled blocking roads,
I think it's perfectly acceptable.
Is it a giant pain and mass?
Yes, it is.
But that's what a protest is supposed to do is supposed to make you uncomfortable,
draw attention.
So you go, hey, let's focus here harassing people, not acceptable.
So the stories coming out of Ottawa where they're trying to rip with people's
mass off.
There's a fire that was lit in a apartment building
that was complaining about the noise at night, etc,
that's typical right wing lunacy and totally unacceptable.
>> Yeah. >> And remember,
I don't agree with their stance at all, but we're gonna protest too.
And we also protest on things that matter wages, healthcare,
protecting your community, as sometimes we block roads and were considered.
And when we do that, of course, the entirety of the media,
200% of the media says, how dare they this is criminal and unacceptable.
And Geraldo is also complicated because he's going with a pro business line here.
They're disrupting the beloved business avenues for distribution, etc.
On the other hand, I've hated some of what Geraldo says in the past, but
on the harassment stuff here, he's absolutely right.
And he has been right on a couple of issues.
So that's why, hey guys, and I'm saying this to both left wing and right wing,
maybe we don't cancel everyone because you never know.
He might be terrible on one issue, and then have a really interesting and
important take that he brings to a conservative audience on Fox News.
>> So I just want to respond to how corporate media doesn't cover certain
protests while it loves to cover others.
So they're all over this trucker thing.
They've been covering it from the very beginning, but
this isn't a labor protest, right?
The corporate media doesn't pick between right or left.
They pick between labor or circus, right, and this trucker protest has
become a circus and they love it and they're focused on that.
Look, the John Deere workers were not left wingers, let's keep it real.
>> Yeah, that's a great point but it was an economic protests.
>> Yeah, that's what's am trying to say.
>> Against big business.
>> Yeah, that's what I'm trying to say.
>> And big media will always support big business.
>> That's exactly right.
Yeah, so alright with that said though,
I want to fill in some more details in regard to what Geraldo was saying there.
First off, it's absolutely true that there are people in that community in Ottawa who
have been harassed by some of these demonstrators.
Let me give you a few examples.
One person said, I just don't feel safe to be here.
This is Justin Romanov who travels downtown every day to work as a food
delivery driver.
I do not feel safe in downtown Ottawa right now,
because I have a feeling if people will learn that I'm a refugee and
a gay, I'm afraid of some trouble there.
And to be honest,
I'm a little bit disappointed that this protest is still happening across Canada.
And he has good reason to be worried because you should take a look at one of
the main organizers for this demonstration.
This is the gentleman I'm talking about.
Let's take a look at Patrick King.
>> Tutto, someone's gonna make you catch a bullet one day to the rest of
this government.
Someone's going two years in.
>> You might want to change your name to Ismael or
drop a bunch of change down the stairs and call yourself Toni Ching Chung.
[LAUGH] You want to say, the Indians culture and everything.
The native's culture is a disgrace.
It is one 100%.
That's right L I've seen the mosque up in Fort Mac.
Ladies and Gentlemen, we are being overrun.
The anglo Saxon people of Canada are our God given culture,
the anglo Saxon and the francophones.
We are losing our culture to other ethnic religions.
>> So when one of your main organizers has that kind of ideology,
it's going to look fish rots from the head down.
It's going to trickle into the demonstration itself.
One woman, a nursing student living in downtown Ottawa who requested
anonymity over fears for her safety, told NBC that.
She had been accosted multiple times for
wearing a mask by people appearing to belong to the freedom convoy.
They're targeting anyone who's wearing a mask.
Anyone who's respecting public health policy.
I myself have been accosted at least three times,
I had one man tried to rip my mask off.
I've been screamed at, I've been told to go back to my country,
she said after someone heard her speak with an accent.
>> Yeah, right wing, classy as always.
So, by the way, why is this kind of mania spreading in Canada.
Canada is historically much more progressive than America and
that's why the right wing in this country often times hilariously blame Canada for
anything that goes wrong.
And there's a whole song in South Vancouver it because it's so absurd and
fairly consistent that republicans do in attacking the progressives in Canada,
right?
So now we've got the lunacy taking hold there.
Now, is it because there was never any right wingers and all of a sudden there
are no of course there's right wingers in Canada has always been.
There's been areas regions of Canada that are more right wing than others,
some of the oil producing areas, etc, right?
But now they have developed the same strain of madness as in America.
And my theory on why that is, is because in the past,
all they got was traditional media, television, radio, and
newspapers and Canada regulates that much more strictly than America does.
So the Canadians wouldn't even get Fox News because the Canadian government said
that's propaganda, it's not true.
So we're not going to give it to you as news, right?
And so they hence they weren't their minds weren't poisoned with corporate
propaganda and they were more progressive.
Now, because of the Internet, they're also going online and going,
I heard that I ever met in in the mass and the nonsense and blah blah blah and QAnon.
So now, great are right wing media has begun to poison the right
wing in Canada and turn them from right wing into lunatics.