Gerald Butts

I would say even probability that countries outside of Canada are active in this debate.

And that is not something that W.A.C.

Bennett or even René Lévesque or Jean Chrétien had to contend with.

It's the function of the openness of our communications environment.

coming from.

There was a story on CBC last week about how much of the AI slop and memes that are supportive of Alberta secession are coming from outside the country.

So I guess my roundup in the opening comments, Peter, would be I wish everybody would play by the rules that this is a local contest to be decided by locals.

I do not think that the forces looking to pull apart the country are entirely within the country.

And I do think that the most apt example, which is sort of the democratic event, that small d democratic event that kicked off our era, was the Brexit referendum in the United Kingdom.

And what you saw there was once the...

Once the hockey game started, the refs left the ice and everybody was swinging their sticks as hard as they could at each other's heads with no regard for whether you could recover for the next game or whether the rules would ever be enforced on you.

And I think the lesson that...

malevolent actors toward democracies learn from the Brexit referendum is that once one of these national rending of garments starts, then anything goes.

And they're hard to police, they're

huge emotions on all sides and anything can happen.

And that's what worries me about it.

Do I think that there's a majority of Albertans who want to separate from Canada?

Absolutely not.

Can I envision a circumstance in which the referendum campaign takes on the

eloquently concerned about.