I keep anywhere between 5-10 percent of my net worth in venture ideas.

I'm not a tough guy. I'm just delivering the truth and only the truth and if you can't deal with it, too bad.

There's only one side with me. You get the right side. You get the correct version of the facts.

Downturns are the best time to start businesses because you develop discipline that's very lean and mean in terms of how to spend money. And those habits serve you very well in good times.

Let's not forget, there are three languages in Canada - English, French, and there's the language of jobs.

(On soft launches) It allows you to test your assumptions and see which ones you got right, and more, importantly, which ones you got wrong. A big hard launch is expensive. Getting even one thing wrong can force you to go out of business.

If you put Canada into $1.5 trillion in debt and interest rates go up just 200 basis points, you cannot provide the services to 36 million people that were guaranteed to them in the social contract they have with Canada. That's a very, very scary prospect. You can't burden this economy with that much debt. The risk you take on is insurmountable. You have to assume for the next 50 years that rates don't go up? That's insane. That's irresponsible. That's stupid.