Tuesday, November 03, 2020

Organized Chaos: The US Elections and The Bank of Canada

     

Okay, you’ve probably never heard of COMER. If you have , you may have forgotten about them because they haven’t been in the news lately. Too much to worry about right now to think of something you’ve forgotten all about or never heard of. One might think that whoever or whatever COMER was they must have been losers as they have slipped out of Canadian consciousness. And, and in my opinion, they took the Canadian consciousness of our constitutional rights and freedom as well as a near debt free economy along with them. Okay, who or what exactly was COMER and what did they do with the collective consciousness of our freedoms and what do we owe to whom or whatever they were?

 

COMER was and still is, as far as I can tell, short for the Committee on Monetary and Economic Reform. It was established in 1986. In 2011 COMER, along with a collection of citizens angry about Canada’s growing debt accumulation when to the Supreme Court of Canada. They wanted to draw attention to the The Bank of Canada’s practice acting as a private bank for other European Banks and domestic and foreign corporations, all demanding high compound interest rates. COMER had a brilliant lawyer, Rocco Galati. Galati pointed out, in no uncertain terms, Bank of Canada Act and a copy of the Canadian Constitution in hand and before the Court, that the Bank of Canada was chartered as a public bank to give interest free loans to the Canadian government’s needs for social and physical infrastructure. Hopes were high. And remained high for the next five years as COMER waged a seemingly endless battle of appeals, court demanded amendments, court dismissals, and court hearings. It was maddening. To have the Supreme Court of Canada make the final ruling in May 2017 that the lawsuit against privatizing the Bank of Canada was not a legal matter. If it was not a legal matter then what was it? The Bank of Canada was clearly breaking the law. But no. The judge ruled it was a political matter. How charming. What an opinion. What a gutless opinion. And furthermore, the judge ruled that there would be no further reporting on the case. The reporters were silenced. The media was silenced. Canadians were silenced. Where does that leave us? Is all hope for a reinstatement of the original mandate for the Bank of Canada lost? Maybe not. There are deep holes in the judge’s ruling that makes his contention that the case was a political one and not a legal one biased, unfair, and ridiculous. And there are supporters in unexpected places. In this time of COVID-19 we need our public bank desperately. Next time.