Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his Liberal regime are hitting the Freedom Convoy truckers and anyone who supported the movement where it hurts the most: their pockets. Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland announced the federal government had already frozen bank accounts, gleefully promising that “more accounts will be frozen.” Ottawa even clamped down on cryptocurrencies, sanctioning dozens of wallets tied to the weeks-long nationwide protests. Whether this is legal or not is being discussed in the House of Commons and before the courts, but it proves that adopting digital money could lead to unintended consequences for liberty-minded individuals and organizations.
On the streets of Ottawa, more than 100 protesters were arrested as police carry out orders to deprive Canadians of their ability to criticize their political leaders. Several eye-witness reports claim mounted police trampled some demonstrators on Feb. 18, though the allegations were countered by Ottawa Police, who say no one was injured and “Anyone who fell got up and walked away.” Law enforcement has also begun towing protesters’ vehicles.
Cash is King?
With the Grits invoking the Emergencies Act for the first time in the nation’s history, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is taking a sledgehammer to the anti-mandate protest that has been largely peaceful. Images are now coming in of Ottawa police arresting protesters and heavily armed law enforcement arriving at the demonstrations and making their presence known. But something else is happening behind the scenes, with the assistance of the hall monitors of the Fourth Estate.
This month, millions of dollars have been contributed to the Freedom Convoy through GoFundMe and GiveSendGo. The former shut down the donation page, while the latter was hacked. When the data were released to the public, journalists across the mainstream media began contacting donors and essentially demanded that they atone for the sin of contributing to a cause the establishment opposes.
Investigations conducted by the CBC, rather than analysis from the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP), prompted the Trudeau regime to begin cracking down on law-abiding Canadians who were suspected of supporting the truckers. Financial institutions could suspend services to clients and freeze accounts as part of the measures. But Ottawa is taking it one step further by targeting 34 wallets with Bitcoin, Ethereum, Monero, Litecoin, and Cardano addresses.
Because it has become challenging to distribute funds digitally, either through bank accounts or crypto, organizers have been handing truckers physical cash so they could return home and pay for food and fuel. Since the government has prohibited citizens from donating gasoline and meals to protesters, it is difficult to disperse from these locations, which is what the government has demanded all along.
Justice Minister David Lametti warned anyone who financially endorses a campaign that the Prime Minister’s Office deems to hold the wrong political opinion: Be afraid. Be very afraid. “If you are a member of a pro-Trump movement who is donating hundreds of thousands of dollars, and millions of dollars to this kind of thing, then you ought to be worried,” he told CTV’s Evan Solomon.
Loonie for a Digital Loonie
Central banks, including the Bank of Canada (BoC) and the Federal Reserve, have started flirting with digital currencies. Both institutions are mulling over the adoption of a digital loonie and a virtual dollar. It was recently reported that internal government documents highlighted that the Finance Department, headed by Chrystia Freeland, thinks there would be “wide-reaching implications for the economy, the financial system” if the BoC introduced a digital currency. She might have forgotten to mention civil liberties, too.
(Photo by: Berkcan Zengin/GocherImagery/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)
If the Canadian government already possesses the power to prevent citizens from accessing their bank accounts, then imagine the statist intrusion Ottawa – or any regime for that matter – could have if everyone had digital money rather than physical cash. Essentially, you could be denied access to your capital and the marketplace unless you worship at the altar of Trudeau or any other mini-Mao.
Ditto for cryptocurrencies. The objective behind crypto was to abandon the centralized financial system, enjoy privacy and anonymity, and fight against the inflationary forces at central banks. Today, be it Bitcoin or Dogecoin, the idea of being anonymous and leaving the financial system is no longer a reality or perhaps a goal for most investors. As Freeland and other law enforcement entities worldwide have repeatedly spotlighted, wallets can be traced and shut down.
China is presently leading the global push with a digital yuan. Beijing claims it wants to enhance cross-border transactions and increase the yuan’s prevalence in the international marketplace. But anyone not drunk of Baiju understands that it is an excellent tracking tool and method of compliance, in addition to the myriad of resources employed to enforce submission to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Other countries are falling behind, which is applying pressure on monetary policy leaders to accelerate their efforts to lay the groundwork for transitioning from physical cash to digital units.
The War on Cash
Over the years, Liberty Nation has reported extensively on the dangers of the war on cash. Unfortunately, since the early days of the coronavirus pandemic, when governments were disinfecting cash, there has been a voluntary stampede into crypto and mobile app payments and increased usage of tapping, swiping, and inserting. There has also been a simultaneous adoption of Amazon and Google devices that can be exceptional spying instruments that households willingly install. For present and future tyrants, these are terrific tools to bolster surveillance apparatuses. In the 21st century, the public has conceded its civil liberties. Will snooping and confiscating their hard-earned dollars and cents be the last straw for the population?
~ Read more from Andrew Moran.
