The problem with becoming a dictator is that madness often quickly follows.  Caligula is an example from the past, for he was genuinely insane and died as a result of that.  Closer to our time, so obsessive was Hitler's effort to exterminate Europe's Jews, he diverted resources from the Russian front, essentially assuring Germany's military defeat.  And in Canada today, we have a ruling party that's equally obsessive, this time in its determination to destroy all political opposition.  To that end, Canada's ruling class is willing to bring down its entire banking system.

Canada's truckers, who are more vaccinated than the average Canadian, nevertheless felt that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau had gone too far when he required them to show a vaccine passport to enter their own country.  They launched a convoy that traveled across Canada's frozen wastes to get to Ottawa to present their case to the government.

In a perfect world, the government, in the form of Justin Trudeau, would have met with them, heard their grievances, promised to work with them, and sent them home.  Had he done so, it's likely that the truckers would meekly have departed, feeling that their voices had been heard.  That's how things work when a true statesman occupies the top position in government.

But Trudeau is no statesman.  He promptly hid himself away and embarked upon a campaign of baselessly defaming the truckers as Nazis.  Because they were not being heard, the truckers stayed in Ottawa, honking their horns, shutting down traffic in the city center, and engaging cheerfully and peacefully with supporters.

As a reminder, because of his and other Canadian leaders' insane COVID policies — for a virus with an average mortality rate of less than 1% — the entire Canadian economy was blighted, religious worship ended, international travel stopped, and the governments made every effort to coerce Canadian citizens to inject an experimental therapy into their bodies.

Slandering the truckers wasn't enough.  Being called a "Nazi" didn't make them go away.  Trudeau, therefore, declared martial law via Canada's Emergencies Act.

In addition to the usual police powers to arrest people who offended Trudeau, Trudeau's government announced that it would shut down all crowdfunding platforms, attack cryptocurrencies, and unilaterally seize the bank accounts of anyone protesting Trudeau's COVID policies or supporting the protesters.

In the Brave New World that is Fortress Canada, you and your family will starve if you offend Trudeau.  You'll also lose your children, and even your dogs and cats will be seized and, possibly, destroyed.  The Trudeau-ites are so lost in the madness of their suddenly unfettered power that the justice minister, David Lametti, says any Canadian who supports Trump must have his bank accounts seized.

Sundance makes an interesting point:

Notice how no one in Canadian government is even talking about the COVID restrictions and mandates?  No one is even talking about the virus as a problem or any issues with the pandemic as a justification for continued COVID mitigation efforts.

The only focus of the Canadian government is addressing the protests against them.

But why did I say Canada is on the verge of destroying its banking system?  Everything I've just described shows Canada destroying its opposition.  In some ways, doesn't that strengthen Trudeau's hand and make Canada a more stable place?

In a word, no.  Trudeau may feel that his throne is a bit more stable, but investors around the world are thinking there is no way they will entrust their money to a Canadian bank.

Image: ATM (edited) by fanjianhua.  Freepik license.

The financial world functions only if there is some element of trust.  I must believe that if I deposit my money with Bank X, that Bank X will return those funds to me when I demand them.  Moreover, I must believe that if the bank fails to do so because it doesn't like me or my politics, the government will side with me, not the bank.

And if neither the bank nor the government likes me, I must have the minimal assurance that there is a neutral process to determine whether their dislike trumps my rights in my own money.  Without that trust, I'm going to keep my money under a mattress rather than deposit it with an arbitrary and capricious banking system.

Trudeau has just turned Canada's entire banking system into one that utterly lacks due process.  It is, instead, arbitrary and capricious, depending entirely on the tyrant's whims.  Even the money-launderers (and it turns out that Canada has been a money-laundering haven) will have no incentive to trust their ill-gotten gains to Canada's banks.

What Trudeau and Co. are doing is complete madness.  Like many tyrants before them, their fanatical, unhinged efforts to protect their status and punish their enemies mean they are engaging in self-destructive acts that, sadly, will also destroy their country.