The subversion of democracy

from Colorado Public Banking
The initiative to amend the Colorado constitution and create a publicly owned state bank.

On May 1st, 2013, at a rehearing requested by the Colorado Bankers Association (Don Childears) and the Independent Bankers of Colorado (Barbara M.A. Walker), the title board of the state of Colorado, which operates under the auspices of the office of the Secretary of State, found in favor of the bankers' argument that the current initiative for a publicly owned state bank contains more than a single subject, thus temporarily placing this year's drive on hold, until an appeal could be filed with, and relief granted by, the state supreme court.

In granting the bankers' motion, the title board invoked the single subject provision as an all-purpose bludgeon to suppress the initiative. Dan Domenico, who voted in favor of last year's initiative, reversed his position because of the added powers of the bank to take on multi-year obligations (bonds), in order to initially capitalize its operations, and the power of the bank to transfer moneys into the state's general fund without limitations (such as imposed by the oxymoronic TABOR amendment). Essentially, Mr. Domenico used single-subject as a mask for his personal political beliefs, denying the people of Colorado a means for expressing their collective political beliefs.

The single subject provision, added to the constitution of the state of Colorado in 1995, like a number of requirements that have been tacked onto the initiative process (random sampling of voter signatures, the required appearance of all parties to an initiative at any hearings, etc.) for the sole purpose of thwarting the electorate from enacting constitutional amendments and statutes. The powers that be pass off these added restrictions as housekeeping measures designed to prevent voter confusion (i.e., they pretend to believe the voters aren't smart enough, and that the law would be better if it were created by the legislature, which is controlled by the banks and their corporate lobbyists).

The bankers and their lobbyists prefer to work behind closed doors and via private telephone lines to control approximately 100 politicians in the legislative, executive, and judicial branches, because it is easier and cheaper than to spend gobs of money pretending to influence the electorate (for plausibility), before subsequently hacking the electronic voting machines. Thus the initiative process became another victim in the banks' drive to subvert any potential democratic initiative.

By empowering the title board with these repressive powers, the bankers have made this committee of three a judge, jury, and executioner for any threat to their hegemony over the state's income and expenditures, and their continued privatization thereof; for example, public services, such as unemployment and food stamps, are dispensed through bank cards. This is just the beginning. Of course, Colorado is not alone in this--it's happening across the country. Some states are much further along in the process of the privatization of public services. This is nothing less than the banks taking taxpayer dollars and stuffing them into their own pockets. Clearly, they operate in no interest but their own.

On the surface, the bankers and their political operatives still pretend that the process possesses integrity, going through "lawyerly" rituals and litanies of civility--shaking hands and addressing each other in respectful tones--while their "clients" (the usurers at the top of the power pyramid) murder and steal across the globe.

This current charade is reminiscent of when Rocky Mountain PBS (then, KRMA-TV/Channel Six) tried to keep Colorado Public Television (the, KBDI-TV/Channel 12) off the air. A Denver Post TV reporter at the time was surreptitiously fed information which he then posted: a chain of complicity that, if traced, could have brought charges of material misrepresentation against KRMA-TV. Meanwhile, the blue-blood station engaged the upstart hippies (KBDI) in court proceedings that consisted of the usual bourgeois superficiality, with their 17th Street (Denver) and Beltway (DC) lawyers, fancy suits and all, raising objections to KBDI's licensing based on what their media operative had posted.

When, through a serendipitous change in the regulations, KBDI-TV was able to go on the air and began broaching this potentially license-threatening information about KRMA-TV, suddenly the flagship station began calling for a truce. Lies, it seems, are legitimate strategy during the legal fight, but truth is never to see the light of day when the people gain access to the media.

Similarly, the bankers legal strategy against public banking is filled with lies and distortions. Last year, the Title Board voted 2 to 1 to approve the public banking initiative. Included in this approval was the tacit admission that the powers assigned to a public bank were legitimate and that they fell within the single subject law.

To overturn last year's action in the current year, the banks and their minions came armed with a variety of illogical arguments, knowing that all the title board needed was excuses, however lame. This is the same strategy that allows the Congress, state legislatures, and city councils all over the country to create the appearance that they are conducting business in a legitimate fashion. Meanwhile, the fix is in.

Here are some examples:
(1) Mr. Domenico argued that, as it is written, the initiative would allow the publicly owned state bank to issue bonds to cover shortfalls in the state budget; yet, Mr. Domenico is well aware that the initiative lists specific areas in which the bank must serve the public interest, and that the publicly owned state bank's operations are subject to sound banking practices. Having witnessed the actions of the for-profit banks close hand, as well as the collusion of public officials with these banks, Mr. Domenico sees no disconnect in assuming that sound banking practices include abuse of the public trust.
(2) One of the attorneys for the bankers, Mr. Doke, then enlightened us with this amazing fact: the bank couldn't issue bonds to fund its initial capitalization because it would violate double-entry bookkeeping standards. This is jabberwocky. Apparently, Mr. Doke assumes that since his bosses regard the electorate unqualified to vote on measures that threaten the banks' interests, the electorate is not smart enough to know the difference between finance and accounting. It seems that Mr. Doke is not old enough to have seen a bond issued by a public body, so we have posted one here.

City of Colorado Springs bond

the electors in the exercise of the right to initiate constitutional amendments, the Board has the duty to designate and fix a title, ballot title and submission clause, and a summary for initiated petitions before they are signed by electors (In re "Title, Ballot Title and Submission Clause on Petition Procedures," at 107–08 (citing In re "Proposed Initiative on School Pilot Program," 874 P.2d 1066, 1069 (Colo.1994)). In setting titles for initiatives, the Board is directed to "apply judicial decisions construing the constitutional single-subject requirement for bills," and is advised to "follow the same rules employed by the general assembly in considering titles for bills."§ 1–40–106.5(3).

The General Assembly has directed that the single subject and title requirements for initiatives be liberally construed, "so as to avert the practices against which they are aimed and, at the same time, to preserve and protect the right of initiative and referendum." § 1–40–106.5(2).

This court has historically found, in review of the single subject requirement for bills, that a bill contains more than one subject if the text of the measure relates to more than one subject and has at least two distinct and separate purposes which are not dependent upon or connected with each other. People ex rel. Elder v. Sours, 31 Colo. 369, 405, 74 P. 167, 178 (1903). Hence, so long as the matters encompassed are necessarily or properly connected to each other rather than disconnected or incongruous, the single subject necessarily or properly connected to each other rather than disconnected or incongruous, the single subject requirement is not violated. Parrish v. Lamm, 758 P.2d 1356, 1362 (Colo.1988).

During the course of the proceedings, Mr. Domenico--bolstered by Mr. Hoke's contention that if TABOR were initiated today, it would not pass single issue muster--chose to argue against the publicly owned state bank initiative from two radically different and conflicting points of view:

First, as if the publicly owned state bank were in place and functional, which would allow it, in his opinion and in the face of the sound banking provision, to issue bonds to cover deficit spending; and

Second, as if it would somehow operate separately from the constitution, in order to nullify the provisions in the initiative that deal with constitutional conflicts and thus place it in violation of various constitutional provisions, illogically then making it more than a single subject.

So, in addition to Mr. Hoke's jabberworcky, we have Mr. Domenico's sophistry, as the means by which we are supposed to be convinced that the title board's decision is anything other than an attempt by the banks to deny Colorado citizens the right to reassign the state's revenues to a trustworthy and transparent custodian, i.e., a public bank.

Meanwhile, right here in River City, the banks aggressive seizure of public assets continues. Their strategy works like this:
1. Lend money at low rates, create an economic boom in which many assets are created. These valuable assets, the fruits of the citizens labor, are collateralized in order to expand operations and grow the economy.
2. Create a false flag, like the collapse of Lehman Brothers in 2008, to create an excuse to stop lending, which, in an economy that runs on privately owned bank notes (on which we pay interest), means that the money supply shrinks.
2. Continue to choke the money supply. (The money supply during the current recession is approximately $3 to $4 trillion smaller than in 2008, thus joblessness, foreclosures, and bankruptcies are rampant.
3. The tax bases of all cities, counties, states, and the nation are severely damaged or destroyed.
4. Banks banks seize assets from citizens, cities, counties, states, and the nation.

Here's a local example from Kiowa, CO.

This year's campaign was further impeded by our attorney's position that appealing the ruling of the title board to the state supreme court was not an effective strategy because we might lose, based on his reading of various case law, despite having pledged to represent the initiative as it was written.

While we staunchly uphold everyone's right to their own beliefs, we are not inclined to have our movement--which involves pressing for the passage of a Colorado publicly owned bank AND for constantly and vigilantly keeping the root cause of the problem (private ownership and control over the creation and regulation of money and the consequent theft of sovereignty) before the public--derailed by anyone who assumes that the process is being conducted in a democratic fashion. As noted in the foregoing analysis, we are skeptical of the political process as it is currently controlled and constituted: first, because the banks control all three branches of government at the state and national level; second, because we have no means of verifying the accuracy of any voting process that uses electronic voting machines; and third, because the banks control the mass media. We cover the details elsewhere on this blog.

So, essentially, what we are fighting here, is an information war in which even "legally" unsuccessful appeals generate positive public education.

We look forward to the 2014 go around with the banks and their minions.