ThatGuy Posted January 20, 2022 Share Posted January 20, 2022 "In Russia, Government blockchains YOU!"- Not Yakok Smirnoff Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Stuart Kelly Posted February 7, 2022 Author Share Posted February 7, 2022 Oh my God! I just sat through one of the most incredible videos I have seen so far. It's in an article by Dr. Joseph Mercola. Can Bitcoin Circumvent Economic Tyranny? Can Bitcoin Circumvent Economic Tyranny? NOQREPORT.COM STORY AT-A-GLANCE Finance guru Catherine Austin Fitts and Aleks Svetski, editor of Bitcoin Times magazine, discuss the breakdown of our economy and potential solutions Svetski believes Bitcoin not only... Basically, Dr. Mercola united Catherine Austin Fitts and Aleks Svetski in a long discussion among the three and, I swear, I had the feeling I was watching a meeting by the Founding Fathers before they came up with the constitution. Seriously. Everybody wanted freedom, everybody wanted a system to get there, everybody wanted to get out from underneath the boot of authoritarians, everybody was as smart as a whip and a world-class expert, but they disagreed on methods. What a delight. Catherine Austin Fitts is one of the most knowledgeable people I know of about the current financial system the world over. What's more, she can simplify hard concepts into simple language (which is probably the reason I can listen to her and understand her ). Aleks Svetski is one of the gods of bitcoin. He convinced Dr. Mercola that bitcoin is as robust as bitcoin purists claim and it will lead to the promised land of individual sovereignty. Fitts thinks the ultimate standard of value is people. And she means people having their own food, shelter, etc., including but not just money. Svetski agrees, but he believes the rules of bitcoin have reached a quasi-metaphysical status where they can't be changes, so they operate like a law of nature. Both are extremely respectful of each other (ditto for and by Dr. Mercola), they basically want the same things, and they are super-clear about their disagreements. They also agreed to a second meeting like this one. I can't wait. The video in the article is hosted by Dr. Mercola's Internet resources in a way that I can't embed it. However, if you type the name of his article (Can Bitcoin Circumvent Economic Tyranny?) into search engines with the word podcast, you will find audio of it all over the place in lots of different podcast providers. However, there is good news. I found a BitChute version. CATHERINE AUSTIN FITTS AND ALEKS SVETSKI: CAN BITCOIN CIRCUMVENT ECONOMIC TYRANNY? WWW.BITCHUTE.COM CATHERINE AUSTIN FITTS AND ALEKS SVETSKI: CAN BITCOIN CIRCUMVENT ECONOMIC TYRANNY? Mercola https://www.bitchute.com/video/4GT3RKbwxDZh/ STORY... I know it's long (almost three hours), but damn. When was the last time you saw the birth--the literal implementation--of an entire new massive culture devoted to individual freedom happening right before your eyes? It's obvious Fitts and Svetski are going to be working together to make sure the individual sovereignty project works technology-wise and people-wise. And I am sure they, and others, will work it all out. I am very, very happy right now. Check it out and watch the video. Or read the article which contains large stretches of transcript. If you see what I see, you will be happy, too. Or, if you are wedded to the old regime (like many people were wedded to Britain in the Founding Father days), you will be terrified. At least dismissive and uneasy. btw - I can't remember which one mentioned Ayn Rand, but she was mentioned in passing in this discussion. Michael LATER EDIT: I just received offline a link to the transcript of that video made by Mercola (or his people). You can get it in PDF form here. Many thanks to my secret weapon. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Stuart Kelly Posted February 8, 2022 Author Share Posted February 8, 2022 2 hours ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said: I can't remember which one mentioned Ayn Rand, but she was mentioned in passing in this discussion. Now that I've got a transcript, I looked it up. It was Svetski who mentioned Ayn Rand. Quote Aleks Svetski: ... have you ever read “Isaiah's Job” by Albert Nock? Catherine Austin Fitts: No. Say it again? Aleks Svetski: “Isaiah's Job.” So it's a biblical reference. It's a short essay. It inspired people like Murray Rothbard and Ayn Rand and all sorts of people. It was written in the 1930s. I'll send it to you. And what he talks about on there basically, it's a fable or it's a short essay that talks about what God said to Isaiah. And Isaiah was basically what God described as a prophet of the remnant. And he said that "Your job, Isaiah, is not to go out and convince the masses. Your job is to go out and speak the truth. And for every 100 people that walk past, 99 won't listen but one will. And the one who listened is the one who was supposed to listen. And by diluting your signal and trying to appeal to the masses, what you actually do is you dissuade the remnant from coming to you." Out of my own general curiosity, I looked up the link to "Isaiah's Job" by Albert Jay Nock. It's on the Mises site. Isaiah's Job I'm posting it, but I haven't even read it yet. The link also give an mp3 version read by Dr. Floy Lilley for free, see here. On another note, Fitts was talking about what she calls "the control grid" controlling the different accesses to the Bitcoin network and asked about telecommunications. Svetsky then said the following. Quote A bunch of Bitcoiners literally just launched some satellites and now you can beam your transaction to a satellite and beam it back down. Wow. That's bigger than it sounds... Michael Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Stuart Kelly Posted February 9, 2022 Author Share Posted February 9, 2022 Here is a weird, weird, weird story. Crocodile of Wall Street Heather Morgan and husband Ilya Lichtenstein charged with money laundering | Daily Mail Online WWW.DAILYMAIL.CO.UK Ilya 'Dutch' Lichtenstein, 34, and his wife, Heather Rhiannon Morgan, 31, who raps under the name Razzlekhan, were arrested on Tuesday in Manhattan on federal charges of money laundering. Here is another news article about it. Justice Department Says It Seized $3.6 Billion Worth of Bitcoin Stolen in 2016 Hack WWW.WSJ.COM The value of the bitcoin at the time it was seized last week marks the department’s largest-ever financial seizure, officials said. And here is even another one. Hipster Couple Charged in $4.5 Billion Crypto Heist Is Even Weirder Than You Think WWW.THEDAILYBEAST.COM A rapping tech entrepreneur and her husband allegedly laundered billions in hacked cryptocurrency. Or how about from the DOJ itself? Two Arrested for Alleged Conspiracy to Launder $4.5 Billion in Stolen WWW.JUSTICE.GOV Two individuals were arrested this morning in Manhattan for an alleged conspiracy to launder cryptocurrency that was stolen during the 2016 hack of Bitfinex, a virtual currency exchange, presently The gist This dorky couple got busted trying to launder billions of dollars worth of stolen bitcoins. The bitcoins were stolen by hackers from a cryptocurrency exchange in 2016. The exchange was Bitfinex and, at the time, it was seated and operated in the British Virgen Islands. (I think they later moved their main servers to Switzerland, but what I have seen so far is too vague to say for sure. WSJ even says Bitfinex is Hong Kong based. Researching this organization is an exercise in how much fake news you can tolerate. ) Anywho, this young couple--Ilya Lichtenstein and his wife Heather Morgan--got set up as a hipster cool couple on Wall Street. Lichtenstein went by the name of Dutch and was an economic guru and entrepreneur while Morgan, who called herself the Crocodile of Wall Street, became the world's worst rapper named Razzlekahn. Oh... yeah... she also wrote for Forbes magazine. But when you see these people talk, it's obvious that they are dumber than drying mud. It's also obvious they are the fall guys for some huge scam. And I suspect the CIA or Davos crowd or Seep State or somebody like that was running them. The fact that they got busted shows some weird shit is going on backstage. In my opinion, they didn't really get busted. Their bust was "negotiated" for some kind of narrative or trade-off. Their videos are being scrubbed from the Internet right now, so it's hard to show what I mean about how dorky they are. However, here are two tweets that have portions of Ms. Razzlekahn showing off her breathtaking talent. She had a YouTube account with lots of videos in it. But the videos are no longer available. And: How in hell did that lady and her hubby get into a position to launder billions of dollars in bitcoin? How did she get to write for Forbes, fer goddssake? Weird... Michael Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tmj Posted February 9, 2022 Share Posted February 9, 2022 I can't shake the feeling she wasn't being ( as the kids say) ironic. When I saw this story , I thought the outcome may be that crypto was returned to 'place' it was stolen from , but somehow i doubt that is the end of this story. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peter Posted February 9, 2022 Share Posted February 9, 2022 1 hour ago, tmj said: I thought the outcome may be that crypto was returned to 'place' it was stolen from Was the place people's imaginations? I have been leery of it since I heard about it, but I am for freedom of choice and capitalism . . . . and imagination. But I would rather have a gold coin in my pocket. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tmj Posted February 9, 2022 Share Posted February 9, 2022 Gold is awesome, but only useful if the baker thinks gold is as awesome. If he prefers crypto then that's how you get the muffins. or or You get some guys with guns to label him a danger to society, take his shit and go to WKMart and pay with whatever their gun toting guys tell you to, choices always choices. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Stuart Kelly Posted February 9, 2022 Author Share Posted February 9, 2022 Here's a monkey-wrench to chew on. A thought came to my mind not even a year ago and it wouldn't let me go. So I thought it through and ended up changing a long-held belief. The thought was about the need for the money medium to be represented by something that has its own intrinsic value. Like gold. And the thought was, why? Why does it have to have its own intrinsic value? The conclusion I came to is because someone said so. And that's all there is to that argument at root. Lots of people repeat this argument as a proposition of fact, a premise. They even came up with a term to represent its opposite--fiat money. But nobody, to my mind, has really tied that intrinsic worth or value of the medium to the actual transactions made with money. At least I haven't seen it. And, as I looked into Catherine Austin Fitts (the lady in the earlier discussion), who is the smartest person I personally have come across about money, I noticed she never made that case. I don't know if she ever did because there is a lot by her I am getting to, but I have not seen anything like that so far. She talks a lot about the things humans need and want and about money needing to represent them. But not about the medium of exchange itself being required to be something with a different use of value (other than as money) to humans. Think about it. If I have a pig and you have an extra shelter, I can trade my pig for your shelter. That's simple barter and no money is involved. But if I issue a claim ticket to my pig and you issue a claim ticket to your shelter, I can give my claim ticket to you so you can pick the pig up later and you can take that claim ticket and trade it with another person for something else you may want. Ditto for me and the shelter. Then whoever wants the pig or shelter can come, present the claim ticket and take them. Trust is involved. That's true. And that means the third party has to believe he will show up with the claim ticket and receive the pig or shelter and not a gut full of buckshot, but there is no reason on earth the ticket itself has to have an independent worth of its own. Paper works just fine. Or a seashell. Or a stick. Or anything used over the centuries. Hell, even the word of a person works for that so long as people agree to use it. So using that intrinsic worth and fiat money argument against cryptocurrency has no validity to me. If people wish to call bits and bytes money and use it as money, or a ledger accessed by a long-ass hash of gibberish, there is nothing stopping them except a story. In other words, a self-limiting belief. Or a gun if the government makes a law. But nothing inherent in human transactions stop bits and bytes or that ledger from being used as money. Also, I've heard (and even thought) that the weakness of cryptocurrency is that it is dependent on the Internet. But as one friend of mine says, if the Internet goes down, you will have problems much bigger than the validity of your money. So big, in fact, the validity of money will be trivial. Also, as Svetsky above stated (in the video with Fitts and Mercola), bitcoin does not depend on the Internet. It uses the Internet, but does not depend on it. The keys (the blockchain hash codes) work just fine without using an electronic means of conveyance. The Internet is just one hell of a convenience for moving the codes around between people. But that's all. Other means are also possible. At one point I intend to reread Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal with this, and other modern world things in mind. I want to be clear and accurate on my premise-checking. Michael 1 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tmj Posted February 9, 2022 Share Posted February 9, 2022 I've had similar thoughts and to extend a thought you brought up in different thread , currency/medium of exchange also depends and affects credit which is an indispensable concept re finance. So like reality and the 'law' , there's currency and finance/capital. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peter Posted February 10, 2022 Share Posted February 10, 2022 Michael wrote: “. . . but there is no reason on earth the ticket itself has to have an independent worth of its own. Paper works just fine.” I was thinking along a similar line. When you hand someone a dollar bill to pay, or your credit card to process and then pay, the person Knows they will receive the value you are trading. Although inflation or deflation can affect the dollar bill or the credit card payment it is not the same as bitcoin. With something like bitcoin or even stocks you might trade for value, the value of bitcoin is More dependent upon a will of the wisp “market value.” The value received with a bitcoin payment is less trustworthy. Unfortunately, under President Carter and now to some extent under President Biden, inflation is also robbing us of value. But what if bitcoin dropped a huge percent in one day . . . ? Unless we go to war, I don’t think the dollar could drop like that. Now if bitcoin had been around as long as the dollar even with some fluctuations in value, I would trust it more. Time and a good reputation will win out. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peter Posted February 10, 2022 Share Posted February 10, 2022 One more piece of capitalistic pie? I am not trying to be mean or get myself into hot water, but hypothetically, what if you injured yourself or had an illness that debilitated you? You are excepting donations. Someone offers you a hundred dollars, and you are fine with that. But someone else offers you a piece of a bitcoin . . . or dollars. Which would you prefer to help get you through your troubling times? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Stuart Kelly Posted February 10, 2022 Author Share Posted February 10, 2022 3 hours ago, Peter said: One more piece of capitalistic pie? I am not trying to be mean or get myself into hot water, but hypothetically, what if you injured yourself or had an illness that debilitated you? You are excepting donations. Someone offers you a hundred dollars, and you are fine with that. But someone else offers you a piece of a bitcoin . . . or dollars. Which would you prefer to help get you through your troubling times? Peter, Bitcoin. Not even close. It's very easy to convert bitcoin to dollars. Michael 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Stuart Kelly Posted February 10, 2022 Author Share Posted February 10, 2022 4 hours ago, Peter said: With something like bitcoin or even stocks you might trade for value, the value of bitcoin is More dependent upon a will of the wisp “market value.” The value received with a bitcoin payment is less trustworthy. Peter, Be careful with the implications of this. You are essentially saying you trust the government, whether freely elected or absolute dictator, more than you trust the free market. In the history of bitcoin, governments the world over have thrown everything they can think of, legal and covert, against bitcoin and it still stays strong. Also, it increases in value over time. A lot. The market likes it. The government (except El Salvador and, now it looks like Russia is coming aboard), does not. The main problem all governments have with bitcoin is they cannot confiscate it except by literal theft (for careless bitcoin owners), guile in tricking owners to hand over their keys, or torture. There is no other way. And what good is a monetary system to a government if the government cannot confiscate money from its citizens? Michael 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peter Posted February 10, 2022 Share Posted February 10, 2022 5 hours ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said: And what good is a monetary system to a government if the government cannot confiscate money from its citizens? What is needed then is a "bitcoin card" or some other way to pay easily like a credit card or cash. When it passes that border of legitimacy, I will agree it may be as "sound as the dollar" . . . if time passes without significant drops in price, or quick increases in value, for that matter. Do I trust our government and monetary policies, including the debt? With a boulder of salt. But for everyday uses I will take handed over money, or a card or money wired into my account. Where do banks stand with bitcoin? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peter Posted February 10, 2022 Share Posted February 10, 2022 6 hours ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said: Be careful with the implications of this. You are essentially saying you trust the government, whether freely elected or absolute dictator, more than you trust the free market. Speed limits? Ponzi schemes (no offense bitcoin)? Are there not legitimate functions of the government not tied directly to protecting individual rights? I think there are, like the OK of food and drugs, listing of ingredients, etc. You might claim those functions keep fraud to a minimum, but they overstep those bonds, and I am "mostly' in agreement to them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peter Posted February 10, 2022 Share Posted February 10, 2022 One more opinion from my big mouth? Open borders? Not too long ago some libertarians were FOR open borders, and against government enforced patents and copyrights. Notice the words below: “political framework” “legal theories,” and “patents.” All of these are government enforced. A knee jerk reaction might be, do you trust the government? Mostly, as long as the people are watching. We elect people like Donald Trump to keep government lean and proper. Now what about those VP choices? Peter Robert Tracinski wrote: Thomas Jefferson, for example, imagined that the political framework he helped create would lead to a agrarian society of independent yeoman farmers—never realizing what his own principles would lead to when fully realized. I don't just mean that no one guessed the specific inventions and technologies that would emerge. What I mean is that no one guessed, or could have guessed, all of the legal structures, business organizations, individual attitudes and lifestyles—the entire way of life of a modern capitalist society. The philosophers laid an intellectual foundation for capitalism and the Industrial Revolution—but modern capitalism was, in effect, created by the capitalists. It was created by the innovators who conceived of ever more complex forms of the division of labor, who developed the extraordinary complexity of modern capital markets, who developed entire new economic institutions such as lines of credit and insurance, and who pioneered the legal theory behind patents and the corporation. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThatGuy Posted February 10, 2022 Share Posted February 10, 2022 1 hour ago, Peter said: Speed limits? Ponzi schemes (no offense bitcoin)? Are there not legitimate functions of the government not tied directly to protecting individual rights? I think there are, like the OK of food and drugs, listing of ingredients, etc. You might claim those functions keep fraud to a minimum, but they overstep those bonds, and I am "mostly' in agreement to them. Riigghht...because they did such a great job with the "four food groups...""The revised food groups made in 1992 make no sense , oils are not a food group , neither are sweets which are part of the 5 or 7 modern day food groups ." The Original “4” basic food groups : – The "Foundation of Nutrition" "Thee Bible" FOUNDATIONOFNUTRITION.WORDPRESS.COM People are increasingly concerned about what to eat in order to be healthy and to obtain or maintain a proper weight. This has resulted in... How Did The Government Get The Food Pyramid So Terribly Wrong? "The food pyramid was doomed from the start, but how did the government get it so wrong in the first place?" How Did The Government Get The Food Pyramid So Terribly Wrong? WWW.HEALTHYWAY.COM The food pyramid was doomed from the start, but how did the government get it so wrong in the first place? ("Mother, should I trust the government?") Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Stuart Kelly Posted February 10, 2022 Author Share Posted February 10, 2022 1 hour ago, Peter said: What is needed then is a "bitcoin card"... Peter, Most of the large cryptocurrency exchanges offer one. I use Coinbase right now simply because of the convenience. It's one of the biggest exchanges and is a lot more hooked into the traditional money system than normal. I even had to hold up a picture of myself holding a sign to get an account. But it works well after I learned it. They have a special relationship with PayPal and normal banks so you can get dollars instantly from selling crypto. They are always advertising their card. I also got a free $100 in bitcoin out of no other than Mark Cuban a while back (the promotion is no longer running) when he released Voyager and, as time goes on, their card seems to be the main thing they want to pump. I dislike that account, though. You can only use it by smartphone, which I have but hardly ever use. But, a hundred bucks is a hundred bucks, so I have that amount over there in bitcoin and I haven't touched it. Someday I should send it to my other account. Or just leave it there and get a few thousand after some time.... (btw - Some fees, not all, are really high on exchanges. So you have to be careful what you ask for. I speak from experience. ) I only have accounts at those two exchanges right now, but I know other major exchanges have their own cards. I think some banks are issuing bitcoin cards or at least plan to. After I learn more, I will have ways of hooking into the bitcoin blockchain without using a mainstream exchange. (And those methods will NOT have a card. ) The downside of the mainstream exchanges is that there is just as much government surveillance on them as their is on online bank accounts, credit cards and all the rest. Oh well. That's the world we live in right now. I'm learning this one so I can later spit myself out of it. But I'll only do that after I switch from Windows to Linux as my computer operating system. Michael Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tmj Posted February 10, 2022 Share Posted February 10, 2022 and stuff like this , setting minimum standards that leave little or no financial incentive to 'beat' may not be the best idea 9 Disgusting Things That the FDA Allows in Your Food | Live Science WWW.LIVESCIENCE.COM The FDA is concerned with food safety, but not necessarily grossness. Here are the acceptable levels of bugs, hairs, poop and other things... 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThatGuy Posted February 10, 2022 Share Posted February 10, 2022 32 minutes ago, ThatGuy said: Riigghht...because they did such a great job with the "four food groups...""The revised food groups made in 1992 make no sense , oils are not a food group , neither are sweets which are part of the 5 or 7 modern day food groups ." The Original “4” basic food groups : – The "Foundation of Nutrition" "Thee Bible" FOUNDATIONOFNUTRITION.WORDPRESS.COM People are increasingly concerned about what to eat in order to be healthy and to obtain or maintain a proper weight. This has resulted in... How Did The Government Get The Food Pyramid So Terribly Wrong? "The food pyramid was doomed from the start, but how did the government get it so wrong in the first place?" How Did The Government Get The Food Pyramid So Terribly Wrong? WWW.HEALTHYWAY.COM The food pyramid was doomed from the start, but how did the government get it so wrong in the first place? ("Mother, should I trust the government?") Oh, and let's not forget this doozy... "Mother, should I trust the government?" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThatGuy Posted February 10, 2022 Share Posted February 10, 2022 2 minutes ago, tmj said: and stuff like this , setting minimum standards that leave little or no financial incentive to 'beat' may not be the best idea 9 Disgusting Things That the FDA Allows in Your Food | Live Science WWW.LIVESCIENCE.COM The FDA is concerned with food safety, but not necessarily grossness. Here are the acceptable levels of bugs, hairs, poop and other things... Thanks! You beat me to it and saved me time; that was going to be my next retort... Thank Galt for the FDA, whatever would we do without them? Or their forerunners in the U.S. Public Health Service? (Ask the victims of the Tuskagee experiment...) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Stuart Kelly Posted February 10, 2022 Author Share Posted February 10, 2022 1 hour ago, Peter said: Speed limits? Ponzi schemes (no offense bitcoin)? Are there not legitimate functions of the government... Peter, Of course there are. We were talking about the money system. And when we talk about politicians and money, you can trust them. I don't. Michael Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peter Posted February 10, 2022 Share Posted February 10, 2022 20 minutes ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said: We were talking about the money system. Thanks. I did not know you were so into it and "versed." I have seen shows where one person holds their phone up to someone else's and bazzinga, payment is received. What can go wrong with that? You mentioned transferring bitcoins to dollars but I will remain leery of it until I do it myself. Or years pass and there are no crashes or successful Ponzi schemes. Word of mouth and trust are not the same as "backed up by the U.S. government." People who get welfare have been using "debit cards" for a while to supposedly buy necessities (not booze) so if a new exchange medium succeeds, go for it. (I told you so's will not be uttered.) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tmj Posted February 10, 2022 Share Posted February 10, 2022 People who get 'debit cards' now , would get bitcoin 'cards' , what you are confusing is the technology of the value transfer with the wealth distribution. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Stuart Kelly Posted February 14, 2022 Author Share Posted February 14, 2022 Even Ted Cruz sees it. I lived in a country (Brazil) where the government confiscated the money of everyone for a while. If bitcoin had existed at the time and people had been using it, this would not have happened. Why? Simply because there would have been no way for the government to do so. Ditto for today. That is the most important part about bitcoin. Michael 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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