T.T. 51: "fear is the mind-killer"
Doom-scrolling distracts from doing what you can
Hola amigos,
Greetings from back home!
My original home…
After 8.5 months in El Salvador, I finally returned to the Washington, D.C. metro area. Home of the Federal Reserve… but also home of my parents, so it’s worth it being back.
Lots to discuss today!
More negatives than usual, honestly… but those are almost entirely external observations, and they’re balanced out with legitimately positive takeaways as well.
This ended up being 2,994 words.
Feel free to only skim it…
Here’s the outline:
Preface
This week’s Thoreau quote
Relevant F.D.R. history
Personal updates
Bitcoin world updates
U.S. political (clown world) updates
upcoming Libertarian National Convention this month in DC. I’m attending it… and so is Donald Trump apparently
Purity vs progress
An interview I did two weeks ago
Three entrepreneurial bonus video links
Preface:
This is a long post.
Even by my standards.
It’s a bit scattershot, and different than what I had initially intended, for a variety of reasons. So I want to emphasize three main points before I dive in:
(1) Conclusion:
Last things first…
Most of this post is pretty negative. But my main point is actually positive:
Risk of negative outcomes is no excuse not to try building positives anyway.
That’s especially true if the absence of those potential positives will GUARANTEE the negative outcomes.
(2) Dopamine:
The tradeoff of my healthy choice to quit cigarettes (old college habit) since returning last Saturday is that my dopamine system has been going a bit haywire since then.
That’s one big part of why I’ve spent such an embarrassingly wasteful amount of time doomscrolling on Twitter this week… but, just like a fever, sometimes things have to get worse before they get better. At least the algorithmic dopamine hits aren’t literally cancerous.
Positive related note:
Speaking of Twitter… I decided to finally start posting original tweets again yesterday, instead of just doomscrolling and retweeting other people. Within a day I was back to getting tens of thousands of engagements from just a few posts.
Six original tweets today —> 32 thousand impressions.
As an introvert, I still feel weird about “influencing” on social media — that’s why I had basically stopped sharing original posts almost entirely — but apparently I’m still talented at it when I actually put in a tiny bit of effort:
(3) Podcast reflections:
My initial plan for this post — before seeing such insane developments in the external world this week — was to reflect on my experiences in El Salvador over the past 8.5 months.
Specifically, I was going to start weaving together the stories and self-assessments with relevant external podcast clips… primarily from a few Tim Ferriss interviews that I binge-listened to on my flight home and on long walks around my parents’ home neighborhood since returning.
I won’t elaborate this week, other than to list a few of the episodes, so you get a sense of the themes that I would prefer to be talking about… if Fiat Clown World hadn’t distracted me so badly this week with news that was too significant to ignore.
Here are four of the best I listened to recently:
Sheila Heen — How to Master the Difficult Art of Receiving (and Giving) Feedback (#703)
I’ll also briefly add:
The reason why I’m so obsessed with Tim’s podcast is that he’s a genius at asking questions in a way that cuts to the core of what makes high performers different.
The way he deconstructs people’s systems and patterns of thinking — often analyzing from unexpected angles — remains virtually unparalleled, even in a world with 2+ million other podcasts now.
But I digress…
Back to this week’s main topics.
This week’s Thoreau quote again:
“Nothing is so much
to be feared as fear”
You’ve probably heard a variation of it:
“The only thing
we have to fear
is fear itself.”
Franklin Delano Roosevelt famously included that line early in the speech from his first inauguration as President of the United States in 1933.
His wife Eleanor later credited Thoreau for inspiring it. Apparently FDR was a fan of his work!
Unfortunately — quick historical tangent — FDR was also lying about fear being the “only” thing to fear…
In the very same speech, the new President introduced his plan for the “New Deal” programs… socialist insanity which unnecessarily prolonged the Great Depression by an entire decade.
Then, exactly one month and one day after the speech, FDR’s executive order 6102 made it illegal for Americans to own gold… one of the most evil policies in U.S. history.
Seriously.
One of the most evil in history.
That’s NOT an exaggeration.
This executive order — unilateral dictatorship, not even an act of Congress — forced U.S. citizens, under threat of 10 years in prison, to submit their gold (sound money savings) to the Federal Reserve at a price of $20.67 (depreciating fiat currency) per ounce.
Then, once the government had collected (stolen) as much as possible, they promptly revalued the price of gold at $35 per ounce… and used those increased sound money reserves to get away with printing more fiat currency.
Literal theft, under threat of prison…
Followed by the hidden theft of inflation.
Oops. Guess there was something else to fear after all.
That being said…
It’s still a phenomenal quote.
Here’s the rest of FDR’s version:
“So, first of all, let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is... fear itself — nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance.”
That’s the part I want to focus on:
“Terror paralyzes needed efforts
to convert retreat into advance.”
Keep that theme in mind.
I’ll circle back to it.
Personal updates:
This is the positive section!
The rest of this post is mostly bleak… but here’s some good news:
I made it back home safely after 8.5 months in El Salvador… my first time ever in a developing country, and the first time I had ever been outside the U.S. for longer than a two week vacation
I already filled out and mailed in the paperwork to renew my passport, which was set to expire in August — the primary reason for my urgent return after successfully organizing Economía Bitcoin last month
I scheduled the renewal of my Drivers License — also set to expire in August — for a DMV appointment tomorrow afternoon. One bureaucratic chore at a time…
Since returning last Saturday, I’m now a full week into another break from alcohol, after taking the full year of 2023 off from drinking (an experiment which noticeably increased my discipline/productivity)
after three days of tapering down, I’m on Day 3 with zero cigarettes (I had picked up the old college addiction again as a social habit in El Salvador)
I’ve worked out and meditated almost each of those days since returning
got to spend time with my parents, including a nice dinner for one of their birthdays this week!
And I had even more good stuff planned. As mentioned above, lots of constructive writing to do, weaving together stories with interesting podcast insights.
But then I got distracted.
Twitter doomscrolling got the better of me this week.
In my defense…
A lot happened in Clown World.
Total train wreck.
Nearly impossible to look away.
So instead of my more constructive reflections on the past several months of personal experience abroad… I’m gonna overview the external insanity of the past week here.
Bitcoin world updates:
Last week had a lot of bad news.
Recap:
Samourai Wallet developers arrested… a related insane/laughable/scary interpretation from prosecutors in the Tornado Cash case… a related FBI warning against similar privacy tools… a new IRS tax form for crypto assets announced for next year… Phoenix Wallet leaving the U.S. app store.
Unfortunately, this week was not much of a relief.
To be clear…
The U.S. government still seems okay with Bitcoin as a Store Of Value. They approved the ETFs in January… they’re fine with MicroStrategy’s “treasury reserve asset” narrative. The dollar has never pretended to be a good Store Of Value, so Bitcoin isn’t a direct threat to the Fiat Ruling Class in that regard.
(At least not yet… although there’s still risk of a modern Executive Order 6102, but that isn’t happening so far at least)
It’s primarily the Medium Of Exchange phase where the “then they fight you” stage continues to escalate:
Roger Ver arrested in Spain
Wasabi Wallet — the main alternative to Samourai for Bitcoin privacy tools — shut down its coinjoin service proactively
Jack Dorsey’s company “Block” (Square + CashApp) now being investigated for allegedly processing crypto transactions on behalf of terrorist groups
And even some of the “good news” is concerning if you read between the lines:
BlackRock — the primary purveyors of ESG, among other evils — hosted a Bitcoin conference
MicroStrategy hosted a Bitcoin-for-business conference… but Saylor’s big announcement advocated for a base layer inscription (spam) “use case” involving digital identity. Even if this isn’t some social credit score “digital identity” scenario — even if Saylor isn’t secretly a Deep State operative, as some people suspect — it still isn’t exactly encouraging to see “GigaChad” focusing on trivial nonsense when the need for BTC privacy and scaling solutions has never been more obviously urgent
Coinbase (the ETF custodian) finally implemented Lightning… but it’s fully KYC from a very untrustworthy custodian that collaborates with Chainalysis to spy on users
For the record, KYC — “Know Your Customer” — is NOT normal. It’s NOT the right of governments to infringe upon privacy.
Quite the contrary, in fact… blatantly infringing upon the 4th Amendment only became so normalized after 9/11. Authoritarians never let a crisis go to waste… but I digress.
The main point I wanted to focus on here was Roger Ver’s case.
He’s actually a villain in the history of Bitcoin — see The Blocksize War — but I still side with him in this case out of principle regardless.
The guy renounced his U.S. citizenship almost a full decade ago… and then, just before the statute of limitations expired, the U.S. government had him arrested in Spain over allegations that he owes $48 million in undisclosed Bitcoin taxes.
Coincidence?
Maybe… but I doubt it.
Why wait a full decade?
In conjunction with the other tyrannical crackdowns against freedom money, I think it’s more likely that they’re making an example of Roger for all other U.S. Bitcoiners to see… and to fear.
Hotel California… you can check out any time you like, but you can never leave. So why bother trying?
If the goal was to demoralize American Bitcoiners… it worked pretty well, at least with an initial “chilling effect” on many of us.
My own morale has mostly recovered by now, but I’m not gonna lie. That news was a serious blow.
Coincidentally, his arrest was announced on the same day that I got a new picture taken for my U.S. passport renewal. I still sent in the paperwork anyway the next day… but it felt disgusting to extend my ties with this country that actively persecutes people who just want to be left alone.
“Land of the free”
Sigh…
I’ll circle back to positives at the end, but first, some more negatives!
U.S. political (clown world) updates:
Two main stories here…
Campus protests/riots.
Authoritarian backlash.
And look… I’m not gonna defend woke college idiots. 99% of the time they’re not only wrong about politics, but DANGEROUSLY wrong.
That being said…
War is mass murder.
I support antiwar protests.
Also, the Republicans who are impulsively opposing this — an understandable instinct, considering who is doing the protesting — apparently learned NOTHING from the “War on Terror” consequences.
It’s like they’ve completely forgotten how the powers that they granted for the government to go after “terrorism” 20 years ago were then turned inward to persecute normal Americans…
Remember the “Patriot” Act?
Israel-Palestine is a complex issue, and I’m already close to 2000 words for this post. And I still have a headache from nicotine withdrawals. I won’t elaborate more now about the war itself.
But here’s a new example already of how war abroad creates the perfect excuse for more authoritarianism domestically:
The “antisemitism” bill that passed the House of Representatives this week was treasonous. It blatantly violates the First Amendment protecting Free Speech… and, to make things worse, it doesn’t even define “antisemitism” clearly. It outsources the definition to a biased third party!
And that definition is insane. It would even make parts of the Bible illegal… specifically the parts saying that Jews killed Jesus.
Hopefully it doesn’t pass the Senate. But if it does, I’m gonna feel obliged to address these issues in much more detail.
Free speech is a hill worth dying on.
Libertarian National Convention
Huge news here.
Donald Trump — yes, the once-and-potential-future POTUS from the Republican Party — is coming to the Libertarian Party’s convention at the end of this month.
I have mixed feelings about it.
This announcement has been very controversial among Libertarians… but the goal of inviting Trump — along with Biden and RFK, but Trump is the only one who actually accepted — to generate attention for the Convention is already working.
I won’t elaborate too much more now.
I’ll be attending it, and there are still three more Thursdays between now and then, so I’m sure I’ll say more in future posts.
For now… here’s a sample of the buzz.
Timcast covering the announcement:
(over 200 thousand views)
Dave Smith’s take:
Here’s a clip from that new episode in which Dave discloses how he’s already been discussing this with many of the biggest names in independent media… not only Tim Pool, but also Tucker Carlson, Patrick Bet David, etc:
Boom.
People with MILLIONS of followers are now very interested in our convention. That’s not nothing.
On a related note, I really like a phrase that Dave used in reply to critics of this Trump invitation:
“I know there are some libertarians who have a severe allergy to relevance…”
Ouch.
It hurts because it’s true.
Many of us have gotten too comfortable being theoretically correct with our critiques, stated safely from the sidelines. It’s much easier than actually debating solutions in the real world with the spotlights on.
And that leads me to my final point…
Purity vs progress
The real world is messy.
Critics are inevitable.
No matter what you do, there will be consequences.
That’s the other reason why I had heavily reduced my original Twitter posting… why I haven’t used my real/full name for any of this… why I’ve hesitated to do any further podcasts after my first three episodes.
FEAR.
I’m only human. And despite my talent — despite numerous other people TELLING ME that I’m good at this stuff — I still second-guess myself constantly.
Bitcoiners…
Libertarians…
Family members…
No matter what I do or say, it’s nearly impossible to please all three of those groups of people who (to varying degrees) care about me, even despite our mostly overlapping values in most cases.
I also felt especially weird speaking out about controversial topics while I was somewhat representing the wholesome Bitcoin Berlín project/team.
But here’s the thing:
The world is going insane. The fiat system is collapsing… two things I didn’t even mention in this post are what’s happening with Japan’s currency and the fact that the Fed flipped M2 positive again (money printer go brrr).
And that’s not even mentioning the CBDC threat… the most evil agenda in the world, even worse than war and genocide. The ultimate tool of absolute totalitarian control.
Virtually NOBODY is properly prepared. We NEED to be having uncomfortable conversations.
So back to the Thoreau quote again, before I end this post.
“Nothing is to be feared so much as fear.”
And the good part of the FDR variation:
“Terror paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance.”
Yes. There are valid reasons to be scared.
But the thing we should be most afraid of is the status quo trajectory remaining unchallenged.
So the conclusion?
I’m gonna keep speaking up. The risks of doing nothing are far greater than the risks of trying to raise awareness about solutions.
Final topic…
An interview I did two weeks ago.
On a boat in Bitcoin Beach.
7000 views…
29 retweets + 169 likes
I got outstanding feedback about it, and STILL — for some crazy reason — I’ve still hesitated to share it.
I think I was hesitating because it was too wholesome… too focused on the solutions happening back there in El Salvador… when I knew I was about to wade back into the muck of political controversy here in Fiat Clown World.
But it’s a nice note to end on… so no more delay :)
That’s all for this Sunday post… see you on Thursday!
I’ll try to actually do this week’s post on time. Control what’s within my control… continue building.
In the meantime, I’ll keep up the healthy choices as well. Despite the nicotine withdrawal headaches… one day at a time.
Bonus links for builders:
Alex Hormozi clip on mindset
Tom Woods — one of the top libertarian podcasters — doing a business focused interview with a world class entrepreneurial consultant.
Last but not least…
Henry Bingaman — who was a panelist on my first ever podcast episode, and whose podcast I also appeared on — did a phenomenal webinar for Tom’s audience last week called “Monetizing Your Mind”
I’ll ask him if I can edit this to include the link.
In the meantime, here’s the episode I did on his podcast:
Great post, Sir. I don't normally read long posts right away, but this hooked me. We miss you down here. Get your butt back to Berlin!