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[0:07] CK: Andrew, welcome to your first Twitter Spaces. Thanks for hustling to figure it out. Really excited and honored to have you talking with us.
[0:16] Andrew Bogut: Yeah, appreciate it. Thanks for having me.
[0:18] CK: So, I guess really quick, why don’t we just start off with what’s your story? Obviously, people may have heard of you as an NBA champion. You have a long history of amazing success in basketball. But you really caught my eye this past year, just because you’ve been really a voice of reason amongst some insanity that’s coming from Australia and other countries around the world.
[0:47] Andrew: Yeah, look, it’s a crazy time. I think wherever you are in the world, it seems to be either cyclical where different countries are getting harder, and then it goes lenient and then gets it harder. In Australia, I have been here for the last couple of years. And throughout this, we were relatively unscathed last year to an extent. We had some lockdowns and that kind of stuff, but it wasn’t as draconian as it is now. Now, it’s our politicians and our so-called “leaders” who are continuing with the division and the divisive talk and the fear-mongering, and it’s like it’s gone up 10 notches and now, we’re probably where the rest of the world was last year. So, it’s a pretty interesting time.
People that are vaccinated, are not vaccinated, that’s not the issue to me. The issue is the coercion and the mandates of what they’re doing. They are not giving people a choice, yet our Prime Minister gets on stage and says that it’s completely a choice when it isn’t. I know a lot of friends that were losing their jobs or about to lose their jobs if they didn’t buy into it.
My position is clear. I’m all about the choice on the matter. And if you want to get it, you get it. If you don’t, you don’t. I think that’s what it should be. But in Australia, it’s gone. We’re almost at 90% in some states. And as a country, we’re almost at 80%, which is, I think, pretty much close to the top five in the world as far as vaccination rates. And we still have lockdowns and all the rhetoric around it. It is so pretty disappointing.
[2:28] CK: I think there’s a lot to talk about. We definitely want to talk about what’s happening in Australia and around the world as the majority of the conversation here, but just to create some context, like, have you always been a voice fighting for freedom and choice? Or is that kind of been something that has really been pulled out because of what’s happening recently?
[2:54] Andrew: I’ve always been pretty outspoken. I’m not one to shy away from giving my opinion on issues that– I might not be an expert in, but I’ll give you an opinion. I might not be always right, but I’ve always been comfortable with it– if somebody asked me a question, I was always taught to try and answer it to the best of my ability. And at times, as I said, I’m not always right. So I’ve always been okay to put whatever I’ve got out on the table and live with the consequences, whether it’s controversial or not, whether it’s political, whether it’s social causes, whether it’s whatever right. So, this just followed suit.
I guess coming from a working-class family that didn’t have a lot growing up, I think all I could think about during these lockdowns, and during these restrictions, and all these things going on was what would I have been like as a child growing up in a working-class family with these restrictions? How would I have lived? How would our family have lived? How would my father, who was a mechanic by trade, which wasn’t deemed essential, or no one’s really driving when there’s a lockdown? So, how do we put food on the table? And that’s what I went back to. A lot of people were like, “Why do you care? You’re a millionaire, just get on with it.” But I am not really voicing concerns for myself. I’m voicing it for people that don’t have a voice.
Basically, imagine being locked in Melbourne, my home city, with the longest lockdown– days in a lockdown– in the world as today that they’ve had the most days when you add it all up. And imagine being locked in if you are someone who’s not making a lot of money and you got two kids at home. So it’s husband, wife, two kids in a two-bedroom unit. You got your job that you’re working remotely, and then you got to do your homeschooling with your kids, and then you got to get meals. It’s just like the amount of stress and anxiety it’s putting on every day on families, is just horrendous. And I think it’s going to have a detrimental effect on the mental health of our society down the track that nobody talks about, because all we talk about, at least in Australia and the world, is case numbers, case numbers, case numbers.
[5:02] CK: So really, it’s just kind of reflecting on how you grew up and then having empathy for other people that might be in your similar situation today. Can you talk about the way that a lot of these protocols and mandates are being enforced? I’ve seen many stories and many people commenting on how this is enforced a lot harder in the poor and working-class areas. And if you’re in the richer parts, you don’t see a cop around at all. That gives you a lot more leeway, just as a baseline.
[5:36] Andrew: Yeah, for sure. That’s definitely an issue. The way the government tries to spin it, they’re trying to put it on everyday people to police it. And for the most part, there are people doing that, like every day, people– by everyday people, I mean people that aren’t in positions of power, just the business owner, whatever. They want them to police it. They want them to check papers. They want them to really implement the mask mandates, whether someone’s got an exemption or not. They are trying to really divide the public and have their stars out in the community doing it. And that’s what’s happening.
There’s a minority probably, 10% of the population maybe for a rough estimate that are buying into it. They’re telling on their neighbors. There was a portion during the Melbourne lockdowns you couldn’t have visitors for like eighteen months. You could have four visitors and then two weeks later we had a lockdown. No visitors for three months. There were neighbors telling on their neighbors for having their grandparents over to see the grandkids because it was deemed illegal or deemed against the mandates, right?
So, the politicians have just created so much fear. I’m not sure if you guys are familiar, but that’s the premiers of states, which is similar to the senators in the US, that we’re doing daily press conferences. These things were getting tuned in to by everybody because they were outlining the rules. What are the new rules? What can I and can’t do? Like, can I go to the bar? Can I go to a restaurant? So people were tuning into that every day, And they were just creating so much fear and anxiety in people that everyone was on the edge and telling on each other and it’s just a divisive time.
So, to answer your question, yeah, the protocol is implemented a “one thing” by politicians, but the fact that they started to get followed and policed by everyday citizens, that’s when it becomes a bit scarier. You never want to get to a position where you’re telling on your neighbor… The division and anxiety around the community, for the most part, at least in Melbourne and Sydney, is definitely an all-time high.
[7:37] CK: I’ve definitely noticed that is just a trend, in general, is divide and really try to lean on individual citizens to pull out these mandates. That’s been something that is part of the horrible history of Nazi, Germany at that time in history, where people were spying on their neighbors and you didn’t know who was part of the secret police. That was a really dark time. And it sounds like– now, it’s maybe not ethnicity that is a scapegoat, but rather it’s like the unvaxxed just like a scapegoat. And that string is being pulled by politicians, not just in Australia, although heavily in Australia, but everywhere else, too.
[8:24] Andrew: Yeah. And it’s just the wording the politicians use, and it’s becoming the whole marketing campaign around getting vaccinated. This is a pandemic of the unvaccinated. Well, it’s not. You look at the numbers, it isn’t.
The way I look at it is, if you’ve got someone that’s perfectly healthy, they eat right, they exercise, they do all the right things for their body, and they’re thirty-five years old, and they’re unvaccinated, I think they’re healthier than someone who’s forty-five and sits on the couch and eats Doritos, KFC, and McDonald’s, and just watches Netflix all day and he’s severely overweight and obese, well, which one is more healthy?
We can’t even have those discussions in a civilized society, right? It’s like, just because you’ve had the vaccine doesn’t mean you’re healthy and everything’s perfect with your body. The vaccines are meant to protect you. But as far as this whole spiel about the unvaccinated being the ones carrying on this pandemic, it’s just very divisive. And the numbers don’t back up.
I could be wrong, but the numbers I’ve read don’t back those statements up. They’re just strictly to cause division within society and shunning what is now supposedly 10% of society in Australia, 20% in some states, but probably as a country, 10% or 15% of people are still unvaccinated.
The other thing is, there’s a lot of people that are double vaccinated that don’t support the mandates, and that’s what’s not spoken about. So, our politicians are jumping up there saying these anti-vaxxers are crazy. They are fascists. They’re this, they’re that. I think the majority of people, at least in Australia, have gotten the vaccine because they’re going to lose something.
The number one priority for them to get the vaccine was not “I’m scared of coronavirus,” it was, “I don’t want to lose my job. I want to be able to go to my kids’ sporting events. I want to be able to go to restaurants.” That’s probably the reason 1, 2, and 3, with health being 4, which is kind of crazy.
There is a minority that’s a smaller number, maybe 20% or 30% that got it for strictly health reasons. But I would argue the majority got it because they were coerced that they’re going to lose something. Whether you agree that being right or wrong, that’s probably the biggest debate with all this.
[10:47] CK: So, Andrew, I think a lot of Bitcoiners are kind of side with your opinion here in this kind of crazy clown world we find ourselves in. It seems like it could be even a minority opinion across the planet. But kind of curious, your interest in Bitcoin. I saw you tweeting out a chart and then I noticed that you followed me and potentially Bitcoin Magazine as well. Obviously, you’re keeping track of this digital currency. I’m curious what your history of Bitcoin is, and your thoughts on Bitcoin, and maybe how that aligns with your views on human rights, dignity, and freedom.
[11:27] Andrew: Well, yeah. Just having another classic currency isn’t the worst thing in the world, right? We know the Fed at least in the US and what they do, especially right now with the amount of inflation in the US. I was involved in Bitcoin not early-early, but probably got involved in 2000.
And it was roughly 2018, I bought some Bitcoin, a bit of Ethereum. And I just let it sit in then and forgot about it for a year or two. I didn’t really pay attention to it. And then I actually got to know Haralabos Voulgaris very well. He’s a Bitcoin guru. He’s all about it. He was in my ear a lot about like, just get on it, and get on it, and keep getting on so much, so that I basically have a daily buy-in for Bitcoin.
I don’t really dabble too much in the altcoins. I just kind of stayed with the original gangster in Bitcoin. Haralabos has helped me a lot with the way of thinking around it. So, I have a daily bias set every day, the same amount of money, whether it goes up or down, it’s just daily bias, which was a recommendation that he does. So he’s helped me through it.
And look, I like to diversify anyway. So whatever people think about it, for me, it’s diversification, and obviously, we just don’t know what’s going to happen in the world with the way the banks are going, with China, obviously, has a digital ID. That’s a concern for a lot of people with everything going on now. You might call it a conspiracy theory today. But 2 years ago, you would have said it was a conspiracy theory that you’d need a vaccine or you’d lose your job, or you need a vaccine to travel the world. So that was a conspiracy theory 2 years ago. That’s now a fact. So, who knows?
People think there’s a big push for digital ID and linking your bank account and a currency to that ID. So I guess Bitcoin would be the alternative to that, but we all know how much governments are going after Bitcoin. So it wouldn’t surprise me, especially here in Australia. We’re probably the most over legislated country in the world with the tax laws, business laws, and whatnot that they try to implement something to screw Bitcoin over. It wouldn’t surprise me, but that’s kind of my short feeling to it. I’m not a heavy guru like you guys by any means, but I’m definitely involved and I follow up pretty closely.
[13:57] CK: That’s amazing. On Bitcoin Magazine, we don’t really dabble in altcoins and really do appreciate dollar-cost averaging on daily buys into Bitcoin. So I think your friend put you on the right path.
I’m kind of curious. We have Roman from Bitcoin Beach in El Salvador, and he’s been a big part of that story. But I’m kind of curious, I guess, what woke you up to the Chinese surveillance panopticon and the fact that governments are kind of clamping down on freedoms? I feel like that’s something that most people in the world aren’t paying attention to, and definitely not in Australia. As you’ve said, Australia is heavily regulated in some pretty alarming ways to the rest of the world.
[14:55] Andrew: Yeah, I read a lot. I read some of the most random shit ever. I’m pretty well-versed. I’m not an expert in anything, but I can talk about most things if that makes sense.
I read a lot of news from around the world. The main thing is I’ve visited China multiple times, right? So I’ve seen their progression, they would call it, to their digital ID. I visited there back in 2005-2006. And in 2008, in the Olympics, it wasn’t as bad then. I went back in 2019. It’s a whole other level now. Like we’re walking into the basketball arena and there’s basically CCTV as you walk in the entrance. As soon as it hits your face, your ID is on the screen. When you go to the Olympics or a sporting event, you have those. You see the coaches and whatever wear those plastic cards on a little chain thing around their chest. That is their ID.
Well, as soon as you walk into the arena, it scans your face and you’re on a screen with all your numbers on it. You’re just like, “Holy shit. This is crazy, man.” That’s basically the technology they have around the streets. They obviously get fines for jaywalking without actually interacting with an officer. It just shows up in the mail, because they got facial recognition that’s linked to their ID to their WeChat account. So you kind of see that and no one really pays attention to it at all. It’s just China. Let him be, whatever, but walk.
But some countries like Australia would love to have that kind of system. People think that’s crazy to say or hear, but politicians would love it. I mean, you’d have your thumb on everyone’s forehead.
[16:31] CK: That’s not crazy to hear seeing what dictator Dan is up to in his press conferences. He could tell.
[16:37] Andrew: No doubt. Yeah, he’s the worst. There’s not one politician here that I trust for their word. That’s in power, not one state. They are power-hungry tyrants right now, and every day they continue to surprise me with the rhetoric they’re coming out with.
But yeah, man, I follow the progression of where China has gone. My family is of Croatian descent. I’m of Croatian descent. My parents are both born in Croatia. And my grandparents migrated during communism. So we were, unfortunately, on the wrong side of the Communist Party. We weren’t with the– what was going on. So if anyone who’s read about communism, you’re either with us or against this. And if you’re against this, you’re hearing some shit.
My great grandfather got thrown in jail. He got beaten by the military police in front of his house and neighbors multiple times for being on the alternate political body, essentially. And so, they escaped that in the 70s and got out right before the War of Independence, which was the early 90s in Yugoslavia. So they’re akin to these kinds of things.
And I guess, whenever you bring it up, this is very similar to how communism was formed and started. People say, “Oh, you’re an idiot. How can you compare it to this?” Well, I’ll tell those people who don’t talk to someone who’s migrated from communism. Don’t talk to me about it, or you about it. Don’t talk to someone who’s migrated from the USSR, or different parts of Germany, or Yugoslavia, whatever, right? There are a few South American nations as well.
Go talk to them and they’ll give you the answer. Everyone I’ve spoken to that migrated from a communist regime has said this is how it starts and we’ve seen this story before. Every single one of them. But you get these kids that are just fresh out of college that thinks communism is Utopia and everything’s great.
And you’ve got these 40 or 50-year-olds in Australia. Australia has never really faced conflict on home soil besides what happened to the indigenous many generations ago. There’s never been a war here. So people don’t know the atrocities of what a human being can put forward. I think we’re sheltered a little bit. We’ve been a lucky country for the last century. So people have no idea, but I guess that would be my one piece of advice. If you think it’s not, go and talk to someone who lived at…
[19:01] CK: Chimbera, what do you have to say?
[19:04] Chimbera: Hey! What’s up, guys? How are you doing?
[19:09] CK: We’re doing great. Andrew, just for some context, Chimbera, again, is a community leader in Bitcoin Beach, El Zonte, El Salvador. His efforts were a big part of eventually Bitcoin becoming legal tender in El Salvador. So, maybe, Chimbera will be shy about that kind of acknowledgment, but he’s definitely done a big part for Bitcoiners. I think maybe he can discuss how Bitcoin has affected the freedom of the people in El Salvador who have adopted it.
[19:47] Chimbera: Nah! It’s super exciting. Andrew, really nice to meet you. It’s super exciting to hear you talk about it and really nice to meet you. You can come down here and we can meet you. I’m jumping into this space because today, I’m in the place where it’s going to be Bitcoin City right now. And this is just like a paradise, guys.
Every place that I have been seen today is like, “Wow! This is going to be amazing!” Being here today and seeing this sunset that I’m seeing today, you can go to my profile and look at the picture that I just posted. This part of El Salvador is amazing! Bitcoin here is going to be close to here and I just want to bring to you this crazy idea, right? But that is going to be a reality. I hope many of you will be here soon.
[21:03] CK: Chimbera, we’ve been talking about freedom and the lack of freedom in Australia. Now, there’s been a lot of criticism towards Bukele for what he’s doing politically outside of the Bitcoin law. Are you confident that El Salvador and Bitcoin City are going to be a free place for people to have, like a haven? Or is that something that might be a pipe dream?
[21:32] Chimbera: I just want to answer you with this answer. I’m having the best time of my life here now. So, get whatever you want, but I’m having the best time of my life.
[21:46] CK: Awesome! I was going to say later on in the conversation, we’d love to hear some stories about how Bitcoin has affected people in El Salvador and El Zonte, in particular your community. Maybe that would be something that is helpful.
But I appreciate you sharing about Bitcoin City. We also have Tone Vays on stage. I actually shared a Tone Vays tweet a couple of days back, and I feel like it was really relevant to what Andrew was saying. Kind of regarding the people who have escaped communism and fascism and the Nazis. They’re starting to see signs of that again in Australia and in other countries across the globe. And I think Tone’s tweet has a lot to say about that. I know Tone has a history in Russia and can kind of reflect on that, too.
[22:36] Chimbera: What I want to share with you today is like, last week, we had the Bitcoin Week, it’s how we call it here in El Salvador. It was amazing. And I welcome everyone in El Zonte and Bitcoin Beach. And I say, “Welcome to the future!” It was so amazing to see everyone from all over the world!
Like people from Europe, people from Africa, people from the United States, people from Canada, all here using different products, using different wallets, using different companies. But having one thing in common and paying all the merchants here using the same monetary network to pay for all the services and all the products. And I say, “This is how the future will be.”
So, if there is one place where I want to be, it’s in El Salvador. It’s not because I’m from here, it’s because El Salvador is one of the places that show the entire world that is like, of course, we go! Australia is getting crazy and I don’t understand why. But it’s somebody saying like, “Welcome, guys. Come here. Find yourself here. Spend your Bitcoin here. Buy your houses here.”
[24:13] Svetski: I really should have joined you guys in El Salvador last week. I was just too busy in Dubai and Europe. Now, back in the US as well. Hey, thanks for letting me say a few words. Andrew, I’m a really big fan. I remember watching you.
I’m a Bitcoiner that did escape the Soviet Union in the late 1980s. I was only ten years old. But I remember it and I basically turned my entire Twitter from talking only about Bitcoin to basically talking exactly what you’re saying. Just watching what’s going on. It’s crazy. I have lost a lot of subscribers. People are very upset that I turned my channel political, speaking out against everything with the mandates, and the vaccines, and some other political stuff, but this is just so much more important!
And yeah, it’s crazy. My parents also see the writing on the wall. America is like one of the last few places left because of our gun rights. And it’s looking really bad. So, I just wanted to comment that I agree with you a hundred percent. And this is literally what my Twitter feed has become, instead of educating about Bitcoin, which is what it’s been for like 6 years straight prior to the last year and a half.
[25:36] Andrew: Yeah. I think just to jump in real quick, it’s important to talk about. We have to talk about it. That’s the most disappointing thing is that everyone’s kind of shunned from talking about it. And I think you’re complicit if you remain silent when you see injustices and human rights violations all over the place.
[25:58] Svetski: Yeah, I agree. And my last week from yesterday, there was like an article where American politicians are advising people not to celebrate Thanksgiving. Like, “Hey, maybe you shouldn’t see your family.” “Hey, maybe, you shouldn’t buy that turkey, because it’s more expensive.” And that one really triggered me because my family left the Soviet Union the week of Thanksgiving, like the week of this holiday.
No matter where I am in the world, I always try to come back to the US. Just this week, it’s like the most important holiday for my family gets together because that’s the week that we left communism. And I’m watching all these articles telling people not to get together with their families. It’s just insane.
[26:40] Andrew: I’ve got a better one for you. So our version in Australia of like the Today Show or the morning show, like the ones you have in America that people watch while they’re making the kids breakfast.
We had a presenter here, probably the biggest rating morning show, and they gave a 4 or 5 minutes segment about how you should deal with unvaccinated family members. And like, literally, went into detail about “well, you should maybe not invite them.” “You should confront them.” “You should make them feel…” I was just like, this is on national TV, one of the highest rating morning shows. I just could not believe it like that this was an actual segment on Australian TV. It was unbelievable.
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[29:23] CK: Some of the stuff that we’ve been seeing out of Australia has been absolutely jaw-dropping. And then two things; the level of criticism internationally is one thing, but then the level of acceptance by Australians is another. It kind of really speaks to how far gone the indoctrination is and how far away we are from 2019 mentalities.
[29:49] Andrew: Yeah, no doubt. And look, most of the people that are standing up and trying to voice their concerns and fight, there is a lot of Australians but the majority of Aussie is– there’s a lot of people that have migrated here that came from different situations that are like, “We’re going to fight for this.”
As I said, I think Australia has been a lucky country for the last century. No conflict here. No wars. First world problems kind of thing. Everyone’s got enough to get by. So, there are no real issues. Whereas now, it’s starting to turn on its head and people are like, “No, we will fight to try and keep this country for why it was great.”
But to most everyday Australians that have never faced this or know anything about this, it’s kind of foreign. Like, “No! We’ll be fine. It’s Australia. Nothing bad is going to happen. We trust our politicians. They’re going to do right for us.” I think they’re the people that in a matter of time are going to be very, very surprised.
[30:42] CK: I want to get back to Chimbera and hear and talk a little bit about jurisdictional arbitrage, the idea of moving states, trying to go to places that are going to respect citizens more than Australia, some states in the US, Europe, that kind of thing.
But I want to hear about what’s happening on the streets in Melbourne and some of these other major cities that have really been locked down for a while. What percentage of Australians have started to really question what’s going on?
I guess, again, this is stuff that’s not really covered at all in mainstream media here. It seems like they’ll talk about some protests, but they definitely won’t talk about COVID or lockdown protests.
So, what’s happening on the streets?
[31:27] Andrew: Yeah, I mean, last weekend, we had I think it was close to a million total nationwide, around about there. It might have been 700,000. But we had 700,000 to a million people nationwide. So we had a couple 100,000 in Melbourne, a couple 100,000 in Sydney, and then every other small city had numbers, right?
So, it’s not very well-publicized. Generally, if it was a protest for any other social cause, it’d be front-page news. You got to get 3 or 4 pages into the paper, or you got to scroll down the website to find it. As I said, there are people there that are mixed groups. As I said, I’m from Croatian background.
So, the thing that really caught me was a friend of mine sent me a live feed. Everyone who doesn’t know should look it up. But the Croatian and Serbian communities, not the best of friends, historically. There’s a massive war that ended in the early 90s. During these protests, there were 2 people, one with a Croatian flag, one with a Serbian flag, walking hand in hand.
So, to see that kind of stuff at these protests, and the media, politicians dabbled down. They call these people right-wing fascists, Nazis, anti-vaxxers. And you talk to some of these people.
I know people personally that have gone to many of these protests. They’re people that were apolitical. They didn’t care about politics, left or right. All they cared about was I want to go work. I want to come home, spend time with my kids, work seven to seven during the weekday. On a weekend, go fishing, go surfing. For a holiday, have the kids go out to eat, go to the sport. Somebody with that life, now they’re invested!
They’re like, “No, I’m going to go stand up.” But you look at what the media is putting forward to portray these people, for the most part, even just the wording they use an article as anti-vaxxers, they’re not! There are some people there that are anti-vaxxers–
Correct. There are some people there that probably are on the more violent side and ready to create civil disobedience. I agree with that, a small percentage.
But the majority of these people are everyday working families who are not Nazis. They’re not fascist, they’re looking at– we’ve been in lockdown for almost two years. Mental health is declining, I can’t pay my mortgage, my kids are struggling because they’re six years old and doing ten hours of schooling via an iPad or a computer. They’re these people and that’s where the media is somewhat being complicit because they’re not telling the whole story.
They’re trying to label these people as villains when they’re not. They’re not villains, they’re standing up for what’s right. But I mean, our politicians then say, well, even when the protests happen that’s a small number of our population.
But as I said, there are people there that have had both doses of the vaccine. There are people there that have had one dose. There are people there that have had none and they’ve all come together. But, unfortunately, the everyday people that just watch the media and think that’s possible. You look at them like they’re the reason why we’re still locking down. They’re the reason why there’s still a pandemic which is it’s just absolute sensationalism at its best and it’s just factually wrong.
[34:29] Chimbera: Andrew, if there is any place that says, “Welcome” it’s El Salvador. Guys, if there is anyone in this Twitter Space that doesn’t feel represented for any country, come to El Salvador, come to Bitcoin Beach, come to El Zonte, come to El Salvador. This is your country! This is your place! This is where you need to be right now, guys.
I’m right now where it’s going to be Bitcoin City. I’m watching an amazing sunset and I say this is a paradise! I’m going to post a picture and I need to leave now because I’m here with some friends. But I’m going to close by saying this, “The Bitcoin Beach still want to go to the Bitcoin Conference in April in Miami. I want to talk to Bitcoin Magazine and I hope we can have some tickets to the conference.”
[35:29] CK: Yeah, let’s make it happen. Just DM me, Chimbera.
[35:30] Chimbera: …to the conference.
[35:31] CK: Yes, sir. I want to turn it back to Andrew. Andrew, what are your thoughts in terms of leaving Australia potentially, going to a place that respects people’s rights a little bit more, and that kind of idea? Obviously, that’s a very popular idea amongst Bitcoin people because Bitcoin is global money, it’s fungible and usable and liquid everywhere, and it enables people to kind of take their property and leave. That’s one of the features. What are your thoughts on that and the future might force that?
[36:09] Andrew: Yeah, I mean, look, I get it. It’s easier said than done. My wife and I, actually, we have children, we have two kids. One starts school next year. I think that’s a huge reason why people can’t just get up and leave.
Look, I have alternate escape routes if needed. If this gets any crazier, I have different options that I can look at. But I mean, El Salvador might be the answer because you look at Croatia, I got a passport. I’ve got citizenship of Croatia so that’s a possibility. But now you look there and they’ve just– because they’re a part of the EU, they’re starting to follow suit with Austria and Germany.
Now, they have implemented the past whereas their president, only three or four months ago, they got to 50% of vax rate in the population and said, “No, we’re done. This is enough. We’re moving on with everyone who’s got it. Everyone who’s wanted it has got it, it’s time to move on.”
So, I thought, shit, they’re doing the right thing. They’re getting on with life. But no, we’re hearing that they’ve implemented passes just to get in hospitals and get medical help and treatment.
The problem is where do you go and all it takes is if you move for political reasons in this day and age is a little bit different than back in the day, it could change on a whim.
You look at how the US, every state is different now with different rules. You move somewhere, let’s say hypothetically you move to Florida, which is great now. Then two years, someone else gets in who’s more into the tyrant type stuff and then you’ve moved your family, and then that changes. That’s a concern with moving on a whim. I agree with Bitcoin, it’s much easier to just get up and go. But I think most people would move right now.
I know people in Victoria, Melbourne, which is a state of Victoria, that would get out but they can’t because of the employment. They’ve got a mortgage on a house. They’ve got kids in school, kids with friends there, family. That’s what draws people. If I was single or just myself and my wife, probably a different conversation. But people have to remember that when you set up your life somewhere with children and that it becomes much harder and that’s where the government and society really have you. You can’t just pack a suitcase and leave.
But I guess on the flip side, debating myself is how long do you wait? Do you wait till it’s so bad that you can barely get out? That’s the million-dollar question.
[38:40] CK: It’s definitely extremely hard and I think within the US, there are areas with more and less confidence for people who want to move. Then internationally, there are areas with more and less are confident. But I feel like even internationally, there’s really no safe haven that has really kind of presented itself. I guess, El Salvador at Bitcoin City and kind of what went down there last week kind of might be an answer. But I feel like there’s definitely a lot of questions still there. I see you’re waving your hands.
[39:10] Andrew: Especially for us. [crosstalk]
[39:13] CK: It’s pretty much just the US or maybe some island. But yeah, one hundred percent.
[39:19] Andrew: The first world, essentially the countries that have been hardest hit with tyrannical senators and premiers and prime ministers, you look at Australia, you look at some of the states in the US. England had been hit pretty hard. Canada, Germany, it’s generally first of all countries. I actually heard someone talking the other day that if you’re pretty well off or have a decent income or decent net worth that go into a second world, third world, isn’t the worst thing because you can live a very good life there. They’ve got bigger issues than COVID so it’s not as tyrannical there, which I thought was an interesting point of view to hear.
[40:01] CK: No, a hundred percent. I mean, I feel like Mexico stands out in North America to me. But yeah, it’s definitely hard, especially right now there are no clear answers.
[40:14] Guest 1: Yeah, I’m with you about Mexico. I’ve been looking at Mexico myself.
[40:20] CK: I see you’re raising your hand. What’s up, my man?
[40:23] Guest 1: I just wanted to chime in and kind of ask Andrew a little bit more on the Australia side of things. What is the access to testing, if anything? Are there testing centers available regardless of what your vaccine status is? Or is that just sort of not even an option?
[40:43] Andrew: You mean testing for just if you’ve got COVID?
[40:45] Guest 1: COVID testing, yes.
[40:47] Andrew: No, they want you to test. They’ll bring out a silver platter for you to test. If they can get their case numbers off and create more fear, they will roll out a red carpet for you to get tested. That doesn’t matter so much so that, I mean, they’re mandatory testing people if you’re in a– what I think today a backpacker hotel in Byron Bay of all places.
Byron Bay is kind of known as I’d say a free hippie-type town, a backpacker hostel. There was a positive case there, they’ve locked down that whole hostel. Then all had to leave, they have to get mandatory testing and then self-isolate. They go hard, even testing, I mean, at one point we had Dan Andrews, who was just referenced before.
He’s a Premier of Victoria saying that even if you have hay fever symptoms, you should still get tested. I mean, just absolutely bonkers. They want as many tests out there as they can get. It shows how scared the people are because you go into some of these testing sites and there are lines around the block on any given day, especially if during hay fever season.
Melbourne’s notorious for hay fever. I get it every winter. Someone gets a little sniffle and their eyes are sore and they’re running a test and it’s kind of crazy. I think you got to know your own symptoms of hay fever that you’re not going to run and get tested every third day. But they get to answer your question, they love testing and they’ll roll out the red carpet for you to boost those case numbers up so they can put it up on a screen.
[42:15] Guest 1: My assumption is all of the testings in Australia is free or at least covered by the health care system that you guys have over there.
[42:24] Andrew: Correct. The health system covers your basic PCR test. I mean, it’s changing like the state of Queensland here has now, that in Australia they’re very strict on letting people back in. Even residents can’t get back in. Well, now they have allowed residents back in. They have to be double vaccinated and they have to home quarantine.
These are people that actually owned a home here that happened to have got locked out of the state, could not even return to their home where locked for months 6 or 7 now.
Now they’re making, if you’re a non-resident, they’re going to open for tourism. Queensland in Australia, for those who don’t know, it’s a Florida/California tropical climate. It’s kind of the tourist destination in Australia to get away for a weekend and get some sunshine. They’re allowing tourists to come in starting next month, have to be double vaccinated. But you’d have to pay for your own testing to come in.
That’s been a huge issue politically here because, for a family of 4, it’s going to cost 4- 5- $600 for you just to get into the state, on top of your travel costs. People are kind of losing their shit around that saying, “well, an everyday family that’s a lot of money just for a test.”
They’re kind of crazy here. Every state has different rules, it changes daily. You need permits to go everywhere. You have to get a permit to go state to state. Just crossing a border, you have to get a permit. It’s just not a good time.
[43:52] Guest 2: Hey, Andrew, when you say tourism, do you mean within Australia? Or do you mean from other countries?
[43:57] Andrew: Both but you can’t get– Well, this is a whole separate issue but yeah, generally-ish, Queensland was very big with the Japanese and a lot of Asian migrants and holidaymakers.
But in Australia, Queensland is kind of the place you go to get some warmth. If you’re working in the grind in Melbourne or Sydney or Adelaide or wherever and you’re like, “Hey, I want to get some sun for 2 or 3 days or go for a two-week holiday with the family,” Queensland’s kind of the place you go and it’s like Brisbane, Gold Coast, Cairns.
But your other question, so, this is what’s crazy there. There are work shortages for whatever reason. Now a lot of companies are struggling to find workers. The theory is that a lot is being stood down because they haven’t taken the mandated vaccine or both doses or whatever reason. Some people have just protested it because they didn’t want to be forced.
There’s a lot of companies that have employee shortages. They’ve actually allowing international students and migrant work visas into the country. They can actually get into some of these states that Australian people can’t even get into. That’s what’s crazy. I tweeted about it a couple of days ago so if you’re looking to go state to state for a holiday, you double vax and all that a lot of other stuff, and you won’t get in. But if you’re coming on a student or a work visa, they might accept one dose. There are different rules for people coming from overseas.
Everyday, Australians over here are kind of up against it a little bit where it’s like, I live in this country. I’m a citizen. I’ve got less rights than someone coming in here on a work or student visa is just absolutely mind-blowing.
[45:33] Guest 2: Yeah, I’m really going to miss Australia. I really enjoyed Brisbane and Gold Coast. I’ve been to all the major cities. I see Svetski just joined as a speaker. That’s where we met back in…
[45:43] Svetski: It was our honeymoon.
Andrew, we haven’t met yet, buddy. I recognize your face because I remember I saw that video that kind of went viral on Twitter or Instagram or fucking something, I don’t know. But I appreciate you having the balls to fucking actually speak up because everyone else has obviously been bought and paid for or is too cocked to stand the fuck up and actually speak the truth. They hide behind a veil of political correctness, which is absolute fucking horseshit. That’s the whole reason why we’re in this mess, in the beginning, is, we don’t have any more strong men that are willing to get up and say something.
The fucking women are braver than the men these days, seriously. My sister’s in Brizzie so I’m as you can probably tell, you know the accent. I grew up there. I got out in 2019. I’ve always said Australia was a dictatorship behind the veil. People used to laugh at me and so I whatever meant Australia is one of the freest countries.
I never knew it would get this fucking bad this quickly, but I got the fuck out in 2019. When I saw what was happening in 2020, I decided not to come back. I don’t know if I’ll ever come back at this point because it’s a disaster.
My sister’s in Brizzie, my mom’s in Sydney. My sister hasn’t been able to visit my mom for fucking god knows a year now, I think. Well, whatever it’s been, it’s just fucking categorically ridiculous.
It’s a function of the country of a time having built up such a capital base that it is wealthy enough to perpetuate what is effectively an economic fraud. Any form of a mandate is economically fraudulent because you can’t force everybody to do the fucking same thing just because some wannabe dictator said so. But Australia has the money to anyone that might oppose either gets appeased or censored.
[48:01] Andrew: Or fined?
[48:02] Svetski: Or fined, exactly. They’re basically robbing from one group to fund subsidizing things like the media. I was looking at one of the recent announcements by the government where they’re saying some sectors of the economy have been impacted really heavily in particular. Media has apparently been impacted really heavily and they get a fucking 100% rebate on any expenses for the next 12 months. If that’s not bought and paid for, I don’t fucking know what is.
[48:39] Andrew: I just quietly subscribed to what I already posted that was like, does anyone else not see what this is? You wonder why we’re not getting the right messaging around who really is at protests, why we’re getting the rhetoric, why they’re doubling down on premiers’ and senators’ rhetoric and divisiveness.
Also, if you follow, I watched a few of these press conferences too, I want to bang my head against the wall. This was last year, I’ve stopped watching them completely. But watching those and just hearing the questions from the journalists with no follow-up, they actually catch some of the premiers or senators in a gotcha moment where they need a follow-up question and they won’t follow it up, they just let it ride. It’s clear as day they know that they are getting funding from the government and they bet a total government line. To your point, you’re right, that thing veil is clear as day it’s been removed now. If you’re not with the government, then you’re in some shit and you got to be pushing shit uphill, as they say. I totally agree.
[49:44] Svetski: Yeah, well, this is why I mean, I don’t know, I guess you’re in a bit of a Bitcoin-hosted room. I mean, I don’t know what your position on that is.
We’ve sort of at least Bitcoin as an innovation or as an invention or as a discovery more than anything else. Its essence or its ethos has been one of defunding and making accountable the governors by the governed since the beginning. It was always this insurance policy on if the world does go completely fucking mad and if things get really, really bad, we should have a parallel monetary system.
Because in the absence of something like that, what is going to happen is the government-issued money or the central bank-issued money, which is basically they’re part of the same apparatus, will make it such that if you want to exist in the world, you require money, like you store the product of your labor in a thing called money.
You work for the way you measure the value that you input into an economy, into a society as money. If they are the ones who issue that and can control it, they can tell you what you can spend your money on, how you can spend it, when you can spend it, how much you can spend. If you are a dissident of some sort and you have the fucking alternative opinion, God forbid, and you might think for yourself, they turn it off.
[51:15] Andrew: Yeah, that’s the conversation around digital ID in China. I mean, they’re notorious for that over there. As I said, that’s a conspiracy theory to happen in Australia or the US one day or wherever, right? But stranger things have happened and again definitely that’s why.
[51:31] Svetski: They’re rolling out CBDCs already, man. I just sort of have a Slack channel for the business. I run a Bitcoin company in Australia and it was in our Slack channel yesterday. One of the marketing guys was like, “It looks like the Australians are going to be pursuing crypto. It’s like a CBDC article.” and I was like, “Man, that’s literally– I call it slave coin.” Because that’s effectively what it is, a Central Bank Digital Currency is fundamentally a fucking slave coin. They’ll have the button to measure and track your sentiment and your opinion.
Basically, should you think differently, we don’t need any thought police anymore. We don’t need any of the Orwellian crap. We have the money and that is where they defund you. It is the ultimate.
In the art of war, to defeat your enemy, you go and you cut their resource lines. You turn off their food, you turn off their fucking water. Well, money is the path to getting that in a civilized society and you hold everybody by the balls in doing so.
This is why like people like Tone, people like Bitcoin magazine. We’ve been banging on about Bitcoin. For this reason, Bitcoin is not about fucking getting rich and going to the fucking moon. It is literally freedom money versus slave money and this is at the fucking core. We don’t win this battle, we don’t win shit. I mean, you’re probably familiar with Pete Evans, right?
[52:58] Andrew: Yeah.
[52:59] Svetski: Peter and I are fucking good friends. We’ve done a 12-episode podcast series on his show and kind of taking him through the fucking rabbit hole of Bitcoin. It’s like, this is the battle we must win. Well, this is the war we must win. We win this, then the tide turns. But until then, I mean, as much as I’m surprised about what’s happening in Australia, I’m actually also simultaneously not surprised. Because when you have enough capital or wealth that has been built up over the last couple of hundred years in Oz, you can erode that in the process of doing something that is completely fucking abhorrent to nature, and to natural law, and to fucking freedom, and everything. But you can find your way into becoming a fucking dictatorship.
[53:51] CK: It’s the speed. The surprising part is the speed of how [inaudible]. I wake up every morning, I look at my Twitter feed and I can’t believe I’m watching it escalate on a daily basis.
[54:03] Andrew: Yeah, and the speed is one thing and it’s just people falling in line and accepting it and actually policing it themselves I spoke about earlier. That’s probably been my biggest surprise. There’s one thing that I mandate or a law gets passed by the government. But it’s another thing to have the people implementing and policing that law that has no reason to really. They’re doing the government’s bidding for them for free. That’s kind of my big concern is how quickly people have just said, “Yeah, that’s just the normal way of life. We’re going to live with this because of the virus.”
They’re slowly eroding everything that’s been built in such a great country. I guess the other point I’d make around why Bitcoin is important in what we’re doing in the world is, I mean, I’m sure most of you have bank accounts. But you can go and withdraw some cash that’s more than a few thousand. I couldn’t believe it.
I went and withdrew some cash about a couple of months ago, 6 months ago I tweeted about this. I got grilled by the teller and I was like, “I know in the US, obviously, they had the 10k law. We have a similar law here in Australia without the right UOP if you’re withdrawing large amounts. But I think I’ll withdraw a little bit under 10k. I think was 8 or 9k for whatever reason, personal reasons.”
The teller is grilling me like, “What are you doing with this money?” I said like, “It’s not your business.” “No, I need to know.” I said, “Okay, I’m buying a used car.” I said it with a smile on my face, obviously, just being sarcastic and like, “Yeah, I’m buying a used car.” Then goes on to grill me about, “Well, you know about fraud in used cars. Are you sure there’s someone actually selling?”
“Lady, just– I want my fucking money. I don’t need to have this conversation with you.” That’s when you kind of realize that if you ever want to just mass withdraw your funds, they can put a stop to it if they really wanted to. It was just really in your face alarming that I’m getting grilled by just some lady that’s obviously just doing her job. But she has been mandated to do that by bosses to what are you doing with your money and making me feel guilty about withdrawing my money is kind of bonkers.
[56:04] Svetski: Yeah, we have a saying in Bitcoin called “not your keys, not your coins.” It relates to this as if the money’s in the bank, it’s not yours, buddy. It’s the bank’s and they’re giving you permission to do something with it. This is, again, one of the things about the essence around Bitcoin is that it’s a bearer instrument. Meaning, that when you hold your Bitcoin, there is not a power in the universe that can tell you what to do with it other than you.
That is why governments fundamentally hate it. Governments love crypto, governments love blockchain, governments like CBDC because all of that stuff is manageable by them. The single thing on the fucking planet that they can’t fuck with is a form of money that is in essence information and tied to the second law of thermodynamics such that they can’t fucking change it, corrupt it, adjust it, manipulate it, or anything and they’re fucking shit scared of Bitcoin.
Man, it’s the Achilles heel. We need to get voices like yours in and around this, because the more people we rally around it, particularly in Oz, I think literally the last thing, me and Pete Evans had been banging on about this. I said he’s got to start building communities there which operate parallel to the banking system and everything.
If you guys can get some local farmers’ markets and people, fucking handymen and plumbers and teachers, and medical people, if you guys can operate independently of them and use kind of Bitcoin as your mechanism for a transaction– the government can’t fucking stop you. A and B, they want to know what the fuck you’re doing and they think that they got you by the balls, but they can’t. The more we can move Aussies off the dollar standard over there, the more you kind of you do two things:
One is you become independent when they think you are dependent. But number two is, actually, you erode their tax base. Because at the moment, if you’re using Aussie dollars and if you’re paying tax in Australia, you’re literally funding your jailers. You are literally paying the motherfucker who’s telling you to stay inside to ram cotton swabs up your nose even though you’ve been fucking jabbed thirty-six times. It’s the dumbest shit on the face of the planet and we’re paying them for it, which makes it even dumber.
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[60:25] Andrew: Well, I guess the thing around Bitcoin for Australians to understand is, I mean when they look at it dollar-wise, I guess the wild swings, that’s probably what everyday Australians that don’t really know much about Bitcoin, that’s kind of the barrier you need to break down for them. Because they look at it as, well, it’s worth 60k today but then it’s worth 30k tomorrow. How do I charge my plumbing services accordingly? How many coins do I charge? Do you know what I mean?
That’s where I think it puts a lot of people off here when they look at it just quickly because they relate it back to the US with the Aussie dollar, right? That’s a bit more stable, so that’s kind of what the old school way of thinking. But, I reckon, I think that’s a big problem that you face when you’re trying to get people completely on that Bitcoin platform rather than having anything to do with the dollar.
[61:15] Svetski: Yeah, it’s more around the input and output costs. If you have exposure to dollars on one side and Bitcoin on the other, then you got to manage the volatility. This is where sort of closed systems really work nicely, is that if your input costs are measured in Bitcoin and then your earnings are also measured in Bitcoin, you actually don’t get that volatility because then what happens is Bitcoin becomes your unit of account.
We’ve also got another thing that we talked about in Bitcoin is called stacking SATs. We don’t look at the Bitcoin price, generally. What we’re looking at is the Satoshi value. Very similar to, I’m sure you’ve been to Bali. You go to Bali and you swap your dollars for whatever the fuck the Indonesian rupee or whatever it’s called. You get a massage and it’s nine and a half thousand rupees. In the same way, you can’t kind of look at it that way. A massage in Australia might cost 60 bucks but it’s actually about 100,000 Satoshis. That’s what we sort of want to think in.
Over time, what’s happening is that the price per Satoshi is appreciating in relationship to the dollar. What might be 100,000 Satoshis today is going to buy your massage today. In 10 years, it’s going to buy you a fucking house.
Unlike the Indonesian rupee, which today, nine and a half thousand rupees is going to buy you a massage, in the future, it’ll buy you a fucking spit in the face. That one’s going down in value, but Bitcoin is sort of [crosstalk] in value.
If we can kind of get the unit buyers and more and more people moving across into a Bitcoin standard helps. But yeah, you’re right, the fact that input costs still measured in dollars and people still use dollars as the unit of account means it’s going to take a while for that to happen. But this is part of that educational process, man, the more people understand to think in terms of SATs. Because that’s the place that me and many probably people in this spaces at the moment think in terms of– when I go out and buy some food, and I pay $100 bill, I don’t look at it in dollars. I’m like, “Fucking hell! That’s like 200,000 SATs that I could have fucking had in my pocket that I’ve spent it on food.”
Then the next day, I decided to fast and acquire more SATs. Anyway, it’s an educational thing. I think people, like you, really get deeper and more versed on Bitcoin, I think you’ve got a lot of trust in the community if you can discuss that better.
One final thing that I got to run is Bitcoins have nothing to sell you but your own freedom and sovereignty. The difference with governments and crypto and all the other fiat legacy system is that they have something to sell you, which is their fucking wares or their ideas and their stupidity at your expense. We need to do our part to kind of slap some people awake perfectly.
[64:36] Andrew: Yeah, until the government here tries to, you know, there’s already been rumblings around Bitcoin. It’s the way to launder money. They’ve started that whole spiel, they did a little bit in the US. But the problem is in Australia if it gets too big and we start going strictly Bitcoin and get off-grid to an extent, the government here is going to do something about it. They’re going to implement some sort of bullshit or something to do with it. They’ll try to ban it, they’ll try to hinder it and that’s the issue we’ll have in Australia.
[65:04] Svetski: Sort of.
Their capacity to ban Bitcoin is similar to their capacity to ban the number “zero” or the letter “A” or banning “2+2=4.” They can attempt to do that, but the thing about Bitcoin, what it does is it transforms money into information you can’t destroy.
I could send you Bitcoin over Morse code, I can send you Bitcoin in a photo, I can send you Bitcoin in a fucking audio file. They literally can’t fucking stop it.
One of the beautiful things about Bitcoin on the ways, it gets skin in the game from players at different levels of the game. There are companies that are technically our enemies- whether it’s media companies, whether it’s banks, or whatever- what’s happening is, their own survival instinct and mechanism will drive them to have to put some Bitcoin on their own balance sheet, otherwise they’ll end up fucking obsolete. And in doing so, all of a sudden, they start to loosen their tie to the government and they start to be in a position where they’re compromised!
That’s what we need to as like– as Bitcoin infiltrates, it kind of takes our enemy’s greed and uses it against them. Because they can either not be a part of Bitcoin and, basically, be left behind. Because as Bitcoin continues to appreciate, mark my words, one Bitcoin will be enough for you to probably buy all versions in the next ten or twenty years.
And I’m not joking. People think Bitcoin is expensive as sixty grand. Wait until Bitcoin’s 60 million or 600 million. Then you’ll know it’s expensive.
[66:48] CK: Alex.
[66:49] Svetski: Yow?
[66:50] CK: My name is thirty-seven SATs because I think thirty-seven SATs is generational wealth. So, very bullish over here. [crosstalk]
[66:56] Svetski: Yeah. CK’s probably even more bullish than fucking Miles is. Literally, that’s what we’re dealing with this.
So, this motherfucker’s got no chance against us. What we want to do is we wanna bring as many good people across to protect their wealth and become sovereign, sooner rather than later. Let the fucking government be the last ones to adopt bitcoin because then they can clean our fucking toilets. That’s sort of the game plan.
[67:27] Andrew: Until the playbook from Australia will be labeled as Nazi coin. [crosstalk] They’ll come up with a law or some sort of mandate saying that if anyone offers to pay for anything in Bitcoin you should tell them, tell your local police officer, where they’ll come and get you arrested. That will be the next fight here. With the way, I governed this, man. I can tell you that much.
[67:47] Svetski: Well, they will. This is where strong networks come into place. They’ll do the same with cash. They’ll do the same with bitcoin. So what’s going to have to happen is that strong networks amongst people, amongst good individuals, need to be built now, so that, you guys, can do that.
As that starts to increase, what we need to do is we need to basically get economically strong enough to… It’s a multifaceted attack, right? So there’s no silver bullet where it’s just the one thing. As private individuals do that, as our own enemies, do it like as bank stuff, putting Bitcoin in the balance sheet as large corporates put Bitcoin in a balance sheet. [crosstalk] It makes it hard for them to fucking ban it.
[68:35] CK: Svetski, there’s a lot of complex game theory. It’s going to be tough to chew through it all in just one sitting. Maybe, there can be a side-channel, but I definitely appreciate the strong orange feeling that you bring to the table. Generally speaking, like Andrew, I think, if anything that Alex is saying is that there’s a group of people coalescing around this monetary technology that really see the world in some other way that you do, and are kind of fearful of the same trends and are trying to counterbalance it.
So obviously, Svetki’s very passionate about it. Hopefully, that you can come over to this side because you have a great messaging platform that’s very alive for sure.
[69:25] Svetki: Appreciate that, CK. Look, Andrew, if you wanna hit me up afterward this, man, we should probably have a chat or maybe do a show together or some shit. I’d love to discuss that further. Sorry for kind of hijacking that fucking conversation, I came in swinging.
[69:39] Andrew: Classic.
[69:40] CK: So, I guess, Andrew, I kind of want to give you back the mic and I don’t know how much more time you have, but I guess based on what just… you know, Svetki’s view and this conversation so far, what do you kind of make of– I guess, what are your thoughts on what’s happening around the world.
Bitcoin, what people can do about it. People waking up– are there people waking up with a reason to have hope. I know that’s pretty wide-ranging but I kind of want to let you pick and choose where you want to tackle this.
[70:16] Andrew: Yeah, it’s concurring me in a lot of directions. It’s a lot to talk about as far as that question, I mean, the number one thing from most people is, just from a diverse point of view, it would’ve been able to see the world, and to sit some daily advice for yourself. That’s a start.
I guess the biggest thing for people that I’d been involved in crypto is taking that first step and trying to make that jump. So, you obviously invest some money a little bit early just to see, get a few of how it goes daily. Then maybe instead of buying, whatever it is, it might be 50 dollars a day, or it might be whatever. That will be a start. I think It’s going to be important. It’s what the future holds, exactly.
I like to point that if we could get off the government’s way of thinking, and the government’s teeth with crypto, with Bitcoin, I think it’s a way to go where you can kind of, like you guys said, if you need to pack up and leave, you don’t have to pack a suitcase for your Bitcoin, right? You can just leave and you can have it wherever you’re holding it, I guess. So, that’s the main thing. It’s just a crazy time.
I think there’s a lot of people out there that are trying to voice these concerns. Sort of, Bitcoin, just having people use their voice as the biggest thing. That’s been the most disappointing. It’s not so much the people that are doubling down on government rhetoric and doubling down on the vision, trying to beat us, the Starz out there, the police, all this shit.
It’s the people that are keeping quiet through all this like that. They’re like “Oh, man. If I say something I might be affected, my job might be affected.” I understand it to an extent, but the more people we have that will speak out will clearly show everyone that’s a majority of people. It’s not the minority.
It’s the majority of people who have these views that everyone’s just so scared. “Political correctness.” “I can’t go against the grain.” “My business has a government contract.” That’s where I’m seeing Australia. That’s the songs everyone hears.
[72:26] Guest 1: Hundred percent on that, Andrew, I refer to it as “unconfiscability.” That’s my elevator pitch. Bitcoin is the first “unconfiscatable asset” in human history. Something in value that you can store in your head. The example I give is going back to the Soviet Union when my family fled the Soviet Union in 1989, we were only allowed to live with 100 US dollars per family member. They even checked how much jewelry you’re leaving with and then they’ll just take it to the airport before you go. So, that’s all you had no matter how much wealth you had, hundred dollars per person to start a new life in a new county. Bitcoin stops all that. All your wealth with you in your head and nobody can stop it.
[73:14] Andrew: Yeah, hundred percent agree.
[73:18] CK: Andrew, have you ever heard of the book The Sovereign Individual?
[73:23] Andrew: No, I haven’t. Good read?
[73:25] CK: That one is absolute fire. It predicted a lot of things including Bitcoin. It was published in 1997. But one of the other things it predicted are COVID, lockdowns for purposes of maintaining bureaucracies. That was published in 1997 and it blew my mind when I read those words reading the book.
It’s definitely a good read and can prepare people maybe for the future that’s ahead. That’s a really good one. Being able to cross borders and take the value with you, it’s a huge thing, I think.
I was talking to a guy who’s like “Yeah, you know the Russian jews would sew gold into their pants to escape with value.” And I was like, “Well, you know, with Bitcoin, you can memorize twelve words, and bam!” I feel like it’s definitely a new weapon in our arsenal- against the freedom arsenal, that is just really a new… something that has never existed before.
[74:31] Andrew: Yeah, by now it’s easy to take out with you. It totally makes sense. I guess it’s just more that conversation of how do you get the everyday Australian, everyday American that has no idea about crypto that gets information from mainstream media. How do you get them on board to say how important it can be, and what it is for the future? That’s probably the biggest goal for it all rather than, I guess we discussed it, we know the pros.
But it’s getting those everyday people who are just not trying mentally. It’s new and shiny, I don’t trust it and the government is always right, and the dollar is today’s need, right? So, it’s getting most people on board.
[75:17] Svetski: On that one, Andrew. I’m going to bounce and grab some dinner. But I was gonna say, I don’t think we need to get everyone on board? I think the people who need to get on board are the people who are literally following you, following me, following Ton, following Pete Evans, following that Michael Sander, and all that sort of stuff.
They’re the ones because they’re the ones who fucking matter. Because they’re the ones who fucking have enough brain cells left to think critically for themselves. We’re not going to wake up everyone. We’re not going to wake up the sheep. We’re not going to wake up the want-to-be fucking inferiority complex mini dictators who are fucking telling you to slip your mask up a little bit further up your nose so you can suffocate more.
The ones we need to wake up are those who are primed to listen. I read an article a little while ago called… it’s about the remnants. It’s a biblical reference to the small minority of people who are intolerant but awake and capable enough to think through things!
They’re the ones we need to talk to and we need to speak to them in a manner that helps them frame and understand what this thing is. They already have a distaste, they already have a distrust, they don’t want to be fucking slaves. A lot of the sheep want to be slaves. They want a government-hire-me-daddy, give me a fucking thirty-six boost, just give me whatever you tell me to do, right?
We’re never going to wake those guys up. So we want to focus on the ones we can. I think you’re a prime example of someone who has got an audience like that. Because otherwise, those people won’t be fucking following you, right? That’s kind of my two cents there. We’d love to connect later, bro. Really appreciate everything you’re doing down there. I hope one day to come back to fucking Australia, but if I can help from here, I’m happy to do my part, man. I’m glad you’re on the right side of the history for this.
[77:17] Andrew: Appreciate it. Thanks.
[77:19] CK: Touche, bro.
[77:20] Svetski: Thanks, everyone. I’m out.
[77:22] Tony: Later, Svetski.
[77:23] Svetski: Later, Tony. [crosstalk]
[77:24] CK: Bye. The article that he’s referencing is called ICS job. Also, a good read. I think there’s an audio version too. But yeah, Andrew we’ve got fifteen more minutes on the calendar. You’ve been very patient with your time. Thank you so much for joining us. The only person on stage who hasn’t voiced a question or a thought is Marjorie.
Marjorie, welcome. How’s it going? We’d love to give you the stage. Maybe you can ask Andrew a question and then maybe from there, we can do last words, and close it out.
[77:59] Marjorie: Thanks, CK. This will be a very good discussion. I was actually listening to what you guys are discussing and I’m kind of just taking notes.
I’m in Canada right now. When I’m looking at what’s happening in Australia and Europe, I’m kind of so worried because it seems like we’re going the same path as Australia. Where unvaccinated people are unable to leave.
So, basically, I have until this coming Monday to make a decision, whether I’m going to stay in Canada or leave because of my medical status because I’m not vaccinated.
What would you say to everyone here right now, because I’m seeing there are some Canadians and there are some discussions right now? Like what would you advise them? Would you just tell them to wait it out, stay there– Because there are people who are like telling me “I don’t want to leave because I have family here, I have a job here.” What would you advise them, Andrew?
[79:03] Andrew: Well that’s a tough question. I mean, people have different kinds of things that keep them drawing to where they are and that’s the hardest thing. I have a lot of friends and family for that matter in Melbourne that I wouldn’t say they are anti-vax, I wouldn’t say they are pro-vax. I think they’re in the middle, that they were okay. I don’t know if I want to get this because of the long-term implications of taking the vaccine.
I’m hearing mixed reports about one not working and I need a booster. People are just caught on the fence, right? All those people are taking it because they’re going to lose their job.
I do know a few people that just got off and left and go to Europe or different parts of the world. It’s a hard one for me.
I’ve got two children. Like I said, just to pack up and leave is kind of the last resort that is on the table. For me, as a last resort, things are really crazy. I got offerings since where I live my children are wearing a mask in school.
I’m not going to push– my kids are 3 and 5, that they’ll get the vaccination, the current jab, like “no, way.” Not right now, anyway, until I know that it’s more than safe and effective than any little children we got now, right? Which will be an easier way, so for my children, not going to happen. So, I don’t know how to answer that.
Like I said earlier, you can move somewhere that is great now. And then in six months’ time, a government official is overthrown and someone else is put in place and then they turn the wrench on you and the people there are completely different lore.
That’s exactly what’s happening in Croatia. What we have thought was going over there for a bit, especially when we heard that the President’s speech, four to five months ago now, saying, as I said earlier, 50% vaccination right? We’re done. Unfortunately, a lot goes on. Sometimes people are going to die. It was kind of an honest speech, and it’s kind of what most people wanted to hear. If you’re sick and vulnerable, and if you’re elderly, you need to protect yourself. If you’re young and healthy and fit, you need to get back on the community and get on with it.
But now, you fast forward four, five, six months, they turn the wrench. They’re part of the EU. I’m sure that the EU got involved and would put pressure on them too. Well now, it’s “no, no, no, you still need a pass.” You need a covered pass to go anywhere simply– all you need to do is a test beforehand.
The only good thing they’ve got there right now is if you’ve had COVID there, there’s actually a vaccine. It’s had covered over there and she’s got papers saying she’s had COVID which gives us six months to not get the vaccine.
But it’s a tough question to answer. I don’t know what your situation is, family-wise, kids, all that kind of stuff. You just got to be careful that you don’t move somewhere strictly for political reasons and then the same thing happens when you’re moving.
[82:04] Guest 2: The proof of recovery is really frustrating because I have that as well. But not enough places accept the full recovery as good as a vaccine when in reality it is better. What you were saying about regime change? I spent, early in the year, I went to Tanzania. Tanzania in Zanzibar because their president was very anti-COVID.
He didn’t even want their people being tested. I was there for like a month, and then the president magically has a heart attack at 61 years old, and the new president puts in all these mandates, and there goes Tanzania!
[82:40] Andrew: Exactly, that’s the concern. I think the move will be where it really gets to the point where you have not a lot of hope, that’s all considered getting out. But if you can just thread water, I mean you’re losing your job most likely, but that’s a tough thing. You just move somewhere and some other asshole gets empowered that is as tyrannical as any other country. And then you’re like “holy shit, now I’ve uprooted the whole way of living my whole life.”
Then you have kids and the same thing happens there, right? I think the world is kind of in a bad position, a bad place right now where… I hope we’d have more answers in four, five, six, seven months’ time where we can start to navigate who’s getting on with it and who’s not. But it just seems like whenever you think a country is getting on with it and moving away from COVID-zero taught mentality then months later, it flips back. It’s just kind of crazy.
[83:34] Marjorie: Yeah, I’m totally with you with that. That’s also the reason why I’ve been on defense. I don’t have kids, I work remotely, but I’m very family-oriented. I don’t want to get to a point where like, let’s say I’m in Mexico, or I’m in El Salvador, and then something happens in Canada, and I’m unable to help my family, right? Even though they’re vaccinated.
It’s just that where things are going right now, for me personally, I feel like it’s much more important to be there for my family. But that’s also because of my personality. I want to be reliable to the people I care about if– you know, shit happens, right?
But at the same time, I do see why a lot of Bitcoiners I know, like here in Canada, have moved out already. They’ve already left. But I do ask them also like what happens when the country where you move to becomes tyrannical also, right? They start applying all these mandates as well. At some point, are we going to get to a point where you have no more places to run to?
[84:44] Andrew: That’s a problem.
[84:45] Marjorie: So either we fight, okay? We fight strategically and effectively, or we just keep running away until we have no more places to run to. What is the most strategic and effective way to handle this? This is going to be one of my questions to the Bitcoiners here like CK. What do you guys think about Bitcoiners getting together, taking a whole of the narrative, the mainstream narrative around the economy, inflation, everything that’s going on right now? [crosstalk]
[85:28] CK: I feel like we’re trying… I don’t know, it’s difficult. You’re asking hard questions. A lot of the Texans would say retreat to Texas and make that a stronghold. But not everyone has that option. I think Francis Pullia is an example of someone who’s in Puerto Rico, and he kind of got rug-pulled in terms of the regime and the policy change.
[86:00] Andrew: He’s in Costa Rica.
[86:01] CK: Sorry, Costa Rica. I apologize. Puerto Rico is in the US. All have questionable situations but I mean… I feel like we’re still in the early days, I feel like there will be an outlet because there’s too much demand for a haven. And hopefully, that can be a place where people use defensively eventually. I’m definitely optimistic long-term, although the short-term is definitely pretty easy.
[86:31] Guest 1: I’ve been traveling all year. Yeah, go ahead Andrew.
[86:35] Andrew: You go ahead. I’ll go next.
[86:38] Guest 1: I’ve been traveling all year. Zanzibar and Tanzania look promising no more. so that’s over. [crosstalk]
[86:47] Andrew: Mexico is over.
[86:50] Guest 2: Mexico is still good. I really like Dubai. Most of my year has been spent in Dubai. That’s a whole other conversation. They are kind of forcing– not forcing, but they’re kind of almost forcing, all of their labor force which is mostly India, and Pakistan, and Africa to get vaccinated to keep their jobs, their drivers, and all the employees.
But they’re very capitalistic over there, they love money. That is a decent place. UAE, Mexico… El Salvador has to be near the top of the list. I haven’t been there yet myself so I can’t talk so much about it. But, so far, most of my year has been spent between Mexico and Dubai.
[87:36] Andrew: I think, to your question, Marjorie. I think at this point would be, we’re fighting a pretty tough battle, we’re fighting a big bank in government. I think it’s a lot of “he said, “what he said”– we’re trying to bring other people that want to be pulled over and have this way of thinking.
But one piece of advice I would give, and I don’t know if this is feasible for a lot of people listening. Right now, get out in dense areas, man. Get out of dense areas if you can. What I mean by that is if you live in a big city, try to get a little bit outside of the city. You might lose some conveniences as far as having to walk to a coffee shop or a restaurant, but I would highly recommend trying to get a little bit of land.
God forbid something happens, you’ve got your own property. What we’re seeing here is trying out a palm of duties of being walked down at this one case. So they can basically now go in a 26th-floor high-rise, one case in that building, they’ll lock that whole building down for 14 days, where you’re not leaving. They’ll deliver food to you. So, trying to risk it in a way… I wouldn’t be surprised to get to that level. Here, even crazier. As I said, the backpacker is hostile here. It’s on lockdown. Basically, they deliver food to the people in the self-isolating tents. So more recommendation would be… [crosstalk]
[88:57] Guest 1: Wow, that’s crazy! I have no idea! It was like China over there. Because China was doing that in early 2020. But I have no idea…
[89:08] Andrew: Yeah, I know. Just by today, down in Byron Bay which like I said is a pretty free, hippy type of town. So to happen there is kind of crazy, but I just think big cities and dense areas are going to be most heavily targeted. Because they can just claim you’re in a dense area, you’re in a big building, you need to self-isolate, you need to quarantine, we’re going to lockdown the building. Where if you’ve got your own house, at least worst case, you’ve got property, just a little bit of land. They have no reason to remove you from that because you’re not in a dense area. That’s just one full process I’ve had over the last years. Going back traditionally and just maybe 15-20 minutes outside of a big city. You can access it when you need it. You bought your own little sanctuary.
[89:55] Guest 1: Byron Bay is great. I spent like a week out there. It’s not that dense. It’s a nice area.
[90:02] Andrew: It’s built up now. It’s gonna be bigger. The backpacker hostels are usually pretty dense is what I’m saying. Anything with units and apartments, and buildings where there are mass people in a small space. They are the people that I think are going to be most heavily affected. When we talk about that from an economic point of view, those people are usually… A lot of people who live in high-density stuff don’t have a lot of funds to be able to an estate, that’s the unfortunate reality for some of us people.
[90:29] Marjorie: One of my biggest fear, is actually, especially living here in Canada and given the situation where the federal government, even the provincial ones, they’ve been hostile towards the unvaccinated people, right? What happens if there’s a supply shortage? Because now, they’re also thinking of ensuring that essential workers that are traveling from the US to Canada, they’re going to be mandated to be vaccinated too at some point.
So what happens if that causes a supply shortage, right? It’s wintertime. Something happens, and you’re living in the city and you can’t even get important things or basic stuff that you need. Like what’s his name? Francis Pullia? He actually tweeted about that. Something about the Atlas Shrugged and the power grid just stops working. [crosstalk]
[91:28] CK: Power grids are going to be quicksand. That’s the crazy part. And they are already are. It’s going to keep getting worse.
[91:37] Andrew: I guess that’s my point, I’m trying to… For those who can afford of being somewhat self-sufficient and whether you get some generators and back-up on your property. Whether you’re growing your own kind of fruit. You’ve got something stock shopped. We’re seeing massive supply change here in Australia.
Not so much, food-wise. Food has gone up as it would. We’re seeing it in the building industry like massive, massive supply shortages. We can’t even get lumber here, for the most part, to build the massive, massive backlog on timber, right?
So you look at that, it’s only going to be a matter of time until it affects our logistic outlets. If there is a power grid collapse, then the logistics for trucking, the logistics for moving food, moving commodities all around Australia which generally has to be done by road because it’s such a big area with only a few types of cities, there can be a massive issue. So that goes back to why I think you’d have, once again, is getting away from dense areas so you can at least be quietly wiped, self-sufficiently growing your own kind of food and stuff.
[92:46] Guest 1: This is already happening in South Africa. They have rolling blackouts. Their power grid is just not strong enough to support it. So, this gives! I mean South Africa is considered a developed country. It’s a first-world country. In the major cities, not Cape Town, but Johannesburg, Pretoria, I mean, power just goes out almost every single day and Johannesberg is a very dangerous city.
Most houses there has their own electric fence around them. You have to have your own generator to just keep that electric fence around your house. It’s kind of crazy though.
[93:29] Marjorie: Yeah, I think that’s really something to think about especially when you’re living in Canada and the government is indifferent or hostile towards unvaccinated people. Because it might get to a point where we’re in an emergency situation, but now, they want to prioritize the vaccinated people, right? You’re a second-class citizen. What do you do?
So, I think it’s important to prepare for emergencies and at the same time what Svetski was saying earlier, start building networks of people who can actually help you, who understands your situation, who are resourceful, and can help you. Because personally, that’s one of the things that I’ve been doing. I’ve been lucky enough to have met a few Bitcoiners here including Ton. And they’ve been very helpful in giving me ideas and tips on what I can do to handle what’s going on right now in Canada, so thanks, guys.
[94:31] CK: So, Andrew, I want to be respectful of your time. I know we’re a little over right now. I guess unless you have to run… We’d like to just kind of close up the conversation. Maybe we can just kind of go to last words and we can close this one out.
[94:48] Andrew: Sorry, I’ve got a few more minutes then I have to take off. But yeah, I appreciate you letting me on. It’s been pretty… I think having these conversations, you have people listening agree or disagree, I think it’s actually good to have these conversations which we don’t really see in the mainstream- different points of view as to why this, why that, why not this, why not that. I think these are very valuable to some people so I hope people listening have taken in– one thing out of everything we spoke about. I think it’s important enough. I’ve taken a few things in this conversation and got a good book recommendation as well so it’s all about learning, read, and forward.
I think… My philosophy right now is to just lie and wait and see what’s going on with the world right now because it doesn’t look like it’s going to get any better for the next couple of months. We’re in a really interesting time in Australia. I think we’re going to know, do I have a land probably by January, February, going back into winter. It’s just going to be a matter of time…[crosstalk] Yeah, go for it.
[95:57] Guest 1: If I may ask for one more question? Have you thought about going to politics? I mean you’re pretty well known and you can have momentum.
[96:07] Andrew: No. Putting my family through that isn’t the best. The political landscape here is just… I don’t think I would last. I think I will be out pretty quickly, by, generally, either you’re in a party or someone in politics. I don’t think the people would be too against it but I’m not the most politically correct, I’m kind of outspoken. So, that causes a bit of an issue, especially mainstream-wise. But I’ve given it thought, previously, but…
[96:38] Guest 1: Hey, if Trump can be elected, then you’ll last. I think politically correct is kind of flexible these days in getting into politics. [crosstalk]
[96:49] Andrew: This time it’s much different. The way it works here is not as easy as being elected and being a big-time senator, premiere. You’re going to kind of work your way out through the minority parties. It’s just not something I want to invest my time in. Just dealing with… I just don’t do well with political rhetoric. I’m kind of pretty much like most people in this room, I got asked a question I want to answer, I don’t want a 15-minute spill. Then I’m like, “Why did you even answer the question?” Do you know what I mean? So I just wouldn’t do well because I’ll literally just be empowerment saying, ”Let’s do that the fucking question.” Like if you are given 15-minute shit, and then, I don’t know how that would go down in mainstream media.
[97:31] CK: Andrew, the politics thing is interesting. Politics have become very popular within the Bitcoin space just in terms of trying to help politicians see the value in Bitcoin and the courage to protect it. I’m not sure if that has a place in Australia if that helps at all with the overall situation.
I guess I just want to give you back the mic. I think you’re saying that you’ve got something out of this conversation, definitely hope you get– these individuals– out of this conversation.
[98:08] Andrew: And I just ordered the book on Amazon. Go on to Amazon. Have you seen how much the hardcopy version of that?
[98:22] CK: It’s really expensive. I think I actually purchased over 50 copies, and I’ve just given them out. I used Amazon to do that.
[98:32] Andrew: The hardcover right now for those who are wondering is $838. So, very, very expensive book. A paperback it’s a very, very expensive book so must be well worth the read.
[98:44] CK: Yeah, man. They’re expensive in Australia. I’m a stan, if you will, of that book.
[98:52] Andrew: I just got the budget paperback. So, hope you’re right.
[98:57] CK: Alright, hey. Keep stacking SATs, my friend.
[98:59] Andrew: That’s it.
[99:00] CK: Awesome. Damn! This is a great conversation. Again, Andrew, I really appreciate your time and the flexibility with organizing it beneath the hood. It’s like a few tries but it was definitely on me. Andrew, you’re the man. I really appreciate everything that you do. I’ve really been appreciating you while you were on the Warriors, and on the Lakers, and in the NBA but even more now with your presence in social media in this kind of climate so, thank you so much. Thanks again for being on!
[99:40] Andrew: No worries thanks for having me, pleasure talking to everyone.
