The end of the nation state: a crypto vision.

in #crypto6 years ago

I founded the Peace, Abundance, and Liberty Network. I didn't just stumble across those three words randomly. I've spent many years and gone through a touch of hell to figure out some basic truths that I observe about the world. The current system is broken. Or, more precisely, the current system is working perfectly in it's design, but the current design leaves much to be desired for the vast majority of people. When I look at the scoreboard I see 1% of the population has 90% of the wealth, and literally 8 people/families have as much wealth as over 3 Billion people. Those 8 people are not 10^9 better or more valuable than any of those in the lower 3B people group. What has happened is that an economic system was successfully implemented that funnelled wealth from the poorest to the system creators and those system creators are now the wealthiest people around.

Now, funnelling wealth isn't always a bad thing. Capital should go where it needs to, but there are a few problems here. The first is that this capital is coerced. Taxation is theft, or to George Bushize it Taxification is theftication. People get in the middle of your daily commerce and say you can't exchange that piece of bread for the unit of exchange unless you give us a portion of that unit of exchange. If you don't we'll arrest you and throw you in prison. How is that not theft? Just because lots of people agreed it's ok to take what's yours doesn't mean it isn't theft.

So, the first problem is that the wealth is funneled under duress, and the second problem is how they use it. A recent survey reported that the USG is considered the largest threat to peace in the world. No wonder... we're bombing 7 countries right now. And that military industrial complex is expensive. Roughly 70% of all taxes paid (at least the ones officially on the books) go to pay a military budget. Essentially money you invest under duress in government services has a 70% overhead for the military. That seems like a bad investment.

So, my first issue with the world as it stands is vast sucking sound of the banking and government complex absorbing wealth from the poor and middle class and then further making it worse by spending it on violent projects. To make matters even worse from that they have further increased spending and their projects into the realm of a massive spy net. Programs like the intelligence agencies are recording your calls, keeping your dic pics, and categorically tracking all the things you say and do on the internet.

But Aggroed... I have nothing to hide, so I'm ok with that.

That's a really short sighted view of this. Just because it's not cool to persecute you for something that you do now doesn't mean that they won't come after you later. Maybe marajuana legalization goes south and all those pictures of you and some blunts lands you in prison. Maybe you studied cryptos. What if government starts watching how nearly every fiat dollar in the world is discarded for crypto and decides to outlaw it to protect the monopoly they've created. There's thousands of pages of laws on the books, and these aren't designed to enhance your freedom, but to extract wealth from you and keep you under tight control

So, what's my point... the world as it stands is a bit of shitshow of violence, theft, and a giant spynet, and that's why the world needs crypto. This thing has the power to bring down the nation state.

Woah, that's a big leap, how tf did you get there?

The governments rely not only on taxes, but on an entire economic system. After world war II the Bretton Woods Accords made the USD the world reserve currency. All transactions now have to go through the USD. For 60 years this has forced other nations to accept USDs. At the very start this may have been good for nations and trade, but what has happened is the USG has been printing paper and forcing other nations to return goods and services for printed paper. That's not an equal exchange of wealth. We print shit out of thin air, and you give us all of your natural resources. That's a bad trade.

Now, once you have the ability to print money at a whim and force the world to accept it you can do shit like grow a massive military budget that's both on and off the books. And you can use that military to enforce the rule that other nations have to accept our dollars. While the general sentiment is that the wars currently fought are over oil, and I don't quite disagree I would put them in the larger context of the US is picking off enemies that voice concern or act out of line with the world reserve currency enforcement.

My central point buried this far down

Out of all the things that nations truly rely on it's the creation of money that now puts them squarely in charge. They inflate it, loan it to their friends, use it to build militaries and spy networks, and basically put up a giant control grid around all of us. One of the first steps to removing this power is creating an alternative to it. Finally we not only have an alternative, but a really fucking good one.

Cryptos go through artifical state boundaries like a hot knife through butter. Cryptos work quickly. Cryptos usually don't have 1/1000th the inflation of fiat dollars. Cryptos are generally decentralized rather than centralized. Basically all the shit that makes government fiat money bad for everyday people has been undone by the nature and design of cryptocurrencies. These are a force for good(s)!

bitcoin at 16k

The fact that bitcoin is at 16k shows the utility of this alternative currency type, and it's a combination of the dollar losing value and cryptos gaining value that makes it so freaking appealing. This baby has been on a 1% gain per day curve for a few years now. That's the opposite of government dollars that lose value every single day. I'm personally trying to remove as much wealth from fiat dollars to put into crypto currencies as possible. Buy a few coins today and spend them in a few years to buy my house. That's the power of a healthy currency, and as people switch from these government systems that steal wealth to do bad thing I'm looking forward to seeing a a future that looks different.

What does the future look like?

I see a world where the governments themselves have been nuetered. Where these bastards can no longer steal and cause harm. Where the spying and the theft are curtailed and where people are free.

I see a cryptopunk world forming out there. Instead of the violence, theft, and spying I see a world filled with peace, abundance, and liberty. Instead of a world where my daughters and I are molested if we want to cross an artificial line on the map I see open borders, free trade, and no one intruding in my commerce. I see a world where centralized military forces have no place. I see a world where I'm free to exist so long as I cause no harm.

I'm happy to be on this journey with you, and thanks for changing the world around us with me!

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That's a very nice article. I hope crypto will do what you are describing. Right now, I can see this technology used for specific usecases, but not for replacing money.

For example, I see bitcoin becoming a digital store of value, aka digital gold, or ethereum becoming a great platform to raise money and create products or games based on blockchain, and lastly Steem which allows you to earn by being active on social medias (with Smart Media Tokens hopefully this will be over all of the internet).

All this innovation is great, but money can't be replaced by crypto. It can and it will, but this will take a long long time. And it will be probably created by governments.

Today's generation of crypto that try to replace money (Litecoin, Dash) are great projects that will definitely improve the way business and transcations are done, but it won't replace money. We will not get paid in Litecoin for doing regular jobs.

For cryptocurrency to replace money, we need a revolution. It will happen, sooner or later, but this might take a lot more time than we expect, maybe not even in our lifetime.

The banking system is a Ponzi scheme founded on debt where average people can’t elevate themselves.
It’s time for mankind to use real money and not some overprinted garbage backed by nothing.

I love the overall sentiment of this post. I assume you are American from the tone of the post but this logic can be used for most governments across the world. With the rise of crypto, people are finally seeing that they need not rely on the banks and governments to get by in life. We are realizing that we have been hoodwinked by the powers that be and that it is finally time to stand up and fight back, not through a violent revolt, but through the utilization of a better form of currency. I think this is just the beginning. Cheers to the bright future of crypto.
tip!

that it is finally time to stand up and fight back

There are several ways to "fight back" here are 2;

"I'm mad as hell, and I'm not going to take it anymore"

or

"The only winning move is not to play."

I absolutely agree with your analysis on the distribution of wealth in fiat currencies. The rich control the flow and it all flows to them.
What I would like to see is if the wealth distribution is any different with cryptocurrencies? From casual observation it seems there are a select few who own the majority of bitcoin, steem, etherum, etc. The reason we have the terms whales and minnows is to express this skewed distribution in our on environment.
If an investor can buy power in steem how is that different from buying influence in a legislative body? I would love for cryptocurrencies to be a solution but it seems that the root of the problem is a bit deeper than the mode of currency.
Please help me become a believer! Show us the distribution graphs for steem and other cryptos. I'm guessing they will be sharply exponential.
But your post was. Keep writing.

I would love for cryptocurrencies to be a solution but it seems that the root of the problem is a bit deeper than the mode of currency.

As the governments of the world start regulating cryptos I can see "us"(or you could say maybe "useless eaters") just jumping from the frying pan into the fire.

Please don't think that I disagree with your overall points in this post, @aggroed, it just seems that those 8 people/families, as well as those under them and closer to the top, are just not going to give up what they have.

I think @yulem has hit on it with the point made about it being "a bit deeper than the mode of currency."

I would posit that it has to do with a heart issue and a covetousness. Those 8 people/families could have a change of heart towards their fellow men and that could result in changing the hearts of those below them etc.

Please note, I'm not talking "trickle down economics" but a "golden-rule", "heart change" attitude.

Great post and praying for a change in the "hearts" of those 8.

Resteemed!


SDG

Inequality isn't a problem in the long term.
A mechanism for transferring wealth by force from the productive to the unproductive is the real issue we face.
Inequality is quickly remedied by an even paying field, where nobody can attack and rob others with policemen.

You don't need taxation when you have wealth. You can just sit back on your pile and use it to coerce people to do things your way and reward your friends. If you want a system without taxes then you should have a system where unused wealth goes away. You could call that a wealth tax, Norway has one - 1% of wealth is taken per year but it forces the rich to be productive, puts the trickle back into trickledown (which we all know is bullshit marketing for the gullible anyway). I'm sure you could invent a system where unused wealth evaporates over long enough time.

But wealth == power, that's as evil and pernicious as taxation == theft. Maybe there is a system where extreme wealth exists but people are just not influenced by it be they could care less about getting bribes?

Incidentally and crypto where there are transaction fees - that's taxation. Modern monetary theory (see @davidpakman recent video) says that taxation by an authority is the real source of fiat money, not barter. Let's not try to reproduce that (obviously doesn't apply to STEEM or EOS).

The more wealth you have, the more you need taxation.
People with lots of stuff get more benefit from socialised property protection services, like the police and the fire department, than those with very little.
I expanded on it here.
Threatening people with violence is uneconomical unless

  • The people you're threatening believe you have a right to do so.
  • The cost of hiring people to do the threatening is externalised onto others.

TLDR; wealthy people already have hired thugs to protect their mansions, and to rob the poor to pay for it.

Less of that would be good.

With the advent and general acceptance of crypto currencies, wealth had started to flow in the reverse direction. " whatever the mind of man can conceive, it can achieve " say Napoleon Hills. Nakamoto Satoshi saw the injustice created by the lopsided global financial system and decided to go to work. He silently caused a revolution which the world leaders would never notice until it became too late.
Whereas their gold and silver continue to grow in arithmetic progression, our alternative currencies grow geometrically. Soon we shall arrive at some point on equilibrium where our assets of few years will equate to theirs of many centuries. Soon we shall overtake!
Nakamoto Satoshi - you have done what Napoleon could not do, to drive away the duke of Edinburgh.
The effect of your works greatly justifies your anonymity, else you could have been tried in their highest court of injustice.

Man i was just talking about this with a friend... I really can see a future where governments are disrupted, and blockchain technology have the potential to do that, changing worlds paradigm so deep is a huge thing, but may happen...

wow... It seems birds, but not

violence is never going away ; just the unfortunate reality, when people get bored enough they may do awful things

Crazy to think how much the world has changed regarding cryptos in such a short amount of time.

I loved that gif the first time I saw you post it this morning.

I agree with everything you said but I'm still having a hard time imagining two things. I hope we can come up with the answers. Actually I know we can but they need to be seriously considered.

1 What do we do when they start coming for our crypto? It seems Japan has already taken steps to tax all crypto transactions. While I know its unrealistic for them to be able to tax ALL transactions, those in charge can certainly make it very difficult for us, using crypto as an excuse to get even deeper into our personal lives.

2 How can we encourage the wealth to spread and not end up concentraed in the hands of the few, even with crypto. Wealth still attracts wealth. While there are ways to go from nothing to something (as some of us have), as certain methods and modes become established, it becomes harder and harder to find a way to benefit. How much of bitcoin is owned by just a few people.

I don't see crypto as an ensured better distribution of wealth but it certianly creates windows of opportunity for the wealth to spreak. SMT could certainly open a bunch of new windows, just as steemit has.

Anyways, nice post.

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