Bitcoin made you a libertarian. What?
No, no.
Introduce me to libertarianism.
Running a business made me libertarian.
We've made it too hard.
We've destroyed ambition and entrepreneurship in this country, and it's not good.
You get punished.
It's like a death by a thousand cuts.
In every direction, people are just ripping you off, scamming you.
That makes me sad.
These are 30 grand people who are taking the 90 grand job because nobody else wants it.
Eight in ten teachers would vote for Labour or Green.
That's terrifying.
We have brilliant people in this country.
They don't go anywhere near politics.
Why would they?
They have their lives exposed, constant pressure, might get murdered,
and there's no financial reward.
And so we are attracting idiots.
Meet King Charles, Buckingham Palace, go explain Bitcoin to them.
So Pete McCormack, four years from now, Prime Minister,
could you be the leader Britain needs?
All views expressed by the host or guests are solely their own opinions.
Nothing stated in this podcast should be considered a specific endorsement
to make any particular investment or follow any specific strategy.
Welcome back to Going Bitcoin, Pete.
I'm excited to talk to you about Bitcoin, everything you've built, and what's next.
part one was just the beginning so here we are part two so next up pete the builder
what's one business idea you tried that crashed and burned i set up a website
how long ago 15 16 years ago called banter which was a social media website for people who liked
football and so when a game was on you could sit there with your phone and say there was a
sending off you could vote whether you thought it was sending off or not you could rate the players
afterwards and you can interact with other fans during the game it was a great idea maybe too
early too early and over-engineered we we built too many features into it it was complicated to
follow and it should have been really just a very simple concept um and people liked it but
ultimately it failed because it it didn't solve a problem it just created an addition to
entertainment but actually if i'd have done it again i i know the problems we could have solved
bet for safe bet or wild bet it's a wild bet because bedford's problems are downstream from
government and so a bet on bedford is a bet really on the government itself and i tried to fix things
locally and I just came up against obstacles because of central government and a financial
and political system that works against people and so I'm pulling back a little bit on Bedford
to focus on the country because to fix Bedford you have to fix a country you fix the country
fix the world what taught you more about business Bitcoin or Bedford Bedford because the way you
learn about business is doing it like you can't learn about business going to university reading
book the way you learn about business is you just start one bitcoin taught me about
people and systems and incentives like business itself the best just bedford because this is where
i created businesses but the way you learn about business it's just creating one yeah and then it's
when you become a libertarian like if somebody was going to university and they were going to get 60
grand of debt to uh to learn about business i'd be like you're mad you can for hundreds of pounds
set up a business you can spend 60 grand set up business after business after business
and you will be way more educated on business spending 60 grand on yourself trying to create
businesses then you will be on going to a university and learning about business what's
been the most rewarding part of running your football club winning leagues just winning um
trying to do something for the community and seeing the impact as on kids so locally we've
been able to support youth youth teams and give them kits and supplies ultimately the reason to
have a football team is to create something for young people not to create a team for adults to
play in you create the team for adults are playing to create the identity and the structure and the
revenue stream so ultimately you can build something where kids can go and play football
how many people do you have on your payroll across all your businesses oh gosh um
i don't know not many 25 and how do you think your staff and your football players
will describe your leadership style
chaotic
um um determined chaotic and determined how come well so i mean i bought a football club that had
40 fans plays in a field and said we're going to get in the premier league so certainly determined
and ambitious um and fearless but also cavalier and a bit punk rock maybe because i just don't
care about the unwritten societal rules about how you're meant to do things we're a football club
with a skull as a logo and you look at all our graphics i don't look at any other football club
and when our team comes out we play uh a rage against the machine but even they're kind of
socialist now but uh and we score goals we play deftones and pantera we just just there's a famous
advertising slogan that says when the world zigs zag and i think i that's how i run my businesses
i try and do them with a zag why cheap code explain well because i was traveling around
the world going to conferences and i was like this is bollocks why do i just put one on here
make everyone come to bedford and actually see a bitcoin project but it's a bit like doing one in
El Zonte go to where the Bitcoin projects are. So that's why really. Yeah, no other reason.
So you run a football club, a podcast, a bar, a coffee shop, a conference, and a fund.
Yes.
Have I missed anything?
That's the main things.
What makes them Bitcoin companies?
They're run by a Bitcoiner, they accept Bitcoin, and they huddle Bitcoin.
What next?
less less yeah less just slow down i get tired now try and scale education about this broken
financial and political system through content and help other people spot what's happening and
give them the exits which i'm evolving on i used to think the exit was better politics
that might not be solvable. The financial machine might be too big and too strong now to defeat it.
So exit comes in different ways. It comes from exiting actually from the system,
which is Bitcoin financially, perhaps going to live somewhere remote and raising chickens and
growing vegetables and just choosing not to play the game because often you know what's that old
saying the way to win is just not to play i'm starting to feel like the way to win is not to
play and so can i scale can i position the content in a way that people recognize it is useful and
they can benefit from it tell us a bit about the fund who or what are you backing just local
people look life is financially very challenging for the majority of people these days and
consequence of that is kids with ambition can't do or achieve things they want to do because their
parents cannot afford the cost so you could be a badminton player a dancer you could be a motor
racing driver you can be any anything and you cannot achieve your maximum potential because you
can't afford it and so the goal was just to have some money to give away and we haven't had a lot
like 75 grand and I think we've it's maybe like 80 90 because of the bitcoin now and and we've
distributed over half I think about 50 000 pound and it's just because of that some kids have been
able to go and do things they can't afford to do I wish I had millions to distribute because the
list is endless for everyone I accept there's 10 I have to not accept and each time it breaks my
heart there's a kid there who has a talent who wants to do something and perhaps they might not
it to do it because their parents can't afford it and uh look there are multiple reasons they
can't afford it but right now many can't afford it because we are extracting our money up to the
wealthiest who lead at least the least yeah every every rich person who benefits from extraction
is taking away from a youngster somewhere who has an ambition who can't do it because his
Parents can't afford it because the system is so crippled that it extracts more and more and expects you to accept less and less.
What are the incentives to build businesses like Real Coffee or the Peter McCormick Show in England?
In England?
In England.
I think there's less incentives.
I mean, I wrote a tweet the other day saying I cannot be bothered to start businesses anymore.
I was going to open a pizza restaurant.
The capex for that was nearly $400,000.
And then there's cash flow, signing a 10-year lease, doing this in a tough economic environment.
I mean, all of that is, it's just challenging.
It's much easier just to put your money in the markets and watch it grow.
And I think there's less incentives.
And I think that's why people are exiting and leaving the country or retiring early or just can't be bothered.
We've made it too hard.
We've destroyed ambition and entrepreneurship in this country.
And it's not good.
How exactly does the system get in the way?
it's those three levers of power, which is money creation, civil liberties, and the regulatory
environment. And so if you're creating a business and they are extracting money through money
creation, they are driving inflation. And so if you run a local shop, you have less purchasing
power from the customer base to come and buy from you, yet your costs are going up.
your direct costs of the products you buy, but then your costs of running your business from
minimum wage to HR costs to accounting costs, your taxes are going up. And the regulatory
environment puts all these pressures onto small businesses that don't exist. Like if you're
Starbucks, you get to buy your product cheaper because you buy it at scale and you get to scale
the regulatory environment, HR, accounting, and you get to play financial games with the money.
If you're a one-person coffee shop, you have so much administrational pressure from HR to
accounting, and it's just very hard to make money now. Very, very hard. And that's why society is
just one of the many signals that society is collapsing. We're destroying the middle class.
in every direction people are just ripping you off scamming you over the last year there's been
so many just little things that have just taken a little like it's like a death by a thousand
cuts little things from a guy walking onto our front driveway breaking into my son's car
and stealing my sunglasses and his wallet to someone um hitting my car in a car park with
theirs and driving off and not leaving a note which costs 800 pound to fix to in my coffee shop
people just stealing the cutlery because it's nice they just think they just think i'm just
going to take that i like that spoon it's nice i'm taking it but it's theft but it's then you
go into the employment law at the moment in this country i mean you generally you only get rid of
somebody if you if you have a company you only tend to get rid of them for two reasons generally
in my experience it's because they're rubbish at their job or you can't afford them well if you
can't afford them you should be able to get rid of them because you want to be able to have a
profitable business and if they're rubbish at their job you should be able to say look i'm
getting rid of you because you're rubbish structurally to get rid of somebody because
of the employment laws in this country is a nightmare it takes you have to go through a
delicate set of steps if you do not get right they take you to an employment tribunal and they
can extort money from you even though they're in the wrong and this is the problem with the surface
area of the state when the surface area of the state is so big and they try and regulate everything
usually it enables the grifters and the scammers and it punishes the honest people
it's everywhere at the moment and that's just another one of the reasons i cannot be bothered
to start a business because you get punished all the time for being the risk taker and if you do
generate a profit the government takes it all anyway so it's just like what's the point i mean
it goes back to defending life liberty and property yeah what changes did you actually
want to make when you considered running for mayor of bedford um i just wanted to run the
council like a business how a businessman would so cut waste ensure the money that they do have
goes into the right places. I wanted to reduce tax, which has never happened. I wanted to prove
you could reduce tax. I just bring in as many libertarian principles as I could, but
it can't be done. I've looked. I've looked at the job. I've looked at the council. I've looked at
the debt. I've looked at their commitments. The problem is there is so much regulation.
So much of it is handed down from central government of all the things you have to do.
you can't run these councils anymore they basically are there to shoulder the things that
government promises to win power and then they uh they pass down the responsibility of delivering
that to the local council without the resources to do it so it's a fool's errand i'm just not
going to do it what's a small local policy you've pushed harder than anyone ever has
i don't think i've not really been pushing policies but safety i'm yeah but honestly
half the town hates me for that how can oh why is a rich local guy employing goons to put on the
high street what are they regulated by who are they accountable to blah blah blah it's just you're
running into the political machine again life yeah defense of property would allow somebody
to privately put security in place.
There's no law that's been broken.
But we're so conditioned to wanting the state to produce everything
that if somebody does it within the private sector,
there are certain people who think that shouldn't be done.
Even though it's private, they just don't want it.
They want it regulated, controlled by the state.
And it just becomes political.
Like everything now is political.
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So you pulled out of running for Bet4Mayer.
I didn't even run for Mayor.
Of the idea, yeah. Because in your words, the budget was a joke and you can do more from outside the system. Can you explain how?
Again, it goes back to that point of creating the content allows people to understand that the mechanics are wrong. The mechanics of the state need fixing before any of this can be fixed.
and so i think i can be more effective by uh creating the content and put the pressure on
the state to do these things i will fail i could say i think the machine's too big now
like what can a guy with a coffee shop in bedford really do i can't do much but but i think at the
same time if i have a choice of being outside of the system and throwing hand grenades in and
create pressure that's going to be more effective than it being in the system and just stuck
just would sludge each way stopping me.
Do you think you understand power better now
or you trusted less?
Both.
I mean, I understand power.
Although I think I'll understand a bit more.
I want to read Machiavelli's The Prince,
which were downloaded.
And I certainly don't trust power at all.
Bitcoin made you a libertarian.
What?
No, no.
Introduce me to libertarianism.
Running a business made me libertarian.
What do you see in Austrian economics?
It understands people and incentives.
That's it.
It's the study of people and incentives,
whereas Keynesian is like rationalizing government monetary expansion.
What do you think is the biggest threat to freedom today?
Government.
Who's your political hero and why?
I don't think I have a political hero because I don't know historically enough or people before my time.
There's a guy I've been researching recently who was one of the Roman emperors.
He was a farmer.
I forget his name, Canisius or somebody.
Somebody will correct me in the comments.
can you anyway he um he came in did the job left and i read a thing from malay this morning where
he said once he's done his job he doesn't want to be a politician once he serves a second term
he'll go back to his ranch and he'll become a professor and teach i think anybody who
understands what the limits of power are they go and do their job and leave then that that would be
somebody who would be a political hero but i don't have any political heroes i have people i've
admired for certain things i admired certain things about what thatcher did during the 70s
inflation here was crazy and she got that under control um she made the uk respective or not
respected on the international stage but there hasn't been a politician since who i've
would ever put remotely near a hero block what do you think the british people actually expect
from their government.
Oh, what do they expect?
I mean, I think we all expect the government
to make our lives better.
What is the role of the government It is to enable you to pursue happiness What the biggest crime ever committed by the British government
You know, you've asked that deliberately.
Inflation.
But the Tony Blair government started a war in Iraq
or were part of a coalition of willing for a war in Iraq
that nobody in this country wanted,
that politicians quit over,
that a million people protested against,
and it destabilized the region.
It's a horrific crime.
Tony Blair himself should be tried for war crimes.
He should be in The Hague.
We posture against other political leaders
in other parts of the world as evil and villainous.
This guy is a terrible human being,
and that is a crime because it made this country complicit
in something which should never have happened.
But inflation is the biggest crime.
Why do you think freedom of speech is being taken away?
But at the same time, we all have agency. Words are just words. We teach us as kids. We say sticks and stones will break our bones, but names will never hurt us. We have a government that wants to restrict the things we say. They don't want free people who think freely. He sounds so conspiratorial. When you hear this, you're like, that guy sounds like a conspiracy theorist.
But no, it's just our speech, our freedom, our ability to think and speak freely harms him.
I've ratioed the prime minister on Twitter three times in the last two weeks because the bloke is a moron.
He wants to ban Twitter.
And it's not about bikini shots.
We can all agree that kids shouldn't be undressed on Twitter.
That's not a good thing.
He doesn't want that.
He doesn't want Twitter because everybody, there's like a spoken revolution against this
government on Twitter.
He and his stupidity thinks he can ban that and stop that.
But all he will do is poke the bear harder and unleash another fire under him.
Why are more people fighting for their rights as they are taken away from them?
because I don't think people truly understand how dangerous and evil the state can be.
And they are lost thinking we can vote our way out of this. This next politician will fix this.
Well, actually, yeah, you know, these mean words, maybe we should stop that because the government
tells me so. I just think when you revolt, you're revolting against two class of people. You're
revolting against the political elite and you're revolting against the people who do their bidding,
who are often voters. And I think some people just do not understand the consequences of bad
government. What don't they get about government and economy? Well, I don't think they understand
is that when they allow a government or do their bidding for infringements on rights at some point
someone's going to come after their rights too in a way they don't like and it's such an easy
obvious thing to spot once you can see all with clarity but i just think some people just are
unable to make that mental leap because like i did once they believe government is necessary
and does want to do good um in terms of economics i just don't think people understand
that freedom comes from the defense of property and ultimately a state that redistributes
eventually runs out of money to redistribute and it's a very hard thing because it's like
when you talk about taking away welfare it feels like it feels so i don't know unfair
You want to take money away from poor people? No, I just don't want to enable a state which
weaponizes these things against the population. I mean, we are, look how advanced technically we are.
Look how advanced our economies are. And look how many people are living in poverty.
The money exists. It's because it's extracted away to the rich people that we have these problems of
poverty. If there was zero tax, we would have better distribution to those who need it more.
When and why do you think the UK stopped celebrating success and successful people?
It might be something that has always been in our DNA, that tall poppy syndrome.
I don't know. Maybe some people are just finding life hard when they see someone with success.
it attacks their own ego i also think we have an education system designed to support the state
and socialist ideas are more you know with socialism comes with creating a boogeyman which
is the millionaires and the billionaires they're not the boogeyman the boogeyman is a government but
they want you to look over there so maybe i think the the demonizing of success comes
from the more socialist aspects of our government and electorate.
In a photo, we always look at ourselves first.
We are the centre of our own movie.
When you look at England, what do you see first?
What's the centre of that movie?
Right now?
Yeah.
That's a very hard question to answer, how to frame that.
I think it's a tragedy.
I think what's happening to our country is a tragedy.
It's a self-inflicted suicide,
all downstream from an inept, immoral, spineless political class
that put votes and power ahead of what is clearly required in our country.
And so we're a tragedy.
this is a country that is committing suicide and i think it's a country that's depressed
that's humiliating itself on the public stage and driving away the best people and i'm very i'm
terrified for the future of this country i'm terrified and i don't see a if it's a movie
I at the moment do not see a happy ending.
It's a movie I want to turn off.
Let me show you a clip from my recent conversation with Jeff Booth.
Okay.
I try not to talk about people.
I try to talk about systems.
Who would you expect to be leading on top of a system based on theft?
Wouldn't you expect the people who were best at it to be leading?
And that would include many, many people,
whether they know it or not, inside our institutions of today. The institutions of today
are not protecting you, they're controlling you. The problems can't be solved from within their
system, and no matter who it is. So I would rather not talk about the people perpetuating that system,
because if you changed a person, it would make no change.
That's basically what we've spoken about in this interview.
Can the right prime minister fix Britain from inside the system?
Yeah, so I'm contradicting Jeff's point here only if their mandate is to fix the system, which is to restore government to what Bastiat said it should do, which is defend live liberty and property and nothing else.
and that's the only way and that means they have to campaign on that mandate
win that mandate the challenge in this country is that we do not have a codified constitution
and so can you bind future governments to that i mean they tried it in the u.s
um they had many a battle the federalists and the anti-federalists over
the power of the state and what central what the federal government would do and
the uh federalists won but the anti-federalists have been proven right i mean i'm i think i am
a constitutionalist i believe we need a hard firm constitution and a bill of rights which defends
the rights of the people and prevents us from having government which can redistribute and so
Look, I agree with Jeff, but my caveat is,
is having a government that campaigns on one issue and one issue only,
and has a mandate to do it and does it.
Next clip.
In 2021, El Salvador made Bitcoin legal tender.
In your view, what was the impact both in El Salvador and globally?
I think it was such a bold move to do that.
I was there shortly thereafter, that move.
And I had a big presentation there.
People were flying in from all over the world.
And the day before I went were all the murders.
And we still went, but it was crazy.
And I think what happened there behind the scenes,
the control structure didn't know that Bichelli was going to make Bitcoin legal tender.
And that shocked the control structure.
And then the behind the scenes, he wanted to create a false flag to be able to hurt his credibility as president.
And then he instead locked everyone else up.
You've interviewed President Bukele.
Have you ever asked yourself who and how could someone actually turn Britain around?
Yes, I've asked whether I could do it.
Yes.
can i be that guy um i think about it a lot but i think about it as how can i i'm not the only
person thinking that what i believe needs to be done needs to be done what jeff would say would
need to be done but very few do how could i as the coffee shop owner in bedford with the podcast
who talks about Bitcoin. How could I be the guy who becomes prime minister and makes this change?
But I am close to some of the levers of power, previous prime ministers, leaders of parties.
I've got to know some of them, but I've told them my feelings on this, and nobody shares them
within the political elite, that we need a complete re-engineering of the role of the state,
an undoing of the vast majority of the statues that have been created to eradicate the welfare
state, that the government doesn't act as a department of redistribution, that its stated
goals and mandate are limited. And I don't know if I can sell this to enough people because I think
it requires a lot of knowledge and understanding. I'm not willing to be a dictator who does this.
There is nobody within the political class at the moment that I believe has a plan that can do this.
That makes me sad.
Last clip.
Today, and because of my book and because of other things, many PhD economists come to me and say,
did my entire schooling on this perception of you knew what money was and it was credit.
And then the whole system had to be built on this, but nobody ever went deeper. And so I don't know
why. I think it just comes down to people who don't ask a very simple question because they
think somebody else knows it. So the economy could be understood by a five-year-old.
Yeah.
It doesn't take a mathematician, it doesn't take anything else.
It's the sum total of our trade.
And prices fall because we compete with each other to provide more value.
That's what the economy should look like.
It doesn't look anything like that.
Which is why the entire construct of economists and teachers and everything else
to teach you that you shouldn't ask about what's a very simple concept.
It's too complicated.
for your mind to understand will tell you what it looks like.
Do you think the British government know this?
No, I don't actually.
I think a lot of people just think what we have is how it works
and how it should be.
And there may be aspects who understand it,
very limited aspects who understand it,
but what is required to re-engineer it,
It just seems too big a mountain to climb.
And that's why they go with their economic advisors, their Keynesian economists,
and continue this system that we have now and accept the catastrophic outcome that is inevitable from it.
And it's sad.
In some ways, Jeff is the most important economist in the world
because he's the one who understands exactly what is happening,
why it goes wrong, what needs to be done.
And he should be held in much higher regard than Keynes
or any modern monetary economist because they're all liars
and they're all complicit in what is going wrong.
Yeah, I'll probably give Jeff a call after this.
It's been a while. I love that man.
What do you think should be the role of government?
So I'm not an anarchist in that it's not that I believe government is necessary.
I just believe it's inevitable.
I just think the way humans coordinate, we will always end up with government.
And with good government comes freedom because they defend and protect freedom.
But the role of government for me is very limited.
It's as tiny as possible.
And it should defend life, liberty, and property.
And that is it.
And get out of the way.
Get out of the way.
Do nothing else.
We will undoubtedly have a better, happier, more productive society
than what we have right now,
which is something which is collapsing in this age of confiscation.
Is the current political system sustainable?
I mean, it's sustainable until it isn't.
it's sustainable until there is conflict that means it isn't or there's revolution until it
isn't but it's it sustains itself and it will continue to sustain itself as long as it can
but it's on i think it's living on fumes how did the uk end up here the same way everyone else did
with a system that's engineered in the wrong way regulation do you believe in democracy
I want to believe in it. I think it's the fairest thing to say each person has a vote. But it doesn't work in the system that we have right now. And in some ways, I am sympathetic to the views of why a monarchy works better. Yes, you have the risk of a bad king, the evil prince.
but i understand the incentives are different um i'm sympathetic the idea that a country should be
run like a company with a ceo like curtis yarvin talks about but these are heresy to most people
because like how can you argue against democracy we fought for look all the places that don't have
democracy and look at iran what's happening now can you talk a little bit more about the concept
of running a country as a company?
Well, you would treat the prime minister more like a CEO,
have a board of directors,
and they would have a mandate for what they need to do for the country,
and they would be rewarded or punished based on that.
And if there is corruption, they would go to jail as they should.
And economically rewarded?
Yeah, I mean, what kind of people do you think you get for 90 grand a year?
Yeah, that's what we are getting.
If I was an MP, I would do it now because I don't need the money.
but if you need the money who do you think you get for 90 grand a year you're not getting our
best people because your equivalents on 90 grand are going to take jobs at 90 grand hoping they get
a bonus hoping they get to 250 and half a mil you're getting people whose ceiling is basically
90 grand unless they become prime minister these aren't 90 grand people these are 30 grand people
who are taking the 90 grand job because nobody else wants it okay and i would pay i would pay so
high i would and i would change the the way we measure it and the goals i'd be paying half a
million and i would provide full transparency into what they do but i would give them the mandate
to run the government departments not let the departments run themselves so they're fully
accountable because what we lack is accountability. There's always someone else to blame. Blame the OBR.
We blame this. We blame that. No, we should have a fully accountable political office that is
responsible for the decisions, responsible for the outcomes and accountable. It's okay to have
a prime minister that gets rich out of running a successful country, a successful term. Yes,
I would far rather have a prime minister get rich from running the country successfully than gets rich from running the country in a safe way and knowing they get board seats and speak fees afterwards, which gets them wealthy.
Like, let them get rich in the job and make them retire, not rich after the job.
How do you sell that to the public?
Good arguments.
You just need good arguments.
you just have to look something isn't working you look at zach polanski head of the greens
bless him but he's a moron like he is a he is a half-wit and this is a guy some people think
should run the country because he says about hope and change he doesn't understand the basics of
economics, some of his inspiration
as Marx is like
he is a thick idiot objectively a thick idiot and he is considered by some people the guy they want to run the country I mean I wouldn have him run a coffee shop
And people want him to run a country.
And I know you laugh, but it's terrifying.
We have brilliant people in this country.
And they don't go anywhere near politics.
Why would they?
They have their lives exposed, constant pressure, might get murdered,
and there's no financial reward.
And so we are attracting idiots to run our country.
Rachel Reeves is an idiot.
Keir Starmer is an idiot.
Ed Miliband is an embarrassment.
Yvette Cooper, Bridget Philipson, David Lammy, these people are rubbish, useless morons.
And they are hollowing out our country through their stupidity, lack of integrity, lack of foresight.
it's it's bad what's your personal red line something the government could do that will
make you leave the country altogether well the last straw might be one that you can't avoid i
mean an exit tax the problem with an exit tax you have to announce it and implement it on the same
day and you can't do that and the minute you announce it everyone's like cheerio we may already
be at that point they might have already cost that red line i'm and not for me you know i i think
about my children right why what reason should they stay here in the uk like we have a state
that's running on fumes which is increasing taxes increasing regulation borrowing more
they are looting the public it's the legalized plunder of bastiat that we are living through
it's so obvious i mean i should get them the fuck out of this country and somewhere with
opportunity so I think the red line's already been crossed when I think of my children
I mean I've had a good life like whatever happens to me happens to me I don't care
but I care about my children but there would be certain authoritarian things that they might do
like they're delaying elections maybe if they stole an election I might be like this is this
is it I gotta go but really I probably should have left before what needs to happen
for the UK to become healthy again.
Huh.
Burn it all down and start again.
I'm going to sound like a broken record.
I think we need a codified constitution
with a Bill of Rights
that protects the freedoms of the people of this country,
which allows the pursuit of happiness,
which massively reduces the function of the state
to give people opportunity.
large parts of what Malay has done in Argentina.
I think a lot can be done in four years.
I think Malay has proved that.
I think the minute you elect somebody on that mandate,
you've started the process.
I don't know if there's like an end point where it's done.
You've started that process.
And once things start to improve, you have to be bold and continue
and you have to do whatever you can to prevent the statist, socialist thieves
getting back into a power and doing that work.
How do you see Bitcoin fitting in?
It's a good question.
I think it's central, but I don't talk about it because it scares people off.
But I think Bitcoin is a forcing function.
It takes the ability to create money away.
It changes all the incentives because you cannot create money.
And so ideally, a country would be on a Bitcoin standard.
So I think it's essential.
I think it's essential for maintaining the reversal.
Why do you think scares people away?
If you don't understand Bitcoin.
Yeah, when you first hear about it,
you've had all these other stories in your head
that it's for criminals and terrorists and it's a Ponzi
and you see some idiot like me driving around in a nice car
and you just think it's about that.
Most people don't understand money truly.
Think about money the way a Jeff Booth does
and think about the economic system.
They're just, they are the boiling frog.
And so to think there's like a completely different financial system
based on scarcity that can work is a huge leap for people.
How would you explain Bitcoin to King Charles in a nutshell?
All right, I'm going to meet King Charles, Buckingham Palace,
go explain Bitcoin to him.
I would say that to have a truly fair and democratic country,
we have to have a fair democratic form of money.
And the only form of fair and democratic money
is one that's ruled by consensus
and does not give the levers of money creation to the state.
And the only form of money that can do that is Bitcoin.
How's that?
That work?
Perfect.
We'll take that.
Let's go through some of the prime ministers you've had, past and present.
For each one, give me one good thing and one bad thing they did for Britain.
Let's start with Margaret Thatcher.
You already mentioned something good she did.
Yeah, look, this will be a challenge.
But for me, Margaret Thatcher, I think the best thing she looks,
she took over a government that was going with its cap in hand to the IMF.
we had a the 70s we averaged 13 inflation and we peaked at 25 and she ended that period with
policies to and it was painful for the country to go through like people went through real pain
but she restored economic confidence in the country um and i think that that's her most
important legacy others will talk about the falklands and respect on the world stage but
actually she you know and she took down the unions but ultimately it was the she restored
economic confidence in the country and her biggest failure would be the poll tax
which if you don't understand it was a tax a local tax i can't remember the tax it was meant to
replace and it was meant to be something that every person paid equally so if you were a billionaire
or you were poor, you all paid it equally.
It was like one vote, one payment.
I think it was like £400 or whatever.
But it kind of went against the spirit of progressive taxation.
You know, if you're poor, you should pay less
and if you're rich, you should pay more.
And it failed.
There were protests on the street.
They couldn't collect it.
And that brought her down.
And that means she ended her period on a negative
when she'd done so much good for the country.
but it was a failed tax idea. John Major? John Major. I don't know a lot about John Major
because I only know about, I mean, I lived through Thatcher Major, but I was so young.
I think one of the most important things he did, look, I'm half Irish. He had an important role in
what eventually became the end of the Troubles in Ireland. I think it was called the Downing Street
declaration or something as i remember it it was a policy based around allowing the irish to vote
uh british rule out of ireland i believe it it was an attempt to end the cycle of violence between
the unionists and the republicans um the the troubles in ireland if you've never watched
and there's a great series that BBC did.
I mean, it was just a cycle of endless violence.
And it felt like there was no way out of it.
Bombings in Ireland, Omar particularly, was a shocking bomb
that they put in a car.
There's a famous photo just before the bomb went off
because you know all the people who died in it.
There was the bombing of the Hotel Bethatria
and they tried to kill her.
But this cycle of violence just did not end.
And I think John Major played a large role in ending that cycle of violence
by giving the idea that the only way this would be solved was through peace.
In terms of a negative, again, I don't know him that well.
So because of that, I guess I don't know what his vision was.
My main negative of him is not understanding what the country stood for under him.
But he's a good guy.
I've listened to good interviews with him.
Tony Blair?
Tony Blair, I've thought about this a lot.
I almost don't want to give him a good because I despise the man
more than anyone that's been in this country.
But I have to hand it to him.
The Good Friday Agreement, again with Ireland,
was basically the actual end of violence in Ireland.
and there has been obviously sporadic moments of violence
and there will be better people who can explain it to IM
but they took risks
but the IRA disarmed after that
and they moved towards a democratic process
in what is a very difficult political environment in Ireland
because it's sectarian
so I do him, Clinton
along with Gerry Adams
who himself took huge risks to negotiate with the British state to end that cycle of violence.
But I cannot not give him credit for that as somebody who's half Irish.
In terms of the things he's done that bad, they are countless.
The Iraq War, I believe he should be tried in The Hague for that.
But I think one of the most evil things he did was remove powers away from central government.
He essentially created the deep state.
by awarding powers to unelected bodies.
And we faced so many consequences from that years down the line.
Gordon Brown.
Again, not somebody I know too much about.
He served one term less than he, well, he should have served,
he should have become prime minister before he did.
Tony Blair had promised him and then served one more term.
and sadly for him he was handed the tail end of that labor administration what i do know about him
is his deep care for poverty and poverty in the country um there's not much i'm going to find good
in a labor politician because i ideologically disagree with the labor party i just disagree with
left-wing parties in this country um but he he does deeply care about people in poverty
and he wants to help.
And that's a good part of his character.
His negatives, I mean, again, I don't know too much.
Did he sell the gold?
I think he sold all our gold, yeah.
David Cameron.
Well, some people would say the Brexit vote was a negative
and he offered it up to the backbenchers in return for them
supporting his run for prime minister.
but I think the referendum on Brexit was a chance for the UK
when we ballsed it up
but it was a chance for vote on our own sovereignty
and by honouring that I think that's a good thing
but at the same time I think it's also his biggest failure
because he bailed on the negotiations
and he should have carried that through
the problem with Cameron
there's very little difference between Cameron and Blair for me
you know you want if you believed in politics which i don't anymore so it doesn't really matter
but if you believe in left and right wing you want sharp differences between these people so
you know what you're voting for i don't think there are sharp differences between these characters
theresa may um i don't know enough about theresa may i i wasn't paying too much attention to
politics at the time she was handed the brexit negotiations i don't know what she did i couldn't
give you a good or a bad i'm indifferent to her because i was not paying too much attention that
time boris johnson a total failure um i think the only good thing he did is he kind of got the
brexit negotiations back on track um but an abject failure a person of all character no substance
destroyed the trust in parliament with party gate completely mishandled covid um
that's a shame because it was somebody people always liked but um just an abject failure
liz truss liz is an interesting one i've got to know liz and
the sad thing about liz truss is she fully understands all the problems in the country
she would echo a lot of what I've said and I echo a lot of what she said in that the deep state is a
problem she wanted to take on the treasury which is a good thing um she recognized uh the problem
of growth and wanted to drive growth she understands that uh we needed to you know reduce taxes and she
wanted to borrow I think the it was the failure of execution now part of that isn't all down to her
like the deep state and the bank of england worked against her but she rushed and i wish
she'd have stuck it out and not resigned and said no i'm sticking to my guns here
fuck you fuck the pressure i wish she'd have stuck with it but handed the reins differently
and she's had to take a lot of arrows since and still does from people who just do not understand
why they are wrong but they are wrong um she's the best prime minister we basically didn't have
over the last two, three decades,
just because she understood the problems
and she was willing to deal with them.
But the mechanics of the state worked against her.
I think she was too strong, and that's the problem.
That machine will work against you.
I've never asked her, but I should ask her why,
if she could have stuck it out, why didn't she?
That's what I'd like to ask her.
Yeah. Rishi Sunak?
Not a huge fan.
I think he's very patronizing,
talks to the country like they're five-year-olds.
But I do think he did restore some economic confidence.
He was proud of CVDCs.
Probably, but they all are because they don't know what they're talking about.
But he restored a lot of economic confidence.
When he handed the reins over to Keir Starmer,
the country was certainly improving on many aspects.
And I say that as somebody who's not a fan of his,
But what I don't think he did is reform the Conservative Party in the way it needed reforming, which is to be a conservative party.
There's too many wet liberals in there from the time of the coalition with the Liberal Democrats, which has really damaged the party.
I don't think he was conservative enough, but I do think he restored some economic confidence.
And what about Keir Starmer?
I don't have anything good to say about Keir Starmer.
I've tried to think about anything he's done
but I have an endless list of bad things
I feel sorry for the man, he's not up to the job
he's been given a job that is very difficult, very challenging
he's just not up to it
he doesn't have the ideas, the character, the leadership skills
required for a Prime Minister at a time like now
he has a front bench of weak, incompetent people
and they've made terrible decision after terrible decision.
They kowtow to their special interest groups.
He's unable to get decisions through.
I mean, I think he's going to be known as the U-turn prime minister
because the amount of U-turns the government has had to make,
things they've tried to do they can't get done.
And the problem is we got a Labour Party at a time
where we didn't, it's the worst kind of party we could have.
We needed a very conservative party.
And because we are, like, altruism is a function of a strong environment.
Like, if you have a strong economic environment,
you can have an altruistic Labour Party, which gives shit away for free.
I don't agree with it, but, like, that's the environment
you want them to have it in.
We have a poor economic environment and a government
that wants to give stuff away for free and borrow more.
And so he's been very weak.
He's weak on the farmers.
He's been weak on government debt.
He's been weak on our civil liberties.
He's been weak on regulation.
I think he is very destructive.
I think he will go down as one of the worst prime ministers in history
or just forgotten about.
But I think he needs to go.
I think he needs to be honest with himself.
I think the coolest thing he could do is resign and admit why he can't do the job.
But he is a very weak man.
And it's not a job for a weak man.
This is a job for someone with a backbone of strength to accept the tough challenges of the country and implement the required changes.
He can't do it.
I have nothing good to say about him.
Can you explain what inflation is and how to stop it really simply?
Well, it's the biggest crime enacted on the public. It's the extraction of money.
You lost me already.
Okay. Hmm. Okay. How should I explain it? Inflation. So inflation is the general increase in prices,
okay, which are not down to market forces. So if I buy a cup of coffee and the price has gone up
because, I don't know, where we buy our coffee from, it's got more expensive because they've
had a poor harvest. That's a temporary increase in prices to reflect the increase in the price of
coffee. But the general increase in prices of everything is from inflation. So as things get
more expensive everywhere, it is because of inflation. Okay, so why? What is it? The mechanics
of that. It's because there's more money being created. So when there's more money in the system,
it's chasing after the same goods and services. And so if it's general supply and demand economics,
it means prices are going to go up. That's inflation. It's the general increase in prices.
But we need to create money because poor people need money.
That's bait. You're baiting me. No, we don't. You are baiting me.
Explain why not. This is the argument that I hear.
You're baiting me. And I know why, because you want the answer.
I want the answer, yeah.
That would assume that when money is created,
that it only created to create a fairer society to help poorer people But that not how money is created and distributed When the government creates money it multiple ways but it ends up on being created through the banks and the banks
end up distributing it so those we call them cantillionaires the cantillion effect is that
those closest to the money get access to it first they get therefore access to the cheap credit to
use it they get to buy the assets as well as other things and when we get the general inflation
the general rise in prices that comes with the back of that it happens quicker than wage growth
and when it happens people are just functionally made poorer because their purchasing power has
been eroded and so your argument is false because that's not how and even if it was
what if you give that money you're not enabling them to create their own money what you're doing
is you're putting a sticking plaster over their financial position but they're still creating more
money in society chasing after the goods and services that will see prices go up how do we
stop it we have to stop money creation and the only way we can do that is making bitcoin the
only money that people use. You think people can go from not knowing Bitcoin to Bitcoin? I have.
Yes. You have? Yes. So yes. Without using labels, can you describe the kind of economic system
you believe would work best in the UK and why? Well, it's not just the UK, it's anywhere. Yeah.
I think the best financial system is one where the base layer of money is decentralized and not
controlled by any individual group of people where the money supply cannot be expanded because that
changes the incentives and the mechanics of the system that's the only way if someone gave you
the uk tomorrow yes what's the first law you would pass the first law i would pass would be universal
free speech i would give us what they have in the first amendment in america you know that's the
first thing I would do, because I think I'd want to establish freedom and liberty within the
country. So the first thing I would do is say, you are free to speak. You can think and speak freely
and you are not going to face any legal consequences there. You might face social
consequences, but that's fine. Let's go through some of the main government departments.
Just say what comes to mind, what's broken and what needs fixing fast.
Okay. Ministry of Defence.
Yeah, I mean, we've not invested in defense. I think our defense is, I think, look, I think our Marines, our SAS and SBS are very good and highly respected. But I think we've not invested in our defense for a long time. And we, I mean, I think there's some like tank things we got recently that are just completely broken. We had a nuclear deterrent test that completely failed. But I think we have a weak defense that we've not invested particularly well in.
I would want it as a deterrent that we're not a weak country you can just walk into and take.
I mean, that's the main reason.
The Treasury.
I think it's part of the mechanics of funding the government and funding irresponsible economic policy.
This is one of the things Liz Truss has challenged, the orthodoxy of the Treasury.
I think it needs to be run by a minister and not its own department.
I just think it's a department of theft.
Department of Health and Social Care.
I think it's too kind and wants to fix everything.
And that means it needs an infinite budget.
Department for Education.
It's just an embarrassment.
We spend more on debt interest in our country than we do on education.
and we're indoctrinating children as to leftist bollocks.
It's an embarrassment.
We are not creating resilient, strong, intelligent kids
who think critically.
I mean, there was a thing that came out recently.
Something like eight in 10 teachers would vote for Labour or Green.
I mean, that's terrifying.
And you leave your kids with them for six hours.
Not mine.
Department of Business and Trade?
I would close it down because they get in the way of business and trade and I would allow the free market to do its thing.
Department for work and pensions?
Same, but the thing is I would close all of these departments because they don't do the things I would do with government, which is defend life, liberty and property.
And so all these are departments that create extraction mechanisms from the productive parts of society.
And some people might think that you close them because you don't care about these things.
I close them because I care.
Yeah, I close them because I care.
Because I don't know a single government department which net improves the things it wants to do.
I think it's all a drag on the freedoms of people to go out and create and be prosperous.
Ministry of Justice?
I mean, it's been captured and weaponized against the British public.
And I don't know what I'd do with it, but we have lawfare that the government weaponizes against its own people.
Department of Environment?
Oh, do you know what?
If I was going to leave one department, maybe those.
it's one of my challenges on the libertarian end of things in that you don't have to look at
a DuPont and what they did you can watch the film Dark Waters and how they poisoned the land look
no restraints on business um I've never heard a very good libertarian answer
for uh for this because it's a bit like what happened with um the film Dope Sick
when Purdue created OxyContin and the calamity,
the catastrophic impacts of the opioid crisis.
And I don't know in a free market if there is any mechanisms to stop that.
Sure, the mechanisms whereby people have free access to healthcare,
but we saw that people committed crime to satisfy their addictions.
and I just never heard a great libertarian answer for that.
So I think I would perhaps be one of the last departments I would close.
And maybe I don't.
Maybe a healthy environment is part of the pursuit of happiness,
something that a government should defend,
that you get to live in a nice, healthy environment
and there are some limited restrictions they could put in place.
The energy department?
I think the energy should be free market.
I think our Department for Energy has led to us having the most expensive energy in the world, which is a tax on businesses and cripples us.
I mean, it's just catastrophic.
You know, when you talk about free market, what do you mean?
Well, the free market is the ability for you and I to freely exchange with each other, for you to provide something, set a price and me to agree contractually to exchange money for whatever it is you're providing.
And the free market means there's no government regulations or barriers that get in the way of that exchange that distorts that market, distorts the prices.
So that's what the free market is.
do I think we'll ever get a fully free market? Probably not. But I would like,
give me 90% of regulations and interference, and we will have a much more prosperous function in
society, which will create more jobs and opportunity for people. I would remove government
from interfering with where energy comes from and the prices that are being charged.
There are some challenges with that, in that obviously you don't want to have,
if you had competition in electricity you don't want to have two sets of electric lines side by
side and choose which way you want to be and so the competition has to act within a single
infrastructure and perhaps there is a role in government for the infrastructure the providing
the infrastructure not providing but allowing the competition to exist within that infrastructure
but it's the it's the regulation and the taxes and the burden and the focus on this kind of net
zero stupidity which i believe has led to us having the most expensive prices in the world
because in a free market for energy we wouldn't have the large solar and wind farms we'd probably
still be burning coal um we may have more nuclear and so i think i think in a free a freer
market for energy in this country, we would have demonstrably lower energy prices.
What kind of leadership style do you think is necessary to fix those issues?
Probably a number of skills I don't have.
I bet you do.
I think you have to be honest, stoic, factual, non-confrontational, unless it's required.
I think you have to leave your ego at the door.
I don't know if that person exists within this country right now
and if they did, whether people would want them.
I think we're so gone and so broken.
Let's play 2029.
Prime Minister McCormack walks into his first cabinet meeting.
Who do you surround yourself with?
What kind of people are sitting at the table?
And what qualities do you value most in them?
I would surround myself with experts in their field.
Hopefully my energy secretary would be Catherine Porter.
I believe she is an expert in understanding energy.
On the economic side, I'd hope to have Jeff Booth with me,
but I might not be able to get him,
so I don't be someone like Shankasingham.
it'd probably be a bunch of people i've interviewed who i respect um it would be as small as possible
focused entirely on delivering exactly what i would want my mandate to be which is drastically
reduce the size of government focused on life liberty and defense of property property rights
and the quality I would want from them all is loyalty to the mission
because I would set it as a specific plan and a timescale
and once we've delivered I would want to be able to step down
and return to normal life.
I have no desire for power, I have desire for results
and so I would say be loyal to the plan,
put all your personal ambition to one side,
take one for the team in this
and if we agree to this plan, let's go and execute it.
Don't work against this department.
Don't work against me.
And hopefully they will be loyal to the mandate.
I think you will get Jeff Booth.
Maybe. I'm not sure if he's allowed to be.
Oh, I don't know. An advisor?
Yeah, maybe as an advisor.
What was your campaign slogan during the elections?
PM for PM.
The Great Restoration.
do you think the people that know you well your staff your players your audience will have bought
it for you i think so why i think i've built trust i think i've i've executed on the promises i've
made i've set a vision and stuck to it so i think people will trust me i think the people close to
me there's a there's a gap between people who don't know me who and they form their opinions
of who I am and who I actually am.
And the people around me know me.
So I think they trust me.
Pete, I see your tweets.
I listen to your pot.
You are utterly frustrated.
You are an honest, hardworking builder,
a thousand percent British
and absolutely disgusted with your government.
You turn a part team into a global Bitcoin billboard.
You are doing what Bitcoin has always said
we were supposed to do,
not just the stack stats,
but get out there and help fix the world.
You've got the heart, the empathy, and the courage to do it.
You've got the skills to surround yourself with the best and brightest.
And you could get the support of the Bitcoiners that helped put Trump in the White House.
You didn't vote in the last three elections because you didn't feel represented.
But could you be the representation millions of British people are longing for?
I mean, I could be. It's whether they want what I'm selling, the mandate I would want to deliver, and they would believe in it. That's a very tough thing.
So, Pete McCormack, four years from now, Prime Minister, why not? Could you be the leader return needs?
not in four years maybe in eight years when reform come in and unable to deliver perhaps then
i don't think i'm on that path to do that that's the problem because that path needs
direction it needs commitment it needs intentionality and i don't have the intention
of doing that. So I'm just a guy who writes some blogs and makes some podcasts at the moment.
Should somehow my content create a movement where people want it? And my family wanted me to do it,
and I believed I could do it. Why not? I'd have to surround myself with some far more intelligent
people than I am. But I think the skill I would have would be to bring people along.
The smart people would have to execute it. We need to call the early Bitcoiners to the table
to help finance the presidential campaign to change Britain and the world.
So to wrap up, if the Bitcoiners showed up, if the money was there, would you say yes?
If I believed that what is required could be achieved, of course.
It would be no greater privilege to serve your country and restore it to what it needs to be.
um i don't i think you've put the cart before the horse i think if i wanted to and chose to do i
think the bitcoiners would support me and say go for it pete i just need to believe i can and have
the intentionality to do it and it is something i wrestle with regularly
if you would say yes what would you call first um my first phone call i i wouldn't answer here
um there is somebody who's already told me to do it
and i would i just wouldn't throw them under the bus there's a few people i would call
i'd call danny just to laugh about it um i'd call jeff booth say jeff this one thing again
I think it's possible.
Can you help me?
I would call Lynn Alden and say,
Lynn, I need some guidance on the economic side of things.
I'd give my friend American Hoddle a call and say,
am I being a moron?
And he'll say, yeah, but you can do this.
There's no one first call.
Well, probably Danny.
i'll probably phone danny and say am i actually doing this
yeah does britain need you or do you need britain
oh britain doesn't need me but britain the uk needs a good strong leader who can restore it
to greatness and there are many better people than me who are far more skilled or able to do
this that perhaps don't understand the problem and ideally a few of them start to connect the
dots and realize actually this is what's required I mean ideally Nigel Farage is going to probably
become our next prime minister reform will most likely win the next election the ideal world he
fully understands this and he executes it because he has that path to power and so yeah I don't need
the uk i want it when i interviewed jeff booth uh he told me that he didn't want to write the
price of tomorrow and i asked him why not and he said because i wanted someone else to do it
but i kept talking about these concepts no one was receptive so i had to go and write the book
he's a very special man our jeff booth it's a little bit of what you're saying yeah
Yeah, yeah.
I'll ponder this.
Last one.
Okay.
Are you proud of yourself?
I'm just not sure I think about it.
I want to be proud of myself as a father.
That's really important to me.
Pride comes before the fall.
I don't need to be proud of myself.
I just need good intentions to ensure I follow through on them.
Thanks for your time.
Thank you.
your candor and everything you've built pete where can people follow you argue with you or buy you a
pint i mean i'm usually in my coffee shop or at the football that's easy to find otherwise i have
a podcast it's called the peter mccormack show you can find it on youtube spotify anywhere and
i have a twitter at peter mccormack i can be a little bit noisy and loud are you lost i can
I'm trying to remember
why Nostra is.
I think it's McCormack.
We'll find it.
But yeah,
I've just started posting
on there a little bit
more recently
rather than just like
posting here on my shows
like a couple of comments
recently.
Bitcoin Twitter's dead.
Can't wait to have you back.
Until then,
stay sovereign.
Thank you.
I understand everything
that Michael said now.
Yeah,
there's a lot to think about here
and I appreciate
the hard work
that you've put into
those questions
because no interview has ever made me think this deeply
and forced me to be so honest.
So I appreciate you.
Thank you.
Thank you, Pete.