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They only went to Bitcoin miners.

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But I would turn around and say,

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but what is causing Bitcoin miners to mine?

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Well, it's the price of Bitcoin.

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What's causing the price of Bitcoin?

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Well, it's people holding Bitcoin.

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What's causing people to hold Bitcoin?

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Well, they don't trust the government.

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What's causing that lack of trust?

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Might have to do with the massive amount of currency

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debasement that has occurred over the past 50 years.

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You know, it's like, oh, okay.

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Really, the people at the root cause of these carbon emissions,

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it's Keynesians, right?

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It's the people who want to print money

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and who have violated the institutional trust

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and the credibility that historically helped government.

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[♪ music playing in the background.

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[♪ music playing in the background.

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Greetings and salutations, my fellow plebs.

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My name is Walker and this is the Bitcoin Podcast.

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The Bitcoin time chain is 832-839,

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and the value of one Bitcoin is still one Bitcoin.

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Today's episode is Bitcoin Talk,

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where I talk with my guest about Bitcoin and whatever else comes up.

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Today, that guest is Pierre Rashard,

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VP of Research at Riot Platforms.

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Pierre is an incredible resource on Bitcoin mining,

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and he's also a hilarious dude.

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We dug deep into Bitcoin mining, energy, demand response in the grid,

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and covered the recent victory for Bitcoin miners in the US

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against illegal government overreach.

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Near the end, Pierre also gives a powerful message to policymakers

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that I highly recommend everyone share with their elected officials.

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I guarantee you will learn a lot from our conversation,

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and you will laugh a lot too.

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A quick request before we dive in.

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If you like the Bitcoin Podcast,

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please share an episode you find valuable on Nooster, Twitter, or even Facebook

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if you're still one of the few people using that.

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I'm a one-man show trying to build out another fucking Bitcoin Podcast.

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So the best way you can support this show

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is to share with your friends, family, and strangers on the internet.

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You can also support this show by going to bitbox.swiss.com

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and using the promo code WALKER to get yourself 5% off the fully open source

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Bitcoin-only BitboxO2 hardware wallet.

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As always, you can watch the video version of this episode on Rumble, YouTube, or X.

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Just search at WalkerAmerica, or listen on fountain.fm,

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or wherever you get your podcasts by searching for the Bitcoin Podcast.

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If you listen to the Bitcoin Podcast on fountain, which I recommend,

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consider giving this show a boost or creating a clip of something you found interesting.

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And if you are a Bitcoin-only company,

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interested in sponsoring another fucking Bitcoin Podcast,

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hit me up on social media, or through the website, bitcoinpodcast.net.

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Without further ado, let's get into this Bitcoin Talk with Pierre Rochard.

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Man, welcome. Thank you so much for sharing your scariest time with me and coming on here.

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Yeah, of course. Thanks for having me on.

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You know, I was thinking, I've just started this fairly recently,

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and I was thinking about folks to have on,

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and I've got to say that your tweets and also videos that you have starred in

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have been some of my absolute favorites, and I was just thinking, you know,

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I need to have somebody on to really dive deep into the Bitcoin mining side,

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and who better than you?

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And I've got to say also, still to this day,

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I will sometimes go back and watch that, the video that you and Riot put out,

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after the New York Times propaganda piece, where you had your little atmospheric tester,

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and you were going around, you know, and just, it cracks me up every single time.

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It was such a, I can't even call it satire though, because there it is,

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there's the famous piece, but I can't even call it satire, because it was genuinely being honest.

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But I think that people who perhaps don't understand the realities of the world

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thought like, well, this is satire, or like, I saw so many articles, I was even looking today,

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and I saw that it got fact checked by like the big fact checkers, the like AFP,

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and all of those, like saying like, well, this actually Bitcoin mining does have emissions,

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and I'll link this video in the show notes for anyone who has not seen it,

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I think probably most folks have, but I just wanted to say that was,

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that was some brilliant work that you guys did with that, so thank you.

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Yeah, thank you. I appreciate it. The compliment means a lot coming from you.

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And the other thing I'd add is I really like that you identify that this video did not fall into the two categories

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that 99% of people thought that it fell into. You're right, it falls into a third, far more absurd category

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of truthful, parody humor.

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Yeah, you could almost call it like truthful absurdism, maybe, like let's just take this to the logical extreme

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and let's use the, you know, use the tools of the regime against it, but it was just brilliant.

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I was reading through this fact check article today, and there was one part where they said,

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oh, if computers are powered, or if the computers are powered by wind or solar,

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then the facility would be considered to be carbon free. However, if a power plant burning fossil fuel

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is generating the energy, then we can't consider Bitcoin mining free from any carbon emissions.

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And it's like, you read that and you're like, okay, but then pause.

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So we're saying that every single EV has a huge carbon footprint, right?

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Like, we're just admitting that then, but in not directly.

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It blows my mind the lack of kind of awareness of the realities of the electricity grid

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and that people think it just comes out like, oh, if it's electricity, it's clean.

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I don't, I don't get it.

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Well, in a way, there, I think that actually is the correct perspective that if it's electricity is clean.

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I agree. But unless you're a Bitcoin miner, then it's dirty, you know.

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Well, right. Yeah. And it's funny because that is actually the position you put forward that, hey, it would be okay

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if they were using renewables. That's actually the moderate position.

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The extremist position is that, and this is the position of the Biden administration, by the way,

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because we know it's their position because this is what they wrote in their tax proposal where they said that

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there should be a tax on electricity consumption from Bitcoin miners, even if you are on your own property

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with your solar panels and your windmills and you're producing your own electricity in a completely renewable manner

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and you are feeding it into your Bitcoin miners, you need to figure out what the transfer pricing is on the electricity

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because they wanted to tax that and they said that it's still a problem because that renewable electricity could be, you know,

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saving lives. It could be put towards better uses like hospitals for disabled children.

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You know, it's like, oh, okay, I didn't understand that was the limiting factor for hospitals was this electricity,

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which by the way, in Texas, we overproduce electricity. We have a superabundance of electricity.

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It's not uncommon for electricity prices to be negative or zero.

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So, you know, so the moderate position is that it's okay if it's with renewables.

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My position on personally, you know, kind of just going beyond the video is that, or really going into the video

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because this is the central point is that any kind of policies around any kind of pollutants or alleged pollutants

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like carbon dioxide or greenhouse gases has to follow basically the science of chemistry, right, of where are the actual pollutants coming out of,

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what's the source, and that's all we need to take an inventory of and do an accounting of.

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Once we start thinking about the abstract of what is causing this,

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you can go up the causal chain to any level.

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So, you know, they only went to Bitcoin miners, but I would turn around and say,

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but what is causing Bitcoin miners to mine?

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Well, it's the price of Bitcoin. What's causing the price of Bitcoin?

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Well, it's people holding Bitcoin. What's causing people to hold Bitcoin?

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Well, they don't trust the government. What's causing that lack of trust?

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What might have to do with the massive amount of currency debasement that has occurred over the past 50 years?

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You know, it's like, oh, okay, so really the people at the root cause of these carbon emissions, it's Keynesians, right?

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It's the people who want to print money and who have violated the institutional trust and the credibility that historically, you know,

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it helped governments. Now, so, but of course, we could keep going of, well, what caused them to start printing money?

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Well, I'd actually argue that it was a technological discovery of the printing press, you know, literally, you know,

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that once you had the technology to, and really it's about the counterfeiting and also the verification, right?

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Once you had a bill counting machine, and so to do that, you needed plastics and semiconductors.

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So, you know, there was kind of a technological tool chain that emerged that lowered the cost of kind of creating a hard to forge currency.

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And I think that's what ultimately gives the government such a good monopoly and thus good monopoly seniority rents, right?

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The profit margins on printing money, you know, the profit margins are terrible on printing money if everybody can do it pretty cheaply, right?

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If you can go buy an HP printer, and you know, it's like, oh, yeah, you can get close enough to $100 billies in HP printer,

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and you know, you can buy the paper and all this, you know, that would be a problem.

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But as everyone who has watched, well, so there's catch me if you can, the famous movie about forgeries,

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but there's lots of documentaries about, you know, how they make $100 bill hard to forge.

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So all that to say that, you know, that arguably was the cause of kind of the inflationary century that we saw.

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And then of course, in the electronic world, you have cryptography now.

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And something that were, you know, the the Treadfy system was using cryptography before Bitcoin existed, right?

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When you entered your credit card information online in 2007, you did so using SSL, you know, HTTPS, these encryption protocols.

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So I would argue that the US dollar was a cryptocurrency before Bitcoin existed.

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And so, yeah, but all that to say that that's, you know, the security technology around a currency matters a lot.

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And then once you have a certain security technology, it's like, okay, what's going to be your monetary policy?

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And that's where I think the Bitcoin central innovation is.

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It's not in the use of cryptography, right, because that was happening with Fiat anyway.

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It wasn't in the fact that you had an app for that, right?

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You already had mobile banking. It was that you can actually know that if you hold one Bitcoin, you've got a fixed percentage of the total diluted supply of Bitcoin.

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Anyway, sorry, I'm rambling, but that that I think is the cause of Bitcoin mining.

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And it is, I think it is particularly offensive to Fiat Maximus that essentially what we have here is that these people are consuming massive amounts of electricity in order to destroy senior-age profits, right?

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To them, it's like you are, yeah, it's that's their lifeblood that you're sacrificing.

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And so I think that's why they find Bitcoin mining to be particularly offensive on top of just kind of the regular, like, degrowth environmentalist perspective is the wastefulness of it from their perspective is not limited to the environmental

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impact, the wastefulness also has to do with that it doesn't just have zero value.

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It has negative value because you're destroying senior-age profits from their worldview.

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From my worldview, I see senior-age profits is actually being profoundly immoral.

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And I think that this is the perspective that is written out in a really great piece by Guido Holtzman of the Ethics of Money production.

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And I think that it's actually, to me, it's actually a religious belief personally as a Catholic that monopoly senior-age rents are a form of theft.

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You know, this is counterfeiting by a different word.

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And that Bitcoin does not have that, doesn't have that bug.

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And so that, I think, is a lot of the anti-Bitcoin mining energy from Elizabeth Warren and others who, you know, they want a world where not only do they have monopoly senior-age rents that help finance kind of their agenda,

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but also they can control how other people spend their own money.

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And so they want to not just control, and they want to do it at a macro level of like, they want to control in aggregate, hey, we want more people to spend money right now.

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And so that's why they hit the money printing button of, you know, hey, we're going to send everyone a check.

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And so they want all this control, arguably, you know, for good reasons, right, that they think that they know better than everyone else, and that they should be in charge, and that if they are in charge, there will be better outcomes for humanity.

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And I see that as just pure arrogance, right?

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It's this pride and ego of, hey, I am omniscient, and, you know, I can know what good stewardship of capital is.

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And I think that ultimately what ends up happening anyway is that it's not the quote unquote good people who end up in charge of these mechanisms.

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It's the people who are cunning enough to weasel their way in and to get their percentage, right?

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So, you know, I've heard stories of fraud with like the PPE loans, for example, like during COVID, but then also just during the bailouts, right?

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You've got these bank bailouts.

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You know, Elizabeth Warren says, oh, you know, if I were in charge, I wouldn't let these CEOs have these big bonuses.

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That's like, okay, but you're not in charge.

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And simultaneously, you are promoting this fiat system as a whole.

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Because it's also, you know, she's basically is able to advocate for a financial system in a form of centralization where, yes, in an ideal world,

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if the gatekeepers, if the centralized, if the central planners are great, then you'll get a good outcome.

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But then she's not mapping that to the reality of that's not who ends up at the top of these authorities.

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And so she just has like an unrealistic understanding of humanity.

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First of all, you can rant anytime you want on this show.

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And I appreciate that.

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What a what an intro really, I'm trying to decide which part to unpack because there are a lot there.

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And I mean, perhaps we should start at the end, which is also in a way the beginning, which is folks like Elizabeth Warren.

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And she actually wasn't correct me if I'm wrong here, but didn't Warren have a pretty heavy hand in the tarp program, the trouble or troubled asset relief program during or in the post 2008 era,

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where she was trying to manage some of the fallout from that and decide what to do with some I'm not I'm not super deep on that.

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Am I correct there? She was fairly high up in that program.

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I think that you're you might be referring to Neil Cache carry, who is another antagonist in the fiat camp.

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I think she was involved with just activism for Wall Street reform.

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But I'd have to go and look what her role was with tarp because lots of shenanigans shenanigans over there.

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It's it is just kind of ridiculous. And I love where you started with just going up the taking things that are logical next step, right?

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Because for so many of these arguments against Bitcoin mining to hold any sort of leaky, you know, water, you need to stop your logic like after one or two steps, like you need to say, OK, Bitcoin miners shouldn't they're using too much electricity.

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And that is bad. But and the electricity is we're also saying that it's dirty.

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We're not talking about the fact that we're not going to go any further and say, OK, well, what's our electricity, you know, our energy mix in the US, where does most of our electricity come from?

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And, you know, we're saying that these Bitcoin miners alone are burning the planet because of their efforts in the USA.

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To say nothing of China's energy mix or India's energy mix or, you know, they're China being like what?

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Multiple times larger than the US in terms of energy usage. And also, they think they use like 70% coal still over there, which, you know, more power to them.

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But you have to suspend your logic at a certain point in order for you to even believe you are making some sort of intelligent argument.

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I wonder, I mean, because you've spent now a good amount of time, I think at the at the state level and at the local level, talking with legislators and people who are, you know, policymakers.

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From what you've seen, are these people generally operating in good faith and and think and is it just an issue of bad information?

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Like they've just been fed bad information by their aides who just didn't do the right research. Or, you know, is it is it one of those don't attribute to malice where you can attribute to incompetence type of things?

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Or is there a little bit of both? Like how do you see that at the local and state level and then at the larger national level?

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Yeah, I find it fascinating because on the surface, you have a lot of formalism, right?

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Oh, this is very orderly, right? Every, you know, bill has a number to it and there's a defined process for everything. And so what a great system.

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It's all just kind of straight lines across, right? You just need to check boxes and it's just, you know, bureaucratic paperwork.

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But then once you actually go in the trenches, it's just it's pure chaos, right?

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There's there's people just lobbying each other left and right. So you've got trade associations that are lobbying. You've got environmentalists that are lobbying and you've got, you know, senators lobbying representatives and vice versa and staff lobbying the senator or the the the other part of this too is that it doesn't fall neatly on Republican or Democrat.

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So part of the chaos is that they're trying to have a say in every single issue in society, right? So a modern politician has to have a position on literally every issue you could think of.

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And if they don't, then they are just they're not qualified to be in office, apparently.

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So that's kind of absurd, because that means that they have to get smart, right? They have to get information about every issue.

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And a lot of these issues are probably very nuanced and multifaceted and complex and probably, you know, the government might not even have a role in being involved in it, but they're kind of just, you know, doing something.

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But the the other piece of that, though, is that they do end up specializing somewhat. So some politicians will get particularly interested in energy policy or they'll get really interested in.

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I don't know.

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I'm just thinking about energy. Energy. That's the only like topic that I guess I'm interested in right now.

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But you know, finance, right, or banking. But they so their but or health care is another big one, you know, but the problem is that here in Texas, in particular, is that there's a very limited amount of time.

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So the legislature meets every two years.

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But even in Washington DC, there's a limited amount of time in the sense of you have to to make anything happen. You have to get a bunch of people's attention.

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Right.

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And in that way, I would actually liken the political system to is very much like social media, right?

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There's particular things that are happening that have people's attention that are in the zeitgeist that are part of the news cycle. And that if you, you know, it just makes them ripe for legislation or regulatory action or a lawsuit or something like that.

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Right.

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I think that a lot of there's, I think that there's a wide spectrum of motivations on the part of policymakers. I think that the majority of them do actually want good policy.

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A lot of them have kids, you know, I do think that to an extent they're like, they are thinking about trying to, you know, make a better world for their kids.

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Some of them are childless. And I think that's a problem. I think there should probably be rules around that. I don't think you should be allowed to, you know, be in a decision making position.

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If you don't have any stake in the future. But the other part of it too, I think the from a policy perspective is that a lot of them like they, they learned, they might have learned about some of these issues from an academic perspective that like they got a degree in this 20 years ago.

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And they're an expert and that they might have a priori's right. They might have biases either for an industry, for example, they might like be really on the side of the industry because they're looking for a revolving door opportunity to jump ship into, you know, the private sector.

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So they're like developing good relationships with people. Or they see themselves as just basically like unhinged mall cop, right, who's like on the beat and takes their job super seriously and is, you know, if they catch you yelling your friend's name, they're, they're going to tell it right a ticket about how you shouldn't yell in the mall, you know, it's like, they're really, they're there to power trip, you know,

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there's not, they're not there in the public interest. And, and then I think that there's like the activist ideologues. On the right, I think this usually ends up being either a religious thing, or a libertarian thing.

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On the left, I think that it's usually that religious thing like but they're they're worshiping mother nature right it's just it's just repackaged Gaia pagan worship from, you know, pre Christian times.

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But they also I think that, you know, some of them have been accused of being satanic cults. Well, I don't know if that's true or not, but that would be quite shocking. But you know, we read rumors in the news.

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I mean, not so shocking though also, you know, in some cases.

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Yeah, but you know, I think that at the end of the day, they, they balance most of them, the majority I think balance wanting good policy with also being responsive to their constituents, they get reelected, or reappointed or whatever it is.

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And so that's a really I think that's the best part about the how the United States government is set up is that every two years we vote, and we can replace the entire House of Representatives at the federal level in two years.

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I think that that is really fantastic. And so the kind of the orderly transition of power that, you know, that I think that's what has prevented the United States from going through what other countries have had like France, France is on its fifth republic.

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You know, we've had a lot of problems like I so anyway, there's there's the responsiveness to voters and then the other really nice thing the United States has is an independent judiciary.

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And kind of the checks and balances that you get between the legislative branch, the executive branch and the judicial branch. And so this is probably a good place to segue into kind of what's going on in Bitcoin mining from a policy perspective today.

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It's like, it's like you read my mind. Perfect segue into the whole EIA quote unquote emergency order, and, and all of that. So can you can you walk us through because you've been I'm getting a lot of my news on this from you because you've been right on the front lines of it.

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But for anybody maybe who's not familiar with how this saga is playing out so far. Can you kind of start us what it was back at like the beginning of February end of January they released the order that they were going to initiate some some data collection, an emergency order.

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Can you kind of talk about how that came to be and then what has happened in the month since they they put that out there because it feels like it's been more than that but I think it's only been like a month right.

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It's been 50 years. So this started in 1971. When we left the gold standard.

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I don't know why you thought that it started sorry those those foolish of me.

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Yeah.

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You know, with the inflation rising energy prices they put price controls in place and so then they had to have rationing and so they needed to collect data to ration energy. So it's just pure fiat right it's just like this is insanity so they created this like whole framework for you know, gathering information

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surveys. Now, the 1970s, because of all that was going on.

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It led to the government flooding the private sector with forms.

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You know, everyone in the United States was spending every day of their life filling out forms for the government, explaining minute details of how they're using energy, what food they're eating, you know, it's just what their leisure time was spent on.

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It was just forms and forms of force.

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The in 1980 they passed the paperwork reduction act.

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This day. Okay, no more forms. You guys have to you have to substantiate why you need to collect this data like you can just collect data for the sake of collecting data you have to actually explain what you're going to do with this information and why it's useful and people can challenge you on this, you know.

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And so the way we're going to do this is that if you want if you want to put out a form to the public. First of all, you have to announce that you're going to do this.

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And so this is called public notice you you publish the proposed form, and then you open it up for comments and you say all right, let's get feedback from the American public.

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Why do why here's you know we got a new form for you know how many bowel movements you have per day right like this is the data that we need to collect going forward, just to make sure America is healthy just like 100%.

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And then everyone submit comments you've got several weeks to submit comments.

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And then, after that they have to review all the comments, and they have to either take them into account or explain why they did not take the comments into account right or the idea or whatever.

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And if they don't do that then they can get challenged in court right so all of this allows you to have kind of a level of review and transparency that I think is just good government.

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I don't think it's particularly controversial. I mean if we're going to do forms right. My view would be that. No there's no forms you can't propose forms there's no process for that.

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No, the process is you ask for a form and I say no.

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But that's not the world we live in so you know the the compromise is all right you can have forms but you have to like prove that you actually need forms.

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And they said that hey look, there's there's some exceptions right if if there's an emergency, you can send the format right away, and that's okay because it's an emergency.

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And the emergency is if there's if it's if it's reasonably likely that your public harm is going to happen. If you don't wait a few weeks right you know of getting comments back and reviewing them and responding to them.

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So I say a few weeks, sometimes if you get like really super high quality comments, it might take years. So that's, you know, that's part of the challenge of being a bureaucrat is that you have to respond to to some pretty nuanced comments sometimes

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and it can take a while, but you have to follow the rules right I mean this is what this is what we all consent to, you know as part of our, what is that called the they have the social contract.

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This is our democracy that we have to defend. So the. So if there's a reasonable likelihood that there's going to be public harm, if you know you don't rush this format to the public, then there's an exception you can have an emergency.

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So the Secretary of Energy, Grandholm, she is responsible for this area of regulatory matters and last year she was testifying in front of the Senate, the highly highly regarded senator from Massachusetts, Senator Elizabeth Warren,

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and she was grilling Secretary Grandholm on when she was going to start collecting data from Bitcoin miners.

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Secretary Grandholm, when you came before this committee last year, I asked you if the federal government knew how many crypto miners are operating in the United States and how much energy they're consuming, and you said that wasn't being tracked and that more data would be needed.

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Well, here we are a year later is the Department of Energy, formal formally tracking crypto miners yet.

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Great.

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First of all, thank you so much for your leadership in this because I do think that you have unearthed a massive problem.

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And so we don't know how many miners there are.

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We don't know where they are.

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We all of them and some of them you do but some of them you many of them you don't a lot of them are just underground.

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Some of them are small operators.

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So as you and I have discussed, we have charged our energy information administration with figuring out how to mandate a reporting of these entities.

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Now that's complicated as you know, because they are many of them are underground and even the utilities may not know where the the draws coming from.

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So I think that you're going to send the format and the survey and that she had asked Elizabeth Horn had asked Secretary Granholm to do this a year before.

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So this would be in 2022 that she was asked to do this.

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And Secretary Granholm was I'll say that she did not seem to view this as an emergency at all.

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So let's talk about that.

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Given that crypto mining undermines all of our other climate work, we can't afford to delay on this.

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There's a lot of urgency around this.

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So I want to talk for just a second about the authority you have to gather information on this.

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Let me ask Secretary Granholm, do you have the authority to mandate that crypto miners disclose information about their energy consumption?

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We have the mandate authority.

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The first was that before we can create the form before we can create the survey, we need to get survey data.

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This is very circular.

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We need to get survey data from another form that is currently being filled out by people that's going to be compiled and then we'll be able to create the next form.

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So in your response to a letter I sent you in February, you indicated that the Energy Information Administration will first need to develop a new survey program to begin collecting information from crypto miners.

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By when do you expect to field this survey and use it to gather data from crypto miners on a mandatory basis?

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First of all, we are looking at creating the survey from a regular report that is an electricity gathering report that we have now asked to include crypto as part of it.

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That report from NREL will be completed by the end of this year on which the Energy Information Administration can base its survey.

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So it's going to take some time for them to be able to craft the survey from the information that they receive from the NREL report, but know that that is happening and we are pushing to accelerate the timeline because it is.

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Okay, so by the end of this year you will have a report on mandatory reporting putting a...

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I want to make sure I know what we're going to do.

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No, we'll have a report that will have gathered not fully but enough information to be able to craft the framework for the survey.

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And Elizabeth Warren is like, okay, but are you telling me this is going to be in 2024?

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And Secretary Granholm is like, well, I hope so.

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And Senator Warren looks just enraged. She's like, you know, I'm going to hold you to it. You got to get it out.

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So we won't be able to get the survey out, the mandatory survey by the end of this year, but we will have the report done and the survey will be constructed from that.

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Okay, and we are certain we're going to get that mandatory survey out then sometime in 2024?

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I hope so, but I don't want to...

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Tic-Toc.

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And she's like, this is an emergency because of the climate. This is the climate emergency.

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I mean, look, we're running out of time here.

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Crypto mining's energy use truly undermines our efforts to fight climate change and we are out of time.

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We need to understand the full scope of the problem and that starts with the authorities you have.

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So I hope that the next time we come back, you will tell me that you now have that survey in place and we are getting mandatory reporting from the crypto mining companies.

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I hope so too.

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I'm going to hold you to it.

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And that seems rather irrelevant to me, but I guess she thought that that was relevant to whether this form comes out or not.

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And so then we don't hear about it for nine months, right?

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And then in January of this year, the EIA administrator, D. Corollus, and I looked into his background.

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I would actually get along really well with this guy.

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He writes Python code. I love Python.

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He's into data and SQL, so am I.

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I think that we would just, we'd nerd out on energy data all day long.

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But unfortunately, that's just not what God put him on earth to do.

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So he sends a letter to the Office of Management and Budget, OMB, the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, OIRA.

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And these guys are the form gatekeepers.

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And they are the ones that are tasked with evaluating literally every single form in the federal government has to go through this team.

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And they will tell you if your form is valid or invalid.

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They're a form note, right? They're a full form note is what OIRA is.

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And so he sends a letter saying, hey, there's an emergency.

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His justification for the emergency is that the Bitcoin price went up, which to me is hilarious.

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This is the first time in American history that we've had a government official declare a federal emergency because the Bitcoin price went up 50% at the time.

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Now it's up 100%.

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So I don't know if the emergency got worse or not because can you really, if the emergency goes from zero to zero, it doesn't really get worse.

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I guess we're continuing the non-emergency situation here.

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And basically his judgment was that if the Bitcoin price pumps, then there's going to be more Bitcoin mining and Bitcoin mining is already 1% to 2% of the grid, which I mean, I think that's actually pretty accurate.

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1% to 2% of the grid in the United States.

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So huge congratulations to the Bitcoin mining industry.

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This is a tremendous accomplishment.

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And I would hope that the Department of Energy would give us an award.

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You know, a trophy saying, hey, like congratulations on being the fastest growing load in the United States.

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This is a huge accomplishment from an electrical engineering perspective.

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And it enables the nation to be a leader in Bitcoin mining, which is really awesome.

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But I don't think they see it that way.

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They see it as, uh-oh.

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They're growing so, so rapidly.

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And if the Bitcoin price is going up, they're going to grow even faster.

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Now, there's not really any evidence showing that they'll get Bitcoin price going up has led to a substantial increase in Bitcoin mining in the United States because it takes years to get the permits.

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Yeah, you have to get permits to develop a Bitcoin mining facility.

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And, you know, the facility, the Arcorsa Canada facility has been in the works for at least a couple of years.

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And, you know, you've got to get approval from ERCOT, the grid, right?

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You've got to get approval from the environmental department here in Texas.

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You've got, you know, there's, so there's a long list of approvals you've got to get.

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And on top of that, you have to have the capital to do it.

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And you have to have a long-term vision for Bitcoin mining.

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And so if the Bitcoin price pumps, you know, 10% in a day, it's not like it's like, oh, let's go add 10% to our operation.

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It's like it to add 10% to our operation, it will take this many months and years, you know, it's like, so when we look at the data of how has Bitcoin mining grown over the past six months, not by a lot.

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In Texas, it's basically, I believe that it's gone from 2.6 to 2.8 gigawatts, which is just, it's just an increase of 200 megawatts, which I mean, to some people,

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I guess, you know, so anyway, the, but that's a distraction because ultimately his argument is that if we add lots of gigawatts to the grid of Bitcoin mining that this is going to contribute to peak load.

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And that's actually demonstrably false.

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All of the scientific data from academia shows the diametric opposite, the Bitcoin miners are actually negatively correlated with peak load.

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They load shed because peak load is the cause of high prices in the real time electricity wholesale market.

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And if peak load is not causing high prices and not causing Bitcoin miners to turn off your grid has a much bigger problem, because it is dysfunctional in the sense that price signals are not reflecting physical reality of the grid.

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And that is a failure mode.

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And you need to fix the regulatory framework around your grid, the marketplace structure of your grid to accommodate that.

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And ERCOT does not have that problem.

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ERCOT is actually, I would say, at the forefront of integrating large flexible loads with the grid and doing so in a way that is really helping balance the grid and is a tremendous public benefit, not at all a public harm in any way.

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It's not even reasonably likely.

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And so it's reasonably likely that it's a public benefit.

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I would argue that it's just beyond any reasonable doubt, just based on the evidence that exists out there.

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And that's why we decided Riot and Texas Blockchain Council, which represents a lot of Texas miners and the digital chamber of commerce, which represents Bitcoin miners nationally.

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From our perspective, this process of declaring a fake emergency in order to avoid public notice and comment in order to avoid any kind of transparency and feedback was not appropriate.

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And that ultimately what would best serve policymakers would be to follow the law, which is to do public notice and comment.

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And unfortunately, the Biden administration did not see it that way.

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So as a last resort, we did have to sue them in federal court in the Western District of Texas.

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So the honorable judge Alan Albright is kind of the federal judge that is there in Waco, Texas, famous for a number of different reasons.

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And the really, you know, the reason why we were in Waco with judge Albright was because Riot has one of the largest Bitcoin mining facilities in the world, not far from Waco in a beautiful town called Rockdale that has really fresh air.

363
00:46:19,000 --> 00:46:23,000
It's not Rockland, which is what the New York Times thought it was.

364
00:46:23,000 --> 00:46:37,000
But it is Rockdale. And there we have our facility so that basically kind of establishes where it makes sense to do the lawsuit.

365
00:46:37,000 --> 00:46:47,000
And we filed this the day before the survey was due. We just didn't have a lot of time.

366
00:46:47,000 --> 00:47:13,000
The, you know, the EIA was really, you know, I want to say metaphorical sense, but it's not really that metaphorical is that they put a gun to our head of, hey, if you don't fill this out, you're going to go to prison, you're going to pay fines, which is pretty insane way of, you know, working with folks.

367
00:47:13,000 --> 00:47:30,000
I think they should try to be more professional than that. And so that, you know, we took it to federal court and we said, hey, can we please get a temporary restraining order, right, these people are stalking us, they're trying to invade our privacy.

368
00:47:30,000 --> 00:47:46,000
We need a TRO restraining order to like keep them away from us, right, they need to. We need the court to establish some order here because these people are acting completely illegally, right.

369
00:47:46,000 --> 00:48:13,000
And our lawsuit, I really recommend people to read it if they're interested in the law because there were a tremendous number of crimes committed by the government in putting together the survey and the, so in any case, the judge immediately granted our temporary restraining order because I think that I don't want to speak for him

370
00:48:13,000 --> 00:48:38,000
but based on what he wrote in the official court document, you know, he seemed to have pretty quickly come to the conclusion that Texas Blotching Council and riot really are victims of government overreach and just total lawlessness by this Biden administration that

371
00:48:38,000 --> 00:48:53,000
they violated several statutes and just were operating, they'd gone rogue basically. They weren't, you know, in any way, performing the duties that they'd sworn to perform.

372
00:48:53,000 --> 00:49:11,000
It's clear that the government has no problem breaking the law when it suits them. So if you want to protect your Bitcoin from unlawful seizure, head to bitbox.swiss slash Walker and use the promo code Walker for 5% off the Bitcoin only Bitbox O2 hardware wallet.

373
00:49:11,000 --> 00:49:24,000
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374
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375
00:49:30,000 --> 00:49:43,000
Plus, when you go to bitbox.swiss slash Walker and use promo code Walker, not only do you get 5% off, but you also help support this fucking podcast. So thank you.

376
00:49:43,000 --> 00:50:08,000
So after that, the judge set a hearing for Wednesday of this week. As we approached the hearing, it got canceled. And it was announced that an agreement had been reached. And then today on Friday, the agreement was, you know, published publicly.

377
00:50:08,000 --> 00:50:26,000
And basically, you know what the agreement is, is that the government is going to destroy any data that they received from this illegal survey, and that they're going to start over and actually follow the law right of doing public notice and comment, not pulling

378
00:50:26,000 --> 00:50:49,000
a long arm when there's no fire, right, not crying wolf when there's no wolf. They have to cut that so they're cutting that out. They're not doing that anymore. They're following the law. And they're paying attorney's fees, right, because of the inconvenience that they created for through their

379
00:50:49,000 --> 00:51:03,000
terrible, terrible approach to policy in this area. And I think that it's a tremendous win on a number of different levels on a very practical level.

380
00:51:03,000 --> 00:51:28,000
It's really important for us to provide lots of comments to steer kind of the direction in which any kind of mining survey should go in. Because I actually do think that there's a really great story of demand response that this survey could unearth

381
00:51:28,000 --> 00:51:49,000
and show how Bitcoin mining is a key part of the energy transition. So I think that there's a really positive story here. But we have to make sure that the survey is crafted in a way that gets both the benefits and the risks, right?

382
00:51:49,000 --> 00:52:05,000
If we only focus on kind of the costs and the risks, then we miss the benefits. So that I think is a practical reason for why, you know, we need to have the opportunity to provide comments before being forced, you know, by law to have a mandatory

383
00:52:05,000 --> 00:52:20,000
survey. Two is that there's no emergency, right? I mean, look, Elizabeth Warren has been pushing this for two years. Right. So just let's look at reality here, which is that there's no emergency. If there was an emergency, then there would already be public harm, right?

384
00:52:20,000 --> 00:52:39,000
There would already be something bad happen. I don't even know, you know, blackouts, right? Urquhart, look, here's the, here's, here, I think here's the main problem that they have with the emergency argument, which is that Urquhart is not going to connect a load that can cause public harm, right?

385
00:52:39,000 --> 00:53:01,000
They would be, they would be in legal trouble if they did that, right? That is negligence on their part. And so that just wouldn't happen. Now, I also think that it's a win from a regulatory perspective that it's really important for all of the regulators in the

386
00:53:01,000 --> 00:53:22,000
United States to understand that Bitcoin miners are industry stakeholders like any other industry stakeholders, right? So you have to approach it that way. If you approach it, you know, through a dogmatic lens of, hey, I don't like Bitcoin, only criminals use Bitcoin, Bitcoin miners are

387
00:53:22,000 --> 00:53:44,000
criminals, and therefore I'm going to just break every law. I'm going to commit the worst crimes possible to prove that they are criminals. It's like, that's really going to get you wrecked in federal court, right? You have to follow the law, even if you think Bitcoin miners are criminals, and we're not.

388
00:53:44,000 --> 00:54:08,000
And so due to the fact that we're not criminals, you're really going to have a lot of trouble with the fact patterns as they get laid out in federal court. So rather than ending up having to pay for attorney's fees for Bitcoin miners due to your just ideological craziness, just accept that

389
00:54:08,000 --> 00:54:27,000
Bitcoin miners are an industry stakeholder like any other, treat us with whatever respect you would treat a solar farm or a battery manufacturer, right? Like, we're all part of the energy transition. And so I think that we got to work together.

390
00:54:27,000 --> 00:54:47,000
And so we're, you know, Bitcoin miners are not opposed in principle to transparency and to doing surveys and to having a collaborative working relationship with regulators. What we are opposed to is we're opposed to crime really is what we're opposed to.

391
00:54:47,000 --> 00:54:57,000
So in this case, crimes were committed. We're opposed to that. We'll take you to federal court if you commit crimes. So I think that's reasonable.

392
00:54:57,000 --> 00:55:14,000
I would say it's it's highly reasonable. And first of all, congratulations on the restraining order and the victory here, because it's not just a victory for miners. It's a victory for, I think, Americans in general, because we have rule of law in the United States, or we're supposed to.

393
00:55:14,000 --> 00:55:30,000
We are not going to continue functioning in the way that we have been six pretty successfully on the world stage, if that rule of law breaks down, because the rule of law is at its most fundamental level, the purpose of the law is to organize for the collective

394
00:55:30,000 --> 00:55:44,000
defense of private property, not to throw innumerable onerous forms at somebody until they bend the knee and shut down their operations because you don't happen to like what they do, because you got some bad information from your staff.

395
00:55:44,000 --> 00:55:57,000
So congratulations for that and thank you for going to bat on behalf of the American people. I want to maybe ask you a little bit to go a little bit deeper into demand response and kind of maybe we can set the stage with this.

396
00:55:57,000 --> 00:56:08,000
Instead of explain it like I'm five, you lay five, can you explain it like I'm Elizabeth Warren or one of her staffers and tell me what exactly do Bitcoin miners do.

397
00:56:08,000 --> 00:56:23,000
And then why are Bitcoin miners ideally positioned to fill this gap of demand response and what is that demand response and how does it make the lives of everyone better or does it make them worse.

398
00:56:23,000 --> 00:56:40,000
What does all of that mean because I think Bitcoin is such a deep rabbit hole by itself. And the more I start to learn about energy, the more I realize that is a cavernous rabbit hole as well, which I am barely scratching the surface and I think most people have absolutely no idea what's going on they just think

399
00:56:40,000 --> 00:56:55,000
I'm going to get in my something to the wall and I get electricity and that's as much as I know about the energy grid. And so can you maybe give like the the background that people need to be able to understand here's where Bitcoin what Bitcoin miners do.

400
00:56:55,000 --> 00:57:15,000
Here's where they sit in like in Texas, for example, you know, because that's where you guys have multiple operations. And how does that generally contribute to the grid in what apparently Warren sees and other see as a negative way, but I think what is demonstrably true is that it's actually a very positive way, and

401
00:57:15,000 --> 00:57:20,000
ultimately is to the benefit of anybody who is also plugging into that grid.

402
00:57:20,000 --> 00:57:36,000
Yeah, great question. So, you know, the Texas grid, I think is reflective of the general energy transition theme of we're going we're moving away from coal.

403
00:57:36,000 --> 00:57:43,000
First of all, you know, Texas used to basically be 100% coal. It wasn't so long ago.

404
00:57:43,000 --> 00:58:02,000
Now, the first thing we we move towards was natural gas. Natural gas, you know, is fascinating because you're basically using a jet turbine right from an aircraft, and you're bolting it to the ground and you're generating electricity with it.

405
00:58:02,000 --> 00:58:18,000
And these natural gas turbines per megawatt of electricity generate 50% less CO2 emissions, greenhouse gases than a typical coal plant does.

406
00:58:18,000 --> 00:58:39,000
Now, the other advantages that they have one is that they are incredibly inexpensive from both a capital expense perspective, but also from a natural gas fuel price perspective that the price of natural gas today is just it's at historic lows.

407
00:58:39,000 --> 00:58:57,000
And it's because it's an associated gas in the sense that you've got people drilling for very expensive oil and in Texas and they're bringing that expensive oil to market, but the natural gas that is also a part of these wells that are coming out of the drills.

408
00:58:57,000 --> 00:59:08,000
They it's kind of just extra. And so they just need a way to get rid of it. So sometimes you have flared gas mining, right, where people are Bitcoin mining right at the wellhead.

409
00:59:08,000 --> 00:59:25,000
Riot does basically the equivalent except at the greater scale of the grid right that now you have pipelines bringing gas from the wellhead to large, highly efficient combined cycle gas turbines that are converting it into electricity.

410
00:59:25,000 --> 00:59:50,000
And then that way you are not wasting or flaring natural gas. Now, what we started seeing with what's called the performance tax credits. So these are IRS, you know, tax advantages that you get from producing electricity using technology like wind like solar.

411
00:59:50,000 --> 01:00:11,000
And these subsidies have tremendously increased the deployment of those generating resources in Texas in the ERCOT market. And so now wind and solar on some days are producing 60 to 80% of the electricity in Texas.

412
01:00:11,000 --> 01:00:33,000
On other at other times they're producing 0%. And so this is where we have to really think in a really nuanced manner about the energy transition, which is that wind and solar, while they are the they're very cost competitive as as resources with the caveat that they're only cost

413
01:00:33,000 --> 01:00:54,000
competitive, if you're assuming that the timing of the electricity consumption matches up with the timing of electricity production. Now, if you have any differences in the timing, well, now you're going to have to firm it up either with a battery, or with a peaker plant like a natural gas peaker plant that would kick on when you just don't

414
01:00:54,000 --> 01:01:11,000
have enough wind or not enough sun or some combination thereof. Batteries are super expensive. But you know, it's also the case that peaker plants are expensive in the sense that they're basically off like 98% of the time, right? So they're just the giant capital good, right?

415
01:01:11,000 --> 01:01:30,000
This giant turbine that is sitting there off 98% of the time, just for that 2% of the time that you turn it on because there's just, you know, not enough wind and there's too much too much demand. So Bitcoin mining is taking that flexibility, but on the load side.

416
01:01:30,000 --> 01:01:53,000
So you can just turn off a Bitcoin mining facility to offset a lack of generation on the renewable side. And so that's really the value proposition in this energy transition is that in Texas in the morning, when the sun has not risen yet, but the wind is starting to fall,

417
01:01:53,000 --> 01:02:08,000
and everyone's turning on their lights, you can have price spikes, and we've seen those happen. You can get up to $5,000 megawatt, right? In a very short window of time, just because you have a very strong mismatch of supply and demand.

418
01:02:08,000 --> 01:02:23,000
Same story in the evening, right? When the sun is going down and the wind is not picking up quickly enough, and everyone's getting home from work and turning on their lights and all that. Again, huge price volatility.

419
01:02:23,000 --> 01:02:39,000
This price volatility has nothing to do with the price of natural gas, right? And this is where, it's really funny, the Sierra Club, they put out a document saying that Texas has volatile electricity prices due to the price of natural gas, and I just laughed out loud.

420
01:02:39,000 --> 01:02:59,000
Like what an absurd statement to make. I look at the price of electricity every day, right, just because of working for a riot. And look, the price of electricity is volatile in Texas because renewables intermittent generation of solar and wind is volatile, right?

421
01:02:59,000 --> 01:03:16,000
There's just, okay, so anyway. The sun sets in other words, you know. Yeah, the sun sets. Because if you look at the price of natural gas, you're basically saying, let's call it like $40, $50 per megawatt, right?

422
01:03:16,000 --> 01:03:32,000
And when you have a scarcity and you're at $5,000 a megawatt, so there's just no way the price of natural gas is causing $5,000 a megawatt. It is a couple of orders of magnitude lower than that.

423
01:03:32,000 --> 01:03:48,000
And then same thing with, you know, Bitcoin mining. People will say, oh, Bitcoin miners are causing these high prices. Also absurd, because the break even for a Bitcoin miner is around, let's call it roughly $80 to $120 per megawatt.

424
01:03:48,000 --> 01:04:10,000
So that means that Bitcoin miners turn off. I think it's fair to say all Bitcoin miners that are doing economic demand response are curtailing and are already off by the time you reach $1,000 a megawatt and then much less $2,000 a megawatt or $3,000 per megawatt.

425
01:04:10,000 --> 01:04:21,000
All the Bitcoin miners are already off. There's no way they are contributing to that price. The only way that they are contributing to that price is by being sellers of electricity in the market and helping lower the electricity price, right?

426
01:04:21,000 --> 01:04:40,000
And at those prices, really what you have are batteries, because batteries are expensive to cycle and batteries will play games of, you know, in their defense, like they do need to have large amounts of revenue in order to justify their capital costs.

427
01:04:40,000 --> 01:04:55,000
But the idea that Bitcoin miners are causing $5,000 a megawatt, I mean, that's just, it's absurd. And then they'll also say, oh, yeah, okay, but maybe you're not contributing to the peak, but you're increasing the average price of electricity.

428
01:04:55,000 --> 01:05:12,000
And it's like, look, if the average price of electricity is $0, and we increase it to $1, in a sense, yeah, that's bad. In another sense, though, at $0, nobody makes any money.

429
01:05:12,000 --> 01:05:20,000
And then you don't have any generation. And then you have $5,000 a megawatt, right? It's like, choose what you want.

430
01:05:20,000 --> 01:05:30,000
Like, do you want generators to make some money and stay in the market and have the capacity for those peak demands? Or do you want blackouts?

431
01:05:30,000 --> 01:05:38,000
Right? And I think that that's where the conversation about, oh, Bitcoin miners are increasing the price of electricity in Texas.

432
01:05:38,000 --> 01:05:46,000
I mean, it's absurd, because first of all, Texas has the lowest cost of electricity of basically anywhere in the world.

433
01:05:46,000 --> 01:05:55,000
Right? I mean, if you look at it, not just on a dollars per megawatt, but also, I'd say like dollars per gigawatt, right? Of how much depth is there to the market?

434
01:05:55,000 --> 01:06:02,000
Because I'm sure you can find somewhere that has like really cheap electricity, but you can only buy like two megawatts, right? And then there's no other capacity.

435
01:06:02,000 --> 01:06:12,000
But I'm saying like, at the wholesale level, the size and depth of the electricity market in Texas, we have the lowest cost of electricity.

436
01:06:12,000 --> 01:06:18,000
And I think we'll continue to have the lowest cost of electricity because the cost of natural gas continues to go down.

437
01:06:18,000 --> 01:06:24,000
The amount of solar power being added to the Texas grid continues to dramatically increase.

438
01:06:24,000 --> 01:06:28,000
We're already, I think we're at 12 gigawatts of installed solar capacity.

439
01:06:28,000 --> 01:06:41,000
This is capacity where we know that 50% of the day it's at zero, right? Like it's, but in any case, on top of that, we've seen several announcements of

440
01:06:41,000 --> 01:06:54,000
new natural gas power plants being built in Texas because of the incentives that, by the way, were voted for by the Texas House, Senate,

441
01:06:54,000 --> 01:07:01,000
Governor, and by referendum, the people of Texas, they all voted to have more natural gas power plants, right?

442
01:07:01,000 --> 01:07:11,000
And so I think that when people say, oh, we need to have zero fossil fuels, they're really going against democracy, right?

443
01:07:11,000 --> 01:07:17,000
Because people are voting for fossil fuels. And so, and we should stop calling them fossil fuels. They're hydrocarbons.

444
01:07:17,000 --> 01:07:29,000
And I think that, you know, in Texas, that really sets up an electricity market where we're going to continue to have the most competitive market.

445
01:07:29,000 --> 01:07:35,000
And Bitcoin miners are going to contribute like tremendous amount of flexibility to this.

446
01:07:35,000 --> 01:07:42,000
Now, I'd also say that demand response, you can think of it along several different axes.

447
01:07:42,000 --> 01:07:49,000
First is just economic curtailment, right? Of, hey, is the real time, wholesale electricity price abruptly break even.

448
01:07:49,000 --> 01:07:54,000
And I think that there's basically lots of room for economic curtailment.

449
01:07:54,000 --> 01:08:02,000
Then the other piece of it is what's called ancillary services, which is basically not that you're...

450
01:08:02,000 --> 01:08:15,000
So with ancillary services, you are signing up in a contract with ERCOT, and you are signing over control to ERCOT of your generator or of your load.

451
01:08:15,000 --> 01:08:19,000
And you're saying, all right, ERCOT, I'm taking my hands off the wheel, you're in charge.

452
01:08:19,000 --> 01:08:40,000
You get to decide whether to turn on my facility or turn off my facility. You get to decide how much electricity I consume, because ERCOT needs to procure control over a generation and load in order to provide real time balancing of supply and demand on the electricity grid for electrical engineering reasons, right?

453
01:08:40,000 --> 01:08:51,000
So that's the way of maintaining frequency stability, maintaining voltage support, maintaining all of the...

454
01:08:51,000 --> 01:08:59,000
And it goes down to like sub-second level, right? So it goes from the frequency of sub-second level to, hey, 30 minute forecast miss.

455
01:08:59,000 --> 01:09:11,000
And so they need to have resources at their fingertips that they can either deploy or wait for things to... Sometimes they wait to see how things play out.

456
01:09:11,000 --> 01:09:18,000
And they need to have that control, and they need to buy it on the market, right? If they seize it, right?

457
01:09:18,000 --> 01:09:22,000
If they're like, hey, we're actually... We're going to have like a command control type thing.

458
01:09:22,000 --> 01:09:33,000
The problem with seizing it is that they don't have economic signal of knowing which resources are kind of the lowest cost, right?

459
01:09:33,000 --> 01:09:43,000
Of what if they say, oh, hey, Amazon, turn off this data center? And that data center was supporting a children's hospital.

460
01:09:43,000 --> 01:09:49,000
And so now the children's hospital is turning off because ERCOT decided to control that load.

461
01:09:49,000 --> 01:09:53,000
Like, that wouldn't make any sense. That would be really bad.

462
01:09:53,000 --> 01:10:00,000
So it's better to have a market mechanism where Amazon would say, hey, look, we actually don't care what price you offer us.

463
01:10:00,000 --> 01:10:06,000
We would never turn off our data center because we are serving critical infrastructure.

464
01:10:06,000 --> 01:10:10,000
And so we're not even going to bid into ancillary services.

465
01:10:10,000 --> 01:10:14,000
And meanwhile, Bitcoin miners are like, yeah, sure.

466
01:10:14,000 --> 01:10:19,000
I mean, the Bitcoin network continues to function even if we turn off.

467
01:10:19,000 --> 01:10:24,000
So we would just miss out on the opportunity cost of $100 in Megawatt.

468
01:10:24,000 --> 01:10:28,000
So, all right, we'll bid into ancillary services. You can control our load.

469
01:10:28,000 --> 01:10:31,000
And same thing for a battery, same thing for a peak or plant, right?

470
01:10:31,000 --> 01:10:40,000
Same thing for any load or generator that is flexible, that doesn't have critical dependencies on it.

471
01:10:40,000 --> 01:10:45,000
And so that way you're able to get all of these resources to compete against each other, right?

472
01:10:45,000 --> 01:10:51,000
And get the lowest bids possible. That way you have the lowest cost of procuring your ancillary services.

473
01:10:51,000 --> 01:10:56,000
And you have the lowest cost on society as well, right?

474
01:10:56,000 --> 01:11:01,000
Because if you were doing the command and control thing, you would be increasing the cost on society.

475
01:11:01,000 --> 01:11:08,000
So ancillary services, I think, is a critical function for a grid, right?

476
01:11:08,000 --> 01:11:13,000
A grid is kind of a, in a way, it is a tragedy, the common's public good, but in a way it's not,

477
01:11:13,000 --> 01:11:22,000
because ERCOT exists, right? ERCOT is a legal entity that is in charge of operating

478
01:11:22,000 --> 01:11:28,000
and kind of making sure that everyone's following, like, voluntarily connecting to the grid

479
01:11:28,000 --> 01:11:31,000
because the rules make sense, right?

480
01:11:31,000 --> 01:11:37,000
In a way, I'd kind of compare it to Disneyland of like, hey, yeah, you can enter Disneyland.

481
01:11:37,000 --> 01:11:42,000
You've got to follow the rules, right? Like, there are some rules about here.

482
01:11:42,000 --> 01:11:45,000
This is not your backyard. You can't just do whatever you want. This is Disneyland.

483
01:11:45,000 --> 01:11:49,000
Although sometimes you go to Disneyland and you're like, wow, people really can't do anything they want here.

484
01:11:49,000 --> 01:11:55,000
But perhaps some people would say the same thing about ERCOT.

485
01:11:55,000 --> 01:12:00,000
But no, there are stringent requirements about participating in the ERCOT market

486
01:12:00,000 --> 01:12:05,000
and that ultimately there is, it is permissioned, right?

487
01:12:05,000 --> 01:12:12,000
There is a gatekeeper and they keep the bar pretty high to make sure that they're fulfilling their critical mission.

488
01:12:12,000 --> 01:12:17,000
And it's right in their name, reliability. They're just trying to get 100% uptime.

489
01:12:17,000 --> 01:12:22,000
And it's really hard, right? It's hard to have 100% uptime in any kind of system.

490
01:12:22,000 --> 01:12:29,000
But they've actually done a pretty good job in learning from what happened with Winter Storm Urie,

491
01:12:29,000 --> 01:12:36,000
working with stakeholders to create a grid that is adapting to the energy transition

492
01:12:36,000 --> 01:12:41,000
and also adapting to the massive load growth in Texas.

493
01:12:41,000 --> 01:12:46,000
Ignore the Bitcoin miners. There's so many people moving to Texas.

494
01:12:46,000 --> 01:12:51,000
There's so many businesses moving to Texas. There's been massive load growth.

495
01:12:51,000 --> 01:12:56,000
We're building semiconductors. We're building liquid natural gas plants.

496
01:12:56,000 --> 01:13:03,000
Texas is just booming because Texas, I think, in its DNA is accelerationist, right?

497
01:13:03,000 --> 01:13:12,000
We're not Massachusetts, right? We're not like the decel philosophy like New York of like,

498
01:13:12,000 --> 01:13:14,000
we don't want any economic growth.

499
01:13:14,000 --> 01:13:22,000
So the ERCOT is having to balance massive load growth with massive generation growth

500
01:13:22,000 --> 01:13:31,000
with a change in the mix of generation, right? Away from coal towards natural gas, wind, solar, batteries.

501
01:13:31,000 --> 01:13:41,000
And so they should really be applauded in their ability to keep the grid running in such a dynamic environment.

502
01:13:41,000 --> 01:13:49,000
Thank you for that background on it, because again, I think so many of these things go completely over most people's heads.

503
01:13:49,000 --> 01:13:57,000
And they also think that this electricity that we are fortunate to have in abundance thanks to our energy production

504
01:13:57,000 --> 01:14:04,000
is just somehow like sitting there waiting for them and that there's nothing that needs to go on behind the scenes for it to happen.

505
01:14:04,000 --> 01:14:08,000
It's just when I plug something in, it turns on and great. That's all I think about it.

506
01:14:08,000 --> 01:14:14,000
So there's this idea that and you genuinely see this idea put forward by people who should know better,

507
01:14:14,000 --> 01:14:21,000
but they say, well, you know, Bitcoin miners are using electricity that could be used by other people and for other things.

508
01:14:21,000 --> 01:14:25,000
And completely ignoring the fact that, well, that that is what happens.

509
01:14:25,000 --> 01:14:32,000
But when Bitcoin miners are using that electricity, it is because there is no other buyer for it.

510
01:14:32,000 --> 01:14:40,000
Bitcoin miners being the buyer of first and last resort, being willing to help finance the build out of the grids,

511
01:14:40,000 --> 01:14:47,000
but also being willing to pick up the slack when nobody else is going to be buying that energy so that you can still have the load build out

512
01:14:47,000 --> 01:14:53,000
that allows people to have no blackouts and a comfortable standard of living because they have low energy prices.

513
01:14:53,000 --> 01:15:02,000
And we know that the more humans have harnessed energy over millennia, the greater human flourishing has been the longer life spans have gone.

514
01:15:02,000 --> 01:15:11,000
And this idea, this kind of Massachusetts decelerationist idea that you should somehow stop using so much energy.

515
01:15:11,000 --> 01:15:18,000
I just think is so ideologically backwards because it's an anti human idea.

516
01:15:18,000 --> 01:15:24,000
You're saying you want humans to flourish less because we have the data that shows us over.

517
01:15:24,000 --> 01:15:31,000
I mean, if you just have to look back 100 years, 500 years, 1000 years, the more we've harnessed energy,

518
01:15:31,000 --> 01:15:34,000
the better off we've been as a species.

519
01:15:34,000 --> 01:15:36,000
And that will continue to be the case.

520
01:15:36,000 --> 01:15:43,000
So I appreciate the the knowledge for folks who may not be so deep down that energy rabbit hole as you.

521
01:15:43,000 --> 01:15:54,000
And I want to I want to kind of go to jump off of that a little bit and to talk about Bitcoin mining from not just OK,

522
01:15:54,000 --> 01:16:03,000
it is good for helping to stabilize these grids by being that energy buyer that is able to turn on and turn off instantaneously,

523
01:16:03,000 --> 01:16:10,000
which there is nothing else that can do AI data centers can't do this other any other Amazon data centers can't do this.

524
01:16:10,000 --> 01:16:14,000
It's Bitcoin miners that can do it and can do it at scale.

525
01:16:14,000 --> 01:16:23,000
This also I think has huge strategic implications because energy security is national security to,

526
01:16:23,000 --> 01:16:25,000
I think, a pretty high degree.

527
01:16:25,000 --> 01:16:36,000
And right now the United States has the highest I believe we have the most hash rate by by about two times right compared to is the next up Kazakhstan after the US.

528
01:16:36,000 --> 01:16:38,000
Probably yeah.

529
01:16:38,000 --> 01:16:49,000
Can you talk a little bit about how you as a as a Bitcoin miner view the role of Bitcoin miners as a helping to contribute to overall national security because

530
01:16:49,000 --> 01:16:59,000
I'm assuming that people on both sides of the aisle scream about day in and day out with different approaches to how the US should have more national security.

531
01:16:59,000 --> 01:17:05,000
But I think at the base level we have to talk about energy and also well monetary energy as well.

532
01:17:05,000 --> 01:17:08,000
But how do you view that as a Bitcoin miner.

533
01:17:08,000 --> 01:17:16,000
And what do you like what is your message to policymakers who are interested in the national security of the United States and in its continued success.

534
01:17:16,000 --> 01:17:19,000
What do Bitcoin miners fit into that equation.

535
01:17:19,000 --> 01:17:34,000
Yeah, so Bitcoin mining it's critical for to have as much Bitcoin mining happening in the United States so that we are depriving our adversaries of revenues.

536
01:17:34,000 --> 01:17:45,000
And so we know that North Korea, Iran, Russia, they, Venezuela, they are mining Bitcoin.

537
01:17:45,000 --> 01:17:56,000
And quite often they you know they they they seize these mining rigs like they're essentially they're they're they're abusing their people and exploiting them.

538
01:17:56,000 --> 01:17:57,000
Right.

539
01:17:57,000 --> 01:18:00,000
And they're they're mining Bitcoin to get hard currency revenues.

540
01:18:00,000 --> 01:18:06,000
And then they use those revenues to go spend it on further pressing their people.

541
01:18:06,000 --> 01:18:14,000
Or even worse, you know, invading neighboring countries or things like that.

542
01:18:14,000 --> 01:18:17,000
It just it reminds me of when Bush invaded Iraq.

543
01:18:17,000 --> 01:18:32,000
But anyway, the thing is that when when they are able to just print money or to mine Bitcoin, then they're able to use those revenues in ways that are not good for the public good.

544
01:18:32,000 --> 01:18:41,000
And so when we mine Bitcoin here in the United States, we're taking market share away from foreign foreign adversaries.

545
01:18:41,000 --> 01:18:55,000
And it's really important that from a policy perspective, the key here is that these look somebody is going to mine Bitcoin, right, because Bitcoin is decentralized.

546
01:18:55,000 --> 01:19:02,000
And so there isn't a world where if we banned Bitcoin mining here in the United States, now nobody in the world can ban Bitcoin.

547
01:19:02,000 --> 01:19:08,000
No, you've just increased the profitability of mining Bitcoin everywhere else in the world.

548
01:19:08,000 --> 01:19:20,000
And so once that clicks for policymakers, they realize that it's really critical to help Bitcoin miners and to increase the amount of Bitcoin mining here in the United States.

549
01:19:20,000 --> 01:19:30,000
So, you know, what I would really ask for policymakers to think about is how can we like modify the tax code so that Bitcoin miners don't have to pay any taxes, right?

550
01:19:30,000 --> 01:19:36,000
I mean, that would be huge in terms of increasing the national security of the United States.

551
01:19:36,000 --> 01:19:44,000
And the other part is the, you know, capital gains on holding Bitcoin, right?

552
01:19:44,000 --> 01:19:53,000
Now, on that note of holding Bitcoin, it's not enough for the United States to encourage Bitcoin mining here in the United States.

553
01:19:53,000 --> 01:19:58,000
We also, we have to encourage a holding Bitcoin.

554
01:19:58,000 --> 01:20:04,000
And this is where I think that we've really, the government has done a terrible job.

555
01:20:04,000 --> 01:20:12,000
You know, kids are going through the school system right now and they're graduating from high school and they don't know how to set up a cold card.

556
01:20:12,000 --> 01:20:24,000
You know, it's like, it's just absurd levels of myopia at a policy level that, you know, kids don't know how to self custody in 2024.

557
01:20:24,000 --> 01:20:28,000
You know, folks, it's been 15 years like Bitcoin is here to stay.

558
01:20:28,000 --> 01:20:36,000
And so the kids have to know how to back up their seed phrases and how to set up a multi-sig and et cetera.

559
01:20:36,000 --> 01:20:47,000
Right. So I think that there's a lot of catching up to do at that level and whether it's, you know, a public school or private school or just, you know,

560
01:20:47,000 --> 01:20:50,000
maybe it's part of getting their driver's license.

561
01:20:50,000 --> 01:20:53,000
They have to learn about hardware wallets.

562
01:20:53,000 --> 01:21:00,000
But anyway, the, you know, there's lots of policies that we could improve in the United States.

563
01:21:00,000 --> 01:21:09,000
Now, I think that critically, there is a problem happening with the Biden administration and the U.S. Marshall Service.

564
01:21:09,000 --> 01:21:18,000
They are auctioning off Bitcoin that allegedly was involved in a crime a long time ago.

565
01:21:18,000 --> 01:21:23,000
And what they should do is hold the Bitcoin.

566
01:21:23,000 --> 01:21:26,000
They should hold the Bitcoin for a number of different reasons.

567
01:21:26,000 --> 01:21:28,000
First of all, what if they're wrong?

568
01:21:28,000 --> 01:21:31,000
What if the criminal is innocent?

569
01:21:31,000 --> 01:21:38,000
The allegations are false or, you know, this person, for whatever reason, they get found innocent by the judicial system.

570
01:21:38,000 --> 01:21:41,000
And if their Bitcoin are auctioned off, what's the government going to do?

571
01:21:41,000 --> 01:21:44,000
Buy them back, you know?

572
01:21:44,000 --> 01:21:53,000
They could sell the Bitcoin today, if they sold the Bitcoin today at $60,000 and the person gets found innocent and the price of Bitcoin is $6 million.

573
01:21:53,000 --> 01:21:59,000
You know, the government would have to bankrupt itself to buy back the Bitcoin.

574
01:21:59,000 --> 01:22:00,000
It's insanity.

575
01:22:00,000 --> 01:22:03,000
So for that reason alone, they should hold the Bitcoin.

576
01:22:03,000 --> 01:22:13,000
Second of all, if it does turn out that this guy is guilty and he's a criminal and that, you know, it's okay to seize the Bitcoin.

577
01:22:13,000 --> 01:22:21,000
Does it really make sense to sell Bitcoin for dollars, given that the government can just print dollars for free, right?

578
01:22:21,000 --> 01:22:23,000
They have a synergy.

579
01:22:23,000 --> 01:22:28,000
Like, there's no reason for them to be negotiating for more dollars.

580
01:22:28,000 --> 01:22:30,000
They can just create it out of thin air.

581
01:22:30,000 --> 01:22:31,000
They don't need dollars.

582
01:22:31,000 --> 01:22:34,000
It's like the last resource they need.

583
01:22:34,000 --> 01:22:43,000
It's like if you came to work and you told your boss, hey, I'll work here if you let me breathe oxygen.

584
01:22:43,000 --> 01:22:46,000
It's like, okay, yeah, I guess.

585
01:22:46,000 --> 01:22:49,000
I mean, like, what a stupid negotiation position to have.

586
01:22:49,000 --> 01:22:51,000
You'd have to be senile.

587
01:22:51,000 --> 01:22:59,000
You know, you'd have to have lost your mind to have that perspective that you would sell Bitcoin for dollars when you can print an infinite amount of dollars.

588
01:22:59,000 --> 01:23:01,000
It's just completely illogical.

589
01:23:01,000 --> 01:23:04,000
You'd have, like, Alzheimer's disease.

590
01:23:04,000 --> 01:23:06,000
And so I hope there's a cure.

591
01:23:06,000 --> 01:23:07,000
I hope that we find a cure.

592
01:23:07,000 --> 01:23:10,000
And, you know, they should print dollars to find a cure.

593
01:23:10,000 --> 01:23:21,000
Anyway, putting that aside, what they need to start developing is a national reserve, right, of saying, okay, we own all this land, right?

594
01:23:21,000 --> 01:23:24,000
The federal government owns way too much land out west.

595
01:23:24,000 --> 01:23:26,000
They need to sell that land.

596
01:23:26,000 --> 01:23:29,000
And instead, they buy Bitcoin, right?

597
01:23:29,000 --> 01:23:33,000
Because land, I'm sorry, land is an S coin, right?

598
01:23:33,000 --> 01:23:35,000
It's basically, it's infinite.

599
01:23:35,000 --> 01:23:37,000
The universe is expanding.

600
01:23:37,000 --> 01:23:43,000
If you go back to your science class, everybody in seventh grade learned this from Bill Nye, that the universe is expanding.

601
01:23:43,000 --> 01:23:47,000
There's an infinite amount of space and time.

602
01:23:47,000 --> 01:23:55,000
So to, you know, invest in land is just, in 2024 is insanity.

603
01:23:55,000 --> 01:23:58,000
What you should be investing in is in the UTXO set.

604
01:23:58,000 --> 01:24:03,000
So they should sell the land out there and raise Bitcoin.

605
01:24:03,000 --> 01:24:06,000
They, you know, why sell it for dollars?

606
01:24:06,000 --> 01:24:08,000
They should sell it for Bitcoin.

607
01:24:08,000 --> 01:24:12,000
And they can add that to a strategic reserve.

608
01:24:12,000 --> 01:24:23,000
And what this would enable them to do is essentially back the dollar with Bitcoin, because today the dollar is not backed by anything, but they do have like Fort Knox, right?

609
01:24:23,000 --> 01:24:24,000
They have gold.

610
01:24:24,000 --> 01:24:27,000
Now, that's great for movies, right?

611
01:24:27,000 --> 01:24:29,000
I mean, awesome Bond movie.

612
01:24:29,000 --> 01:24:32,000
It's great, you know, it's thrilling.

613
01:24:32,000 --> 01:24:34,000
It's exciting.

614
01:24:34,000 --> 01:24:37,000
But gold is an S coin as well, right?

615
01:24:37,000 --> 01:24:39,000
There's an infinite amount of gold.

616
01:24:39,000 --> 01:24:41,000
They're adding gold to the gold supply every day.

617
01:24:41,000 --> 01:24:45,000
If we brought in a gold asteroid, you know, gold would get to zero.

618
01:24:45,000 --> 01:24:51,000
Like it is the most overhyped asset in human history.

619
01:24:51,000 --> 01:24:58,000
And, you know, the government Biden, he's a lot like Peter Schiff, right?

620
01:24:58,000 --> 01:25:00,000
In the sense that they both love gold.

621
01:25:00,000 --> 01:25:02,000
They own so much gold.

622
01:25:02,000 --> 01:25:09,000
I don't know if I actually don't know if Peter Schiff owns any gold, but Biden has a lot of gold in Fort Knox, right?

623
01:25:09,000 --> 01:25:16,000
That he's, you know, arguably Biden is a bigger gold bug than Peter Schiff.

624
01:25:16,000 --> 01:25:22,000
I think that's unless Biden announces today that he is selling all of the gold in the United States,

625
01:25:22,000 --> 01:25:26,000
which frankly he should do so that he can buy Bitcoin.

626
01:25:26,000 --> 01:25:33,000
He should sell all of the gold, just flood the market, just drive the price of gold to zero and accumulate Bitcoin.

627
01:25:33,000 --> 01:25:42,000
Now, I know Peter Schiff wouldn't be a fan of it, but it's the logical rational policy for the government to adopt.

628
01:25:42,000 --> 01:25:49,000
And so they'd be able to develop a strategic reserve that, you know, is comparable to the petroleum reserve.

629
01:25:49,000 --> 01:25:56,000
Now, speaking of the petroleum reserve, they should sell all of that oil and buy Bitcoin.

630
01:25:56,000 --> 01:25:58,000
Oil is an S coin.

631
01:25:58,000 --> 01:26:03,000
They're constantly finding new massive oil reserves.

632
01:26:03,000 --> 01:26:13,000
There's no reason to be hoarding it in, you know, in the United States when we could just sell it and buy Bitcoin instead.

633
01:26:13,000 --> 01:26:18,000
So, you know, the strategic petroleum reserve, it's anachronistic.

634
01:26:18,000 --> 01:26:21,000
It dates back decades.

635
01:26:21,000 --> 01:26:30,000
It's, you know, gosh, I guess our great grandparents, you know, like it's just, it's so old.

636
01:26:30,000 --> 01:26:34,000
So gold is old, oil is old, land is old.

637
01:26:34,000 --> 01:26:43,000
And what, you know, they need to essentially divest from all of these legacy assets and put it all into Bitcoin.

638
01:26:43,000 --> 01:26:50,000
And then all they need to do is just sit on the Bitcoin and stop issuing dollars.

639
01:26:50,000 --> 01:26:52,000
This is so important.

640
01:26:52,000 --> 01:26:54,000
This is what Malay passed a law.

641
01:26:54,000 --> 01:27:02,000
He said it is now illegal to print Argentine pesos to finance the government, right, for the deficit.

642
01:27:02,000 --> 01:27:06,000
You can only print Argentine pesos to buy dollars.

643
01:27:06,000 --> 01:27:09,000
Now, he's almost right, right?

644
01:27:09,000 --> 01:27:11,000
He's, he almost got it.

645
01:27:11,000 --> 01:27:17,000
And so in the United States, they should only be allowed to print dollars to buy Bitcoin, right?

646
01:27:17,000 --> 01:27:26,000
And arguably the logical step would be for them to buy Bitcoin and print dollars until the dollar is worthless, right?

647
01:27:26,000 --> 01:27:32,000
Because then at that point, they would have a massive Bitcoin reserve.

648
01:27:32,000 --> 01:27:35,000
The dollar would be worthless, but you know what?

649
01:27:35,000 --> 01:27:38,000
That means that we don't know any money to China.

650
01:27:38,000 --> 01:27:42,000
All of those treasuries that China is holding are worthless.

651
01:27:42,000 --> 01:27:50,000
All of that money that we owed to foreigners could put, gone, all the student loan debt.

652
01:27:50,000 --> 01:27:54,000
Our generation is saddled with student loan debt.

653
01:27:54,000 --> 01:28:03,000
And what it is time for is a jubilee of forgiving all debt by driving the value of the currency to zero.

654
01:28:03,000 --> 01:28:11,000
That way, we can really lift up the most vulnerable in society and give them an opportunity to succeed.

655
01:28:11,000 --> 01:28:21,000
And so that's why it's so critical from a policy perspective to print so many dollars to buy Bitcoin that the dollar goes to zero.

656
01:28:21,000 --> 01:28:33,000
You've made an incredibly compelling argument that I think needs to be taken to the Senate floor, honestly, because at this point, it almost seems irresponsible.

657
01:28:33,000 --> 01:28:39,000
That we're not, that we're currently, you know, they have dollars are being printed, but they're not going to Bitcoin.

658
01:28:39,000 --> 01:28:47,000
And for every dollar that is printed that is not being used to buy Bitcoin, it feels like a crime against the American people.

659
01:28:47,000 --> 01:28:56,000
It feels, it feels like, it feels like you're saying, I don't want to lift up everyone in this country to the highest point that they can be.

660
01:28:56,000 --> 01:28:58,000
I want them to wallow in the mud.

661
01:28:58,000 --> 01:29:01,000
And I don't think that's the message that the government wants to send.

662
01:29:01,000 --> 01:29:05,000
Is it because it's the one that they're sending through their actions right now.

663
01:29:05,000 --> 01:29:12,000
They, you know, they're worried about this student loan problem, right, and they're trying to finance it right now by, well, who knows where that money is coming from.

664
01:29:12,000 --> 01:29:16,000
I mean, it's being created out of nothing to get rid of that debt.

665
01:29:16,000 --> 01:29:22,000
But why are they not just taking it a step further, as you said, buying Bitcoin with those printed dollars.

666
01:29:22,000 --> 01:29:30,000
And in the meantime, getting rid of all of our debts around the world, because the debts are then they're worth less and less until they're worth less.

667
01:29:30,000 --> 01:29:42,000
I mean, it's really a brilliant, a brilliant strategy and as the holder and printer of the world's reserve currency, which with senior edge over every other country who has their own senior edge, we're in a unique position to do that.

668
01:29:42,000 --> 01:29:47,000
It'd be quite a, quite a move for the American people.

669
01:29:47,000 --> 01:29:59,000
And for those who are very concerned about national security, I can't imagine our country becoming any more secure than if we just turn the printers on, rip the knob off, and just continually buy Bitcoin.

670
01:29:59,000 --> 01:30:13,000
Yeah, that's right. I mean, from a national security perspective, what you would have is a Phoenix emerging from the ashes of the dollar, right, a beautiful orange Phoenix that looks like a honey badger, actually.

671
01:30:13,000 --> 01:30:16,000
It's a honey badger emerging from the ashes of the dollar.

672
01:30:16,000 --> 01:30:25,000
And that would actually position the US to continue to be the global leader in commerce and finance, etc.

673
01:30:25,000 --> 01:30:44,000
And what we would do with the reserves is the first of all, all the people that were negatively impacted by Ponzi schemes like social security, you could put the reserves towards making those people whole, right, because essentially they got scammed by the government.

674
01:30:44,000 --> 01:30:55,000
And so I think that would be a good use of the reserves is kind of just settling some injustices that were committed generationally.

675
01:30:55,000 --> 01:31:04,000
But also just cutting the size of government such that you can have the government live off a small percentage of the reserves, right, like so.

676
01:31:04,000 --> 01:31:14,000
If they just spend 0.001% of the reserves every year, you could just not have taxes for centuries. Millenia.

677
01:31:14,000 --> 01:31:19,000
And so that I think would be the most prudent way to manage the reserves.

678
01:31:19,000 --> 01:31:26,000
And you could just put that in law, right, of the government cannot spend more than this very small percentage of the reserves.

679
01:31:26,000 --> 01:31:36,000
And the only way they could add to the reserves would be by selling their chairs, you know, not getting haircuts like, you know, they've just got their underwear, that sort of thing.

680
01:31:36,000 --> 01:31:38,000
You know, just don't even wear underwear.

681
01:31:38,000 --> 01:31:47,000
Yeah, there's a lot of tactics and strategies that Bitcoiners could teach them on how to just be an ADIQ plea.

682
01:31:47,000 --> 01:31:50,000
And that way they can make their money last.

683
01:31:50,000 --> 01:32:03,000
You know, I think hearing you talk in such an impassioned way about this too, it just makes me realize that we need as much as the political system is fraught with problems.

684
01:32:03,000 --> 01:32:13,000
It is fraught with problems and with sociopaths and psychopaths and people of, let's say, lacking that are severely lacking in the moral department.

685
01:32:13,000 --> 01:32:19,000
But it is because of our broken incentives that our political system is the way that it is.

686
01:32:19,000 --> 01:32:33,000
And if we can start changing those incentives by printing our shitcoin dollar to buy as much Bitcoin as possible and changing that incentive structure, then it incentivizes, I think, better people to get into politics and more Bitcoiners,

687
01:32:33,000 --> 01:32:39,000
especially the even, you know, from ADIQ, then jump up to the top part of the bell curve.

688
01:32:39,000 --> 01:32:44,000
We don't need any more of the middle of the bell curve in politics, I think we either need you need to be on the low end or the high end.

689
01:32:44,000 --> 01:32:49,000
Otherwise, just stay out of politics and will be a lot better off, I think.

690
01:32:49,000 --> 01:32:54,000
But it's a hopeful vision that you paint, Pierre. I've got to say, it's very hopeful.

691
01:32:54,000 --> 01:33:10,000
I mean, the midway managerial class has been a plague on this society for basically, you know, one, and this has been studied sociologically is kind of the rise of the managerial class.

692
01:33:10,000 --> 01:33:21,000
And then, you know, the rise of the business school and the MBA and the consultant and the investment banker and all this, like, a lot of that is fiat.

693
01:33:21,000 --> 01:33:30,000
It's got to go. And I think that that's what we're seeing is, you know, it's also what we saw with the takeover of Twitter by Elon.

694
01:33:30,000 --> 01:33:35,000
He like fired thousands of people and people are like, whoa, the website's going to stop working.

695
01:33:35,000 --> 01:33:43,000
It's like, no, there's like a dozen engineers who keep the website running like everybody else is sure, you know, cost.

696
01:33:43,000 --> 01:33:49,000
Now, maybe they'll I'm exaggerating there a little bit, but that's broadly, I think the zeitgeist.

697
01:33:49,000 --> 01:33:57,000
And I think that that needs to be the zeitgeist of the next administration is that, hey, look, like, we can't afford all this.

698
01:33:57,000 --> 01:34:09,000
We got to get rid of people. We got to really get us down to a skeleton crew of what's the minimum we need to basically secure the border.

699
01:34:09,000 --> 01:34:14,000
Right. I mean, that's basically the only function of government is to secure the border.

700
01:34:14,000 --> 01:34:26,000
If they can't accomplish that, then what's the point of having a government and hopefully we, you know, or I should say, thankfully, there are at least states that are

701
01:34:26,000 --> 01:34:42,000
willing to step in and handle things for themselves, because clearly, even with the insane levels of bureaucratic bloat in the federal government, which was somehow requires a third of your entire life's work just to keep the lights on.

702
01:34:42,000 --> 01:34:47,000
They still cannot manage to perform their most basic basic functions, which is just truly shocking.

703
01:34:47,000 --> 01:34:50,000
So I think we do need to trim the fat.

704
01:34:50,000 --> 01:34:57,000
And the best way to trim the fat is to trim the fiat and the best way to trim the fiat is to buy Bitcoin with that printed fiat.

705
01:34:57,000 --> 01:35:04,000
And so I think that we've arrived at a pretty reasonable, what most people would argue is a pretty reasonable conclusion here.

706
01:35:04,000 --> 01:35:11,000
And I hope that these that these points are taken seriously by by those in power.

707
01:35:11,000 --> 01:35:18,000
If Elizabeth Warren, if you're listening to this, maybe you can be that agent of change, you know, where our arms are always open.

708
01:35:18,000 --> 01:35:22,000
We're always waiting for you to realize that you are wrong.

709
01:35:22,000 --> 01:35:32,000
And for you to start fighting for the people that you purport to represent, because that's what they want to the people are asking for it.

710
01:35:32,000 --> 01:35:35,000
But, you know, oh, go ahead, go ahead.

711
01:35:35,000 --> 01:35:40,000
No, I'm just I'm thinking back of when she was like, you know what, I agree with Jamie Diamond.

712
01:35:40,000 --> 01:35:42,000
I was like, yeah, you do.

713
01:35:42,000 --> 01:35:45,000
Like, we know, we know everyone.

714
01:35:45,000 --> 01:35:57,000
Yeah, it's it's it almost seems like so much of what she does almost seems like satire that you start to have to like do a double taking.

715
01:35:57,000 --> 01:35:58,000
You're like, no, like, she can't.

716
01:35:58,000 --> 01:35:59,000
Is this a parody account?

717
01:35:59,000 --> 01:36:05,000
Like she can't possibly be making a statement of the structure of the most interesting man in the world statements.

718
01:36:05,000 --> 01:36:07,000
Like, I don't often agree.

719
01:36:07,000 --> 01:36:09,000
Like, you know, you're you didn't just do that.

720
01:36:09,000 --> 01:36:10,000
Did you like you did.

721
01:36:10,000 --> 01:36:12,000
Okay, good.

722
01:36:12,000 --> 01:36:13,000
Good.

723
01:36:13,000 --> 01:36:14,000
That's that's incredible.

724
01:36:14,000 --> 01:36:15,000
Good for you.

725
01:36:15,000 --> 01:36:16,000
Good for you, lady.

726
01:36:16,000 --> 01:36:19,000
But, you know, Pierre, I want to be conscious of your scarce time.

727
01:36:19,000 --> 01:36:23,000
And I appreciate you sharing it with me because your time is valuable.

728
01:36:23,000 --> 01:36:30,000
You're spending it basically defending Texas defending our nation by mining Bitcoin.

729
01:36:30,000 --> 01:36:32,000
And I thank you for that.

730
01:36:32,000 --> 01:36:40,000
And I did get a chance to at BitBlock boom 2022 tour your facility there and man, it is fucking impressive.

731
01:36:40,000 --> 01:36:45,000
Pardon my French, but it is just really cool to see that at scale.

732
01:36:45,000 --> 01:36:46,000
Wow.

733
01:36:46,000 --> 01:36:54,000
The immer you guys were setting up or had just set up one of the immersion mining facilities there are one of the immersion buildings.

734
01:36:54,000 --> 01:36:55,000
And that was wild.

735
01:36:55,000 --> 01:36:57,000
There's just there's no fans.

736
01:36:57,000 --> 01:36:58,000
There's no nothing.

737
01:36:58,000 --> 01:37:03,000
There's just circuit boards sitting in this lubricant and it seems like this magic.

738
01:37:03,000 --> 01:37:15,000
And meanwhile, they are fighting for the hardest money that humanity has ever or will ever discovered in a free market in a pretty darn free state.

739
01:37:15,000 --> 01:37:24,000
That was also my first time being in Texas besides besides a couple of road trips through and then and then being in airports, but airports don't count.

740
01:37:24,000 --> 01:37:26,000
So it was nice.

741
01:37:26,000 --> 01:37:28,000
It was thank you guys for the hospitality there.

742
01:37:28,000 --> 01:37:29,000
That was really cool.

743
01:37:29,000 --> 01:37:31,000
Yeah, thanks for visiting.

744
01:37:31,000 --> 01:37:34,000
It's it's a modern marvel.

745
01:37:34,000 --> 01:37:36,000
It is it is.

746
01:37:36,000 --> 01:37:52,000
And the last thing I would ask you is, is there anything you are reading right now that you would recommend Bitcoin related or otherwise anything that has been sparking your curiosity on the printed page of late.

747
01:37:52,000 --> 01:37:53,000
Yeah.

748
01:37:53,000 --> 01:38:00,000
Well, you know, what I've been reading lately is the lawsuit.

749
01:38:00,000 --> 01:38:05,000
I've been reviewing that over and over and checking all the sources and things on like on that.

750
01:38:05,000 --> 01:38:16,000
So I would really recommend folks read that because our complaint, you know, I think it's the first time Bitcoin mining in the grid have been litigated.

751
01:38:16,000 --> 01:38:20,000
And so our complaint has like facts about the grid and Bitcoin mining.

752
01:38:20,000 --> 01:38:21,000
Right.

753
01:38:21,000 --> 01:38:25,000
And so it's just exciting to see to get to read that and to contribute to that.

754
01:38:25,000 --> 01:38:29,000
And it's, yeah, we're standing on the shoulders of giants.

755
01:38:29,000 --> 01:38:32,000
I mean, we had an amazing legal team.

756
01:38:32,000 --> 01:38:39,000
We had an amazing, well, several trade associations, the Texas Blockchain Council and the digital Chamber of Commerce.

757
01:38:39,000 --> 01:38:42,000
So Lee Bradshaw and Perry and boring.

758
01:38:42,000 --> 01:38:45,000
They were tremendous leaders on this as well.

759
01:38:45,000 --> 01:38:50,000
And they were really the tip of the spear and pushing back against this government over age.

760
01:38:50,000 --> 01:38:56,000
So right riot, I think deserves credit as a private business putting its name on it.

761
01:38:56,000 --> 01:39:05,000
Because that does, I think, you know, it from one perspective, it's like, oh, well, you should never sue the government.

762
01:39:05,000 --> 01:39:08,000
You know, you shouldn't sue your regulator because that doesn't look good.

763
01:39:08,000 --> 01:39:16,000
It's like, unless you're right, which, you know, in that case, you have an obligation to your, you have a duty.

764
01:39:16,000 --> 01:39:25,000
And so riot really stepped up here and huge credit to our head of public policy, Brian Morgenstern and our CEO, Jason less,

765
01:39:25,000 --> 01:39:30,000
who were really unflinching of like, hey, this is not a cake.

766
01:39:30,000 --> 01:39:44,000
We're definitely going to make sure that we're adequately represented, right, which is that's that's basically all we're asking for is that we're not in principle opposed to a survey.

767
01:39:44,000 --> 01:39:46,000
It just has to be done the right way.

768
01:39:46,000 --> 01:39:52,000
And so that's really, you know, to the credit of the company that we stood up for ourselves like that.

769
01:39:52,000 --> 01:40:04,000
And so, and you know, to me, it was really humbling because to me, I thought it's like, we have to do this, not just for riot or TBC members or digital chamber of commerce as members.

770
01:40:04,000 --> 01:40:06,000
We have to do it for Bitcoin, right.

771
01:40:06,000 --> 01:40:15,000
At the end of the day, it's like, that's the that's what the guiding principle is here is that North Star of Bitcoin, like, what is this good for Bitcoin?

772
01:40:15,000 --> 01:40:17,000
If it is, then let's do it.

773
01:40:17,000 --> 01:40:22,000
And so that was really great to see.

774
01:40:22,000 --> 01:40:23,000
And I love it.

775
01:40:23,000 --> 01:40:26,000
And you know, you, it's not that you shouldn't sue your government.

776
01:40:26,000 --> 01:40:29,000
It's that you shouldn't have to sue your government.

777
01:40:29,000 --> 01:40:33,000
But sometimes they force your hand by breaking the law.

778
01:40:33,000 --> 01:40:37,000
And so, yeah, yeah, what are you going to do?

779
01:40:37,000 --> 01:40:41,000
Looking forward to working with them legally.

780
01:40:41,000 --> 01:40:46,000
Hopefully they play by the rules that they themselves have said, but we'll bring them back to court if they don't.

781
01:40:46,000 --> 01:40:49,000
I mean, that's, you know, zero doubt about that.

782
01:40:49,000 --> 01:40:50,000
We're ready to go.

783
01:40:50,000 --> 01:40:54,000
So they got to play ball.

784
01:40:54,000 --> 01:40:55,000
Yeah.

785
01:40:55,000 --> 01:41:02,000
Well, anywhere you want to send people that they should check out your at Bitcoin Pierre on Twitter.

786
01:41:02,000 --> 01:41:05,000
Anywhere else you want to direct people?

787
01:41:05,000 --> 01:41:09,000
You know, Satoshi Nakamoto Institute, nakamoto Institute.org.

788
01:41:09,000 --> 01:41:13,000
Michael Goldstein is doing a fantastic job.

789
01:41:13,000 --> 01:41:18,000
And then, yeah, that's that's it.

790
01:41:18,000 --> 01:41:19,000
Thanks for having me on.

791
01:41:19,000 --> 01:41:20,000
I really appreciate it.

792
01:41:20,000 --> 01:41:22,000
And it was a, it was a pleasure.

793
01:41:22,000 --> 01:41:24,000
I look forward to doing it again.

794
01:41:24,000 --> 01:41:30,000
And hopefully you won't have to deal with too much more regulating the regulators in the meantime.

795
01:41:30,000 --> 01:41:34,000
So I hope you get a little breather from that.

796
01:41:34,000 --> 01:41:35,000
Thank you.

797
01:41:35,000 --> 01:41:36,000
I appreciate it.

798
01:41:36,000 --> 01:41:46,000
And that's a wrap on this Bitcoin talk episode of the Bitcoin podcast.

799
01:41:46,000 --> 01:41:51,000
If you are a Bitcoin only company interested in sponsoring another fucking Bitcoin podcast,

800
01:41:51,000 --> 01:41:56,000
head to Bitcoin podcast.net or hit me up on social media on noster.

801
01:41:56,000 --> 01:42:04,000
Head to primal.net slash Walker and on Twitter search for at Walker America or at Bitcoin podcast.

802
01:42:04,000 --> 01:42:15,000
You can also watch the video version of this show on X or on YouTube by going to YouTube.com slash at Walker America or rumble by searching for at Walker America.

803
01:42:15,000 --> 01:42:17,000
Bitcoin is scarce.

804
01:42:17,000 --> 01:42:22,000
There will only ever be 21 million, but Bitcoin podcasts are abundant.

805
01:42:22,000 --> 01:42:28,000
So thank you for spending your scarce time to listen to another fucking Bitcoin podcast.

806
01:42:28,000 --> 01:42:34,000
Until next time, stay free.