Sterlin 
Because what they're essentially saying is, not only do we own you in the context of this country, if you try to leave and get out of here and you've been talking shit about us, or you've been articulating ideas of freedom, then they'll try to come after you anywhere.

This is one of the things that governments do anyway, they have what's called extraterritorial reach in the US where they go around the world trying to arrest people. 

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Doug 
Alright, Sterling, what's going on, man? 

Sterlin 
Oh brother, but how's it going on your end great here looking forward to the discussion 

Doug 
Yeah, yeah, yeah, everything's good. Everything's good a little hectic. I was in some traffic. You know Fiat things getting in the way. I'm not completely untethered. I don't know. I don't know about you I don't know how nobody's completely untethered. Yeah, that's right. There's always I don't know how far you are along in the process But I still have my umbilical cord out.

I haven't completely detached yet 

Sterlin 
Yeah, same here. Being that we're both based in the US, it's hard to completely detach from the system. But as much as possible, I try to use crypto, but it's really definitely a challenge. 

Doug 
Yeah, no, I know you're trying to walk the walk and you describe to many, or you describe it very well, to many of why we need to move in that direction. I wanted to have you out today because Roger Vare obviously is a hot topic, right?

And I saw one of your pinposts recently, it looks like you had a history with him from back in the day, so you have a good vantage point of really understanding who the guy is. And speaking of trying to detether right and walk the walk, Roger was one of the first to do so, if not the first to actually attempt to achieve that. And he's still trying to detether to this day.

He cut the umbilical cord, but they're trying to sew it back out. I'm not exactly sure what the hell's going on with that. But he came out and he gave a talk, he was on Tucker Carlson, mentioned Monero, mentioned Zanno, really, really doubled down on the N-word, which is beautiful to see, right?

I've always said that that's kind of the litmus test of whether or not you're really in it for the liberty, right? Are you willing to say that the N-word? And he's certainly proven that. I mean, we know Roger's been interested in Monero for a long time, so wanted to bring you on, Sterling.

I think you're the right man for the job to kind of talk about how important this moment is with what we're seeing with Roger and kind of give us your perspective on who the man is and what's going on and why we should all be riled up about it. Yeah, brother. 

Sterlin 
Absolutely, so I can start with my talking about my experience about the man Roger Ver who you know Who is he and what is he about as a human being? So a little bit of backstory.

I worked with Roger very closely between 2015 all the way up to around 2019 so I spent several years working with Bitcoin comm I helped open up the media the news media site for Roger and Bitcoin comm and then I helped do a lot of Advocacy and promotion of Bitcoin comm and I was there for the scaling debate scaling wars We could get into that a little bit But the point that I want to drive home is that during the time I spent with Roger?

I had personal time to sit down with him to get to know him to talk to him in person and one of the things that really inspired me to work with Bitcoin comm and Roger is because of his devotion and his focus on promoting and advocating Liberty and voluntary s values the guy has been a consistent advocate of Doing whatever he can to promote more freedom in the world more liberty in the world and as a part of his vision Roger was so dedicated to this that he's given a lot of money to a lot of different libertarian causes a Good amount of people may not know this but Roger not single-handedly There was a lot of people who gave but he did he was a very large donor in the in Ross Ulbrich's trial So he gave a lot of money to the family and to help support Ross and Lynn and in trying to help his defense, right?

so Roger is just a He's hardcore focused and has been hardcore focused on trying to help people out as much as possible He's given to a lot of different and he helps seed the cryptocurrency Industry and he talked about this during the interview with Toker Carlson He funded companies like blockchain comm which was blockchain info at the time He also funded ripple and cracking as well So this whole first generation of successful cryptocurrency companies he funded those out of 

Doug 
Yeah, I think he was even like part of the seed round of coinbase. I think even to I think he was I could be getting that wrong 

Sterlin 
Yeah, no, it's actually kind of a funny story. I think what ultimately happened He had it he had a choice he had to make or he decided that he had to make between funding blockchain.com and Kraken or sorry blockchain.com and coinbase if memory serves and he's mentioned I think in interviews before That he wishes he would have funded coinbase, but I don't think he actually pulled the truck.

Oh, yeah It was like it was like a consideration Right because he had an opportunity but he passed on it. He went with blockchain.com So I think he missed it memory serves any but he did end up funding Kraken and anyway My memory could be hazy. Maybe he did have some involvement down the road But if my memory is usually pretty good if I don't I don't think yeah, I think he missed the bus.

Yeah Yeah point being is that he all he and he did all of this because he was a Hardcore support aside from the libertarian piece.

He was a hardcore supporter of Bitcoin in the early days because he had this cryptoanarchist and sort of cypherpunk vision that this is freedom money that can be used to take power back from the Federal Reserve and The system and bring it back to the people so the locus of control changes from the federal government and the system to the person right because now you can be your own bank and You have peer-to-peer currency you can trade with people For whatever you want without having to worry about going through intermediaries.

So you disintermediate other actors where you can be in control And so that was a component of the libertarian vision as Roger saw it And just aside from that that the thing as a person that I liked most about him he was always very honest very straightforward and if he Wanted to work with you or do something with you is he was always frank about it And it if you wanted to get funded by him, he would always be forthcoming say yes, I can do that No, I can't do this So he was he was always just very communicative about his ideas and his goals and his agendas So I saw him as an extremely honest and decent person and he was a real pleasure to work with while I was there at Bitcoin calm and The what's happening to him right now, and I know we're gonna get into this deeply It's an absolute travesty and it is really a direct result of his and frankly just his Activism right the fact that he has done a lot of work for promoting cryptocurrency for freedom He's been also a hardcore dissident and critic of the government right and government activities something he mentioned in Tucker Carlson specifically was how the ATF and the The what was it ATF who else was involved was the FBI whatever the Branch Davidians and Waco, right?

Where they basically burned us a building with here incendiary tear gas. Of course, they make they made the claim They made the claim that it was actually the Branch Davidians who burned it down But ultimately that no matter what happened that resulted is that was a result of their actions against the compound and against David Koresh And I like 20 plus children. 

Sterlin 
I think died in that hit And he gets very emotional when he talks about these ideas because it's absolute an absolute atrocity. Yeah, that happened. You see it in this face 

Doug 
I mean, it's right what then not to throw you off track here. But when I first interviewed Roger that was in 2020 and you know, I went in I had my My impressions of him from from the you know propaganda that was that was spread against him Like obviously I hadn't completely You know drunk in the Kool-Aid. I knew I knew something was up.

I knew the guy I mean they used to call him Bitcoin Jesus, right? I saw it in there.

We saw what he was doing and then he got completely pummeled publicly by the Bitcoiners which became the Bitcoin maxis and so I always You know, I wasn't as I in it as you were I was I was in crypto But as an outsider you were you were behind the curtain you were working behind the scenes you're working in these companies You had that real vantage point, but from my perspective somebody who they were trying to fool with the propaganda Yeah, even me somebody who I like to believe is quite resistant to Psyops I was like this guy, you know, there's something, you know It this guy's a whatever he did they made about to give be a complete asshole, right?

And so I had him on at 2020 and like, you know before he could you know finish his first Sentence I was like this guy's like a genuine dude And we start talking and and I really start to understood who he was I mean, he was he was a Liberty fighter before Bitcoin existed, right? He he had gotten caught up in issues with the law because he was such a libertarian, right?

I was before crypto he was he was living the libertarian life He was fighting as like an advocate for those ideals They threw him in jail for selling fireworks, right?

I think what it really came down to is he had signs up right that said like fuck the IRS or I don't even know right I like what I don't you probably know better than me, but he had like side a jump that was basically giving an FU to to the feds and The gang the gang came for him and when they did he went through that experience and he survived it and came out stronger and even more determined and on certain in search for a Way to fight back and when he found Bitcoin he realized that like this is the frickin way This is how we're gonna do it and he realized that sooner than basically anybody that was able to vocalize it and He has been true to that testament ever since and so to now look back and realize that There there was a hijacking right because here's this guy Bitcoin Jesus is telling us did he get caught up in some silly things?



Doug 
Yeah, I think he did.

I don't I don't think you know, he doesn't have a perfect record he got manipulated by You know some of these other guys like Craig Wright and what whatever happened, but I think him as a person He was always truly looking for The digital cash solution and trying to get that off the ground whether it was BTC Bitcoin cash You know Manero, right and like he always was true to that vision and through Experimentation and being open-minded he did get caught up with with some of these people But I think that is because he was such an open-minded guy too that he was willing to kind of go down these rabbit holes And he made these avenues so that that is that's my overall take on Roger and I think he's he's definitely a legitimate freedom fighter more than 99.999 percent repeating in in the Bitcoin land and for people to not have respect for him in that regard And to be rooting against him though, that's that's the You know, that's the indicator there, right? That's what you should that's what people should have their eye on seeing who those people are and then realizing Okay, those people are not the cypherpunks are not the kryptor anarchists They absolutely do not care about using this tool for purposes of disrupting the state. They're on a different mission So I think it's it's good to realize that too because you're seeing a lot of that out there and people should be taking note Yeah 

Sterlin 
Yeah, great points. A couple of things too. I mean, it's very clear that if you wanna radicalize somebody to freedom, just arrest them and throw them in a federal prison, right? This is what happened with Roger early on. You're correct.

He was a target of early, what we call, lawfare, where they used the legal, they weaponized the legal system to go after people who were activists and who were pissing off the bureaucrats and the kleptocrats and all the nasty people in the government apparatus. And all it was for was selling the wrong size firework over eBay, even though a lot of these companies were selling the similar firework.

I think Cabela's is what it was related to online. And that's why they got him into prison. Because it's really a tragedy because it was his first offense. And they wanted him so bad in prison that he had to come to a plea bargain and so he wouldn't lose if he went to trial. And it doesn't look like they were willing to negotiate early on.

So that's how bad they wanted to send a message and to put him in prison. And of course, during that time, no one really, they weren't as paying as much attention to the lawfare side of things like we are now. And of course, what I mentioned earlier, that sent him on a course where he wanted to promote more freedom, right? He doubled down on it, he started pushing forward and then he found Bitcoin.

You told the story very well from that point. And then I think, and just a bit of the story that's interesting, he heard about Bitcoin through another person who's in jail right now as a result of lawfare, Ian Freeman, right? Because he heard one of their free talk live shows and they introduced it to him, him and Mark Edge.

And that's how he got into it, started spreading it around the world and then got into developing it. And another point that's really relevant is, and this is super important, is a lot of people are focused on win number, go up win moon, win limbo when it comes to Bitcoin right now. It's all about the digital gold use case.

So do note that Roger was already a multimillionaire before he even got into Bitcoin. He had his company Memory Dealers and another, like a couple of tech companies where he had already made his riches. And he mentioned actually on an, I think this might've been the interview with Tucker Carlson where he had multiple Lamborghinis and he sold them all for Bitcoin.

That's how much he believed in the vision. He wanted to just spend the rest of his life promoting freedom through cryptocurrency. So even though he could have just said chilled on his millions of dollars and said nothing and been happy with it. So, but it just, that's a testament to his character. Yeah. Right? Oh yeah. It's just, it's a massive thing and it's absolutely beautiful.

And that's why we come back to this question of, of lawfare or having the system weaponized. 

Sterlin 
It's gotten worse in recent years. And I think this is largely because the cryptocurrency ecosystem in general represents a massive threat to the hegemony of the US dollar, right?

Because the US has the most to lose when it comes to massive financial changes in the world because right now they're able to basically control and puppeteer the world as a result of the dollar being the global reserve currency. So everything hinges on their ability to control that.

And if another currency were to rise up and people were to adopt it and embrace it and it damaged the dollar, they would suffer as a result of that. So I think all of this, plus just their, you know, the bureaucratic need just to control and to puppeteer and to micromanage everybody's lives is a direct result of that.

And so anybody in crypto who pushes back against that agenda, against their modus operandi, well, you're gonna see casualties through the conduit of lawfare as a result of that. They're gonna cut, they've come out to people and we've seen this with the tornado cash guys, samurai wallet guys, Ross Ulbrich, who we mentioned.

So Ross is just another unfortunate consequence of this attack on the cryptocurrency ecosystem at large. But I do think that this case, his is gonna be one of the largest and it's really gonna highlight these problems and more and more and more people are gonna pay attention to it. So in that way, maybe there's a light at the end of the tunnel.

And I do think, we'll talk more about the case in a minute, but I do think there's a very good chance that Roger's able to get out of this. I've been watching Roger Barnes, I think he's there, is it Robert Barnes? Yeah, the attorney who defended Wesley Snipes and it was like a tax fraud or evasion case.

And he's mentioned multiple times that this case doesn't seem to hold much water and it's a very clear example of how politics and law can be weaponized against political opponents, rather than people actually intent on breaking laws because Roger was very insistent. He knew that he was already a target of the US, right? We'd already covered his previous history as an activist.

And so he told all of his attorneys that he was working with when he decided to expatriate and to leave the US, which is what happened, right? And just a bit of background for anybody listening.

So when you try to renounce your citizenship, which is what Roger wanted to do, because he wanted to get the hell out of the US because he didn't feel like this was a place that he could call home with the government watching his every move. But when you try to renounce your citizenship to the US, it creates a fictitious tax sale, right? Or a fictitious sale of all your property and all your assets.

And then you have to pay tax on that fictitious sale. So anyway, he went through the process of doing that, which is not easy, cost money, hire attorneys. And then of course, all of his assets, there's a lot of money to pay taxes on without actually selling anything. And the evidence is that he's not going to pay taxes on him. 

Doug 
And to be expected to properly assess what that value should be, giving your best efforts where you've hired accounts, you've hired attorneys, and you're trying to abstractly come up with some number that equals what the value would be if you sold all of that thing at that moment in time.

When you own such a large portion of that thing where you're going to crash the market and for that to not be allowed to be held into account of assessing the value, complete fraud on their part, and it's just coming up with an excuse to throw somebody in jail. Yeah. 

Sterlin 
It's wild because – and this is something I see online a lot where people are – they're just jumping to conclusions, and they're saying, oh, he didn't pay his taxes, he has to pay his fair share.

Aside from the fact that taxation is absolute theft, to begin with, right on foundational first principles, Roger was still trying to do the right thing because he didn't want those guys to easily be able to come after him.

And get this, he was – they were in discussions, him and his attorneys, with the IRS to pay whatever they claim was owed, and apparently they did never come back with a clear answer on what he actually owed. And we can see how difficult that would be to the point that you alluded to in the very early days of Bitcoin.

So for one, even if he would have sold, in theory, all of his Bitcoin holdings, he would have completely fucking crashed the market, right? This is like circa 2014. There's no way. And then – so trying to figure that out and add calculations. And this is also a regulatory environment for Bitcoin that was non-existent at the time.

All these rules from the Treasury Department and the IRS have come down since then, but that was definitely the Wild West in terms of your crypto holdings. So it had been very difficult to ascertain that. You would have had to get all the attorneys involved to try to figure it out. And I think they attempted to do their best, but still, in good faith, he was trying to actually say, what do I owe you?

I'll gladly pay it to you, right? It's like that wasn't an issue. 

Doug 
Now, maybe you know the details on this, but how did it get to this level so fast and in such a way where he wasn't even given the opportunity to fix the issue, or was it that he was, and then he's like, no, I paid, that's what I believe it was, leave me the fuck alone, and I'm not giving you more money?

How did it get to the point where now they're indicting him and putting him through a legal project, why wasn't there a back and forth there, a negotiation? Are you familiar with how that all went down? 

Sterlin 
Yeah, and that's what I'm trying to get at. There was actually, but there was like an ongoing back and forth, like up until the moment when they indicted him, it was like a sealed indictment from a grand jury, right? Where he didn't even know until the guy, he was arrested in Spain, where the dude just walked up to him. Right.

Roger Vera, and he was trying to figure out who the guy was, and he's like, come with me. Showed a badge, and you're under arrest. At that exact time. 

Doug 
But he paid he had he had made his payments where the rent where they then requesting more money of like an amount like you I was this much more and then he was just kind of correct instead of paying. He was just continuing to argue 

Sterlin 
Here's the thing. This is how I understand it, and don't quote me on this, but this is what the documentation suggests in all the other interviews that I've watched on the subject. They were claiming that he owes more, but they never gave an exact amount. They couldn't articulate what he actually owes.

They basically were just saying he owes more, and as far as I know, they were in that back and forth. And that was ongoing for a while, and then they decided to indict him and go after him anyway. But there's a couple of points that I want to make that I don't want to gloss over.

One is that to get any extra information with him, and this is a huge miscarriage of justice and is antithetical to the Constitution of the U.S., they raided his attorney's office, breaking attorney-client privilege in the U.S. That is not something that's acceptable. That's certainly taboo legally. 

Doug 
Yeah. That's a Supreme Court case right there. Just figure out why in this instance were they able to go around attorney-client privilege. I don't even know what the precedent is there and what other scenarios that's been done. 

Sterlin 
That's insane. And this is, again, watching attorneys talk about this. Just for the record, I think everybody knows I'm not an attorney. So this is just from hearsay and knowledge. 

Doug 
I actually am but not not not not practiced enough to fog. Oh, yeah 

Sterlin 
I can't remember you mentioned that at some point. A New York's attorney, but go ahead. Cool, yeah, no, so that, but that is no matter how you slice it, extremely egregious, and that really speaks to the law fair component as the desperation on the side of the Department of Justice in the U.S.

where they just wanna, if they wanna go after you, they're gonna bypass all the rules, all the due process rules, all the common rules of law that we would anticipate as being fair and just and bypass all that.

So one is, instead of going through the tax court, right, which is typically what would look like was gonna happen, and then instead of like getting all the information directly from the attorney and from Roger requesting it, they decided just to raid the attorney's office, hold the people there.

I think some of the folks that involved in that law firm actually quit according to some documents that I saw. So it was a huge kind of thing. I think that happened in 2018 if memory serves, and by the way, anybody who's interested in seeing this, plus they wanna sign the petition for Roger's release, that you got freerogernow.org. And that's- freerogernow.org.

Yeah, where I learned most about this is they, his attorneys for the case recently filed a motion to dismiss all the charges, and everything that I'm talking about is certainly in there, and there's another piece of this where they're actually just claiming, and I think this is a rightful thing to claim, is that the exit tax, for one, is just completely unconstitutional, and not supposed to be part of a constitution.

I think it definitely seems like a bold legal claim, but I would personally agree with that, think that that's complete, a complete sanity to try to exit tax. But anyway, it's all in the motion to dismiss. 

Doug 
income taxes. That's generally. That's it. 

Sterlin 
Good point. Yeah, that reminds me. I mean, the federal income tax was only supposed to be a temporary measure during wartime, right? It wasn't supposed... But that's the thing with governments. Anytime you give an inch and they take a mile, laws don't just go away. If they have power, they're going to consolidate it and continue to use it. 

Doug 
the rat the ratchet effect let me uh bring this up yeah i gotta make sure i signed a position i don't know if i did i think i know i sign i think um shit i gotta make sure i gotta sign that guys do it sign it takes like a minute right you just fill out like fill out your name i guess and just hit enter this is well well worth it right if we're gonna do any type of advocacy and you know uh this this is this one is well worth and i think it could actually make an impact here because we got trump coming into office the new administration there's no reason why roger doesn't check all the boxes as being somebody that it should be uh you know basically given given apart and given clemency from from the weaponization of the of the federal government against individuals for for fighting liberty he's he's in that list uh you know ross albright is obviously part of that list uh rogers is is right there um so i think it will happen but yeah i think i think it's everybody should should sign the thing keep spreading the word obviously we saw it it go nuclear the other day um when he was on uh what's what's his what's his name uh tucker carlson show i mean i think it was like over 2.5 million views or something that was that was amazing to see um but yeah we got to keep pushing it out there i i think what do you say do you think trump will will step in his administration will step in and do something 

Sterlin 
Yeah, that's a really good question. So I'll say, before we even talk about Roger, Trump has already promised at a number of high-profile public conferences that he would pardon Ross, or he would commute, sorry, he would commute Ross's sentence on day one when he gets into office.

So assuming that he keeps that promise, there's no reason why he can't also come in and pardon Roger as well, and perhaps some of these other folks who have been a victim of the system. Now, as a crypto-anarchist and a volunteerism, extremely skeptical of any kind of political solution. I'm also skeptical of politicians keeping their promises.

But I do see there is some reason for Trump to keep his promises and maybe to take it a step further because he's also now been a victim. Assuming all of that is, all the stories are true. He's also been a victim of lawfare, right? As well when they raided his Mar-a-Lago office, right? And then they have tried to convict him on election charges. Yeah, so I think- 

Doug 
He's a victim of weaponized federal government. 

Sterlin 
as justices. That's right. The hope is that has changed his mind, and he was already a proponent of, I'll say generally more freedom. Trump is definitely not a libertarian.

I definitely don't think that he's going to be the savior of any of us who are anarchists and want more freedom in the world, but as far as keeping his promise and maybe pardoning some of these folks, I do have high hopes that that will turn out to be true. There is another thing that I wanted to mention about Roger's case. I said there were two things.

One is the breaking of attorney-client privilege, which is just a huge red flag for people. The other is that this happened, Roger's indictment and arrest happened about a week after he published his book, Hijacking Bitcoin, and then started to do a book tour and talking about these ideas.

One of the key points of that book, aside from it being hijacked from a developer perspective and people wanting to turn it to digital gold, there's some evidence and some ideas that they put forward that there were intelligence agencies involved in working with Bitcoin developers and helping to hijack this.

I don't think it's a coincidence at all, and other people like the co-author Steve Patterson has said this as well, that they're probably specifically coming after him as a result of vindictiveness for promoting this book, plus all the activism that he's done in the past. So where there's smoke, there's fire, there's all this political activism and all this.

Also the fact that he directly has funded all these companies and all these organizations and crypto and libertarianism makes him a prime target for a lawfare attack vector. If you're looking at this from our vantage point, just being libertarians and voluntarists and you see everything that Roger has done, you can, I think, very quickly surmise that this wasn't just a typical tax case.

As a matter of fact, I don't think, at least I've never seen before where they've gone after somebody who has attempted to renounce their citizenship for not painting. This is like, this is a novel circumstance that hasn't happened before as far as I know. 

Doug 
We got some big yeah big names obviously Tucker Carlson like we said this law fair isn't really about taxes It's about control there has long challenged both permanent Washington and centralized finance and they hate him for it They see him as a threat Charlie cook Kirk we want to see President Trump get rid of lawfare here as he was once a victim of one So a pardon lifting of charges, whatever it takes.

It's time for a clean slate into free Roger Bella Assange Brett Weinstein. So I mean you it's it's in the circuit.

It's in the Liberty Circuit you know, I think I think we'll continue to see people in that sphere talking about it and It's gonna it's gonna it's gonna get out there we Joe Rogan I could see, you know See Joe Rogan that or not if he's been mentioning it yet, but I can see that happening So that's that's good to see but we got to do our part guys This is how the grassroots works, right?

So I I'm actually excited because it looks like it's it looks like it's working It looks like the efforts the efforts are paying up Aaron day is doing an amazing, you know amazing job He was for my from what I'm saying.

He was really kind of the impetus of organizing the effort Get it getting the word out and now he's got real momentum behind it So good job our day and obviously Sterling I've seen you, you know, you doing a lot on the effort as well So thanks to you guys 

Sterlin 
Yeah. I think it's really clear that if they can do this to Roger and they keep doing this to people in our community, in our ecosystem, they can do it to anybody. They can decide to come after whoever they want.

If we don't have pushback, at least beginning legally and help, like you said, from the grassroots perspective where everybody is speaking up against this, really it's a complete miscarriage of everything that's dignified and decent in our world. So I'm so happy to see the response.

And there's even people who may really loathe Roger for his particular views and they don't agree that Bitcoin was hijacked. Maybe they're maximalists. There have been a good segment of those folks coming out in defense of Roger. And our friend, Juan Galt, is one of them who's been a Bitcoin maximalist for a while. And he was even at Monero Topia and he's spoken up to Roger.

So I do think this has a way of bringing a lot of our factionalism, like breaking apart some of the factionalism and bringing people together in defense of Roger because we realize that this is not okay and we need to do whatever we can to support him.

And signing the thing is one of the minor things that we can do, but talking about it publicly and online and being as loud as possible about it, I think is really important. Me personally, I empathize greatly with Roger because you're probably familiar with my background. I got arrested for possession of MDMA and cocaine. Almost went to prison for a long, long time.

Got lucky and dodged a bullet that that quote unquote crime wasn't federal. So I know what it's like to have to be processed through the criminal justice or shall we say criminal injustice system. Scary. Scary stuff. Yeah, it's terrifying because it doesn't take much for those guys to completely ruin your life.

And even if you do go through that system and you get a non-guilty verdict, if you went to trial in a lot of ways, it still ruins your life because there's reputational damage, even if you're innocent. There's still the idea lingering in people's heads that you could be a problem or a threat. So going through that system is like having a scarlet letter.

It's not a great thing, but I do think a lot of people's minds are changing. They're starting to see the system for what it is. They're realizing that the emperor really doesn't have any clothes. And now I think we're going to have more propulsion and more momentum toward greater change and starting to create, generate more freedom around because of all the stuff that's happening.

That's just completely insane, right? From a rational, illogical and decent human's perspective. 

Doug 
Right, it's trying. People are starting even beyond crypto, right? Just normal people are starting to look at this and be like, wait, what? Why are they going after this guy for this? That doesn't seem right, right? There's not too many people, if they hear this story, they would be rooting for the government.

Obviously, they're trying to frame it like he's some guy who won a windfall and he's stealing all his gains. But I think anybody who takes a decent look at it will realize right away that's just not the case. And like I said at the outset, I do think it's important to step back and look at those who are supporting this and those who are against it, like you pointed out some names there.

And just like Max Keiser is somebody on the other side of this, right? He's one of the biggest names in Bitcoin right now. He is one of the current Bitcoin emperors, right? Like him and Sailor. Has Sailor made any comment? Not that I've seen. Yeah, he's going to keep his mouth shut. He's not an idiot.

He already put his foot in his mouth with basically saying, it doesn't matter if you hold your own keys, right? Basically saying that crypto anarchists are a bunch of people wasting their time playing around. 

Sterlin 
I was going to get on a soapbox. I think that kind of rhetoric gets me so fired up because that whole train of thought speaks to Roger's idea to begin with. Even if it's not technologically hijacked, it's socially hijacked and socially engineered for sure because that was not the language that the original folks and I was in there early on in crypto and in Bitcoin specifically.

We were talking about cypherpunk values, crypto-anarchism, peer-to-peer cash for the world, disintermediating the banks, freeing the individual. And now those talking points have got completely inverted where now all these guys are talking about crypto-anarchism, Michael Saylor's words, crazy crypto-anarchists. They're also saying we need to keep all of our Bitcoin on custodial exchanges.

We need to have more KYC, more know your customer. It's the complete opposite. So you can see very clearly if you just pay attention that Bitcoin is hijacked from that perspective because all these guys have to do is control the rails, the on and off ramps, get people to continue custodying their funds.

And this is also to Aaron Day's point where all this does is pave the way for a CBDC and a controlled bit of account that these guys can surveil and watch and keep tabs on every step of the way.

So we have a very clear indication that the direction that Bitcoin and the rest of the ecosystem has went is anti—and this is stuff I talk about all the time too—it's antithetical to the original cypherpunk ethos. And that's why I think we're starting too to see a resurgence of people coming out and talking about the original use case.

We actually just did a cypherpunk space recently, and we had quite a few people show up because there's a realization that these values are important. I mean, Doug, I spend quite a bit of time on X, right? And when I – all these spaces that crop up are just talking about, oh, win 100K Bitcoin right before it hit 100K, and it's all about the casino and the value and win number go up.

That is not what this ecosystem was originally about. It was about having a liberatory technology that could unfetter us from the system as it stands. And I think those values are going to come back into the limelight as all this stuff is happening, right? I think it is, and I think that's a beautiful thing and a good thing. 

Doug 
Yeah. Oh my God. Yeah. I mean, as you know, that's what Monerotopia is all about, right? Like, and this year was bigger than ever, better than ever, because we're kind of reaching a fever pitch with it. There's the Bitcoiners are coming back.

You know, those that are the true cypher punks, crypto anarchists that were in it for the right reasons, they're realizing and they're walking away from the BTC maximalism at this point. And they're like, you know, fuck that, fuck Michael Saylor. We got to fix this. And so it is exciting to see that, at least. And I think that's going to go a long way.

I think the tide will eventually start to turn, because that's how this tech was always going to play out, right? If this invention worked as intended, the game theory was that eventually it was going to work, it was going to grab hold. As long as the people use it, we win, right? And so we got diverted with Bitcoin. There were some weaknesses there that allowed basically governments to co-opt it.

Could it have been saved? 100% it could have. I mean, the way, you know, it was open source. You could have improved it.

They tried to make improvements, but it got socially and politically co-opted to the point where design decisions weren't about making it digital cash that governments can't fuck with, but making it something that integrated into the current system that allows it to go up in value as much as possible in fiat terms. That's what it's currently being designed towards. And that was the co-opting of it.

That's how it got co-opted. And that meme now controls Bitcoin. And so until you change that meme, Bitcoin will continue to be that and won't evolve into digital cash. And so thankfully, you know, the idea is much bigger than just Bitcoin itself. And at the end of the day, it is open source and people can recreate the versions that are unstoppable.

Because I do believe theoretically something like that can be created and will flourish and will work. I think Satoshi realized it as well. And it's now been tweaked and turned to the point where we are ahead of them in terms of the tech and the way encryption works. We have an advantage, right? They can't beat math. They can't use bombs against our math, against our code.

All they could try to do is socially take things over and change a product and change a project politically. And as long as there's enough of us that realize that and we control it politically, there's no way of infiltrating and stopping true digital cash. 

Sterlin 
Yeah, 100%. I think that's talking about the solution space for everything that's happening at the moment. Yeah, the technologies that we need to exist that support our values and support freedom already do exist right now. Obviously, we have Monero, Zeno. You still have things like Bitcoin Cash if you want just peer, peer-to-peer cash. But if you want privacy and anonymity, you have that as well.

So the technology is here. All these guys did was delay the inevitable for a bit of time. That's all they can do because they can't completely subvert all the technology. You can't stop decentralization. Like you said, you can't stop math. You can't bomb math into oblivion. So what's going to happen eventually is people are going to continue to adopt this. The technology is going to continue to grow.

And ironically, even though Bitcoin ended up going the wrong direction away from the crypto anarchist ethos, the idea of it still remains buried within it. And anybody starts getting used to Bitcoin, that gives them opportunities to look at the ecosystem at large. They come into contact with these ideas, and maybe they don't, but they still use something like Monero or Zeno eventually.

And that opens up the ecosystem to more peer-to-peer transactionality and the way that we envision it where people aren't just custody. I have to say this. This is one of the key things that we talked about very early on. It's not your keys, not your crypto. Very simple idea.

That just means that we want to embrace the peer-to-peer mentality and mindset where we're doing transactions with each other directly without having those intermediaries. And that's just a huge step toward liberating ourselves financially and raising financial responsibility as well. 

Doug 
Yeah, I mean, that's the real weapon against the state system is this tool that allows us to create our own parallel economy outside of the state-controlled system. That's the real thing, right? The creating something that basically can't be devalued, there's power there, right? It takes away the ability of governments to print money. So there's definitely value there, right?

That's a tax, obviously, that's a very, very real tax against all of us. But there's the economy itself, and that's where they have even more of a stranglehold and that's what they really don't want to lose, right?

Is this ability to control everybody's transactions, surveil everybody's transactions, see what everybody's doing with their money and take their pound of flesh based on those transactions and be a part of that economy. What terrifies them is an economy outside of their system because then that's how you ultimately win, right?

That's how you greatly weaken the state apparatus in the most effective way possible. That's why Ross Albright, obviously, I mean, that did that for the first time in a very big way with large numbers.

It was an economy outside of their economy, and that's what terrified them, not even so much of what was being sold on it, but the fact that you had this large economy outside of theirs that they weren't controlling. And that's what they feared with Roger himself, right? Because that's what he really represents, that's what Ross represents, and that's what Fripto is supposed to represent.

That is what this is all about. There's other things we can do with it, but that is the core value proposition of crypto. That is what it was invented for. 

Sterlin 
Yeah, what you're reminding me too, the vision that we're ultimately realizing with the incursion of strong anonymity, safeguarding technologies is what Samuel Edward Conkin III wrote about in his book, The New Libertarian Manifesto, where he talks about this idea of agorism and counter-economics, where when you have the mass creation of a black and gray circular economy and you have horizontal grassroots trade networks where people are doing peer-to-peer exchanges outside of the state apparatus, that is usurping power away from that apparatus over time, right?

Because it takes their ability away to tax those people and it takes the power of money away from them and puts it back into the hands of the people. So this is a Conkin-esque vision and this is the same thing that you're right, Ross Ulbricht tried to realize and in a way did realize it because with the creation of the Silk Road, he actually caused more interest.

He grew Bitcoin, the Bitcoin ecosystem, because it was one of the first major marketplaces where people were transacting Bitcoin and it was created and grounded on a black-gray circular market. Most people were doing mainly transactions and cannabis on the Silk Road. And by the way, for anybody who doesn't know, just a tad bit of background info on Ross.

So Ross Ulbricht, it is the alleged founder and contributor to the Silk Road. The Silk Road was the first dark net market and Ross ultimately got caught and charged with engaging in an organized criminal conspiracy and then I think they had some wire fraud charges and drug transactions.

So there's a bunch of charges like a laundry list of charges and he ended up getting a double life sentence plus 40 years in prison. And of course, recently Trump has promised, like I mentioned earlier, to commute his sentence on his first day because he realizes that was an attack on the ecosystem that was definitely lawfare, that was weaponization of the legal system to put Ross into prison.

And there's been a lot of hard work on everyone's part to try to get him out. And of course, this plays directly into Roger because as I mentioned earlier too, he's funded his original defense and since then helped Ross's mom, Lynn, to fight for that, for getting Ross out eventually and fighting against that miscarriage of justice. Awesome, man. 

Doug 
Awesome guys guys. We have 420 live viewers right now Well, one of my favorite numbers guys light like and share all these things we're talking about right the this idea that we need The this this meme to to respread in crypto land the true meaning of crypto what its purpose is I personally think we're gaining strength right now.

It seems like there's momentum the maximalism I think I think it's hit a peak Right with the hundred K obviously Bitcoin can keep going up as governments get more involved in it but I think kind of it's hit a peak in terms of people realizing that the BTC maxis are just out for themselves and they're just trying to make a buck right and The you know that what crypto is true for those that are looking now.

All right, where do I find the real thing?

They're realizing that it does exist We just need to grow grow our numbers like and share this Retweet it people could fight fight, you know be finding this show right now for the first time they could be you know And instead of trading dogecoin or whatever Whatever meme coin they're they're fucking around with right now Maybe that maybe they accidentally click on this and they're like wait a minute.

Why these guys like so hyped up a Liberty And next thing you know, they too are into crypto for digital cash purposes Like everybody should be into it for at least those purposes Anybody who's against those ideas you're just on the wrong side. What are you what are you doing here? And you will lose you will lose too.

That's the thing Yeah, so I just want to reiterate that I do see some good chats coming in here Lord gains tip 25 cents. Love what you're doing with the show and XMR bizarre. Thanks for the work you're doing Thank you, man. Thank you for the tip Starting to wonder if XMR chat is working guys. Send your tips at XMR chat comm slash Manero talk once again This is how we this is how we we win.

We got to use it You don't need to send me $10 send me 10 cents. Send me one cent Let's just get those Manero transaction counts go and get it up get it up Sterling man that that brings me to kind of just like a practical question that I asked people all the time Right, like so what do we need to do it? Right? I'm saying we need to obviously spread this meme What are some other actions we can do?

How do we get the word out beyond those that already do understand this we're saying maybe this Roger case can can be you know Help be that that thing that opens the door, right? Everybody would be concerned about wait a minute I have no attorney client privileges anymore. What the hell is that all about like that?

That could be the wedge right people Realizing that this is liberty fighter is just being under, you know is under attack But what else can we do to get into the mainstream sphere where we can get normies for lack of a better word? 

Doug 
I try to insult people but we could get those normal people to start Caring enough about these concepts where they're like, okay.

I want to go use crypto because it prevents governments first from surveilling my transactions and whatnot and for like Actually taking action and understanding that there's value in and living that life Even if it may be maybe slightly more difficult at this point But realizing it's it's worth the effort because of all the value you'll you'll get out of it How do we break into that man? Yeah 

Sterlin 
I think the first thing is this goes back full circle to the very first thing we talked about, and that's trying to detach yourselves from the financial system as much as possible. We still struggle to do that for a lot of reasons, and I think a lot of us do. But I just want to give some indication that there are people out there who are living solely on crypto, and they've figured out a way.

For one, I recommend following my buddy Joel Valenzuela's channel on X. It's at the Desert Links. I think it's his username, and he's a big proponent of teaching people how to just live off of crypto. Because if you're living off of crypto and you've detached yourself from the system, you're already promoting what we're trying to promote.

And actually, you're creating those black and gray circular economies that we're talking about. And like I said, I try to use crypto as much as possible. I constantly carry it around and use it when I can. So detaching – probably just like us, you guys won't be able to do it fully and completely, but to start moving your life in that direction is great.

And the further along that you can get, that's fantastic. One of the things I do personally, just another thing that helps – it's an action. It's a bit different from trying to contact the mainstream, but I'm hugely involved in the parallel society movement.

So there's all these – some organizations like Praxis has actually talked about the network state or the parallel society movement as the cryptocurrency in-game, where we start creating these societies outside that run in parallel to the nation-state system as a continuation of helping to break down those systems in the sense that it makes – so if you have alternative governance models running in alternative societies, that forces governments to compete on another plane.

Aside from currency, now you have a governance competition component. So that's one of the things that I love, too, is just trying to do the exit-build thing or to build systems within the system that fight back. So those are a couple of ideas of what you can do to start pushing this forward.

In context to what we're talking about, the most important, simple thing you can do is simply sign the petition for Roger and then talk to people about it online to sound the alarm bells. So that's really important. Good points. 

Doug 
Let me ask you, I don't know if I ever got your take on this. What do you think of this, obviously, Monero getting delisted. We talk about it, how it's a good thing. It shows that it actually works as intended. Governments fear it. But do you think, is it better or worse for Monero adoption, the fact that there's pressure on centralized exchanges and it's being delisted?

Maybe it bottomed out in terms of the amount of delistings that will happen, I do not know. Maybe it will start to get relisted. Should we be fighting for that? Let me hear your answer before I give you my take. But what do you think about that? I think it's an important topic. 

Sterlin 
Yeah, I think frankly, it's a good thing overall because what it does is it so when this is this is what happened with Bitcoin to begin with, right? It's not easy to try to create a currency, right? Imagine if so the permissionless nature of Bitcoin in the early days, you go and imagine going to ask a regulator, hey, Mr. Regulator, I developed this currency and I want to start passing this around.

So not only are you going to get laughed out of the office, but then if it actually works, someone's going to come to your doorstep, they're going to arrest you and take you to jail. But if they knew who Satoshi was, they would take it to prison.

So these situations where there's governmental-based bottlenecks that disallow people from easily innovating, right, it forces people to find a way to innovate around that, to create freedom.

So I think the pressure that governments have put on Monero by having all these custodial exchanges delisted creates a great opportunity for us to be able to innovate in the peer-to-peer space and to allow to give people opportunities to use it and to embrace it and to adopt it on that level, which I think is what we need anyway.

We don't need people using the traditional rails and the custodial banks, etc. So I think mass adoption on a grassroots level with Monero or XANO or whatever the anonymity-enhancing coin is is absolutely fantastic. I mean, is it really mass adoption if it's just custody really owned by Coinbase or by Kraken or by Michael Saylor or whoever it is?

I would say that's antithetical to the kind of mass adoption that we're talking about as a peer-to-peer electronic money system. 

Doug 
Yeah, I agree. It makes it anti-fragile, right? It forces us to build out the tools that we need for Monero to work outside of the fiat system. That being said, I do think having bridges to the fiat, to the normie world, is important because that's how we bring in new users, right?

And I always argued if somebody had to use a centralized exchange to get their crypto, which is what most people do, by far the majority. Even the cypherpunks out there, I'm sure a lot of them have accounts with centralized exchanges or had them at one point in time. And so it's a way for people to obtain crypto.

And I always kind of argued, if you're forced to get your crypto on exchange, the best crypto you could possibly get on exchange would be Monero, because at least when you pull it off, you're not tracked and traced thereafter.

If people have to get into crypto through centralized exchanges, I would want to see them get into crypto through Monero, not through Litecoin, not through Dogecoin, not through Bitcoin, which are taking off the exchange, and then you start to have a trail. What would be best is if they're pulling their Monero off, just like taking cash out of a bank.

And yes, will the government know that this guy bought Monero and that guy bought... Yeah, they will. But at least now they're able to kind of run off into crypto land without a trail. And from there, yeah, sure, they can get into shitcoins and Bitcoin, whatever it may be. But strategically, it makes more sense to want that to happen.

I think even from a crypto anarchist standpoint, if we want to grow this outside economy, we want people getting into it through a bridge where they're not leaving a trail behind. That's kind of my take on it. I think we would see numbers really go up if more people had access to Monero. When I say numbers go up, price, but just usage as well. I've been in Monero for quite some time.

I know a lot of people in New York, I ran for Congress here in New York, people kind of know me as a guy who knows things about crypto and Monero. And when people ask me, how do I get Monero? It's not an easy answer. They're like, well, I have Coinbase, I use it all the time. So why don't I see it on there? Well, you don't see it on there because it was delisted, but that's actually a good thing.

It's great that it's delisted. Oh, okay. Maybe some of them will pick up on that. But the fact is that they can't just go on their phone and click a button and grab some. That keeps a lot of people out of Monero. So I don't know. How do you feel about that? How do we ignore that clear advantage there? 

Sterlin 
Yeah, I mean I see the merits in your argument, and I think there's a lot of people who that might be their door to getting into Monero, and also to any privacy coin for that matter, and then having it grow as a result of that.

I think clearly the reality that we face is that's going to be very difficult, but it's just going to continue to get de-platformed, and people involved in it are going to continue to get de-banked, and exchanges are going to have lower risk tolerances for privacy tokens. But I would 100% agree with your perspective if we could find a way to allow that to happen in a way that works, right?

Where the exchanges can actually take it on, and it doesn't get immediately de-risked or de-banked, because we can never realize that vision if the scenario keeps cropping up. But I will say this. There is another thing that we kind of can do that is maybe a bit of a middle ground.

So I don't personally use any exchanges, and I'm lucky because I work in the space, and I can get paid in different types of crypto, right? Yeah, I know. 

Doug 
I don't touch exchanges either, right? But for the normies, you know, yeah, I have Monero that comes in, then I have Monero that goes out. 

Sterlin 
Yeah, so all I'm saying is even if you're a normie, you can learn about crypto, and then you can try to do work and accept crypto as payment, and boom, you're in the system. Of course. And even if you take something other than Monero, because a lot of people aren't going to do transactions of Monero for whatever reason, they're scared. You can very easily exchange that token into another.

Of course, there's a bit of a learning curve around that. But I do think – I mean, this is a huge part of what we're trying to do. If we have a peer-to-peer economy, having people get paid in crypto opens up an opportunity for them to engage in peer-to-peer transactions on a market, even if it's a black or gray market.

That's one thing, but I think getting paid in it is a nice way to pop your crypto cherry if you're a normie. One of the first things I did when I got into Bitcoin, the reason that I got excited about it was because I went to Porkfest. I bought some, but then I used it to buy goods from the vendors at Porkfest, so I realized it's utility and use case right away.

And I think people have to just get it and start using it to be able to do that and getting paid in it. It's just another way to go about it. Again, Doug, I don't disagree with the overall merit of your argument for mass adoption in anonymity coins like Monero. I just think we're in a difficult situation to realize that with the political situation.

But maybe when Trump comes into office, maybe there's more opportunity for people to re-list Monero. Who knows how to play out? 

Doug 
Yeah, exactly. That's why I'm kind of bringing the idea up again, because I think it's different times now with Trump coming into office. I think maybe it's not it's not as crazy to think we can start getting Monero re listed.

And I do think there's pushback on that in the Monero community, I totally get the arguments of if we're not on exchanges, fuck them, this place is dead anyway, why do we need them, right? Like we could we could go that route. And I don't think it is cope. I allows us to build outside of their system 100%.

But I think if we did have the ability to kind of politically sway and change things here in the US, make it a more Monero friendly country, it would benefit Monero. If New York became a pro-Monero state, I think people might be like, what? That's great. I think that's a great thing.

And what we're doing is we're giving access, people access, normies access to this liberating tool, they're going to eliminate cash, cash will no longer exist in society. It's not just about us being able to use it among each other. It's about giving it to the rest of the society so they can benefit from these freedom tools, and they need access to it to get it. And that's, that's why I bring it up.

And I think it's, it's actually controversial in the Monero community, there's like a whole subset that would be like, I'm probably going to like, they'll probably write me comments, you know, on this video, like, you know, why do you want to bend your knee to the centralized exchanges?

And you know, I think there's good argument to be made for why we would want to see Monero to continue to be listed on centralized exchanges. Yes, we have Sarai coming up. Yes, you can use Hivino. Yes. Obviously, I want people to go on XMR Bazaar and sell goods and services for Monero. That is the way, 100%. But that's, that's like second order stuff.

We need people to just get a little bit of this in their hands too. And I think we should push for it. Now might be the time. 

Sterlin 
Yeah, and Doug just for the audience's potential use case there are some central exchanges You can still can't you still purchase it on kraken yes. Yeah, okay? 

Doug 
But uh crack crack it is not in New York crack. It is not in New York. I am 

Sterlin 
New York is shit for crypto in general like yeah 

Doug 
I know it's I mean we have the bid license here. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, I'm thinking I'm thinking of getting involved in that politically And you know, obviously I ran for office here in New York 2020 But I'm thinking of maybe trying to put some efforts towards I don't know Maybe even getting rid of the bit get let's get rid of the bit license in New York I see things moving, you know much more towards the Republican libertarian way here in New York There there's definitely been a wave I think now could be the time with Trump in office There'll be a new governor, you know, there'll be a governor's race coming up here in New York I could see I could see a Republican potentially winning that for the first time in a very long time and I think to be to have that on your platform that we want to completely reverse New York Turn it turn it back into the financial capital of the world By making it the digital cash capital of the world Ash was always king in New York New York was always known as being a place where you could get anything you wanted with cash Bring that back and we'll watch we'll watch that will be part of the reflourishing of New York And I think I think it's a good good time to perhaps like go down that road.

I don't know. I don't know me Obviously, you're you're much more of an agarist than I am I am in many ways.

That's where I want to get to but I also You know, I also think we fight, you know, we fight with the tools we have we have the cypherpunk tools we have the crypto anarchist tools, right, which is which has been narrow and Moving everybody towards opting out but we also do have the political tools that we could use to try to Change the system as it currently exists.

I was you know describe it as Digging a tunnel from both ends, right? We might as well be digging from the other side 

Sterlin 
Yeah, personally, I don't see the political solution as being that viable because I don't really get into it in detail because I personally ask that you see this as a different strategy where it's a means to an end. It's just not my personal strategy, but I don't have a huge dog in the fight. I do want to mention just briefly about bit license in New York, a funny thing that happened as a result.

So the guy who created that, who helped draft that legislation, Ben Losky, I believe is his name, he actually helped create bit license, the legislation for it and the implementation for it in New York. And then he went on and started a consulting firm where he took money to off ... So he ended up getting rich off the ...

I don't know about rich, but he ended up making money off of his own drafted legislation, which is super corrupt in my opinion, where you can help draft legislation and then help people, quote unquote, get the license as a consultant. That seems rather fucked up to me. So this is just how the broken system of currying favors and shit works, and that's what ... 

Doug 
It's the revolving door of regulators in the private sector. 

Sterlin 
Yeah, that's right where they bounce back and forth and then they can profit off of their activities from one sector by moving to another one. Yeah, it's a real kind of a shit show when it comes down to it. But yes, I'm not – back to your point, I'm not going to be super toxic like some of these folks who may be in the community who are antagonistic toward these ideas.

I think if you can try them and you have some faith or hope that they can work and you can make change actually happen, well then by all means go for it.

I think a lot of us who have probably given up on a political solution – a lot of us are – like Derek, for instance, who's a good friend of mine, Derek Brose, has focused on the notion of exit and build, right where he's actually for the most part left the U.S.

and went to Mexico, more hospitable jurisdictions, not only for crypto, but just living without having the government come and get you a job. That's one of the things that I like about traveling so much too is when I'm in the U.S., this is like the homeland of police raids and no-knock raids on people's houses and other places in the world that's not near as prolific as the thing that happens, right, where you don't have this police state that constantly comes after you. Like in Mexico, for instance, yes, it has a ton of problems. There's a lot of corruption, but they don't have the infrastructure. They don't have the police state. There's not like a culture of no-knock raids unless you're like a high-end cartel leader or something like that, and the most part you don't have to fear that that's going to happen just any given moment. And so that's one of the reasons why the exit and build, parallel society, establishment movement, those kind of things. So I say if you have hope that you can politic and make change in the system here, by all means do that if that's what you want to do. But then there are also those of us who have other solutions and we're trying to figure out things elsewhere, right? Of course. That's all I'll say. 

Doug 
I mean, most of my energy is focused on the opting outside. That's what XMR Bazaar is, that's what the Noto project is, that's what Monerotopia is. That's where all my energy goes, because like Roger Ver, I know that this is the best shot we have at landing the largest punch, right? So that's where I focus all my energy.

That being said, I think we're leaving things on the table if we don't also fight the battle on other fronts, where there might be weaknesses and we can penetrate. It's going to take a long time to get us to the point where we could essentially completely ignore the state. And so there's multiple ways to reduce its power over us. And crypto is obviously the most impactful way.

But I do think it's worth exploring these others, especially as the beast gets weaker, you can you can punch it from different angles. I mean, I don't know. And the other important point to make is a practical one. Like we said, at the end of the day, we are still tethered to the system. You're hanging out in Texas, I'm hanging out in New York. I got XMR Bazaar going, which really is a dream come true.

I built that because I want to be able to buy anything with Monero. I want to be able to hire my electrician with Monero. And it's literally getting to that point. But I do still live in New York, New York State. My family is in New York State. I'm not leaving this place completely at any point in my life, even if I may be partially at some point.

So if I'm going to be in this land, I want to fight for this land to be as free as possible is the way I look at it. And I do think it could be done even in a place like New York City. I do think it could happen. Maybe just take somebody as naive as me to continue. 

Sterlin 
you on that road? I mean, I'm pretty open-minded and I'm sympathetic, and obviously you're taking a multi-pronged approach to these issues. So I consider you an ally and a friend in this, so like I said, I don't have a dog in the fight. I do believe that whatever approach that we think can benefit us, if it works, that's great. If it's worth trying, go for it.

There are a lot of really uncompromising ideologues, where I think that there's some modicum of compromise in the form of a strategy that you can use, as long as you don't get completely cut to the system, which happens to some people, but I think that's because their philosophy actually changes.

I think we can have strategies as long as it's aligned with the philosophy ultimately, and we don't cross a line, then it's fine. So, again, no, you won't hear any squirting or argumentation. 

Doug 
I wasn't and if I did I would have mine. I just want to write write write. Yeah, I just did your full take on it and Just continue to get that message out because I think it's an important one whether people disagree with me or not. Yeah 

Sterlin 
Keep pushing that idea. Same. What matters is that we're trying to do what we can to generate as much freedom for everyone as possible, and there's a lot of different avenues to achieve that. I would say, yeah, for me personally, something that would be beyond the pale of acceptable would just be to try to be a politician.

I think this was like the Adam Kokesh route where he's going to try to run for president and stuff. This is like the libertarian party in my opinion also got completely cut anyway. There's gradations of the different strategic approaches you can take for this, but yeah, I'm personally giving up on a political thing.

But I do respect other people's attempts to gain freedom as long as they don't end up compromising themselves in the process. That's all. 

Doug 
Like I think Roger Verra would love to see Monero listed on coinbase 100% here in New York. I think you'd be excited about that. I wouldn't think you'd be like, ah, you know, we lost no You know the cypherpunks to lose everything. Hell.

Yeah, you know, they coined you Rogers you knew more than anybody that the name of the game is get this in the hands of as many people as we can Yeah, I said like that's the name of the game like Johnny Appleseed get it out there Even if it even if this you know, even if you have to use their tools and they may you know track and trace But with something like Monero, it just takes away their ability It's like we're just taking cash out of their bank and disappearing into into the night.

That's right 

Sterlin 
That's about a little port thing. 

Doug 
Yeah. Any other topics you want to bring up, man? We're around an hour and 15, 500 live viewers right now. It's been a fantastic, fantastic evening. I think we've done a good job getting the word out about Roger. Obviously, I think a lot of people listening into this show have already heard about it, are already amped up about it, but let's continue to grow it.

Side the petition, I think me, myself, I may have even forgotten. So I think everybody's very busy and then also very lazy at the same time. We're clicking buttons all day, but the dopamine, you may not get the same dopamine hit from taking that action, but you will once you sign it. So it's worth a little bit of the effort that it takes. Type in your name, go ahead and sign that petition.

It is, what is it? Freerogernow.org. Sterling, anything you want to get out? 

Sterlin 
No, I just hope that everyone really understands on a fundamental level what this case means and if Roger does end up getting fully extradited, he doesn't get the case dismissed, he has to go to trial, goes down all the legal paths that ends up going to prison for the full extent that they want to put him in prison for, then we have to fully understand the repercussions for that for all of us, right?

Because what they're essentially saying is not only do we own you in the context of this country, if you try to leave and get out of here and you've been talking shit about us, right? Or you've been articulating ideas of freedom, then they'll try to come after you anywhere. This is one of the things that governments do anyway. They have what's called extraterritorial reach in the U.S.

where they'll go around the world trying to arrest people, right? And they'll have their vassal states or their puppet states extradite you back to the U.S. and it will only get worse, right? We talked about earlier, Doug. You give them an inch and they'll take a mile.

Any kind of new law or precedent that they set can potentially be onerous for all of us and for all of our ability to be as free and liberated as possible. So that's why we have to fight for Roger. We have to fight for Ross. We have to fight for Samurai. We have to fight for tornado cash because all this lawfare is just going to get worse and worse and it's going to be a continuous downward spiral.

But like we pointed out, I think there's more and more people who are coming to the cause. Some people are waking up as a result of this. They're seeing the depredations and the degradations of the government and they want to help and they want to do what they can. So having education and understanding and talking to people about this, even if it's your family at the dinner table, right?

Or at home and say, hey, listen, this is what's going on. Check out this website. Check out Matero Talk. Check out Aaron Day's work. Check out Derek's work and start digging into these problems so that you can arm yourself with the knowledge to help at least, at very least, educate people on what's happening so they can understand how serious this is.

You know, I think a lot of people just see the – you mentioned this earlier, Doug. They see the surface-level value of what's happening, right? Or they just see the surface-level incident, like, oh, it's a tax crime. Punish him, right? He didn't pay his, quote unquote, fair share. But things get a lot deeper. There's a lot of machinations.

There's a lot of state nastiness and there's a lot of vindictiveness. These guys harbored a certain people with certain mindsets. Even if we go back to Ross's case, when Judge Katherine Forrester sentenced him to – the double wife sentenced him to 40 years, she had a whole soapbox speech about how his ideas are dangerous, about how libertarianism is dangerous. 

Sterlin 
And we don't need these ideas to run amok in society and then people to enlist those ideas in their own cause for the development of similar kinds of plot. So she specifically and frankly illegally brought up his ideas as being wrong as part of the court case.

So that tells you how – you spoke to this, Doug, how terrified these folks are of seeing liberty prevail, of seeing cryptocurrency and cryptoeconomic tech prevail. They want to stop it at all costs. And really, this is all fueled and catalyzed from our philosophies, from our foundational and fundamental principles. So we have to remember to keep promoting these ideas. Don't be scared.

Don't let the chilling effect bog you down. Keep pushing forward at all costs. Talk to people about these ideas and then take action in whatever way that you can or whatever way that you deem feasible for where you're at in your own life. And it's different for everybody. It goes back into our discussion. Different people want to do different things, but there's plenty that we can do.

And it just starts as – it could be as simple as just talking to somebody about the ideas and helping people wake up. 

Doug 
Yeah, we got to normalize it, right? Normalize privacy, normalize digital cash. Cash used to be normal. They're trying to make it abnormal. You go and take cash out from the bank and you have to fill out a report if you take a certain amount. They're trying to make it abnormal, but cash should be considered a normal thing.

You should be able to freely use it as you wish without having to tell the government how you're using it. And once that goes away, we're going to need a replacement and digital cash should be considered completely normal and acceptable in society. Shorewave 2009, tip 25 cents. RitoSwap, formerly Haveno. Rito now has 24 trades per day. Yeah, Haveno is a great solution.

Like here I am talking about, obviously, don't need to get out of the discussion again. But yeah, the ideal way to obtain your Monero without KYC, without AML is using something like Haveno, which works. It's just a matter of us, more of us using it every day. XMR Bazaar, same theme. All the tools exist and they're really user friendly at this point, even the decentralized ones like Haveno.

It's not that bad. You download a piece of software and it's like you're using a decentralized version of local Monero. We got another tip over here, Lord Gains tip 25. By far, my favorite way to obtain Monero is through commerce, 100%. Also, my favorite way to sell Monero is through commerce, to actually spend it. It feels amazing. You earn Monero, nobody knows.

It's just between you and the person paying you. It costs a fraction of a cent to send and when you spend it, same thing. There is no better feeling. Then we have some guy here talking about how in Argentina, he uses Cuevas. I love Argentina for that aspect. I hope the Cuevas don't go away. Basically, for people who don't know what those are, it's like black market money exchangers.

He's saying that's how he gets his Monero. He turns his pesos into USDT and these Cuevas, which is amazing. I've been there, I've used them. Then he goes on a DEX and changes it into XMR. Beautiful to see. Unfortunately, we don't have that really going in New York. There's no Cuevas in New York. I don't know, maybe I got to get that going. Bring the Cuevas to New York. I don't know how long I'd last.

I don't think I'd last very long. Sterling, man, we'll leave it at that. Thank you so much. Greatly appreciate your time and everything you're doing. I'm sure I'll see you on the circuit. I'll see you at the next conference or Liberty Loving thing. If not, sooner than Porkfest. I'm pretty sure I'll see you at Porkfest. You think you'll be there this year? 

Sterlin 
Yeah, I think there's a pretty high chance so far on my road road map is Derek's we talked about Derek a bit a bit His the greater reset actually now the people's reset is yes end of January Right. So be in Mexico for that and then maybe gonna do a talk at the In Prospera like a for Vitalia at the Free City Summit. Yep.

Okay, I'm gonna do some traveling then after that Maybe start thinking about pork pest again. I love pork pests last year. That was after yeah 

Doug 
You were such a big part of the Monero tent too. I really appreciate that. As we were talking about last year, this year we wanna ramp it up.

Orkfest is the same time as MoneroCon this year, so I guess you're not going to MoneroCon, or you don't know yet, and I honestly, I got some family things going on here, good family things where I gotta stay close to home, so I'm leaning towards Orkfest, but I'm thinking we really ramp it up this year. I know Aaron Day is interested in collaborating with us and helping us make it a bigger thing.

Maybe like a Monerotopia at Orkfest, we could have some talks going on, some more than we had last year. I think it'd be cool if we stream the MoneroCon talks at Orkfest, right? We could have a nice green set up for people that wanna come watch some of the MoneroCon talks because they'll be able to see here from the devs, right?

They'll be able to hear from Luke Parker at Orkfest, just throwing it out there. I think that could be a pretty cool thing and some other things maybe we could do with making the privacy coin tent a larger thing at Orkfest this year. 

Sterlin 
Yeah, a million percent that sounds sounds amazing and I'm leaning also toward pork fest unless I have to be in Europe For some event or some other reason then that would be the only reason if I go to I love Monero Conde don't get me wrong. It's a really good time and I really like this pseudo crypto anarchy there as well Oh, yeah, basically that place is amazing 

Doug 
Yeah, so we'll talk more about that offline and yeah, man. Thank you. Thank you for everything. I'll close it out 

Sterlin 
here. Cool. Thanks a lot, Doug. Appreciate you having me on, man. This was a really good conversation. It's so important and critical. All right, buddy. Cheers. See you, brother. 

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