Rudy Havenstein - How the FED is Secretly Destroying America
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Hey, hey, welcome to the Bitcoin Matrix podcast. I'm your host, Cedric Youngleman. In today's episode with senior markets commentator Rudy Havenstein, we explore the economic challenges of our time from inflation and hyperinflation to the Federal Reserve's role in deepening division and corruption.

Rudy provides sharp insights on how the 2020 financial crisis amplified the failures of the great financial crisis of 2008 and discusses Bitcoin's potential to tackle systemic issues while addressing political polarization and offering a fresh perspective on finding common ground. So I hope you enjoy this rip.

The only thing I'm going to ask of you is if you can please go and subscribe to the RSS feed and subscribe to the YouTube channel. And if you do want to get in touch with me, it's Cedric at the Bitcoin Matrix dot com. And now let's enter the Bitcoin Matrix with former Reich Bank President Rudy Havnstein. What is real? How do you define real? You can't jump into cash. Cash is trash. What do you do? You get out.

Rudy Habenstein is an anonymous bank critic, an internet personality who argues the middle class was destroyed by Wall Street and the Federal Reserve, creating historic wealth inequality. Rudy is anti-war, anti-kleptocracy, and uncategorizable. Rudy Habenstein, welcome to the Bitcoin Matrix podcast, sir. How are you? Yeah, I'm doing good. Great to be here with you, Cedric. Thanks for inviting me. Yeah, I'm happy to get together and chat. I've been looking forward to this for a long time.

Maybe we could just kick it off with a little bit with like, how did you pick your internet persona? You know, the Reich and Reich Bank president 1908 to 1923. What does that mean? Well, my resume to you. Yeah, you know, I think at the time, I don't know what prompted me in April 2013 to come on, but yeah.

I think it was the reason I'd always had an interest in the period. Growing up in the 70s, very familiar with the way inflation impacts the middle class. And I think there was probably some stuff going on in 2013. You know, there's a ton of QE and all this other nonsense going on that probably said, you know what, I want to.

but use this name as I tell people, it was meant to be a warning, not encouragement. You know what I mean? Because inflation's bad. It's particularly bad for people who don't own any assets. It's very, very bad for about 90% of the population. And I don't want to see it get worse. And for 10, 15 years, we had every central banker in the world saying inflation's too low and we need more inflation.

You know, and I've got the receipts for all this stuff over the years because and I'm just what are you talking about? You know, there's a Wall Street Journal article from 2015 where John Hilson Rath, who was like the Nick Timuros of that day of that time,

wrote some article very similar to recent articles. Like, what are you guys complaining about? Inflation's only, you know, 1% or 0%. And they're out there. The comments from Wall Street Journal registered subscribers in 2015 when official CPI was 1% or less

were vicious at the Fed. What are you talking about? My tuition's gone up, my gas, my rent, my property tax, my mortgage, everything. I mean, these people are venting when inflation was 1%. So imagine what they feel like with inflation at pushing 3%. And it's over their two... First of all, the 2% is made up. It's like Kashkari pulling $700 out of his

you know, rear, uh, back in 08 and Paulson, they just, they just picked a number. And so 2% is their number. And, but that's not their statutory requirement. It's zero, it's a stable, stable prices, which is not what we've had. So anyway, I'm just, inflation really bugs me. And, and, and on CNBC, which I have on as white noise a lot, it had it on forever. Um,

There's a constant parade of billionaires and discredited economists, academic economists who come on and say, "Inflation is no big deal," or, "We should have a 4% target." And of course, this is all ... You get into the whole other issue of CPI is a joke. I mean, for 25 years, the CPI said that new and used car prices didn't go up at all because they introduced something called hedonic quality adjustments probably 30 plus years ago.

As Grant Williams says, every adjustment they've ever made to CPI is to make it lower. They've never made any adjustments that make it higher. I think they have a health insurance thing they did in a recent year or two where

Where they said that health insurance, which is my single biggest expense, is actually down like 34% or something. It's absurd. I mean, a guy on Twitter named Charlie, I think it's Bill Lello, thank God bless him, he keeps pointing this out. How absurd the CPI calculation is. If you've ever looked at it, as I have, it's absurd. They have strange weightings. They have substitution. But the worst thing overall is the hedonic...

quality adjustments, which looks good to a math PhD at the BLS, but it makes zero sense to somebody in the supermarket line. And anyway, you know, so this is one of my typical rants I go off on, but I picked Rudy Havenstein as a warning, not as encouragement, but it looks like for a lot of people, it's almost what they're shooting for. Now there's a,

hyperinflation is the worst possible outcome for most people. There's very few financial hyenas. I mean, I'm sure Ken Griffin would do very well in a hyperinflation, but it's very bad for most people. But there's a huge difference between high inflation and hyperinflation, two different things. Hyperinflation is a currency collapse, and I hope we never get to that. But if we keep going exponential, the reserve currency forgives a lot of sins, but

You know, maybe, and I remember books from the 70s about the death of the dollar. So this, but it's, what's the Stein's law? If something cannot go on forever, it will stop. So I don't know if it's in five years or 50 years, but it will stop. And then hyperinflation in the United States would be the greatest disaster in, one of the greatest disasters in history, I think, because it would just destroy the society. As every single contemporary account of Nazi Germany that I've read, and I've read dozens,

shows that there's an absolute 100% link between, there's a direct line between the hyperinflation and the demoralization of the German people and the rise of Hitler. You know, his push was in 1923 at the peak of the hyperinflation. Now, there was a depression in the 30s, and that certainly didn't help things. But the morality of the German people, the absurdity of life that the hyperinflation showed them,

Led them to take a chance on this guy that ended up responsible for the death of tens and tens of millions of people. So, you know, these things start small. I'm trying to like I just want to educate people. You know, I for for 30 years, I've been sending emails and stuff out to friends of news articles and things because I was shocked by how many of my friends very successful people.

educated, you know, hardworking businessmen or whatever, they had no idea what's going on with the Fed. They couldn't name the Fed president back then. They had no idea about how inflation... They just don't know. And your average person has no idea how the Fed's involved. As I... Sometimes people say, what about Congress? And I go, yeah, I pick mostly on the Fed because most people have no idea what the Fed is or does.

And they don't know its role in the kleptocracy, which is huge. As Kevin Warsh just pointed out in an interview a couple weeks ago, you know, the Fed is the one who said to Congress, spend whatever you want to spend because we're going to have zero rates and we're going to buy your bonds up.

So, you know, Warsh is a Fed insider, but he's basically been saying what I've been saying for years. The Fed is like Congress's drug dealer. It enables their profligacy. Ultimately, the problem is with Congress. But there's tons of people that go after Congress. So I try to educate and amuse, you know, both myself and the people that follow me. And so that's why...

i try to throw in a lot of humor um but the fed is bad for most americans and i try and i just point that out and i think i've made a little bit of a difference i think there's a lot more people who see the scam now than did uh 11 years ago so anyway that's sorry to just go that was awesome i'm passionate about this so yeah that's great and so i mean in 2013

I mean, were you just as passionate about these things? Maybe were you in a place in your life where you felt maybe more stable? I'm trying to figure out where you were in your life where you not just turned to Twitter, but turned to Twitter to educate and amuse and kind of had maybe it would seem like some vision of growing this account. I had no vision. Not the vision of growing the account, but like of getting a voice out of putting out some signal. It was an outlet.

for me. It was like, I call it my art blog, you know, because, and I always tried to say, you know, I'm going to back, you know, I'm not going to just say, oh, the Fed sucks, you know, because, you know, I see that that's pointless. I will say, this is why the Fed sucks and have a link and discuss how it affects, you know, normal people or do click, you know, I always have links, you know, I always back the stuff up. I don't just pop off, you know, and I've had Neil Kashkari and

And other people like that come at me and they run away after a while because I can back up what I'm saying. Now, they may disagree with my we may both look at the same thing and view it differently. But, you know, I'm not just making stuff up as I tell people I have the receipts. So, you know, I've gone up against some of FinTwit's biggest, you know, Fed cheerleaders. And they don't really bother me anymore now, you know, now that I after 11 years. But when I had 50 followers, yeah, sure. Some of these big guys would come after me.

I like, like I said, I've always written, you know, mostly for friends, emails and stuff, you know. And so this was just another creative outlet. And then, frankly, you know, I started with zero followers like everybody else. I am amazed the number of people that I was able to interact with.

I realized early on through Twitter that Ike would never meet in a million years. You know what I mean? I mean, I, the list of people who follow me is a financial is like a wall street. Who's who of, of top, you know, the guys that everyone interviews all the time and they're all, you know, um, they're not a CNBC guest generally, but, but they're, um,

These are top, you know, these are very successful, you know, multi-gazillionaire hedge fund guys, a lot of them and Wall Street guys and scientists and other people too, you know, economists. You know, there are some PhD economists who follow me because they're what you call what heterodox. They don't buy the Neil Keensian party line. And, you know, I'm always bashing PhD economists, but then I always have to say, no, not you, not you. You know, you guys are okay, you know, so.

I'm just picking on the Janet Yellen and the Ben Bernanke school of thought. Although Powell, who is not an economist, he went completely insane. He almost put Bernanke to shame in 2020, saving his hedge fund buddies and private equity buddies, just like Bernanke did. But yeah, no, I just... What was going on with my life? I don't know. I just...

I just read a lot and I always, this stuff's always bouncing around in my head. And I thought, oh, I can just type. It's like a little post-it note, you know? And I use my, my account, both my sub stack and my, and my old emails and the Twitter as a resource. I am always searching my old stuff because I'll be like, someone will talk about, you know, Tim Geithner or something. And, and I'll go, oh my God. Yeah. I remember when, what was that? And I'll have to search for keywords and I'll find something I wrote. You know, I have emails going back, you know,

30 years almost. And so I'll find some reference there and people are like, wow, how'd you, you know, how'd you remember that? I go, you just got to remember keywords, what to search for. As far as the account, it's just, you know, it, it, it's, I didn't, I never cared about building up, you know, that's so big now on Twitter. It's like, Oh, build up a bunch of followers and get paid by Elon and stuff, which I don't, I don't, I do not get paid by Elon. You know, for me, it was like, I'm just going to do what I do. If you can't please everyone, then you got to please yourself. And sometimes I post that song. Cause I,

You know, and so that's what I do. And of course, you know, as I joke, you know, I post stuff that I wish other people would post, you know, stuff that I want to read, you know, and, and it's sometimes it's very, you know, obscure references I make or something like that. That's, that's for my benefit. If anybody else gets it, that's great too, you know, and I think some people appreciate that and some don't, but yeah, it's, it's just been, it's been great. Some of the people I've met that I never would have been in their orbit and I can, you know, I can email them.

All sorts of people, you know, some of whom you've interviewed and, you know, that I never would have been able to reach. And it's like six degrees of separation, too, or two degrees of separation. Like if I ever wanted to get a hold of, I don't know, you know, some famous guy, I'd probably just say, hey, Dave, call him. You know, Dave, call him. You interviewed Dave, call him.

Hey, Dave, can you hook me up with this guy or send him my message or something? I mean, so I'm like, I could probably get a message to Trump in like three tweets or three guys or two or three guys. So that's kind of cool. I don't abuse that. And I almost never do anything like that. But I'm humbled by the intelligence and the experience and wisdom of my followers too. And I learned a lot from them and I appreciate it. And

Thank you guys, all of you for putting up with me. Likewise, sentiment and the generosity of followers and colleagues or peers on the internet, sort of internet friends. What's interesting there, I mean, I remember going through 2008, even growing up,

As someone who really was into finance and economics and trying to figure that stuff out, I always wondered what it would be like to be a Geithner or Bernanke and the ability to have all that power and to make the decisions and

You know, they're always framed as geniuses so that that would always look good, you know. And then I remember growing up and being like, these guys are crooks. Yeah, this is this criminal. They're just helping their friends like, yeah, like who wouldn't do that and get get to be called smart and make a lot of money along the way doing it.

Absolutely. But from 2013 to now, 2024, 11 years later, in terms of hyperinflation, maybe how much were you even considering hyperinflation? What probability would you put on hyperinflation in America in 2013? And maybe what probability would you put it at now? Well, I made it very clear.

that I was in 2013 and around that time that I was not predicting hyperinflation as a number of people were around QE. I just, as the way I put it is- But I mean, in the long future, like, you know- Well, it's going to, in the long future, it's inevitable. It's inevitable. I mean, unless you get some sort of major reform, but I mean, inevitable, you know, these guys are super good at kicking the can down the road. So-

Like I said, it could be 50 years. It's been 50 years, death of the dollar. Here's the thing. The reserve currency status of the United States is an incredibly huge advantage. I mean, as I joke with people, I still accept dollars. I mean, everyone's like, the dollar's trash. I go, yeah, I know. I got a book from 1979 that says the dollar's going to zero. So no, I don't buy that. I do not foresee hyperinflation in the US in my lifetime.

I hope to God my long lifetime. But I think it's definitely a possibility and we shouldn't discount that and just say, oh, well, we're the US, we're different. It can never happen here. Because, you know, the Germans back in the 20s, they were a big power. Well, you know, they screwed up in World War I, but they were a big, powerful nation. And a lot of people were holding German marks.

International investors were holding massive amounts of German marks right up until 22, 23, when the whole thing went went to hell. You know, so we just got to be careful. We're not any smart. Bernanke, you know, Powell is not any smarter than the guys at the Reichsbank back in 1920s. These guys were all all very smart, you know, and.

It's the hubris and the numbers are so much bigger now. I mean, it's ridiculous. But and as to your question, I'm not predicting hyperinflation in the United States now. Could it happen in other countries first? I would certainly expect it would happen in other countries before it happened to the United States. So there you go. Yeah, it is. I think long run, it is a concern, a real concern. But in the long run, we're all dead as a

zero has your Keynes or somebody said so. In terms of maybe the great financial crisis, and, you know, I looked at maybe 2020 is a very similar event, at least from the capital markets perspective and credit and liquidity. My gut at the time was like, this is probably, you know, a similar moment, meaning that they can kick the can for another maybe 8, 10, 12 years after this. Sure. What do you think? Like, where do you think we are now? Like, well,

You know, okay, the two main things for me, like Ben Hunt one time asked, you know, when did you get radicalized? Hey, Bitcoiners, invest in Bitcoin with confidence. Why do I recommend River? River is the best place to build your Bitcoin wealth, and they offer zero fee on recurring buys.

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And for me, it really was the Iraq war, watching how Hurricane Katrina was handled, and 2008. And those things combined to make me think that, you know, the last thing on the minds of our leaders was America first to steal a...

I think Reagan used it before Trump, but you know, and that bugged me. And I view, I call, I've called years ago, I called the 2008, you know, thing a coup. It was a bankster coup is what I call it. And I get almost no pushback on that because people kind of go, yeah, I guess that's what it was. I mean, they shoveled 700. I mean, like I said, there's a, there's an, an Andrew Ross Sorkin who is a, you know, wall street cheerleader, but his book too big to fail is,

Um, it's a bad book because it paints the arsonists as, uh, you know, fire marshals, but, um, there is a line in there where like Kashkari and Paulson are talking about how much money should TARP be?

And they, what about a trillion dollars? And then they said, no, we'll get killed. We can't do a trillion. And then I don't know if it was Neil. I'd have to look at the quote again. Said, well, what about 700 billion? And they go, okay. I mean, they literally, and then there's a line that Sorkin wrote that said, even Kaskari laughed at the absurdity of it all. It was a political calculation, not even anything related to, how much could we grab and get away with? TARP failed on the first vote in,

And it was like a three page bill, including a Section 8, which if you look up Section 8 of the original TARP bill said that this bill is not reviewable by any agency or court of law. In other words, it was it was like giving Pfizer a shot.

immunity. It was like, you cannot question this bill. So the bill failed, rightly so, because my understanding is, from my memory at the time, the congressman saying their calls were 300 to one against the bill, okay? Because America was mad. America was mad. And a lot of them getting foreclosed on things like that. And these guys are going to just give these guys $700 billion. So then they added, I forget how much it was. It was like over 400 pages of pork

I think tax exemptions for arrow shafts made in, you know, certain states and stuff. I mean, I, again, I have all, you know, over the years, I've got all this stuff out there. And it passed.

And then, you know, because Bush, if you remember, gave a speech saying, well, if you, if this doesn't pass, then, you know, your banks are going to close and you're going to lose your job and your stock market's going to fall. Well, every single thing Bush warned about happened anyway after the TARP bill passed. But Wall Street bonuses were saved. They paid. Okay. So TARP money is fungible. Mm-hmm.

So TARP, the only reason that passed the second time, besides the 400 and something pages of pork, was because they promised that that TARP money was going to be used to help homeowners. Right.

And what happened is immediately after the passage, they just, you know, Sheila bear wrote, wrote about it in one of her books, you know, it was bait and switch. They started using it to save the banks, not the, you know, and this is Geithner was very clear on that. They're not, it's not about helping homeowners. It was about helping, helping the banks deal with these foreclosed houses. So the, I have it out there, the, the amounts, um, uh, the bonuses that were given out, um,

from that tart money because tart money is fungible you know it was 700 billion dollars no strings um so like you know there's there's a andrew cuomo uh probably one of the few things he did good was um uh is he did a he did some sort of report on it where he actually got a list of all the bonuses they've filed and you know um you know for example uh

For example, like I got posts on all this, but for Morgan Stanley, which was just days away from collapse. Okay. That's a quote from, I think it was Paulson. It paid out 4.475 billion in bonuses, including 718 bonuses over a million dollars. This is the same year they got TARP money. It's just beyond. So, I mean, people were ticked. So the TARP was a scam.

But by the terms of 2020, to get kind of back to answering your question, it was peanuts because the numbers just got so much bigger. I mean, here's some example, like Citigroup, which should not exist really. It's a completely corrupt, failed institution over the years. They lost $27 billion in 2008, and they gave out $5.3 billion in bonuses. Merrill Lynch lost $27 billion also in losses in 2008, and they gave out $3.6 billion in bonuses.

uh uh wells fargo 42.9 billion in losses and gave out a million dollars in uh or a billion in bonuses you know i mean it's i got it's again all this is out there but so people thought that was a scam and then in 2020 it was like 2008 on steroids

They were doing these loans to corporations that were set up a week before in the Cayman Islands. The Fed was loaning money to everybody, everybody who's Wall Street connected at, you know, sub 1 percent interest rates. They were they were just pouring money over Wall Street. And, you know.

You know, Ben Bernanke at Citadel was on the phone. Janet Yellen at the time was working for Magellan Financial. You know, they went and testified before Congress on the need to buy corporate debt. OK, they were not representing the American people. They were representing Citadel and PIMCO and Magellan. And nobody ever points that out. That's another thing just to go off on this.

Anyway, is our abysmal media. Financial media is abysmal. All of the Fed reporters are basically at best. They don't make any waves because if they make any waves, they're never going to be invited by Michelle Smith, Powell's chief of staff. Look, look her up. They're never going to be invited back to the press conferences. Now, I don't know who picks like the White House press conference people, but maybe but you do on occasion hear hostile questions.

You never hear a hostile question from the Fed people. People like to point out one time a guy who I'm not going to name his name years ago asked a very mild question of Yellen and he was never invited back again. Very mild. And he loves the Fed.

So there is no questioning. I'm like, hey, have Jim Grant go to this one of these meetings. Have Edward Chancellor go to ask questions at a press conference. Why don't we have Matt Stoller go? There's a bunch of great Fed critics from the left and the right who would ask. I mean, I could come up with some very good questions myself, but it's never going to happen. And the Fed is so powerful in this country that the fact that

We have no media, no mainstream media ever holding it accountable. That's, that's a disgrace. And it's been that way my entire life. Um, so I, you know, that's why I try and be, I mean, that's what I say. I've got, I point out things that no one else in the media points out. There are some, you know, alternative guys that are doing the same, you know, uh, doing God's work, you know, trying to point these things out too. And, and, and good for them. Um,

But for the most part, we don't have any critical financial coverage of the Fed. Getting back to 2020, there's a tweet I made in March 2020 that said, that sound you hear right now is the Gini ratio going up, which means inequality. And I was saying, this is like 2008 on steroids, guys. And it turned out that's exactly what it was.

Definitely from a numbers perspective. I mean, the numbers get exponential. If 2020 wasn't them kicking the can down the road, I mean, even if it was, the next bailout is going to be like $7 trillion. The only difference with 2020 was somehow they obscured how direct it was to the recipients. I mean, except for maybe PPP, but maybe that bled a little lower than TARP. One of the most infuriating ironies of...

that era of the 2008 great financial crisis and things like the tarp was the whole notion of these bankers who obviously mismanaged, you know, risk at, you know, such a, you know, tremendous scale, whether it was, you know, they, they were putting the pedal to the metal because they knew it was a bell or not, like however you want to call it, even if it was nefarious, terrible, you know, if it was negligent, terrible, uh,

if it was naive, terrible. Right. And, and yet they would consider the only people who could rescue the system and manage the risk going forward. Yeah. Yeah. You said it before, right. The arsonists is fire marshals. And, uh, that was just sort of infuriating. Um, but you know, at the, but at the same time from maybe, uh, you know, we were both what, uh, 14, 20, uh,

14 years younger. No, not 14 years. 16 years younger. And for myself, I mean, a much different perspective of like, I was almost like, put teachers in time. You know, not, I wasn't, you know, today I wouldn't be like, let's put non-qualified people in charge. But back then it almost felt like anyone could do this. Like, but the, you know, we just get anyone in there but the arsonists. It's the same crowd. But, you know, there was no occupied Wall Street this time.

No, no. I mean, that guy shut down pretty quick. What did you make of that movement? Well, I think it's like Barry Sanders over the years. I mean, him and he was the only one ever besides Ron Paul who'd questioned the Fed. But

but those guys i think they were good at identifying the problem but the solution was usually kind of eluded them you know and of course bernie folded and is completely a wall now and ron paul's like pushing 90. so we need um we need someone else in congress because nobody in congress goes after these guys either um it's i i actually put on the c-span hearing sometimes when powell is before the congress or back when yellen was in front of congress and these guys are they're in awe of the fed the fed

you know, thank you so much for being here. Thank you for all that you do. I mean, it's almost like they don't realize that the Fed is an agency Congress created and can put on a leash or end at any time. But again, they're not going to do that because the Fed gives them the free money. And that's how they can have, you know, $36 billion, you know, debt and stuff. So they'll buy it. I mean, you were definitely kind of, you know, kind of calling out maybe,

both Trump and Sanders as more symptoms, you know, of what was happening. Oh yeah. Yeah. And, and do you think, I mean, I'm going to ask this kind of individually, I guess one off. Do you think Bernie Sanders is authentic? No, I think, you know, I almost, I almost, I almost thought about voting for Sanders in 2016, which if you know me is like, you know, that's, that's a pretty, that's a pretty big step because, you know,

Would that be a pretty big step from which direction? Well, I grew up pretty conservative. So for me, you know, I did vote for Obama in 08. That's not conservative.

no but i believed i believed his speeches and then i found out they didn't mean the transition well i was so angry on that he was a great orator and i oh yeah yeah but his speeches didn't mean anything and then he he ended up being the bankster's best friend eric holder was i mean you know wall street lawyer um no i was so like bush 2.0 the way yeah all the banking programs exactly exactly it was like and the drones and the war yeah and

I was so angry in 08 at the Bush administration and George Bush. And, you know, that's all those neocons and stuff. Like I said, Iraq war was a big thing. And then watching...

because i work at home i watched the uh the katrina i mentioned katrina disaster i think i was 05 and how uh you're literally watching a week later people on roofs you know 80 year old people you know on roofs with no water and then you've got michael churdoff or these other guys in dc oh everything's great we got it under control you know and that really ticked me off because i thought you know what this is america

this is not haiti this is america and now a little bit more common of an event for america now like i feel like we have three katrinas a year now with like what happened in north carolina and you hear the horror stories from there we're sending aid to ukraine we're sending aid to israel we're sending now we're sending aid to syria we're so but we're not i mean i guess we're sending some aid to north carolina you could ask somebody like melody right she's much much more on the ground there that's

But you're right. Wherever we send aid, though, there's so much. I think that's a get, a grift. Absolutely. 98% of it doesn't go where it's even supposed to go, even if that's what you wanted it to go. Well, Ron Paul is saying something like foreign aid is a way to take money from poor people in rich countries and give it to rich people in poor countries. And that's what it is. It's money laundering and everything else.

So then, you know, coming out of, you know, we don't have a second Occupy Wall Street, which was kind of surprising then. And I don't know if we'd get one if there was another cataclysmic sort of systemic failure in the capital markets. But, you know, then are you sort of an end the Fed person or like what is the answer or solution to sort of reigning these boom and busts in?

occupy wall street in 08 it seemed although you did have the rick santelli's and people like that uh you know sort of whipping people up um that was more of a left-wing movement i think just because instinctively left-wing um is suspicious of banks as they should be um i think nothing's going to change until you know the middle class what's left of it uh you know um the uh

the salt of the earth people in the US stand up and tell their congressman you know this ain't gonna fly but but I don't even know if that works anymore because you know like I said in 08 the calls were supposedly 301 against tarp and they passed it anyway but um I I don't know what the end is yeah I have a whole meme thing with the and the Fed you know I I just put different pictures with the text and the Fed on it it's kind of like I said it's my it's kind of an artistic uh outlet for me um

You know, Thomas Sowell has a great answer to that question. What would you do without the Fed? And he's like, well, what do you do when you cut cancer out? And I think it's indisputable that the Federal Reserve has been a major factor in rising wealth inequality in the United States, which I believe is a major factor in the division that we have in the United States and a major factor in the corruption we have in the United States because we have a group of people now who are so wealthy beyond...

you know, anyone's wildest dreams. I mean, isn't Elon worth like 300 billion now or something? That they could buy, it doesn't matter if 10,000 or 100,000 Joe six-packs call Congress and ask for something because the congressmen know they can get more money from the billionaires, you know? And I warn people, you know, I'm a big fan of Whitney Webb and she does great work on some of the people surrounding Trump

um you know uh keep an eye on them because as i pointed out i don't think that your liberty is necessarily their their priority i think uh i i'm very leery of of some of the people around uh these so-called you know quote libertarian billionaire movement um so just just just be well yeah i mean i would just be leery of any way they frame themselves because i don't know how much that is just pr and

you know sort of uh well these guys are all tied into the at that level they're all tied into the national security state i would i would agree and so i think i think both

Parties are just sort of a pendulum swing to keep us attacking each other. Absolutely. And I think not only does it rile people up swinging that pendulum just back and forth on these social issues, but also they can get different grift from each side. So I really think if there was no way they were going to sell, I think, lockdowns and the vaccine rollout under sort of a left-wing admin approach,

And, you know, they and they use a right wing regime to, you know, sort of lower taxes on the wealthy in ways that maybe aren't the best way to lower taxes. I'm not saying I want high taxes. Right. But I think it's grift on both sides. And so like the pendulum swings to the left and then the right is angry. And then they could do things that only the left could get away with. And they swing it back and then they have the right. And I think right now it's possible that they're swinging back right to left.

shove more surveillance down our throat as a way of you know sort of national defense but you know yeah i mean um i got the same concerns i think we should have concerns no matter what though i think we should always be these people should work for us that's more to the point uh on that and i don't think to what you said they're they're not serving us in the way that you would think if they were working for us right well we'll see i'm hopeful i mean i've just learned over the years to um

to expect to be disappointed. And, but I'm rooting for the United States. I want us all to succeed, not just the billionaires. And I want, you know, and I care more about some poor guy I don't know in Ohio than I do about anybody in Israel or Ukraine or,

or syria frankly i mean i don't know now maybe that's not politically correct to say but i mean it doesn't mean i don't care about people around the world i get what you're saying you know what i'm saying and it seems like so many times in the last especially in this last administration we're just hit with hey i mean literally they almost go out of their way to say hey i think there's congressmen there's some videos of them saying hey our top priority is israel our top priority is ukraine and then

And that flags in our chambers that weren't, you know, it bugs me. Yeah, that bugs me. And, uh, you know, just as, uh, someone flying a Trump flag above the American flag bugs me too, you know? And, uh, and one thing I got, I, I think this is one of the reasons that I, I have, um, a decent number of left wing and right wing followers is that I, I gave up on the, um,

The D the D versus R nonsense years ago. I think it's a dead end. I mean, we had Bush. He was a Republican. He was awful. And, uh, we had Obama who was a Democrat. He was awful. Um,

We had a first administration of Trump. Now, Trump, remember, the candidate in 2016, and I have a bunch of posts on this from that time, was very different than the president in 2016 or in 2017. I mean, he was bashing the wars. He was bashing the Saudis. He was bashing Marco Rubio for taking Goldman Sachs money. And then he goes in and he appoints

You know, Gary Cohn and Steve Mnuchin and half of Goldman Sachs are in his administration. His first trip is to Saudi Arabia. They were like cartoonishly evil. Yeah, cartoonishly evil. And then he's there with, remember that, with that Saudi sphere and everything else. Now, these are the guys that he said did 9-11. I mean, Trump's on the record as saying they did 9-11. And there he is. That's his first visit. And he's very chummy with them. And I just read today that there's going to be, the next Trump Tower is going to be in Saudi Arabia. So the Trump, the president was not Trump.

um now now am I am I sorry that uh that Hillary lost hell no and I hell no I'm not and I said that at the time but

and he doesn't mean you have to be a fan of the other ones like i mean it's just it's like choosing i tell people it's choosing between ebola and rabies you know i think ebola is survivable but rabies you die so it's it's two horrible choices you know um like you know biden was i couldn't believe they picked biden i mean it was like bernie was actually you know in a fair election

I think he would have won in 20, in 2020, but they had to stop him at all costs because he's a threat to the DNC and all they care about. They don't care about winning. They just care about preserving their status at the DNC as, as just as James Garville. But, uh, uh,

uh uh you know uh Bernie um they all all in one day and I have a I put together a montage of all the headlines where in one day you had basically every every congressman every every Democratic you know leader in the country endorsed Joe Biden

You know, he was kind of like the any anybody but Bernie candidate. So so they so they got Biden. And I said at the time, I go, this is going to be really good for humor value. But you guys haven't learned anything since 2016. I mean, there was zero introspection in 2016. Remember, it was all Russia, Russia, Russia. And Hillary Clinton actually talked about election denying. She's actually said they'd said for the next four years that the election was stolen.

Then it was by the Russians. So then Trump gets in and, and you have people complain, you know, and, and you hear the other complaints later. Oh, you know, when Trump in 2020 was denying the, the results of the election and people were, the other side's complaining, he's denying the results of the election. Well, I'm like, I,

you know, I don't think you should do that, but you know what? Hillary Clinton did the exact, you guys spent four years saying Trump was an illegitimate president, not my president. All that nonsense. Now you never, you know, I mean, Joe Biden was my president, you know, do I like him? No. Now Trump, I'm extreme. You know, I say, I tell people, look, I can be very happy that Kamala Harris lost, which I am.

And still be very, very suspicious of Donald Trump. Right. And and especially the people around him, because frankly, he surrounds himself with very bad people over the years. OK, so I know I got a lot of followers that are and I got a lot of friends that are hardcore followers.

Trump, you know, 100% supporters. I mean, almost to a religious fervor. And then I've got other friends and other followers who hate Trump. And I can understand. I mean, you know, I wouldn't let him babysit my kids, you know. I mean, I don't... But that's the choices we have. Do you want Ebola or do you want rabies? So...

I hope Trump comes again in 2016. Some of the things he said were like, wow, he's bashing Wall Street. He's bashing the wars. Let's see him come. I want, you know, I hope I remain optimistic. I hope for the best. I hope. Do you see Trump as an outsider who.

Yeah. You do? I think he hijacked the Republican Party, especially last time. Well, he definitely, I think he hijacked the Republican. I mean, he was a lifelong Democrat from New York City. Right. So I don't think, I mean. Real estate developer. And I don't hold that against anybody. I'm not for or against the parties anymore. I mean. No. I mean, I know how I grew up. I grew, you know, but like I've, however I grew up, I've evolved past parties, I feel like. Me too. At a national level and, or really at any level.

And I want to be issues based, but I also don't think anyone in Washington, D.C. should have a lot to do in my life. I mean, I really think she should really just deal with the borders, you know, and property law, you know, property rights and.

let everything else be but um unfortunately they are such a role in our life but i don't know if i see trump as a true outsider i mean one is a former president so at this point i don't see him as you know yeah about it but even before i mean you could look at his history i mean he was going to russia in the 1980s and making very political statements about becoming president

And, you know, his background with Roy Cohn, which is very interesting. Yeah. And the whole New York City real estate market is very interesting and what it takes to succeed in that market. Right. Which could show, you know, but then also I think, you know, at best you could say maybe he's a great businessman, you know, through licensing. But, you know, he's obviously a great actor. You know, most of his fame and wealth in the modern era comes from being on a reality television program.

which, you know, is, is, is just strange. And just all, you look at a few countries around the world, like Zelensky was a former, I think comedian, comedian, Reagan was a, you know, an actor, you know? So I just, I don't know what to make of these people, but at the same time, so it's like, I, for me, it's really almost like unfathomable that someone from completely outside the system could break their way into the system twice, like without the blessing of, of,

the system um and then something else so i asked you in terms of like when you met we were talking about the fed before and like how you could look at it like a cancer but you know you know as an american and without getting maybe too tribal or nationalistic like you you know you want america to do well we live here we want to participate in the economy you know and you have like on one hand at the end the fed it's a cancer and i i kind of really see that like life would just be better without the fed

And without people controlling the price of money, you know, but, you know, I just spoke with Tom Luongo and that episode is going to drop soon. But, you know, he's a little bit more of the mindset of like that's like putting down our sword against the other central banks, you know, and maybe we can fight the Fed later. But right now, like, let's defeat our enemies in terms of central banking wars, you know.

As I've said before, I'm not delusional. I don't expect the Fed to be ended in my lifetime. Okay. So because there's, you know, the powers that be do not support that because they benefit largely. But what we can do is put the Fed on a leash. We can look what they did in mortgage-backed securities. They had zero. They own none in 2008. Then over the next, you know, until recently, they purchased 2.7. They just bought. Now they still have about

I think 2.3 trillion, trillion dollars of mortgage-backed securities. And then you, and then, and chart that up against the house price rises. Um, they went nuts in 2020. They were buying 500, um, billion in MBS in like a two month period. I mean, they, you know, the QT pales in comparison to the, to the, um, pace of, of QE. Uh, they weren't in that market before then. And then we wonder why our housing market got permanently screwed up. And with Zerp and the QE, um,

The monetization of the MBS, you know, we had, and with Geithner in 2010 to 2012, selling off huge blocks of foreclosed houses to, you know, Blackstone and all these other hedge funds. We had a massive transformation, a massive financialization of the housing market in this country. And that's on the Fed. I mean, Zerp and their MBS buying, I'll just forgive their treasury buying for the moment, that was inexcusable. And I think illegal, but-

As I pointed out before, even if the Fed did illegal things, Congress would simply immediately pass a law saying whatever illegal they did was legal. So I think we should end stuff like that and Congress could do that. No more MBS buying.

And, you know, you could throw out the FOMC and use the two-year yield. I think Tom McClellan, I believe it was him, who's charted over the years that the two-year yield leads the Fed funds rate. So, you know, yeah, sure. Do we need people in there? I mean, they were supposed to be a lender of last resort.

For good collateral at a, you know, at a high interest, at a high, you know, not an easy interest rate. Okay. And that's the, that's ridiculous. They don't, they've got, they went insane under, it started under Greenspan, but Bernanke, you know, he comes in, he's got all these wacky Neokinzian ideas and Yellen was just more of the same.

Um, that has to change. Fed has to put them on a leash and have them stop doing their, their goofy stuff that they're doing. Climate change. You know, what, what, what the, what the hell is that? You know, DEI, all this other stuff that the Fed does, you know, you got Janet Yellen raising a pride flag and, you know, tweeting it out. God bless her. But, you know, Americans are sick of seeing that. Like I said, I'm sick of seeing that. I'm sick of seeing, uh, other people, other countries flags on, you know, US congressman's, you know, bios and stuff, you know, um, um,

This is America. And I feel we have big parts of America. We have, we have, we have parts of America that are killing it. They're doing great. They're there. And there's parts of, you know, California and New York where there's guys,

They're making more money. Like in all the history of the world, no one's ever made this kind of money. And then I think you have a huge chunk of America where people are hand to mouth. I mean, like half at least where people are struggling and inflation is a huge problem for them. And the Fed is not helping them. The Fed, in fact, doesn't care about them at all. And that bugs me. And I think before we go and give aid to Syria,

Go to downtown L.A. and, you know, miles of homeless encampments and stuff. I don't know what the solution is to that, but you got people, you know, shooting up on the sidewalk and you got San Francisco's open sewer. And, you know, all over America, there's little cities like that and stuff. And maybe it's bad. You know, a lot of it is bad local politicians, you know, and maybe that's just the locals fault. I agree. But.

We've got a lot of stuff we could do in America, a lot of infrastructure, a lot of crumbling bridges. I mean, let's fix America before we go build some bridge in Syria that they're going to blow up the minute we leave. You know, we look the other way. Just don't get me started on our foreign policy. It's been terrific my entire lifetime. Yeah, I agree. And I do want to stay on the domestic stuff, especially the middle class. Like, where is the middle class right now? Well, for years, I...

There's a chart that the Fed would put out of, you know, wealth held by the top 1% and then the next 9% and then the next 40% and then the bottom 50%. And so the chart of the top 1% went lower left to upper right. It looks like a NASDAQ chart. You know what I mean? It just went to the moon. The chart of the middle class literally was the opposite. It was upper left to lower right. It looked like a severe bear market.

And then even the top 9%, below the 1%, that it was trending down. And then the bottom 50%, which only had, you know, a half a percent to 2% of the wealth, that just kind of was flatlined, you know, would bounce around a little bit. So the reason I posted that was just to point out how literally the Cantillon effect is working as a result of Fed policies, Zerp and QE, and that the rich are getting richer.

So I think it was last year, 23, and I have this documented.

They suddenly revised these numbers that I've been posting for years, the data series. They revised all their data and like to chop 10 or 15% off the top 1% and like spread it out, you know, in the other groups. You know, they do the same thing with the CPI. When they don't like the data, they monkey with how they calculate it. So, you know, their explanation was, well, we did a revision of our, you know, methodology or something. But basically, CPI,

somebody at the BLS, I like to think somebody at the BLS or the Fed said, yeah, you know, these charts look so bad for us. Can we just monkey with the data so it looks better? You know, and that's what they do. I mean, you know, there's, there's, I've, anyone asked me, I can send you some posts on how they calculated CPI. It's, it's a joke. It's something that no person in a supermarket would think had any relation to the way that they live their life or the way that they

pay out of their wallet, you know, and yet it's accepted. Everybody on CNNBC accepts what they say today, 2.7% year over year. Oh, okay, 2.7%. It's repeated like it's gospel. I mean, I'm surprised they don't take it out to four decimal places, but it's just taken as gospel. There's no questioning of the narrative other than a few cranks like me. And that bugs me. And it's not in the national media. It's no better now than it was, you know, 10, 11 years ago. I will say on Twitter, though,

I think there's been a huge, and in daily life, a huge jump. Now, it's probably still a fraction of the population, but a huge jump in the number of people

that understand what's going on. I had an anecdote I posted where I was in the supermarket and I give the teller a $50 bill and the teller says to the box boy, what's the deal with these 50s and 100s lately? And I said, oh, it's inflation. I said, the 50 is the new 10 or the new 20 or whatever.

And the guy goes, "Yeah." And the checker goes, "Yeah, it's the Federal Reserve's causing all this." And I was like, I started laughing. I go, "Literally, like I say to you, don't get me started."

So as I'm leaving, the guy behind me in line goes, yes, the Federal Reserve is causing all this. So, I mean, I was like, wow, is this like, you know, a candy camera or something? But yeah, it was it was funny. I think people get it. And that's some progress. Now, if we could get that message to Congress, you know, that would be nice. Put a leash on these guys. You don't need to end it. You put a leash on them and get them away from all the

ante on effect, which look that up. I know you know, but where the rich, basically because of government policies and money printing, the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. And that bothers me. I mean, I've benefited from Fed policies personally. I just hate to see what it's done to our society. Okay. And I'm not a sociopath. I could have made a lot more money, but I guess the market closed, but I don't.

There are more important things to me. And I've been very fortunate. And I care about America. And I care about the people in America. I really do. Even the ones... I mean, you know, that's all I'm saying. I care about America first because I'm an American. I think America's been good to me. And it's the worst country in the world except for all the others. So anyway, God bless America. Yeah, I agree. God bless America. So if you say...

you know the rich get richer and so that's an easy adjustment for them right that's a good ride and the poor get poor and so i'm not going to say they adjust at all that that's really goes from worse to horrible but does the middle class they just adjust to inflation they just kind of just float well i remember like what's going on here i remember from the 70s i mean my dad was a teacher and he ended up taking a doing starting his own business on the side a little like local advertising business because um

He had four kids, and my mom took care of those four kids, and he needed more money because everything's going up. And we ate a lot of Hamburger Helper and a lot of stuff that was on sale, on closeout, like it had been sitting there. It was past the expiration date or whatever, and a lot of tuna fish and peanut butter sandwiches.

So I remember, yeah. And I remember when I had a $20 bill and I thought, you know, that was like a $100 bill, you know, and I'm sure somebody born way before me can remember when a $5 bill or a dollar bill, you know, you know, we used to have stores called Five and Dimes, right? And then and then because things cost five cents and ten cents and then we had dollar stores.

And now that's long gone in the last five years that now the dollar stores have things five, 10, 20, you know, because they can't stand business. And there's a lot of closing the five below. I'm sure maybe you've heard of it. I'm sure. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I'm embarrassed that my kids love this store, you know, but like I went in the store once with them and I hate just going any retail outlets, but I got dragged in for this maybe for Halloween or something.

But like you go in the store, that kind of store and like you can literally see the goods are distant, like disappearing. They're getting thinner. And like, yes, like the car I grew up in matchbox car group was like made of a very different material, much stronger material than now. Right. And they're disintegrating in front of your eyes, like dematerializing in a way because they can't afford to put things in the box for $5 anymore. So the only way to meet the price point is like to put nothing in the box. It's just,

Yeah. Horrible. It's like reverse hedonics, I call it. They don't subtract. They don't lower the price. The way hedonics works is the car goes up $10,000, but they say, well, it's got these new features that are worth $15,000. So actually the car went down $5,000.

You know, that's what they do. They do that with men's shirts, long sleeve versus short sleeve, polyester versus cotton. They have hedonic, they have math formulas to calculate how much better or worse a polyester shirt is than a cotton shirt or how much better or worse a long sleeve is versus a short sleeve. And I've got the receipts and it's amazing. And so they actually, the whole point of hedonics is to say that things that went up in price actually went down in price.

And seasonal adjustments do that too. But it's completely insane. And I think if 330 million Americans knew how inflation was calculated, they'd go nuts. They'd riot because it's completely absurd. It has nothing to do with reality. Most people think the CPI is like, okay, there's this basket of goods and how much did it go up from year to year? And that's whatever the percentage is, that's the CPI. No, no, no.

And they do wacky things for some of our biggest expenses. Health insurance is just completely screwed up how they calculate that. They don't, they don't use premiums. They, they use OER, you know, for you know, house housing, you know, which Gundlach says, I don't know how much, where they ask you, Hey, how much would your house rent for? And there's a great Gundlach, Jeff Gundlach clip I have where he's like, I have no idea what my house would rent for, you know? I, so it's, it's absurd and,

Once you realize the whole purpose of CPI and PCE and sticky this and super core that, the entire purpose is to understate the actual rise in your cost of living. Otherwise, they would just tell you what it is. Right. Because they want high inflation. I mean, they're very clear on that. You read a lot of these academic papers, as I do on occasion from economists. They want inflation.

They think that's the way out of everything is to just inflate away the debt. You even hear rich guys on TV say that, you know, rich, rich stock market guys. Let's just, you know, these guys who own a bunch of leveraged assets, right? Hey, let's, you know, we have to, there's no way out. We just have to inflate away the debt. Well, but as if that's not a default, and I want to hammer this home to people too. Inflation is, not only is it a tax, as Ben Bernanke himself said, it's an extremely regressive tax, but it is a default tax.

Just as much as if you said, you know what, Cedric, we owe you $1,000 a month, Social Security. We're only going to pay you $500. Now, most people would be outraged at that. Wait a minute. That's my savings account. I paid, well, not really. But you would be angry at that. You'd be in the streets if they said, you're only getting $500 a month, Cedric. But-

What they'll do is they'll say, oh, no problem, Cedric. We'll give you $1,000 a month. We're going to print a boatload of money to pay for everything else that we're not taxing for. And so you're going to get your $1,000. Of course, it's only going to buy $500 worth of goods. I mean, Alan Greenspan himself said this, and so did Ray Dalio, who I pick on a lot. But Ray has a great clip where he just explains this.

to some YouTube post who has like 2 million viewers. Okay. And Ray's explaining how, you know, you have the bonds and you'll either get all the bonds back. You either, you either won't get your money back, all your money back, or you'll get your money back, but it won't buy. It'll only buy half of what you, of what you, you know, what it used to. And the host at the end goes, wow. Wow.

Wow. I've never heard of it phrased that way before. And I looked at the guy, he's got 2 million followers. He's a big financial guy and it's like, this is all news to him. But when someone says, let's inflate away the debt, they are saying, let's screw the poorest people in the country the most to save the richest people in the country. I mean, there's a guy on Twitter called Darth Powell, who has a great quote I love that goes, deflation is to rich people what inflation is to everybody else. So I think that's a very...

concise quote. I think so. I, I, Darth Powell has been very, I think very insightful in leading the charge on real estate. Yes. I think he's really missing the boat on Bitcoin. Uh, I'd be remiss if I didn't mention that on the show. Sure. Well, it is a Bitcoin matrix, right? Yeah. Uh, I try not to get into fights or, you know, and everyone can have their opinions. I just think I, and it's interesting. Cause like, you know, I think that's somewhere where like,

You know, someone's really well-informed in one area, and I don't feel they're that informed on Bitcoin. And they're sharing their opinion. It makes me not want to take part or take in the other content. Yeah. But I'm going to try to keep the streams clear. But, you know, it's a little frustrating. It's interesting. Well, let me say on this. I have no problem over the years agreeing with someone

strongly on one position and yet disagreeing with them on a bunch, one or many more other issues, which is why, like I said, I think I get along with left and right people too. I'm looking for common ground. I love Dennis Kucinich. I love Ron Paul. I'm looking for common ground. On Bitcoin, I honestly should be a billionaire today because I could have bought Bitcoin all day long. I

I had smart people tell me about it when it was far cheaper than today. And the reason I didn't, and I should have, I should, you know, I screwed up. I should have taken a flyer and put 10 grand in or something or one grand is I was like, well,

well, heck, if this ever gets big, the government's going to crush it, you know? And they, I'm frankly a little surprised they haven't yet, but God bless them. I will never opine on, I mean, I'll never talk about why Bitcoin is this or that because it's not my wheelhouse. I am not the enemy of Bitcoin. I've been a great number of people. I think there's huge overlap between sort of the traditional, you know, Austrian type school, you know,

you know, anti, you know, Bernanke Yellen type people and the Bitcoin community. We, we were like, uh, there's a lot of overlap there. We got, I get along. A lot of my followers are, are people I follow are, are Bitcoin maximalists almost, you know what I mean? And that's fine. And, um,

And as I said in another podcast, I think I said, I have no, you know, I don't have any FOMO. If you tell me you put a thousand dollars in and now you're worth 10 million. I mean, I'm like, that's great. I have no FOMO, which has saved me in the stock market a few times over the years. So I wish nothing but the best for Bitcoin. I do own a little bit. Um, so if it goes, goes to what, what, what does Eric Trump say? It's going to a million dollars. You know, I'll be, I'll, I'll have some money, you know, that'd be great. Um,

I, uh, I'm, I told a group of people, honestly, I posted this too in 2017. I said, you know, I was at like a book club and I told a bunch of guys who, who were asking about Bitcoin. Cause remember Bitcoin hit like 17 or 19,000, something like that back in late 2017. And I said, look, they're all asking me about Bitcoin. I go, you know what? I go, everybody here should buy a little bit of Bitcoin because if it goes to a million dollars, I don't want to hear anybody bitching that, you know, they, oh, they should have bought some and you, you know, so I said, and I said that, I don't know how many did, you know, but, um,

But so I am not I am not a, you know, a crypto person at all. I'm just too old. I'm too dumb to get it. And I've had a lot of very smart people try and convince me. The way I put it is we're the Bitcoin guys and me. We're both on the same hijacked plane, you know, and we'll work together. Let's work together. I mean, yeah, Loris Lepard. Great guy. He's been one of my biggest fans.

i follow him he follows me supporters and um you know he's a he's a full-on bitcoin guy um twice um yeah there's a number of others too larry and and larry's a great bridge um that's you know came to it from hard money gold yeah that that's what's frustrating with darth is like we're like you said we're on the high same hijacked plane yeah uh he's arguing the same stuff we are he just doesn't see us on the same team he sees us as part of the problem

And I didn't mean to hijack this conversation and make it so much about Bitcoin. One of the things I love about the show is we can have our talk and just really go where it goes and we don't have to kind of always talk about Bitcoin. Well, what should concern you guys, I think, I don't know, maybe not. It concerns me is the... Hey, Bitcoiners.

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at thea.us/cedric. That's T-H-E-Y-A.us/C-E-D-R-I-C. - Scaramuciization of Bitcoin or the Larry Fink, you know, I mean,

It sort of epitomizes the exact opposite of what I allegedly supposedly is the ethos of Bitcoin, right? But it's for enemies. It's a neutral network. It's numbers. It doesn't care about us or fake. I understand that. I understand that. I'm just saying that these parasites latch onto everything. And I don't know if it's, you know, whenever those guys get involved. We got to be weary. It worries me. We got to be weary. I mean, trust, don't trust, verify. Trust but verify. Yeah. Yeah.

Or don't trust verify is what we say. You know, don't trust first. But here's the thing. There's so many smart guys that are very pro Bitcoin that I agree with on a huge number of issues. And I'm not saying I disagree on Bitcoin. It's just that I'm not a Bitcoin guy. I have a little bit. That's a huge step.

Yeah. And I think Bitcoin would tell you a little bit one day is going to be worth a lot. Well, it's already a lot of it's already worth a lot more than I pay for. It'll grow in purchasing power forever. And just that just knowing that, I think, gives people a lot of from our perspective, my perspective in terms of empowerment, like, wow, like one day this will be worth a lot of money. Sure. That's empowering.

But that's just, that's the thing. Let's say, forget Bitcoin. Let's say we agree on ton of issues, but we disagree on, you know, I don't know. Climate change. Climate change. Maybe something less dramatic than that. Well, let's say climate change. Let's say you're a full believer in it and I'm a denier. Right. Which I'm not saying I am. I'm just saying, let's just say we have a major issue that we disagree on, but we agree on everything else. I have,

Absolutely no problem. And I'm not going to pick at you on that one issue that we and I and frankly, if you start picking on me on the one issue we disagree with, I'm like, you know what? I don't have time for this. Let's agree. Let's talk about what we agree on. You know, I think it's important and try and advance that.

That's why, you know, I got a great picture of Ron Paul and Dennis Kucinich together, like smiling. They're friends. And I say, I'm looking for common ground. I mean, I could find someone who's, you know, maybe there's someone who's pro-Fed, but they're very anti-bank corruption. I have no problem.

I don't need to attack them when they say, you know, J-PAL is doing a good job. But I can agree with them when they say, you know, this bank fine is ridiculous. These guys are criminals and they never go to jail. I mean, I don't know. I'm just saying. Well, I think I get what you're saying totally. And I really like 99.9999% really there. The .0001% I'm not there is when I think that

who are trusted in one area and have built up credibility. Yeah. Go into another area. Now, it's very similar to mainstream media. I could read an article about phishing. I don't know anything about phishing. And I'd be like, wow, everything that guy said or that girl said makes sense. It sounds smart. And then if you know phishing, though, you're like, that's a bunch of word salad nonsense. Yeah. Yeah. And you start to know. If you know enough, you're like, what you're saying is not true. There's a term for that, which I forget right now. But yeah, I know what you're talking about. And so...

And particularly with something like, I don't, you know, outside of something like Bitcoin, it's a very precious thing. But in terms of like, I don't really go up to people in real life or anywhere and be like, hey, you know, I got this checking account. You can make a little extra money. You should do that with your money. I really don't try to tell people what to do, not financial advice. But if I don't know a subject, and I think something like Bitcoin, which at least if you...

are interested in it will help you go away from things like the Fed and go away and help you figure out how to protect yourself from inflation. Even if you don't choose your tool. But if you're out there screaming Bitcoin is is is is bullshit. Right. Then you're I think you're hurting people.

or can be hurting people. And so I, there, I think it's like a little bit of a moral line, like where I'm like, whoa, like now you're, cause Twitter is a battlefield of ideas and people are coming there and people should not, you know, people should do what, take responsibility for their choices, right?

but like people are trying to get signal there. And I think like in that case, I'm like, wow, you're giving me a really bad signal, bro. Like, that's just not good. And I'm like, I followed your account. I really, I've almost, I boosted his account a lot. So now I feel like, wow, like, and I, like I was saying, people can be wrong or,

Or not even wrong. You can disagree. I shouldn't say wrong. Because maybe he's right or whatever, you know. But you can disagree on one issue and still be friends on other things. I just think that when there's innocent people in between, you know, that the ideas need to be battled.

Cause we're not trying to be friends. Like Darth's not trying to be my friend. He's like yelling at people. I think are my friends. Like in telling us that we're all con artists. Well, I haven't, I haven't seen, I mean, I just don't, I'm not in the threads or wherever this, this is going on. No, no, no, no, I don't mind. Your show is called the Bitcoin matrix. I figured, you know, I have no problem talking about it. Cause like I said, there's a lot of, a line I have a lot of in common with some of the biggest Bitcoin advocates. I mean, on, on our beliefs and, and, um,

No, I don't. I try not to. I think Bitcoiners are truth seekers. That's part of it, too. He hasn't really, in my opinion, given an argument that has any legs to stand on. Well, I think the Bitcoin people get the problem. I mean, they see the same issues I see with our monetary system.

And so for me, that that's an ally. And the fact that I'm not a huge crypto guy, that's OK. It's OK. You know, that's what I'm saying. It's like you guys do you. I do me. I don't bash Bitcoin, but I don't promote it. I mean, I just you know, I just listen to people who are fans of it. And I and I nod and I go, yeah, well, let's we agree on this and this and this and this and this.

And the fact that I'm not all in on Bitcoin, I hope doesn't mean that you can't be friends with me. And not you, I mean, just in general. Because, yeah, one of my favorite sayings is just pick and choose your battles. And I'd rather not pick a battle with someone where I have a minor, I have a

like i said i my only reason against it was i figured the government was crush it so i i you know i bet wrong i bet wrong so far i definitely had that concern in the beginning yeah so now it's so big i don't know you know and you know trump oh i think that i think reserve and everything else you know i think we still could fight uh i think you know goliath is still in front of us yeah i don't trust the feds you know battle in front of us and i mean gold was money

in the Constitution. And they confiscated it in 1933. So... They don't even listen or pay attention to the Constitution. And most...

Americans don't really know the Constitution or what their real rights are. That's on purpose, by design. Well, our educational system is terrible, which I think, like you said, is by design. I think they like stupid voters. Both my parents were lifelong public school teachers. Mine too. My mom, when she had the kids, she stopped being a teacher, but my dad was a teacher.

his whole life. So, yeah. So, you know, and back then teachers were, you know, it was pre-union teachers didn't make much and, um, no. And for kids, I still don't think they make like a lot. I mean, I mean, you could talk about like, there are some districts in the country that have very cushy programs with very huge pensions that I think are very out of line and out of bounds and it's a tough job, but it is a tough job. I think, um,

I think education is very important for our young people. So I'm not trying to, uh, well, there's, there's huge school systems in our country that are, that are producing, um, their product as kids who can't read and write.

um yeah math um and um i just doesn't mean i think the individual i mean it's no i'm not talking about the teachers i'm talking about the school systems and i think if you look at them i know it's true for colleges but i bet it's also true for elementary and high schools that the uh the ratio of of administrators to teachers has skyrocketed probably that's a huge problem that's yeah and that's where a lot of the money's going um i just finished rewatch i'm i'm on i'm re-watching the series the wire i love my favorite show of all time yeah it's probably mine too and i um

I just finished season four, which is all about the Baltimore school districts. And I think from knowing the people that were involved in that show, that that was probably about as accurate a depiction of, of inner city schools as you're going to get. And it's very sobering and depressing. Yeah. And it's not good. Yeah. My,

My parents were in, like they taught in some of the worst inner city school districts in New York City. Yeah. And I would go in like whenever my, like what we would have a lot of, I was in the suburbs and we'd have a lot of snow days or even holidays that they didn't have. So I would go and, you know, my parents didn't have daycare or anything. So I would just go to work with them, you know, but, and so I grew, I had just, I have the utmost respect for teachers and, you know, but I think I just don't like the system very much.

And that's been something hard for me to kind of reconcile over time. I don't think the system's designed well, but you know, I, you know, but nothing's changing. That's, and it's kind of sad, but we can send a hundred billion or whatever to all the, you know, overseas that, that kind of bothers me. Not that a hundred billion would fix it because frankly, throwing money at these things historically doesn't seem to work. Yeah.

But maybe we need a paradigm shift in thinking there, too, just like we do in Congress. Do you think the middle class... Yeah, go ahead. Do you think the middle class... Do you think it's going to survive? We were saying, okay, chance of hyperinflation is very low. A lot of these things, they could kick the can forever. Like,

The middle class seems to be shrinking and seems to be struggling. But is this just more par for the course? Or is it getting a lot worse and maybe not sustainable? I get a lot of feedback from people. I think I've done... I mean, real estate's unaffordable. Yeah. Well, I think, like I pointed out, largely thanks to government action. But not just the Fed, but also government policies that...

You know, like Kamala wanted to give $25,000 to first-time homebuyers. Well, every house just went up 25 grand. Right, right. Or 50. That absurd kind of stuff. Yeah. Are they going to survive? Well, you know, I think real inflation is probably multiples of 2.7. Yeah.

Like 10 or 15%? Maybe it's 8 to 12, something like that. I don't think that's unrealistic. I mean, I look at what I pay. I still write checks because I feel that's a good way to direct. I feel like it was 8% before 2020. Yes. Yeah. Well, for example, my health insurance goes up 15% every year for the last 25 years. So I guess if you believe the 2 to 3 in their terms, because they never have a good unit of account.

Well, it's not the same as a 1982 or three. Yeah, right. But is it did we go from eight to 12 or did we go from eight to 24?

Well, I don't know. I don't know. Like my auto insurance went up 41% this year. Right. So maybe it only goes up 20% next year. Is that what? Is that deflation? No, it's disinflation. You know? Yeah. They're getting squeezed and they're getting squeezed. And even 2.7% over time is going to destroy your purchasing power, by the way, as Bitcoin people know well. So there's a church near me that I know people that work at Food Bank.

And it's in a, what I would call a middle-class area. And they have 900 families and individuals. These are not homeless people. These are generally people with cars, people with houses, and they come every month, um, to pick up boxes of food or, you know, blankets or whatever else they need. These are working poor, you know, um, getting back to Kevin Warsh again. Uh, he said years, he said years ago that I posted, um, he says, you know, you know, uh,

52%, I think, at the time, I think it's still around the same, around half of Americans have no assets. Their only wealth is their W-2 income. So these are the people that are getting destroyed by inflation. These are also people who do not really have lobbyists. The very poor have...

I'd make up to certain income amount, have certain backstops, have free this or, or, uh, subsidize that. Um, the middle class, you know, if you make, you know, you and your wife make, you know, 75, 80 grand, something like that. You're not, you know, you're not going to qualify for a lot of this stuff. Maybe it's higher even if you're in Frisco. Huh? Yes. Yeah. And it's, um, and of course, you know, it's just all priorities. You know, a lot of people spend stuff on stupid stuff nowadays, like, you know, Netflix subscriptions or something, but, um,

I mean, I wanted to, I mean, I get, yeah, I mean, it just, I don't think, but I mean, it feels like they'd be giving up

a day uh we uh i i have netflix no i know i do too like you know what i mean like i just like my kids would look at me like we don't have netflix anymore yeah i know i know okay well i don't you know and like i know i'm wasting money yeah i got a several subscriptions like this and like i'm not happy about it well i i don't know but it's like you're in this weird world where like this stuff seems ubiquitous it seems abundant

And it costs us four times more than the utility value, let's say. And we're getting 75% of the utility value is vapid, to what your point is. It's like you don't need to watch that stuff. It's not improving your life. It's not productive. All these things are wasteful. But I think that is the fiat matrix in a lot of ways. It's where we're all just getting grinded down.

Well, it was, it was just a simplistic example. I mean, for, it's a great example though. I mean, it's just so illuminating because it's like, it is just, I struggle with that. We all do. It's just like, I mean, I, I have to get what I'd not have to, I get, I get bottles of water delivered like spring water. Cause I, I don't like the tap water, you know, is that, you know, it's like, is that wasteful? Is that mindful? Yeah.

Is that resourceful? You know, I mean, there's a lot of decisions that we're all trying to make. Yeah, I'm not criticizing anything. No, I'm not either. I'm saying I'm trying to defend these. I'm like almost like it's hard to not make these bad decisions. If you want Columbus, it's, you know, it's. But what's wrong? Well, what's wrong with your city water supply?

You know what I mean? You're probably, you're paying for that too. Maybe, you know, there's a lot of things we can fix. I had to test it. I don't think it's like the best and like, you know, it's not great. Well, you could be in Flint, Michigan, right? Is that still, is that fixed yet? I don't think so. I don't think that's fixed. And to your point, that's what we're, these are all those things that we're just not fixing. And even if we did, it would cost us like 10 times as much as it should cost to fix it. It would probably cost like $4 billion to cost a,

$18 million problem. That's way more than 10x, but because of the grift and also just because of the inflation and the debasement of the money. Absolutely. It's hitting the middle class hard. That's my point. They're getting slammed. And even just to feel a semblance of keeping up with our... For myself, even just to...

like things like Netflix would be like what I had HBO growing up and my parents were teachers. Yeah. Do you know what I mean? Like, so like H Netflix doesn't feel different than HBO. It'd feel like if I didn't have Netflix, Netflix, which I wouldn't have a problem with philosophically, but like it would feel like a step back if we couldn't afford Netflix. Right. Well, that's the thing for, for me, when I go and I see, go to a restaurant, I,

And, you know, not a fancy restaurant, just a, you know, a Denny's or something. Not Denny's, but... I know what you mean. And the price now is double what it used to be. Triple. Or triple. For me, it's an irritation. And frankly, I just won't go back. But for other people... But it doesn't mean that it's not nice to go out and have someone else cook and clean for you once in a while. Once in a while. Or date with your wife or something. Right. I understand that. But I mean, for a lot of people...

For a lot of people, inflation is an existential threat. Do they eat or do they pay their rent? Or their car needs to be repaired and they're paycheck to paycheck. And the Fed clearly is not making inflation, even though it's its first and main mandate, is not making inflation a priority at all. Not at all. And I just see a steady stream of very wealthy Wall Street types.

Oh, and you got the Krugmans and the Jonathan Chates and the Justin Wolfers and the Jason Furmans and all these other guys who basically...

They mock people who complain about inflation. And they tell us, you know, Greg Ip, I think he's a Wall Street Journal reporter. I think it's the scariest thing out there. The Fed mouthpiece. But he has that headline that says, you know, what's wrong with the economy? It's you. What's wrong? It's you, not the economy.

And Jonathan Chait actually had a headline. I think he was with the New Yorker or something. He's another one of these characters. And it's, Paul Krugman is right about the economy and you're wrong. That the smug, you know, just condescending hubris of these columnists, you know,

You know, I see a lot of parallels, frankly, getting back to the 20s, you know? When I was 15 or 16, I mean, Paul Krugman was, you know, the New York Times columnist that won, you know, and I just, the Nobel, and like, I was...

There's someone to look up to. And I remember thinking that his opinion mattered. Oh, no, it doesn't. I agree with you. I mean, the facts machine quote alone obliterates what his opinion should matter. But like, it's amazing that he's still the fixture. He is in the conversation and has the credibility. He's an approved propagandist. He's in the club. Yes. You know, Paul Krugman, who regularly and I would quote it.

at times mocked people who who complained about the high cost of living he in in uh 2000 he was making 50 he had in an article of his i posted he was making 50 grand a speech to uh bankers uh in 2000. so it's easy for a guy you know like barry sternlick for a net worth of like 4.7 billion commercial real estate guy there's a great quote for him i posted where he says you know

I don't think inflation is that big a deal. I think we could have an inflation target of 4% and that would be fine. And I was like, well, yeah, a guy who's worth, has a net worth of 4.7 billion. Of course he wants inflation. He wants his debt to be devalued and he wants his assets to spike up so higher and he wants rents to go up. He actually said, we need higher inflation so that we can get higher wages to pay higher rents.

You know, it's almost like you could I couldn't make this up, you know, if it wasn't, you know, it's truth is stranger than reality. I mean, than fiction. So I don't know that I see that a lot and it bugs me. I think there is way too much under emphasis on how the high cost of living is hurting Americans right now. I think we saw that in the election, I think.

you know, people were not happy. And if Trump doesn't come through, then they're not going to be happy at him either. If you remember when he was president the first time, he called, he wanted, I mean, there's no one more easy money. He wanted negative interest rates. He wanted more QE. So anybody thinks he's going to come in and set the Fed straight, I think you're in for a surprise. He's a New York real estate developer. He loves easy money,

More than Barry Sternlich does. So I am not hopeful on that part of the administration. Now, if he can keep us out of wars, new wars, and he can stop sending money overseas and try and help America, that'd be great. And we shall see. Yeah, we shall see. I have two questions for you before we roll out. Sure. One, so just, I guess, in terms of Trump and also the UnitedHealthcare CEO and assassinations this year, what's

What do you make of all this? Do you think this is an inflection point? I mean, I have so many questions for you around this, but I'll just, I mean, what's your take on, I mean, especially the UnitedHealthcare CEO, does this change everything for CEOs around the country, especially CEOs that are maybe in disliked industries? Is this... I don't know. They were blowing up. They had, you know, truck bombs on...

in front of the New York Stock Exchange in the 20s. You know, these things go in cycles. I think people are angry for a variety of reasons. I think the lower standard of living, while they see, you know, all the attention paid to other countries and to U.S. billionaires, I think that bugs people. And I think they feel like, hey, I'm playing by the rules. I'm working hard.

Yet you seem to care. It's like Americans, I think, and I've said this, don't, I get the, I think most Americans don't feel like our leaders care about Americans. I mean, they care about, you know, Larry Fink and Ken Griffin and Elon Musk, but those guys are almost in a whole nother, that's a whole nother world. That's a, that's a category of like globalist billionaires, you know? Yeah.

they're not really you know the guy that runs a pizza shop or the or the nail salon or whatever you know i don't think they feel like they're they're they get any attention at all and i don't think the certainly the employees of them get any attention i've dealt with with the insurance business i i i don't understand i i think it's a big grift i think i think it's like having so many administrators at colleges and you know and and schools you know you have these this sort of this like parasitic layer

that sits on top of everything. And I don't blame the doctors. I know doctors, I know nurses and assistant assistants and stuff. And, you know, I don't think they're the one, they're not the ones gouging. They're trying to survive in a system where, you know, they'll say, well, you're trying to bill for this. We'll give you one 10th of that. I mean, I've had some big bills before. I have very good insurance that I pay through the nose for. And, and I've gotten huge bills before. I mean, I pay a ton. And then of course I have a huge deductible and then I pay,

you get these huge bills and then they're knocked down quite a bit and then they'll pay part of it. And then you still end up, you know, having to pay a huge chunk. So,

I can understand people's frustration. I've been on the phone on hold with Anthem, you know, so I know what the frustration is. Oh, I get it. I haven't looked into this guy's whole history. I understand he had major medical problems and everything. And, uh, it's a very strange story. Well, his parents owned, I think retirement homes or. Yeah, I haven't done. I mean, there's a lot here, but like, just, but forget, let's not, maybe then we're not experts on, on, on this. No, I don't know. I'm not. We don't have to get into that, but in terms of, but I want to ask you in terms of maybe, uh,

the reaction from just, you know, the wider spread, you know, has been very much like, it seems like people are happy with this vigilante justice. Well, I wish that, yeah, I'm not, I can't support, you know, I can't support it. I can understand. That kind of retribution. I can understand. It's kind of like when, you know, once in a blue moon, like when someone, like China executes a banker for corruption and people are like, well, we should do that here and stuff, you know, it's like,

I'd rather have a system that didn't perpetuate this kind of grift that we have in both the banking industry and the healthcare industry. Let's try and address that. And I know there's always some disturbed people that will use violence. I'm not a fan of violence because they know how to handle violence, you know, as John Lennon said. I don't know. I can understand definitely what people are ticked off. That's what I want to ask about. So I'm not pro-violence.

But do you think people ticked off that? Do you think people are happy that a rich elitist got knocked off? Or do you think this is more about the health care system and health care outcomes? I think everybody instinctively has had a bad experience with the health insurance company and a certain percentage of the population when they see somebody get hurt that's heavily involved. You know, a head of one of the companies, they have sort of a

human nature reaction of good, good. I'm glad. I don't think that's all people. I think it's just some people and some of them are very vocal like Taylor Lorenz, you know, nuts like that. But, you know, I can understand. I can understand. But you can't. I mean, if everybody who had a grievance

A real grievance. And there's, everybody's got a real grievance about something. You know, maybe this guy had a little bit more of agreements or maybe you and I have less of agreements, but you can't go and just shoot someone you're ticked off at. I mean, where does that end? But I certainly understand the rage. Well, I don't believe this story, but I, I understand, but I'm more going at the rage and I understand the rage. I'm just kind of curious if it's actually rage at healthcare or, or just elite, uh,

In general, because I think I was surprised by like people being I didn't expect so many people to voice so much outrage at the health care system. Well, you know, that seems like a 180 from a few months ago. There was a whole subreddit four years ago where people would celebrate.

um, uh, anti-vaxxers who died, who died of COVID. And, um, you know, it was like thousands of posts and these people like, ha ha. I think it was, who was the guy? Was it like, was it McKerman? Um, Oh, it was some, some official that, that died of COVID after being saying he was against the vaccine or something. Anyway, it was a whole bunch of glee. And I remember looking at it going, I have a, I have it posted somewhere. I can't remember the exact name of the, um, the subreddit, but, uh,

It was very disturbing. It's like, ha ha, this random guy in Iowa that made a Facebook post two weeks ago saying, I'm not getting the vaccine. He died. Ha ha. And it was like, this is just demonic. I mean, it was like, what are you guys doing here? This is wrong. And plenty of people who got vaccinated died too. So I don't know. I mean-

It was just such a sick time. But to see the glee, there's a certain percentage of population that's just like, you know, wants to see someone else, you know, that they don't like get really badly hurt or die. And I don't have that feeling. I mean, people say, oh, you hate the Fed. I don't hate the Fed. I hate what they're doing, what their policies have done to this country. I don't wish any violence on anybody. I wish they would disband and go live on a desert island somewhere. I mean, that's my usual thing.

retort, but you know, violence is not the answer because nobody can bring the violence more than the, than the national security state, you know, and the U S government. So you don't want to go that route, you know, uh, unless it's, you know, end times or something you're trying to figure, you know, but you don't want to go that route. Cause it's not, it's not gonna be a winning route. I mean, this guy's going to spend the rest of his life in jail if he did it. And, um,

And there you go. I mean, what did he gain? He's going to be in a lot of pain. Maybe prison has better health care because it's on the taxpayers. That might be true, frankly. Yeah, I don't know what to make of it. I've enjoyed this conversation immensely. This has been so dope. I want to thank you for coming on the show and sharing your time and your thoughts. I'll leave it to you for any parting words and let people know where they can find you and your work. Well, thank you. I know I tend to go off on...

rambling tangents here and uh I appreciate your listeners uh putting up with me but I am passionate about a lot of this stuff um my main thing now is just let's work together common ground um I'm very anti-war which sometimes ticks off some of the people who agree with me on other issues but

you know, they, they have a specific country or something they have an alliance to. And that's okay. You know, it's okay. I don't need to agree with people on everything. I mean, I learned many years ago when I was a young kid or in college, you and I can argue nose to nose on some big thing and get all heated up and then say, ah, let's go have a beer, you know? And I, and too many Americans can't do that anymore. And it's a shame. So anyway, uh, I'm on the Twitter at Rudy, uh, Havenstein and, um,

i have a substack which uh i put some fun stuff on there uh rudy.substack.com so thank you very much for the uh for the letting me letting me vent here thank you yeah thank you so much rudy anytime