Latest / Monero Talk / Is Bitcoin the New Petrodollar? w/ Derrick Broze | EPI 320

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Is Bitcoin the New Petrodollar? w/ Derrick Broze | EPI 320 · Monero Talk

• Doug All right, Derek, what's going on, man? Derrick Broze Well, I just got back from Bitcoin Nashville back in Mexico, feeling good, at least feeling good about being back in Mexico, maybe not about the future of Bitcoin. Doug Yeah, you're not you don't really fit in over there man. And like I said, that's not really an insult to you. That's definitely an insult to them. What was I feel like they've lost their way a little bit. Doug What was your interpretation? Derrick Broze I think I told you before, Doug, that I first got into Bitcoin and then the broader crypto space in 2012, got my first transaction back then, and then went to the Texas Bitcoin Conference in 2013, 2014 as a journalist, trying to understand the space better. Derrick Broze I interviewed Vitalik way back then, and so I've been around and watched the space grow and was definitely very much the beginning an advocate for Bitcoin in terms of it being an actual alternative currency to get away from the Federal Reserve System and to get around government and things like that. Derrick Broze That was very much the way that I learned about it and the way that I was introduced to it. But even back then, I could see that there were some people who were already arguing for once Bitcoin becomes regulated by the government, it'll be a mature project or it'll be accepted in the mainstream. Derrick Broze Those people try to pull in that direction, and those who are like, no, we need to follow the original vision, digital cash, and try to keep it away from the government. Now, I think that first group has won, for the most part, in terms of the price is up, and that's all that some people care about. Derrick Broze You got big banks investing in it. At the Bitcoin Nashville, you had Cantor Fitzgerald, obviously, you had Trump there, you had RFK. In terms of mainstream awareness, sure, I guess you could say that that's been successful, but as far as the original vision, or at least the reason I was introduced to it and the reason I still believe in things like Monero, it's very far from that. Derrick Broze It's not at all discussed. For example, like you said, I don't really fit in there, I'm definitely a privacy guy focused on that. The vendors, there was a few panels there that kind of touched on privacy, mentioned Samurai Wallet, which was cool, but for the most part, it was all just either highly technical stuff about Bitcoin or investments, and it was very political. Derrick Broze I wouldn't say everybody was on board for that, but there were definitely people who were, of course, excited to see Trump, excited to see RFK. There were others who felt like, hey, I wish Bitcoin would stay out of politics, but by and large, that crowd who has come into the broader space, well, that's the one thing is they would say there is no crypto, it's just Bitcoin. Derrick Broze This is what the maxis always say, of course, like, yeah, okay, Monero is good. We don't even exist. We don't even exist in the world. That's their position, and for a lot of the newbies who've come in, because you did have a really diverse crowd, I'd say, in ages, ethnicities, backgrounds, so that was cool to see, but for the most part, I would guess that the newer people there, and there was about 8 ,000 -something people who've come into this space have heard about it in terms of just add it to your portfolio, Derrick Broze like a stock or something, not as some kind of potentially revolutionary tool that's going to circumvent the government and the Federal Reserve and the central banking system. It's just something else to invest in. Derrick Broze It's another cool thing. Of course, as you know, just like with Monero, but I think the Monero community is a little less, this is my personal thoughts, a little less cringe than the Bitcoin community in terms of those kind of statements, like, nobody else exists, it's just Bitcoin, don't even discuss any other thing, because otherwise that might hurt the Bitcoin project. Derrick Broze That's just not my vibe. To me, I want to use what works, and in what's private, of course, and Monero does. That's kind of where my direction is, but nonetheless, it was interesting to be there and sort of witness it all with kind of like stepping back to observe it, and I'm there as a journalist, of course, as well, but also just kind of as a participant in the community. Doug It was a monumental moment. I mean, to have RFK Jr. and Trump be out like, yeah, I'm 100% Bitcoin. Like, we've arrived in terms of Bitcoin being something that cannot be ignored. It's literally, we have politicians out there running for US president that are completely pandering to this community. Doug I was always, I was kind of excited about RFK Jr. I'd like to hear your take on him. I know. I think at the end of the day, you just don't have trust in any politician and really either do I. But I had some hope in him when he was coming out. Doug I liked a lot of things he was saying with like, you know, the vaccine stuff. And he seems to have a very keen sense for corruption and how corruption works. Yet ironically, he's a big government guy at the day. Doug But I like the way he talks about like corruption and the different industries and explaining to people how government's essentially controlled by whatever it is, the pharmaceutical companies or the, you know, these stuff. Doug So I would, if I were able to talk to RFK Jr., especially at the Bitcoin conference, I would want to get his understanding and take on things like chain analysis and the fact that Bitcoin is a surveillance tool that the government's using to that the government is and will be using to surveil everybody that essentially uses it. Doug And you know, how does that how are you okay with that, given everything that you stand for? Curious your thoughts on that. Derrick Broze Yeah, I think that'd be a great conversation starter there because you're right. I mean, I give him credit where credit's due. He's great on the vaccinations and on general on bodily autonomy and health freedom. Derrick Broze And that's something I feel strongly about as well. He also has spoken out about BlackRock and sort of the takeover of the economic system. And of course, he's a big supporter of Bitcoin in this area. Derrick Broze I do have areas where I think he's got major blind spots, but I think with the one you just discussed there would be interesting to see what he feels about that because obviously, like on one level, like let's say the most skeptical, cynical perspective, these are politicians who are coming to pander to an audience of people who are now an influential voting bloc. Derrick Broze Bitcoin isn't where it was 12 years ago, 10 years ago, when I was going to these conferences and it was just a couple hundred people who most of the outside world had no idea what this Bitcoin thing was still at that point. Derrick Broze But now you've got Larry Fink of BlackRock coming on board. You've got a lot of what they call themselves the PayPal Mafia in terms of Peter Thiel and David Sachs and Howard Lutnick at Cantor Fitzgerald. Derrick Broze He was there speaking at the Bitcoin Nashville. So a lot of these big players getting involved in there and these are some of the same players that RFK Jr. has spoken out against. So I would also be curious to see what he thinks about their involvement as well as the chain analysis and the potential for Bitcoin to be tracked. Derrick Broze I don't know if anybody's actually had a chance to ask him about Monero on the record. I briefly got to question him two times and actually was in Austin a couple of months back at the ConsenSys conference. Derrick Broze And yeah, people can find that on my website, theconsciousresistance .com. The first one I just was wanting to put him on the record about Ross Ulrich and I asked him specifically, this was right after Trump had spoken at the LNC in DC and Trump was making his first promise, not for a pardon, but to commute Ross's sentence. Derrick Broze And so I asked RFK if he would go further than Trump and not just commute the sentence but actually pardon it. And at that point he was still kind of, I'm going to look into it, this and that. And then shortly after that, he did come out and say he would do the same thing as Trump. Derrick Broze And then after that, so I was going to follow that up with another question that is one of the areas I think he has a huge blind spot in. But his press lady was being really standoffish. They only let everybody get one question. Derrick Broze And this is sort of the fun life of an indie journalist. I tend to scout the building and kind of know where people are coming in and out of in case I have to be more like on the ground, like, hey, let me just ask you why we're walking out the building because I really want to get the question. Derrick Broze And I came out of the room and I could see these. It wasn't secret service yet because RFK didn't have secret service yet, but his private security was kind of hovering around. And so I just sort of walked a little bit and just sat down in the hallway at the venue in Austin because I felt like, OK, he's around here, someone's going on. Derrick Broze Why are these guys all standing at attention, ready to go? And he was in the bathroom, so he walked right out and I just turned my camera on and had about a three or four minute interaction with him. Derrick Broze And I asked him if he still believed, as he stated in a previous interview, that the Palestinian people were the most pampered people in the world, which is something that I think is just completely a historical one. Derrick Broze And so we had an interaction with that and people can see that on my website. But again, I think that would be outside of the Bitcoin and these other issues, another major area that I personally have a problem with. Derrick Broze And unfortunately, when you look at those, if you include him with now Harris, Biden before her and Trump, they're all pretty much on board with Israel and kind of the Zionist project. And in fact, I saw an interview just I think it was just yesterday and the day before that RFK did with John Stossel. Derrick Broze And John Stossel was kind of pressing him on his claims of like wanting to cut the defense budget. But then at the same time, he was like, no, no, we're definitely going to keep funding Israel. That's not even on the table. Derrick Broze So there's just these areas, obviously, you know, there's not going to be any perfect political candidate. I'm not a political guy. I don't vote anyways, but I definitely see areas where we will get more of the same no matter who is in there. Derrick Broze Now, of course, it's good that Bitcoin's having its moment. I do wish privacy was more in the discussion. I wish Monero was more in the discussion. But as you know, and I'm sure everybody listening knows that the U .S. Derrick Broze government doesn't want Monero to grow in the case in the way that Bitcoin has. And that's why I think Bitcoin has kind of been chosen. And some of the reporting I'm working on, as well as recent reporting by Whitney Webb and Mark Goodwin, formerly of the Bitcoin magazine, has been showing that this is, you know, they're making it. Derrick Broze He calls it the Bitcoin dollar, kind of like the petrodollar, but it's going to be allowed to grow and prosper. But it will just be another thing still connected to the dollar system. It's not going to circumvent it or, you know, destroy the dollar that they can perfectly Doug It's a it's a new perfectly taxable asset, right? Derrick Broze At the same time, Trump gets to kind of take this stance of, I'm not against CBDCs, and that may or may not come true, but either way, I think they've effectively, if they get everybody on Bitcoin as well as things like Tether, which again, we know BlackRock is heavily invested in holding US Treasuries through that, then the same system is just going to perpetuate itself. Derrick Broze So again, for me, and I imagine most people hearing this, the idea of Bitcoin originally and now Monero and other privacy projects is to try to have free money and circumvent these systems that are supporting, like I mentioned Israel, I don't want to be involved in a system of taxation or even using the dollar if I have other options that funds those sorts of atrocities and things that we've seen. Derrick Broze So that's why I've always been a big believer in tax avoidance when possible or using alternative methods to get things done outside of the dollar financial system. And so that's important to me. Maybe for others, they don't care. Derrick Broze They just want number to go up and they just want to get gains where they're going to get them. But sooner or later, they're going to realize that all that system is just going to keep them in the same old thing. Derrick Broze Sure, it'll have Bitcoin attached to it, but it won't take us anywhere new that I think many of us believed it originally could. Doug Amazing. Yeah, obviously right there with you on all that. So you don't vote, but you're out there talking to politicians, right? So you are, you're not completely ignoring that they exist. What's kind of your take there? Doug How do you, how do you see things in terms of like the value in, in engaging with the system? Obviously, you would do engage with the system to some degree. How do you kind of view that? Derrick Broze You know, I it's interesting because I tend to wear multiple hats, right? Like I one of my hats is the hat I'm always wearing is an activist. And I can't deny that I come from an activist background. Derrick Broze And so I care about the state of the world. I care about corruption. And I always have. And along the way of my activism, that turned into taking it seriously and doing journalism and starting to, you know, go to press conferences and asking questions to the local mayor, the police chief, and then bigger politicians confronting the former head of the CIA and other other people whenever I have the opportunity to. Derrick Broze And part of it is, I think, comes from that activist background that, hey, these people in some cases are responsible for horrible things. And I don't think they should just be allowed to walk freely without at least being asked a hard question. Derrick Broze I'm not saying I'm going to do anything violent or attack them or anything, but at least burst through their little bubble where most of the world. Doug Let the world know, yeah. Derrick Broze Exactly who they really are. So part of it is coming from activism. But it's also, I think, just a aspect of my journalism is even if I'm not going to vote, I do want people to follow my work or who might wonder where RFK or whoever else stands on this or that issue to be able to put them on the record. Derrick Broze And I think that's important, whether you're a politician or just an influential person in general. I don't think anybody should be beyond questioning, of course, is a big difference between being just an average individual person, a private person with an opinion and being somebody who is in office in government somewhere and their opinions. Derrick Broze They matter a bit more in terms of how they might impact our life. But beyond that, I mean, I don't try to engage with that system. And obviously, Monero is part of that. I do think I vote. I feel like I vote every day with my actions. Derrick Broze I vote by using Monero. I vote by the way I live my life and the way I live my relationships and the businesses I support and where I spend my crypto and all that sort of thing. The idea of voting with your dollar, but even beyond just the economics of it, but all aspects of your life, like to me, those are more important than some of the other just waiting every two to four years and pressing a button and getting a sticker and saying you voted. Derrick Broze That can impact your life and can impact people in real ways. And at the same time, if even a small portion of the population, let's say in the United States, five to 10 percent of people put the same energy they put into following politicians or fighting with their neighbors over politicians into learning how to grow their own food or getting off big tech or other areas that I've written about in my book, Derrick Broze How to Opt Out of the Technocratic State. If people put more energy into that and vote that way, to me, we would see more freedom in our lifetime than just, okay, we'll wait for the next politician to come around and hope that they're going to do things for us. Derrick Broze And I kind of see that as more outsourcing our power. When the opposite, what I'm describing, what I call exit and build, it actually takes more effort and more time than just, okay, I'm going to go vote. Derrick Broze And you know, like I said, hope that somebody does what you want them to. But you know, that's not necessarily a path that people are even aware of, let alone have the desire to pursue. But I do think it's it's a worthy one, especially, you know, like actually, since it's funny, I was drinking out of my Monero topia mug this morning with my smoothie and I was just going to opt out of, you know, technocracy, Derrick Broze opt out of surveillance state and into Monero topia. That's really a lot of what my work focuses on is I don't think most people are even aware of how big the surveillance state has grown and, you know, what potentially is on the horizon. Derrick Broze And so for me, the idea is for those of us who do see, you know, and have concerns about privacy and individual liberty, then perhaps we should put more energy into figuring out what's going to keep us free in the long term, not just, again, trust politicians or just worry about Bitcoin getting up, getting up there in the numbers. Doug Yeah, no, I love it, man. Obviously, you know, I can't agree with you more once again, like, that's what Monerotopia is all about. It's literally about, you know, getting people to opt out, use digital cash, peer to peer, taking action, building out a parallel economy, right? Doug A circular economy. Have you seen XMR Bazaar? Have you, have you seen, did you see what we launched? XMRbazaar .com? Derrick Broze guys sharing it I haven't been on it yet but I congratulations on that I was I saw there was some videos are being shared was it like you guys purchasing certain things using the bizarre buying windows out Doug That was, yeah, so recently XMR Bazaar is a Monero -based peer -to -peer marketplace, like a Craigslist, right? And then we have trustless multisig built into it, but then we also have a feature where you could just post business listings, like with a map, like a global map of places that accept Monero. Doug And somebody put up that there was a store in New York City, in Queens, in Astoria, a grocery store that would accept Monero directly for groceries. And I live in New York, and I'm like, holy shit, somebody put this on XMR Bazaar. Doug So I went over there and sure enough, you know, the guy was, I called him beforehand and he's like, all right, I'll do it. And sure enough, he's now like willing to sell groceries for Monero. So it's, yeah, yeah, that's probably what you saw, it was super exciting. Derrick Broze useful in voting to me. I mean, doing something like that, getting another business on the counter economy. Doug And that's the way you phrase that, you know, I've never, you know, obviously, I guess I never really stopped to think of it, right? Like, not only are they scamming us, right? But they're, they're stealing our stealing our time and preventing us from focusing on our energy on just, you know, ignoring them and opting out, it's like, not only are they pulling the scam, but they're also, obviously, Doug keeping you locked in, right? And watching, and viewing, and you know, you know, eating your popcorn and drooling as you just watch them do whatever it is they want to do. Derrick Broze is that like I tend to joke and call it the like you know say something like on this season in America you know yeah season and I mean is he gonna run is he not gonna run it's like the truck Doug Trump assassination was that the whole world was glued to that, right? I mean, insane. And then. Derrick Broze the best ratings Trump ever got. Doug Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure, for sure. I mean, when that moment happened, yeah. Go ahead, sorry, sorry. Derrick Broze No, I was just going to say, I love the bizarre that you're mentioning there, because so I mentioned earlier, I'm in Mexico right now. I live in Morelia. I live between Texas and Mexico, but I'm here most of the time. Derrick Broze And we've got our land out here, and we're working on building our community and trying to have it as a space to promote these ideas and to teach more people how to do it. But also a big focus of ours is how to do it here locally and in the city we live. Derrick Broze And there's so many local markets, I mean, all over Mexico, but we're finding some that are not just like local market. Like we live in Michoacan. This state is where all the avocados come from in the US, and there's farms all over the place. Derrick Broze And so there's a lot of agriculture. It's just really beautiful, a lot of waters and things like that. And there's a few markets we go to every other weekend. There's an organic local market that just has about 10 to 15 vendors selling their own honey or their own soaps or the fruit and the veg that they grew or their local cheese or their local milk. Derrick Broze And it's this beautiful counter economy, and it's on cash, so it's all pesos for the most part, which is definitely better than some other things. But what myself and a few of us out here are trying to work on is to get that peer -to -peer counter economy really built here. Derrick Broze And every time I go there, I've been imagining that, OK, one week it's La Ruta Naturada, and the next week it's Mercado Organico. So it's like two different markets in two different places in the city that have all organic and local vendors. Derrick Broze And there's another market that happens once a month. And between this, there's got to be 30 to 40 businesses. And so we're trying to get them to get on adopting Monero. And the bizarre thing helps out with that, man, because as you know, local Monero shut down. Derrick Broze And that was a big hit for us here in Mexico, because Mexico is one of the few places where if I need to get pesos and go from Monero to pesos for whatever reason, like to pay rent or something, my landlord's not taking Monero yet, then I could just go to local Monero. Derrick Broze I could initiate an exchange. And somebody on local Monero will send me a code for the local ATM. So in Mexico, you can go to the ATM. You don't even need an ID. You don't need a bank account. You just press in the code into the ATM. Derrick Broze It gives you your cash. Then you send them the Monero. It's beautiful, beautiful, simple, and super easy. And that was one of the ways we were getting ready to pitch it to the local community to say like, hey, this is an alternative currency. Derrick Broze Pitch them on all the benefits and encourage them to hold it. But at the same time, when they're like, hey, I need to get pesos, it would have been very easy with local Monero for them to go back to pesos. Derrick Broze Now, unfortunately, that's gone because of all the stuff going on here. But any more options like the XMR Bazaar and things like that just make it easier for people to see that it's something they can realistically use and transact with other people. Derrick Broze Exactly. That's our big goal is to try to build a local counter economy here where we're at, so that I know that if I'm living here, I can go support these businesses and I can do so in a way that I also supports a project and does so in a private way. Derrick Broze And I think if more and more people focused on that, instead of just paying attention to whatever the latest drama on this season of America, then we'd be in a much better position. Doug for sure bad for sure. And that you've done an amazing job at bringing people into this into this world. You're a great great voice for it. Any any thoughts on you know, obviously, we know what we need to do where we're like where we need to focus. Doug But how do we grow this camp? How do we grow the tent, get more people into this tent? Derrick Broze I mean, I think that, for me, it seems so obvious that it's a necessary tool, right? But I think that the average person, like, I spent years touring, promoting Bitcoin before it became what it is now. Derrick Broze And I did two US tours where we would, we partnered with Roger Verra back then and Bitcoin .com and they gave us some Bitcoin to take on the road and we were open up wallets everywhere we go and try to encourage businesses. Derrick Broze And it was really beautiful to try to grow that space. But at the same time, I would see some of the hesitations and the reason people were just either not interested and sometimes it was just they didn't understand why it was necessary because that goes back to people not being informed about why the current system isn't working and why it's based on debt. Derrick Broze So sometimes it's an educational thing. It's like you have to educate people to the point that they even understand why the solution is necessary. Because if they don't understand why using dollars every day is bad or how that's not helping them, then they won't really see the need to do anything different. Derrick Broze So I think just continuing education, that's kind of one of the roles that I try to play in helping people see the flaws in the current system and then pushing them towards, hey, here's the solutions. Derrick Broze We have Monero, we have Monero topia, we have organizations that are in this community that are trying to provide solutions for people. So I think it really does continue to start with education, getting more adoption, just get like, which is the bazaar is great for getting more, more businesses on board so that people can see again, when I'm once I have the Monero, what can I actually do with it? Derrick Broze You know, I've been buying things like flights and, you know, you can do hotels and stuff through cheap air and just recently stopped doing it, but cheap air has been around for years and then Travala is another one. Derrick Broze So that's one of the ways I would show people like, hey, look, I have Bitcoin or I have Monero. I think Travala may have stopped accepting Monero now. Doug Yeah, I'm not sure I think I don't know if they just don't list it and then you could still select it or if they just completely stopped Yeah, I don't know Derrick Broze Yeah. So unfortunately, that's part of the struggle here. But in general, trying to show people, yes, look, you have this crypto. And if you need to go on a flight, why not use one of these other services where you can pay for your flights with the crypto you have and just avoid the whole dollar thing. Derrick Broze So more use cases, more businesses accepting it so people see it as something that's normal. And again, that they understand they're going to actually be able to spend it if they want to. Or even just, I think, and this goes back to those of us on the ground who care about this project, there are probably hundreds of thousands of Bitcoin meetups and groups all around the world that exist now, because obviously, Derrick Broze Bitcoin is more well known. And I know there are some focused on Monero as well. But I think we probably need more because of what I was touching on earlier, that the Bitcoin community, not all of them, of course, but many of them, especially the influencers in the space, are quite hostile to anything other than Bitcoin. Derrick Broze So they don't necessarily want people come into their Bitcoin meetups talking about Monero or something else. And I think that's unfortunate. But having more local on the ground, advocacy groups, just activist groups, whatever it may be, who get together and who can help build that peer -to -peer economy. Derrick Broze Get together and discuss, does anybody here own a business? Would your business be willing to accept Monero? Do you have a friend who has a business? Do you regularly patronize a business that you've got to know a little bit and maybe you can talk to them about having these kind of conversations and on the ground level, like you have the on the ground level activists holding Bitcoin meetups and local events and obviously bigger things like Monero Topia, Derrick Broze continuing to educate people about the problem and why the solution is necessary. And then, yeah, just more adoption, more businesses being willing to accept it. I think if we continue to do those things, there's no doubt that the space will grow. Derrick Broze And of course, in the case of Monero, we also have the extra thing to contend with, which is the US government trying to scare people away from Monero. Doug It's a small little thing that we're dealing with. How far are you from Mexico City then? Derrick Broze I'm just like four hours away, man. It's going to be a fun trip. Doug Yeah, just just thinking here, I mean, I, you know, so it's in November, I don't know if you if you start making progress in your in your local town over there with Monero, definitely let them know about Monero topia, you know, they could come for free, you know, they could come hang out there for free, learn more about Monero, come sell stuff, they could come sell stuff for Monero, we're already going to have two marketplaces there. Doug I think you remember from last year we had, yeah, we're gonna do that again. And then this year, the woman who the young woman who runs the marketplace Semena, she really saw like she got to understand Monero at that weekend. Doug So now she's completely on board. And she said she'll make sure all the vendors are fully ready to like use and accept. So that should be cool. But yeah, think about that. If you want to tell your people that you know, in your in your town over there, that's, that's a thought if you're gonna start to spread out locally. Doug Yeah. Derrick Broze If we can grow the space I would love to get I mean this is it's another important aspect of my activism And I'm not Mexican from Texas born and raised my family's been there for generations my partner She's from Mexico or her family's from Mexico. Derrick Broze She was born in the US, but it's important to us to be Integrated into the local community and all the different things we do You know again as from in my activist background whether I'm living in Texas the US or Mexico Like I'm gonna get involved locally in some capacity so this is really important to us to be able to build that counter economy and then also to help the local Mexicans who might Not be aware of things like Monero topia We also host our event in January the formerly known as the greater reset now the people's Really in what earlier in January and we do the same thing. Derrick Broze We make it free for Mexicans We translate we've actually worked with this Mexican company that Translates like live interpretation where so the Mexicans who only speak Spanish can come in and they can check out a headset and they love it live in Spanish and all those talks for free in Spanish and you know because we're really trying to make sure that we're not just a bunch of Americans or Europeans or whatever coming from elsewhere and then not contributing to the community where and because I think Mexico and places like Mexico and the you know So -called developing world have a lot of opportunity where maybe even more than the US in the US people are you know There's struggles going on. Derrick Broze Of course, there's poverty but generally speaking people are better Well, they're more well off. And so maybe crypto is just a funny and a fun investment for them to maybe make some extra money But as you know in places that are struggling economically and who have a hyperinflation of things of that sort These tools actually have real value and can help them get around that Inflation and that you know government money and so the more people I think we get understanding that in Mexico and elsewhere then the better off all of ours all of us are going to be Doug Yeah. I mean, we were just going to have like a second stage or we had to sit, but we were going to have just talks that were just going to be done in Spanish, but I love this idea of, uh, interpreting them live. Doug If you could give us some insight on how to do that, I, we would definitely implement that as well. That's, that's fantastic. Derrick Broze you with the company. It's a family company. They're Mexican. Oh, awesome. My husband and wife, and then they have like a few people who work for them and they just show up, they set up their little booth and put on headphones and then just do it all live. Derrick Broze Just, it's pretty amazing to watch them work recording so we can release them all in Spanish. It's really cool actually. So yeah, I would love to, I mean, I, again, I believe in what you guys are doing with Monero topia and I'm happy to be coming back as a speaker. Derrick Broze And, you know, it serves my goals and my purposes to see the movement grow more, especially here in Mexico. Doug Yeah, maybe maybe we get you to perform as well. I don't know. No pressure. I think you mentioned you might want to. Awesome. Fantastic. All right. Well, we'll, we'll list you as entertainment in addition to being a speaker. Doug Do you do you know what you might be talking about at the at the conference? Do you have something you're zoned in on or? Derrick Broze There's a few things coming to mind. I mean, one of them, obviously, would be whatever progress I have to report between now and November regarding what we're doing here locally would be hoping that'll be fully flowing on. Derrick Broze And I have some really big things to report by then. But so that'll be part of that. And then so thinking of the timeline, and obviously, we're in Mexico, but the US election is going to affect people, and obviously, Mexico's proximity to the US, but it's going to impact and affect people. Derrick Broze So by that point, we'll know whoever has been chosen in the selection. And we'll know whatever's coming, the sort of narrative that we have to play with. And I think that that is always just a crucial time to reinforce the importance of, again, of opting out and getting people to think about how they can take their lives in their own hands. Derrick Broze And that's, I mean, it's really been the focal point of my message for a few years now with my book coming out. And last year, I kind of was introducing some of those ideas. I think this year, I'd like to go a bit more in depth into just some of the different, there's like five areas that I tend to focus on when it comes to opting out or trying to start thinking about your exit plan. Derrick Broze And not like exit in terms of, I think some people hear that and they think like, quote unquote, running away or living in fear. It's nothing like that. To me, it's actually the opposite. It's more about living in line with your values and principles. Derrick Broze And the closer you're able to do that, although it takes time and effort and energy, and maybe sometimes lifestyle changes or different habit changes and stuff like that, if you really truly care about living in line with your values and principles, which I certainly do, then starting to think about how you can do that in your finances, in your food and your mental state. Derrick Broze I mean, I think this is another sometimes overlooked part of the whole thing in our various movements, especially I'll say like the crypto space, the freedom space that sometimes we need to exit from unhealthy mindsets and limiting beliefs that really hold us back or hold us back from being the people that I think we're capable of being. Derrick Broze So that's another area, food, economics, our mindsets, our own physical and health as well. These different areas that we can try to create more liberty, more freedom in our individual lives. And then if you imagine each of us doing this on the individual level, and then let's say on the neighborhood level, the community level, and on and on, and each of our various spheres of influence, then we will get to somewhere better. Derrick Broze And it won't come from just waiting for politicians or other people I think have maybe gone to the point of being so -called black pill, where they just kind of given up hope. And I don't think that's helpful either. Derrick Broze I don't think choosing apathy or let's watch it crash and burn is any more helpful than saying, let's just keep voting for politicians. To me, taking that power back in our own hands, individually, collectively, and really focusing on what we can do for ourselves is so important. Derrick Broze So I'll probably be doing some variation on that and just diving a little deeper. Doug Fantastic, man. Fantastic. Before, I just want to kind of go back to the thoughts on Mexico, though, and growing the narrow there. I was talking to somebody actually yesterday, who lives in Mexico City. Doug He's, I guess, born, I think born and raised in Mexico. And he's, you know, he's making good points too, right? Like, so the peso is isn't particularly weak right now. So is, you know, Mexico isn't the most fertile ground for convincing people to use an alternative currency compared to somewhere like Argentina, right? Doug Where we're seeing actually Monero starting to blossom. I don't know if you follow that at all, but there's a small town in Formosa, province of Argentina that started using Monero locally, some young guys, and they spread it. Doug Yeah. Have you seen that at all? I haven't seen that. I'd love to check that out though. Oh, wow. Yeah. And we're doing a whole, we're doing a soccer tournament in the town. I did see that. That's really cool. Doug I went and visited the town, but yeah, my point is like there, it's very fertile ground because obviously the peso, the fiat there is worthless and you never know, and it's extremely unstable. And so people are very accustomed to using alternative currencies that hold value better. Doug I'm just curious your thoughts. So do you think, what do you think there is like ample desire for people in Mexico? My argument to this gentleman yesterday was, well, I feel, I don't know, I've never lived in Mexico, but just being there, I know a lot of people do use cash. Doug So I think a lot of them do without, if they don't realize it, they do use cash on a transaction, aren't all perfectly taxed and surveilled by the government. And I imagine in Mexico, they are trying to eliminate cash. Doug So perhaps that's the avenue in terms of getting people excited about an alternative currency, but yeah, give me your thoughts on that. Derrick Broze I, from, so I've been visiting Mexico for about eight, nine years now and living here since March, 2020. And we traveled, we did it, we actually did a tour of Mexico during 2021 and got to visit a lot of different communities and various freedom hubs and freedom cells. Derrick Broze And I would say that by and large, obviously Mexico is a huge country with millions of people. So just generally speaking here, but by and large, most Mexicans don't trust government. And that's always, I think, a great starting point for these kinds of conversations because they're just very skeptical of politicians, very skeptical of any proclamation of the government claiming to do this. Derrick Broze I've also learned that when the government claims something, that doesn't necessarily mean it actually plays out in real life or in real time. They might say, hey, this thing is going on and you don't actually even see the impact or feel it or it never really has an impact on the local level. Derrick Broze And also the vast majority of people do use cash. Now, you can go to major cities like parts of Mexico and even parts of Morelia where I live here. And you will find restaurants that are cashless and things like that. Derrick Broze But by and large, the average Mexican deals with cash on 90% of the time. You know, if I want to walk down the street right now and go buy some tortillas or something from the local store, they're going to take cash. Derrick Broze I go to a gym 10 minutes from my house where I write my name in a notebook. There's not even a digital record of me going there. You know, it's just we write the name in and we pay them in cash. And then at the same time, in this same city I live in, there's also other gyms that offer like thumbprint entry and super highly digitized and things like that. Derrick Broze So you do see the diversity of that, but I think Mexico and other Latin American countries for sure, but definitely Mexico is part of why I'm here besides loving the land that I do think Mexico is behind in terms of some of these various agendas and that there is this window of time to help Mexicans maybe see why they don't want to get further integrated into the systems. Derrick Broze Exactly. A lot of these folks are promoting, for example, CBDCs, digital identities, sort of the outgrowth of the immunity vaccine passports we saw during COVID, they like, for example, Bill Gates, he is behind the what's called the ADHAR system, stands for the Foundation in India. Derrick Broze And they spent years going around and scanning the retinas and the faces of over a billion people of a billion Indians until the system was completed. And now that system, the ADHAR system is necessary to pretty much do anything. Derrick Broze Healthcare wise to get if you're on government assistance to do any government services, any type of even some often buildings, you have to show your ID to get into show this digital identity. And Bill Gates is funding this program and others as well. Derrick Broze But they promote this idea that there are these poor Mexican farmers and poor rural Indian villagers who can't get an ID. So we need to help them. These are the unbanked of the world. And if we can just get them a digital ID and get them into the system, then we can help them live a better life. Derrick Broze And they kind of sell it with all this buzzwords and everything. And I think that that is the total opposite of what I'm working towards. And what I'm trying to show people is the value of not plugging into these systems. Derrick Broze Whereas you were saying, Doug, you can be tracked and traced and every transaction, et cetera, can be logged and they can put the profile on you. I do think these things eventually will get to the point of systems like social credit scores. Derrick Broze And we've already seen examples of this during COVID of people being locked out of their PayPal accounts, Patreon, Venmo, Cash App, other stuff like that, including their bank accounts for donations they made to certain organizations like the Canadian Trucker Movement, things like that. Derrick Broze So we know the problems associated with that. I definitely think that's kind of what we're working against in Mexico and Latin America is there are those folks trying to get in here too and trying to fund programs to get Mexicans on board with digital IDs and many of the same programs. Derrick Broze I just personally think it's going to take a bit longer here because of the lack of infrastructure in much of the country. Doug Terrifying though. I mean, it's happening everywhere and once it fully happens, it's going to be really hard to go back. I mean, it's pretty much impossible. That's why something like Manero is so important because at least it lets them stay in the digital world but gain some liberty digitally. Doug Yeah, exactly. It is freaking terrifying though, man. I mean, so I don't know if I've asked you this in the past, but like kind of what is your overall thesis there? Is it just that we're, you know, this is the natural tendency of the human arc that, you know, we use technology, technology grows and we kind of enslave ourselves with it? Doug Or do you think there's something more nefarious? Are there other forces at play? I mean, give me kind of your, you know, your deepest, darkest conspiracy theory on how things work. Derrick Broze Let me put on my tin foil hat first. No, I mean, so I think it's a combination of some of the things you said there. I mean, obviously, technology is a tool. Digital technology is a tool. Hopefully, that doesn't need to be said. Derrick Broze But in case anybody's hearing what I'm saying and thinking, I'm anti -technology, hopefully, that'd be obvious that I'm not. I use Monero and things like that. But I do believe we are in a digital arms race between the folks who do want things like Monero and encryption and privacy and want to use AI to help advance the human civilization and other individuals, organizations, banks, governments who see those same tools and see an opportunity for control, Derrick Broze for limiting freedom of movement, for limiting freedom of speech, for just, again, being able to track their populations. And so the way I see it is the government tries to create something to spy on us. Derrick Broze And then some radical programmer out there, cypherpunk, creates something to block that and defend us. And we're just going back and forth in that struggle. And I just think we're still in the early stages, but we're definitely knee deep in that. Derrick Broze It's just the problem is most people don't even realize it. So I think there's some of those elements going on of just, like you said, this arc playing out of good versus bad technology to make it super simple. Derrick Broze And at the same time, absolutely, there are people, organizations, and institutions who are driving things in this darker direction. And that is what I write about. So the book, How to Opt Out of the Technocratic State, which I will have a Monerotopia, but everybody can download it for free at theconsciousresistance .com slash how to. Derrick Broze And it's the second edition I published in the middle of COVID. I wrote it before COVID, and then I needed to update it based on all the insanity we saw. And you can get it in Spanish, German, all those other languages. Derrick Broze But part of the book is obviously by the title, How to, like a guide to try to get out of these systems and think about how we relate to digital technology. But the beginning is more of a little bit of a history and a look at some of these ideas. Derrick Broze And essentially when you look at COVID -19, or what I refer to as COVID -1984, and the response around the world by the world governments and the people who are funding and driving a lot of the policies, like lockdowns and the vaccination programs, their belief is very much a technocratic ideal. Derrick Broze And the technocratic movement, technocracy, goes back to the US 1920s, 30s, and 40s. It was popular in the US and Canada, came from Columbia University, can look up Technocracy Incorporated and see some of their material. Derrick Broze But they envisioned a world back then, prior to of course computers as we know them and artificial intelligence and things like that. But they talked about a world where you could have energy credits, where in their mind the politicians were too dumb to run things and the people were too stupid to know what's good for them and to vote their way to a better world. Derrick Broze So you need to remove voting, democracy, constitution and politicians out of the equation, which kind of sounds good, removing the politicians. But they imagined instead of businessmen running things or politicians running things, that you would have what they called this technique king and his advisors who would run the technique or what I call the technocratic state. Derrick Broze And again, they were talking about this before they had the technology to do it, but they imagined a world where you could use machines or computers to kind of micromanage society and to plan out which resources should go where. Derrick Broze And again, ration out these different energy credits. And of course they do talk about this would require a bit less liberty in our world in order to make this work, but they promise it would be equitable and great and all these things. Derrick Broze And so the official story says that that political movement kind of fell to the dustbin of history by the 1940s and just wasn't popular and it faded away. I actually think it's still here and it's very much guiding many of the people who are trying to manipulate our world. Derrick Broze I mean, you look at the response to COVID and the mantra was trust the experts. That's a technocratic mindset. The technocrats, the way that they describe it would be the scientific and technological elite. Derrick Broze The people who would have the know -how and know how to use the technology and the tools to micromanage society, while the rest of us are just kind of bound to whatever the computer or the machine says. Derrick Broze And they didn't have the tech to do it before, but they definitely are getting closer to being able to do something like that. And I think that's what these push towards digital identities and CBDCs, et cetera, are all about. Derrick Broze We've heard discussions about carbon credits and we saw, of course, the immunity passports, vaccine passports. I think that is really what we're witnessing. I do believe there is a conspiracy and I don't think that's a bad word when people really can be mature about it and understand what that word really means to conspire, to breathe together, to plan together. Derrick Broze And obviously powerful people with financial resources and others might come together and say, hey, you know what, to our benefit, if we make these moves and this moves and that move, it's going to benefit our bottom line, but also maybe keep us and our families in a position of power that we're so comfortable in. Derrick Broze But of course, we're gonna have to kind of keep this under wraps a little bit as we progress towards this goal of ours. For those who, that sounds a bit outlandish, I encourage people to check out my documentary series. Derrick Broze It's a 17 -part documentary series called The Pyramid of Power. You can find it at thepyramidofpower .net. We've released 14 episodes so far and it'll be finished by early 2025. But it starts really simple, looking at the education system, looking at the media and kind of progressively as we get up this pyramid, gets a little more conspiratorial, but all documented facts, every episode has transcripts with all my sources and you can look at it and you can see that there is a history of people put in like, Derrick Broze controlling the financial system, obviously through the Federal Reserve and the central banking system. This is why I was discussing the co -opting of Bitcoin. I think it's the same influential families and bankers and people behind the scenes that are trying to co -op this new tool. Derrick Broze And so this goes back to that digital arms race, right? Crypto came on the scene. We don't know who Satoshi was. Monero came about later. We've got these privacy tools. We got the potential for privacy tools to help us transact in a free way. Derrick Broze Of course, those same people aren't just gonna stand by and allow us to exit the system peacefully and to make them irrelevant. So they wanna make an effort to get involved in the crypto, the Bitcoin space and kind of ride that wave. Derrick Broze But again, as we talked about earlier, just keep it where people are still playing the same old game. Yeah, you might be using Bitcoin now, but you're still in that dollar fiat system one way or another. Derrick Broze And I think that's what makes Monero so powerful, why they're afraid of Monero because of the potential that it offers. So I do think there is both a combination of maybe it's just humanity's destiny that when technology comes about, whether that's the fire or the bullet or the computer, some people are gonna use it for good and some people are gonna use it for bad. Derrick Broze And at the same time, there is absolutely planning and organization behind this push in this direction. Doug Yeah, for for people to ignore the concept of conspiracy altogether is the most naive thing in the frickin world, right? Like you see it firsthand, you know, it's no different than any other mafia or gang, right? Doug We all know mafia, mafias and gangs exist, nobody would deny that. So now they just have to realize that there's very powerful ones that have succeeded to such a high degree and are using powerful mafias Derrick Broze our governments. Doug Yeah, exactly. That's what I'm saying. That's exactly, that's exactly what I'm saying. Right. And they conspire together to do things. Yeah, so I mean, it is absurd that the you know, the sheep just like, I mean, this, they've done a great job, right at misbranding the term conspiracy theory, right? Doug And making it just a thing that if you say you're crazy, which has been part of the part of the part of the SIOP, and they've greatly succeeded at that. What do you think, man? I mean, do you think people will will wake up? Doug We've woken up. Do you think we'll see a greater movement in that direction? Or will the I think Derrick Broze Monerotopia is part of it, man. I mean, honestly, like I don't say that just, you know, cause I'm excited to work with you guys, but I think that things like Monerotopia, what we're doing with the People's Reset and other movements, like I didn't mention, we're doing the People's Reset in Mexico again in January, but in September in just about two months, I'm headed to the UK. Derrick Broze We're doing our first event in the UK. It's the first time we're bringing the same thing of, this time it's three days instead of five, but it's all solutions focused. One whole day dedicated to technology, dedicated to food, dedicated to health and we're growing. Derrick Broze I mean, when we first launched this in the middle of COVID, we had a hundred thousand people tune in online, cause obviously it was lockdowns. We had the benefit of everybody being at home and we had a hundred or so show up in the middle of the lockdowns and then it's just grown and grown and we're just one movement. Derrick Broze And as I get more connected, as I'm sure you've seen the same thing, as you get more connected internationally, you realize like, oh my God, there are other people just like me trying to figure this out, working on their area and their communities. Derrick Broze And that is really what I have faith in. I have no faith in politicians or elections or anything like that, but I have faith in the average person who despite what you mentioned, like we are facing one of history's greatest propaganda machines. Derrick Broze If your mind even tries to crack out of that matrix and start questioning things, here's a page to tell you that's fake news. Here's a fact checker to tell you, don't look in that direction. It's probably never been harder to really crack through that veil. Derrick Broze And yet at the same time, I mean, I get emails of people telling me they're just starting to wake up. They're just starting to go down these rabbit holes. They're just discovering Manero, let's say. And that gives me hope because let's say we were at a point where those emails and those messages and new people stopped coming. Derrick Broze It's like, hey, what happened? Nobody else is waking up. It's just us that figured it out however many years ago. But thankfully that's not the case. There are more and more people starting to question these things. Derrick Broze And of course, I think there's also false narratives being ceded to those who are waking up to kind of redirect you back into the left, right paradigm and stuff like that. But beyond that, I do think that there is a movement continuing to grow and I'm doing, I mean, this is not a hobby of mine. Derrick Broze I've been doing this work, whatever you wanna call it for the last 14 years from documentaries and books and public speaking and podcasts and confronting politicians and writing articles. And I definitely see a lot more people asking questions. Derrick Broze I feel a lot less crazy now than I did in 2009 when I was trying to talk to friends and family about these things. And I basically had one friend who was willing to start an activist group with me. There's a lot more of us asking those questions. Derrick Broze So I definitely think we have some concerning things on the horizon that I am trying to shout from the rooftops about. But I also think there is still so much hope and not false hope, but real hope and our human potential to rise to the occasion because despite the potential for the human to be a sheep, to be asleep and to be ignorant and apathetic and so consumed by their own little world that they couldn't care less about what's going on around them, Derrick Broze even though it will impact them in the longterm. Despite all that, I also see that this beautiful flourishing human spirit that does wanna be free. And I don't know, maybe some of us were born into this world to pursue that and others weren't. Derrick Broze I've tried to figure this out, man, because I've met a lot of different people who are going on this journey, right? This freedom journey. And there's no consistent thing. Because I've asked myself like, okay, did we just not drink enough fluoride water? Derrick Broze Did we not drink enough TV? Oh, do we not watch enough TV? What caused some of us to wake up and others not to? But in reality, it's people with all kinds of diets, all kinds of backgrounds, all kinds of upbringings. Derrick Broze And just for one reason or another, oftentimes a traumatic event or something major will call somebody to bed. Whoa, like I went to prison at 20 years old. That was my wake up before I even woke up to politics. Derrick Broze Other people, maybe they get sick and they start researching health or something. Something, the financial crisis obviously was big for a lot of people in 2008. But I hear those kinds of stories often, like something will happen and then that human spirit of wanting to be free, wanting to understand the world. Derrick Broze I think it wakes up and then it starts to kinda consume you and you just gotta figure out how to, what you're gonna do next. And I think that that is still within us. It's still within at least more people. Derrick Broze And if I didn't believe that that was possible, I would just focus on building my land and going to live in the mountains and say, screw all you guys. But I still think there's chance to wake up more people. Derrick Broze So I put in the energy and the effort to do the work that I do. And obviously you guys care about those same goals too. Otherwise you wouldn't be doing what you're doing now. And so those are the kinds of things that give me hope despite all the heaviness. Doug Yeah, no, no, sometimes sometimes I'm like, what, you know, what am I what am I doing, man? But I'm like, why am I so motivated by this? And I think some of us I think some of us just aren't really easily programmed. Doug I think it's part of it, right, for whatever reason, we're, we're, we're, we're built a little different, we're not as easy to program. But I do think it's possible to pretty much wake, wake anybody, anybody up, but they at the end of the day, they're programmed. Doug And that's what you're trying to trying to overcome. Yeah. Do you think, no matter, no matter who wins the presidential election, it's a step towards a further step towards technocracy? Is there any, is there any better candidate in that respect? Doug Or is it like you said, or is it just, you know, they're all ultimately controlled by the same, same group of people that will gain power? Derrick Broze Well, if I was to go just based on what they say, what they claim, which I don't think is a smart move when it comes to politicians, even a newly minted politician like RFK Jr. But if I was to go just on their words alone, then I would say RFK seems the least likely to go in that direction. Derrick Broze I think it's the Harris, Biden, Obama kind of faction of these things are ready to go in that direction. And I don't see any hope or reason to think that Trump won't also go in that direction because of some of the connections I touched on earlier with Peter Thiel, his connections to his VP candidate and him, you know, Larry Fink, even going further towards Bitcoin. Derrick Broze But also a lot of these, David Sachs, Peter Thiel, Howard Lutnick of Cancer Fitzgerald, all these folks starting to line up behind Donald Trump and to the tune of millions and hundreds of millions of dollars, while also again pushing him towards promoting Bitcoin. Derrick Broze And he even said it in his speech at Nashville, he said like they've got it wrong. Bitcoin is not a threat to the dollar. Bitcoin is going to help the dollar. And I was just sitting there thinking like, well, the whole point was for it to be a threat to the dollar originally to like outcompete it and to create an alternative to it. Derrick Broze So I don't think again, whether or not he keeps his promise about no CBDCs, sure, maybe that will happen. Maybe not. It could just be a, you know, campaign lie or whatever. But even if that does happen, we're still going to end up in the situation where we have the Bitcoin dollar standard and a very similar system that is using chain analysis as we know, they could still track and trace that as they corral everybody further into that. Derrick Broze So and with RFK, maybe he would be less likely to. But you know, when I put my conspiracy hat back on, I've got an ongoing bet with a friend that and we're kind of we're still kind of thinking that it might be a possibility that they might throw us a curveball with a storyline of an RFK junior win from nowhere come from behind. Derrick Broze And if that was to happen, it would make me even more skeptical of him if somehow. Oh, yeah. That pain couldn't do it. He got all the 50 states got on all the ballots and then oh, my God, he won and the health freedom people was celebrated and love it. Derrick Broze And then probably based on history, turn a blind eye to everything that he did. And I don't know. So I've still kind of got a feeling that might be in the cards. Doug Jesus, that would be crazy. It would be the most entertaining. It would be the most entertaining outcome but yeah, you think you think he's the least likely to be controlled by the CIA essentially Derrick Broze If I go back to my question to him about Zionism and his unrepentant support for Israel, I mean, we know, and not to totally get off onto this, but I mean, just the reality is we know how big the Israeli intelligence networks are. Derrick Broze We know through Jeffrey Epstein that they were blackmailing people with sex acts and things like that. I'm not saying that RFK Jr., they have something on him, but we do know that he was associated with Epstein, was in his black book, and also in the past has admitted to having a sexual addiction or things like that. Derrick Broze Those are the type of people that an intelligence agency would like to manipulate and make it very easy to manipulate. If you have a habit of buying prostitutes and they can catch you in a compromising position, that's when people become easy to blackmail and things of that sort. Derrick Broze So unfortunately, I think that no matter which of them win, they've already kind of pledged and shown their allegiance to Israel, and it's not just like, picking on Israel. That's a very powerful player in terms of intelligence and otherwise. Doug Who do you think actually tried to take out Trump? Derrick Broze Man, I don't even know that one gets weirder and weirder by day. I did a, I've watched probably hundreds of hours of different angles and listen to people's, other people's analysis. I put out an article the couple of days afterwards called, we must question the Trump assassination attempt, just pointing out some of the different things that I saw and not even getting into the conspiratorial side of things. Derrick Broze Just saying like, Hey, look, all the things that are being found by now, that there's people, there's people warning about it ahead of time. There was some reports and I think these are the least explored ones I've seen so far, at least two different local news reports I've found that where people were saying they saw multiple shooters. Derrick Broze I don't think that's been fully, you know, fleshed out. And then again, conspiracy, conspiracy theory hat back on and Nashville Trump's here look perfectly fine. I'm just saying it didn't look like it'd been bit by a mosquito. Derrick Broze But I don't know if we'll ever done, fortunately, that's how these things, like the most recent episode of the pyramid of power is called the false flag deception. I go into the history of false flag events. Derrick Broze I'm not saying that this was or that I can prove that, but my point is that, you know, it's been 20 plus years since 9 -11 and we're still debating that. It's been 60 years since JFK. We're still debating that. Derrick Broze Like the unfortunate reality is we'll probably never really know what exactly happened. But what we do know is that politicians and then I think the people behind them who really run things will always use crises to their advantage, you know, whether they engineer those crises or just the act of God and act of nature and they take advantage of it. Derrick Broze That is just their MO. They're going to take advantage of it one way or another to spin it towards something that benefits them. Doug And is you're thinking that like the if it were, you know, to have been staged, essentially, was it is it that the Trump team is doing it? Or is that once again, all of them are kind of controlled potentially by the same group, whatever deep state, whatever you want to call it. Doug And this is part of their tactics. Derrick Broze I try to hold space for all of the above, right? Like in my article, I pointed out, like, here's one level of reality. It is what they're telling it is. It was this guy, he got radicalized by the media, who was definitely saying a lot of crazy things about Trump and, you know, people over the years, we've heard all kinds of things about Trump, right? Derrick Broze So that's the most basic, maybe that part is true. Just some young guy got radicalized, he knew how to shoot a gun, he decided he's going to go up there and somehow the Secret Service and all these things just go wrong, which is really hard to believe. Derrick Broze But that's one level, right? So just the story as it is. And then there's a level of like, okay, the Secret Service failed. Doug any nicks any nicks trumps here i mean like all the things that's perfectly right everything is Derrick Broze It's really hard to say, like, I don't know, right? And then let's say if you buy into the idea, you believe that something isn't right, what we're told. Then we get into the questions you asked. Well, does that mean Trump's secret service? Derrick Broze Somebody was told to stand down, somebody, because there's some weird things. Like I went back and looked at the videos, you can see right before the alleged shot goes off or whatever it is, that the secret service starts clearing the photographers out from right behind Trump and out from the side. Derrick Broze And if you were there with a shot going off, like you would have probably got a pretty good photo of whatever exactly happened. Or there's just little things like that that don't add up. And then there's the other thing of we could go to the biggest grand conspiracy of it all and say, there's obviously some people thinking that the Biden administration may have been involved in someday because Jill Biden was in town and the secret service, Derrick Broze there's those theories. I can't kind of know. I mean, I can speculate and things of that sort. I still think though, that even if somebody tried to kill Trump, whether it was a radicalized left -wing dude as their talent, as it may appear, or somebody told Trump's secret service to stand down, I don't think that that means Trump is a hero and he's a good guy. Derrick Broze And this is evidence that he's fighting the deep state and they're so afraid of him. Again, people could just be radicalized against Trump because you look at his actions, you look at the people who he surrounded himself in his first administration, the people who he's already starting to talk about associating with, it's clear that he's not really gonna represent anything radically different. Derrick Broze He's not draining any swamp. At best, what I think, because I don't think there's just necessarily one unified group that's running everything. Now, maybe when it comes down to it, these broader groups, we know of the Bilderberg Group, we know of influential groups like the World Economic Forum, stuff like that. Derrick Broze But I would say 100% of the time, those folks at the top, even if they have disagreements over different things, which may be the resources, wars, et cetera, they're going to side with each other over the people 100% of the time. Derrick Broze So there may be some factional division going on, things of that sort. Maybe that has something to do with what we saw play out, but I still don't buy into this idea that this means Trump is a hero and now a threat to the deep state. Derrick Broze Because to me, you could see what happened right afterwards is almost as close to you can get of outright deification of Trump. And even some people like saying he's touched by the hand of God, God intervened here to save him, to make sure he could save America and these kinds of things. Derrick Broze This thing only helps him out. One way or the other, again, whether manufactured or just taken advantage of, it surely seems to help Trump in this narrative. And I think at this point, so many people are sick of a lot of the things they see from the left and the Democrats that Trump probably is going to win it in this narrative of whoever's scripting it. Derrick Broze And that will be easier to pacify some of the more right leaning folks who claim to be patriots and care about freedom. But they, as we've seen in the past, they will make excuses for anything Trump does as long as it comes from him. Derrick Broze It could be the same thing that Obama did, the same thing that Biden did, but if it comes from Trump, there will be excuses. And I think that is probably a bigger play to what I often call the predator class, to bring Trump back into office, create a lot of division, trigger the heck out of the left, but at the same time, continue to advance their agendas while people are fighting online and in the streets. Doug Yeah, gets gets in there, just bolster, you know, pumps up the surveillance state with JD Vance sitting there with Peter Thiel on the phone. Let's get those contracts going, boys. I mean, like, yeah, he does have my vote for the Ross Albright, you know, he can't he came out strong at that. Doug He looked everybody in the eyes. So I'll gamble on that. And just one issue, you know, and I hope he pray that he actually lives up to it, because then at least we get we get something out of it, right? Derrick Broze people for wanting that to be true. And like, actually, I saw Ross's mom Lynn at the Nashville event this weekend. And I was there in Ross's trial and reporting on it, I was there in the courtroom, you can look up the old articles back there. Derrick Broze I mean, I had like a visceral response to hearing Ross get sentenced, I just yelled out Ross is a hero as they were dragging him out of the room. And, you know, I stayed close with Lynn and the family and tried to support how I could. Derrick Broze So I absolutely 100% get and understand like, the push. Now does it make me throw up in my mouth a little bit to see shirts that say free Ross Boat Trump? Absolutely. And I personally won't be supporting it. Derrick Broze But yeah, do I get the strategic argument? Of course, I do. And if Ross is free, that'll be a beautiful day. And I hope for that. I hope for that and pray for that for his family and for him. And I also hope that if that comes through the election of Donald Trump, that that doesn't lead to a bunch of other horrible things. Doug Yeah, and if he does win and that doesn't come there's there's gonna be there's gonna be problems. There's gonna be problems I I don't think trump would do I think I think he would I think he would follow through I really do Because I don't think he has anything to lose at that point, you know, he just he just wants to He wants to make make make the people happy In a lot of ways, right? Doug He's he's a populist at the end of the day Shit man we uh We but the yeah the the the jd vance and connection to peter teal thing and all that does have me It does have me have me worried and concerned that Um, you know be careful what you wish for type of situation. Doug Sure. I don't know Let me let me ask you one one last question before we before we round, you know finish it off. Um we were talking about obviously the You know the government and politicians and everybody getting cozy with bitcoin They couldn't couldn't possibly be any cozier right now politicians themselves and i'd say the us government Um, how do you think they end up dealing with manero? Doug Is there if manero gets large enough? Well, you know, we we grow this opt -out community larger A lot of people start using xmr bizarre, whatever it is people start using manero maneros grow. Do you think they end up? Doug Cozying up like they did with bitcoin and figure out a way to to be okay with it or will it always just be a Battle and they they you know will fight tooth and nail, uh against it Derrick Broze Well, I hope that the Monero community doesn't go the way the Bitcoin community, you know, my fear for a long time has been that even if, as you know, they can try different routes to quote unquote make it illegal, but can they stop me from meeting somebody in person and sending them Monero, that'll be a little bit more difficult. Derrick Broze But if they continue to arrest people and continue to scare businesses into shutting down like with local Monero and others, then I think effectively they will shrink the ecosystem and they can, you know, just continue their propaganda as they were doing with Bitcoin years ago and saying that Monero is only for terrorists. Derrick Broze It's only for, you know, hackers and North Korean hackers or drug dealers and this sort of thing. So then you scare away, you know, Joe and Jane average normie who, oh, I'm not touching that. I'll just stick with this Bitcoin thing or with my dollars. Derrick Broze I don't want to use that scary terrorist money that the government keeps warning me about. So the space could shrink and sure, those of us who want to use it can still use it. But perhaps it that fear is enough to scare away a lot of people, scare businesses into oh, no, I'm not willing to accept that. Derrick Broze Like I was saying earlier with Travala and some other companies, they have started to take Monero off their off their listings and then off their their accepted currencies and things of that sort. So if you do that, I mean, it'll still exist. Derrick Broze The blockchain will still be there. It'll still have all the features, but that make it will make it much more difficult for us to get to the world that we were talking about, where we can have actual use cases in a daily situation. Derrick Broze And instead, it's kind of only it's back to us just being the cypherpunks and the crypto anarchists who are still willing to risk that. Because I mean, what happens when they just start if they figure out some way to just come after not some alleged terrorist or something or, you know, a wallet like samurai wallet or something like that, but just somebody who has been like, you know, like one of us who's just been using Monero for a variety of different reasons for years and they start trying to come knocking about what alleged taxes we owe them and things like that. Derrick Broze I think there's certain steps they can take that will scare more people away. And if that has the effect, whether it's still legal or not, of shrinking the space so much that we can't grow, you know, and we're very limited in how we can use it, I think that's that might be an easier way for them to win and if they can't co -opt to the Monero community and bring them in the way they have with Bitcoin is just to try to scare the heck out of everybody and keep them away from it and to try to keep that ecosystem as limited as possible. Doug which is exactly why we got to all ignore that, not fall for the scare tactics and just not comply, carry on and get, just grow too much, right? To the point where they don't have the momentum to stop us. Doug Easier said than done, but obviously I'm hopeful for it. I do think at the end of the day that the crypto anarchist way works. I think the crypto anarchists are smarter at the game. They figured out the chess board and I think we could do it. Doug Dude, thank you so much for doing this. Super excited about chilling with you in Mexico in November. Anything you want to shield that you weren't able to mention, anything you want to get out. Derrick Broze Well, I'm just super excited about Monerotopia, man. I was checking out the lineup the other day, and it looks like quite a few friends are going to be there. So I encourage everybody who's hearing this to come to Mexico City in November, come hang out with us and be a part of the movement that's actually trying to use crypto in a private way and take us away from the traditional banking system and the governmental systems. Derrick Broze If people want to find out more about my work, you can visit theconsciousresistance .com, when I mentioned the pyramidofpower .net earlier as well. And if you're interested in what we're doing in the UK or in Mexico, you can check out thepeoplesreset .org or thegreaterreset .org. Derrick Broze Both websites go the same place. Doug Awesome, brother. Thank you so much. Appreciate it. Cheers, buddy. Derrick Broze Talk to you soon.