Acersaken, Høyesterett og det store strømsviket I disse dager behandler Høyesterett søksmålet mot staten i Acersaken. Nei til EU mener at avståelsen av norsk suverenitet til EUs energibyrå ACER er grunnlovsstridig. Derfor har de gått til sak mot staten. Saken startet den 5. september. De fleste er historieløse og vet ikke hvordan norske politikere og særinteressene kom i posisjon til å selge ut norsk vannkraft og å mangedoble strømprisene for nordmen. Her får du en kjapp gjennomgang av det viktigste. Det skjedde for litt over hundre år siden, det vil si lenge før både EU og EØS. Retten til å produsere kraft var opprinnelig en del av eiendomsretten til grunneierne. På starten av 1900-tallet begynte noen av dem å selge eller leie bort rettighetene sine, blant annet til utenlandske selskaper. Nyheten om disse avtalene ble et påskudd for politikerne om at de skulle verne om "norske" ressurser slik at de ikke ble "solgt ut av landet". Dette var imidlertid bare den formelle begrunnelsen. Den reelle begrunnelsen var at politikerne og de særinteressene som de representerte ønsket å frata norske grunneiere kontrollen over ressursene. De var grådige, og ønsket å overta ressursene gratis. Fra 1906 til 1917 innførte det norske Stortinget en serie konsesjonslover for vannkraft og andre naturressurser. Lovene ga staten vide fullmakter til å sette betingelser for utbygging og utnyttelse av norske vassdrag. De som ville produsere kraft måtte søke om konsesjon. Konsesjonsperioden var fra 1917 på 50 år. Lov av 18. september 1909 om ervervelse av vannfall, bergverk m.v. bestemte at myndighetene skulle ha rett til å overta et anlegg uten betaling når konsesjonstiden var ute. Grunneierne gikk til sak mot staten og mente lovene var i strid med grunnlovens vern av eiendomsretten. I et skammens kapittel i norske domstolers historie forkastet Høyesterett i 1918 søksmålet, og ga staten medhold. Dette er hovedårsaken til at den norske staten, fylkeskommunene, kommunene og offetlig eide bedrifter som eier vannkraftverk og overføringsnett i dag kan selge kraftproduksjonen ut av landet. Konsekvensen er samtidig at nordmenn importerer de europeiske prisene tilbake til Norge. Dermed er det norske borgere og bedrifter som må betale regningen, mens det offentlige eser og eser og eser ut. Merk deg at det ikke er noen ironi her. Det var hele tiden meningen å bruke politisk makt over kraftressursene. Og det har de da også klart - til gangs. Etter min oppfatning er Acersaken Høyesteretts siste sjanse til å vinne tilbake tilliten hos det norske folk når det gjelder energipolitikkens ødeleggelser. Det var Høyesterett som i 1918 satte norske politikere i den posisjonen som de utnytter på det groveste i dag. Nå har Høyesterett mulighet til å rette opp feilen. Jeg er imidlertid ikke optimist. Sett over et lengre tidsspenn har Høyesterett vært en tilrettelegger for at statens makt bare kan øke og øke, til skade for det norske folks frihet. Ved å godta lovene har de gitt politikernes inngrep legitimitet, mens Ola Nordmann har stått og sett på med lua i hånden. Hvis man skal lære noe av historien kommer flertallet av Høyesteretts dommere til å falle ned på at det enkle ofte er det beste også i Acersaken. *** Hvis du syns at du lærte noe er det fint om du trykker liker og følger meg.

Our Belief System, The Monetary System and the American Hegemony Civilization scales in layers. Layer zero is the people’s belief system. Layer one is the monetary system. The other parts of a civilized society scale upon the monetary system. Today’s world order is effectively a hegemony ruled by the US. This piece dives into the following questions: What was the belief system and the monetary system that formed the basis for the American hegemony? And what is it that makes this hegemony so vulnerable today? To get the proper perspective we have to look back in time. The first example of government monopolization and political debasement of money was probably the Greek citystate of Athens, some 2500 years ago. It’s difficult to know what it was with their belief system that led to this decision. But the state used the policy to finance its ambitions to rule others and the Peloponnesian war against Sparta. In the end Athens lost, but the inflation policy spread. The Roman empire also financed its wars in part by debasing the silver coins. Many books and articles have been written about how the inflation policy also brought it to it’s knees. We don’t know for sure which belief system that was the basis for the Romans’ choice of monetary system, but once more we see it’s intrinsically linked to war and domination. My region, Trøndelag, in the middle of Norway, probably was one of the last civilized areas in the West that had monetary freedom – the right to use whichever money people liked best. The people used money from many other countries and they preferred money with a high share of silver or gold. We don’t know for sure which belief system this freedom was based on. But it was likely closely linked to the fact that the Trønders loved their freedom and hated kings. It has been said that the Frostating law’s resistance provisions, which secured the freedoms of the Trønders, was unique. I’ll explain shortly what these provisions said, but let me just say that I find it very likely that it has been the same principles that have governed every free society before they fell under the rule of kings and their inflation policy. The resistance provisions basically obliged each and every Trønder to kill the king, if the king took someones property without the consent of the Frostating, which was the regional court and assembly of free farmers and landowners in Trøndelag. If the King didn’t adhere to this rule and lay claim to someone’s property it was also the duty of each and every Trønder to pass on the war arrow that would be cut, bring it to the neighbor, and saddle up, ready for hunting down the King and his men. Our royal sagas has strangely enough preserved a story that demonstrates the effectiveness of my ancestors’ rule of resistance: In the 8th century AD they were invaded by King Øystein of the Uplands. He appointed his son as King of Trøndelag and went home. As soon as the Trønders got the opportunity, they killed their new king. The reason was probably that the resistance provisions still applied, and that the duty to kill the king didn’t stop when the war ended. These principles ensured two things, that kings had little or no power in Trøndelag and that the people enjoyed monetary freedom. This suddenly came to an end in 1050 AD when King Harald Hardråde took power, immediately introduced inflation as a policy and readied his country for war. It all came to a bloody conclusion in 1066 in the Battle of Stamford Bridge. King Hardråde lost the war, many thousand Norwegians were killed, and the Viking Age came to an end. We see that the monetary freedom was based on a simple code of conduct: Kill the King who doesn’t rule by consent. If you didn’t obey the code, you would be punished with harsh fines. You would probably also lose the privilege of being protected by your neighbors. The inflation policy, on the other hand, was based on King Hardråde’s political ambitions, most fundamentally his obsession with ruling over as many peoples as possible, including the English. We have later had a few examples of monetary freedom, in the golden age of the Dutch in the 17th and the early 18th century, and a de facto policy of monetary freedom in the US in parts of the 19th century. In the Netherlands this rule grew out of the rebellion against tyrannic inflationist kings and emperors. The rebels were inspired by monetary freedom traditions that could be traced back to the 8th century AD in a part of India that was ruled by Muslims. In the US, the de facto principle of monetary freedom was indirectly protected by the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, which secured that the state would have very little power over the people, at least when it was compared with the inflationist monarchies of Europe. It was probably of great help that several of the founding fathers meant that inflation was a crime against humanity. The combination of the 200 year long tradition with central banking in Europe and the introduction of the gold standard across the whole wide world in the 1870s undermined the de facto principle of monetary freedom in the US. When the Federal reserve, the first real central bank in the US, was created, and the World War I broke out on the 28 July 1914, the last nails were hammered into the coffin of monetary freedom. From that day on, we have in reality been on a globally coordinated inflation policy, first dictated by the British, and later by the Americans. To sum up what we have looked at so far, monetary freedom has grown out of peoples’ desire of freedom in general, and the acknowledgement of the simple fact that you are obliged to fight for your freedom if you want to keep it. We can call it the Code of Resistance. On the other end, the inflation policy goes hand in hand with war, aggressive foreign policy and suppression of individual freedom. We can call it the Code of Coercion. These two very distinct monetary systems and the codes that they are based on, spring out of two very different belief systems – individual freedom and worship of the state. Let's now jump forward to today’s system. The specific geopolitical system that we have now, is scaled upon a very specific monetary system, which again is scaled upon a very specific belief system. The geopolitical system that we have today is what American neocons, such as Biden, Blinken and Nuland, often refer to as «the rule based order». This is in essence a system of American hegemony where the US dictates what the rest of the world is allowed to do. The American hegemony is scaled upon the monetary system that we basically can call «the dollar standard». In practice this system implies that the US and it’s closest allies, which are mainly all the English speaking countries, the EU and Norway, inflate their currencies in a controlled manner, meaning – at a tempo that isn’t too high. This enables them to maintain relatively strong currencies. In turn, this enables the US to force its inflation upon the rest of the world. Their most valuable export commodity is the US dollar, which the Federal reserve and the private banks «print out of thin air». In return, the rest of the world exports commodities and various other goods and services back to the US. The euro area countries to some extent enjoy the same benefit with the euro, which is the second biggest global currency. The rest of the worlds’ governments enjoy the benefits of inflation too, but their policy is more concentrated. With the consent of the US and the EU they debase their currencies at a high speed. This extracts most of their own people’s wealth, into the state coffers and the pockets of the country’s wealthy elites. At the same time it ensures that their currencies have low value compared with the USD and EUR. This, in turn, means that the USD can continue to enjoy its status as the world’s dominant currency. If we simplify our analysis, the global dollar standard can be defined as a symbiosis between the US and it’s right to exploit the rest of the world by exporting its inflation, and the other countries’ right to exploit their own people by debasing currencies that to a much less degree is used beyond the borders of the national states. The effect has, among others, been that very few developing countries, which mainly consist of former colonies, have been able to build capital and become industrialized. Lyn Alden and Alex Gladstein have been instrumental in sharing this knowledge with the rest of us. This brings us to the next subject: Layer zero today. The first question we need to ask is which specific belief system it was that the dollar standard was scaled upon. In such a short piece I will once more have to resort to simplifications, and I’ll first zoom in on the birth of the dollar standard. Today’s monetary standard was conceived in war. When the Bretton Woods conference took place in July 1944, it was relatively clear that the allied forces would win World War II, but that this depended on the continued support from the US. The 44 allied states who attended the conference established a quasi gold standard. In practice it meant that the Americans could inflate its currency using gold as a fractional reserve. In turn the other countries could inflate their own currencies, using dollar holdings as a fractional reserve. All of the countries, including Soviet Union, agreed on these principles and signed the treaty. I would say that the belief system that underpinned this decision, that is – of the country’s rulers, likely was, firstly fear, because if they didn’t support the proposal the US could make it more difficult to end the war, and secondly, greed, because there in reality wouldn’t be much of a restraint on their ability to extract wealth from their own citizens via the inflation policy. What happened next was that the US delivered on their promise to end the war. However, they did much more than that. When American airplanes dropped nuclear bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945, the US administration also demonstrated an unprecedented ruthlessness. This must have aggregated peoples’ fear of the new superpower. It can be no doubt that this aggressiveness made it easier for all of the parties to the Bretton Woods agreement – with the exception of the Soviet Union – to ratify the treaty. On the 27 December the agreed upon threshold of signatories was met and the establishment of the quasi gold standard was a fact. Russia joined the Bretton Woods system in 1992, following the collapse of the Soviet Union. While the dollar system was conceived in war and a final act of terror, it would for a long period be maintained first of all due to greed and fear. The fear part needs a few comments. When the Soviet Union abstained from ratifying the Bretton Woods agreement, this went hand in hand with Stalin’s ambitions to further the idea of national and international communism. The combination of the cold war and the many proxy wars between the two super powers that followed after World War II, meant that the Western countries and most of the rest of the world solidified their support of the dollar based monetary system. Thus, fear of global nuclear war, and dependence on US military protection against the Soviet Union, was the belief system that the dollar system now was scaled upon. When the Soviet Union and the East Bloc countries imploded, the US neocons took the concious decision to support some countries, such as Poland, financially, but not to do the same to Russia. The consequence was that hyperinflation broke out in Russia. This sparked political turmoil, which paved the way for a weak oligharchical political system that would keep the Russian bear dormant for a long period. At the same time, the US neocons established close ties to China. The deal was basically that the Russians should be shoved into the cold, that China should accept dollars as payment for consumer goods and buy US treasuries, in exchange of the US making it easy for Americans to buy Chinese goods. The flipside of what later has been described as the «Chinese Miracle» was that the Americans were turned into consumers who deindustrialized their domestic economy. It can be argued that the belief system that the dollar system was scaled upon during the last 30 years to a large extent was consumerism and a continued effort to ensure that Russians was perceived as a threat to the west. As Lyn Alden points out in her recent book, Broken Money, the dollar standard has also been kept alive by military intervention in countries that tried to opt out of the dollar, and American-led economic sanctions. What happens today is that the dollar system runs out of legs, and effectively stears into the abyss. The six features described below are IMO the most important driving forces: 1. The enormous US public debt, which has been monetized by the Federal Reserve’s and other central banks’ moneyprinting.The debt currently sits at about 130% of GDP. Many leading economists today argue that the debt is unsustainable, and that it will continue to rise as the federal government is forced to print money to pay interest and cover other costs, such as the unfunded liabilities caused by the social security system and more. This constitutes what we can call a threat of internal economic implosion, which was the fate that the Soviet Union and the East Bloc countries succumbed to. 2. The reduced ability of the US to weaponize the dollar, due to deindustrialization and a significantly lower manufacturing capacity that the US needs to wage wars that can support the dollar’s dominance. 3. The BRICS countries want out of the system. This constitutes a decentralized threat on a global level against «the rule-based order». 4. The ongoing polarization inside the US federal republic, where some of the states dominated by the Republicans have decided that gold and silver is legal tender, support Bitcoin mining and block the introduction of CBDC. This happens at the same time as they wake up and realize that the exorbitant moneyprinting since before the Great Financial Crisis in 2008, has reallocated a significant share of the wealth from people who define themselves as Republicans to people who say that they are Democrats. (H/t to Balaji S. Srinivasan, who has shed light on this in recent podcasts). This constitutes a threat of internal political implosion. 5. The increased flight of capital into the two escape hatches of gold and Bitcoin. These systems constitute a threat against the dollar in terms of being competing monetary technologies. 6. The rapid distribution of knowledge about money and the effects of inflation as a policy. This constitutes a decentralized threat against the system, at a citizen level. Although it takes time to stop the dollar dominance, the combined effect of these 6 pressure mechanisms is extremely powerful. I believe that it again will be the belief system that decides which monetary system our children will have in the future. People’s knowledge about the effect of the inflation policy, item No. 6 above, is going to drive the processes described in No. 1 to 5. I believe that this is the main motivation when the US government and its allies currently spend so much political capital on limiting free speech. As these developments unfold, I have decided to take on the role of an activist, or prophet if you like, who preaches the following two simple principles: 1. Civilization scales in layers. The people’s belief system is layer zero. The monetary system is layer one. The other parts of a civilized society scale upon the monetary system. 2. There are only two alternative monetary systems. On the one hand, we have monopolization of money with a forced standardization of which money that people can use. And on the other hand, we have monetary freedom, the right to use the money that we like best. I have taken upon me to play this role, because I think these two principles represent perspectives that to little extent are reflected in the public debate today. Although there is a growing realization of the fact that the monetary system has a huge effect on society, and that the current system is intrinsically antithetical to freedom, the significance of the system for the functioning of civilization and how it relates to our belief system is undercommunicated. By emphasizing this, I hope it can inspire people to focus on these two core principles when they dedicate their time and energy to changing today’s policy. I am convinced that having such a lazer-eyed focus will speed up the process. Regarding the choice of monetary system, we basically have three camps today: - The «fiat» camp, who consists of people who support the current system, - The «goldbugs», who support the idea of reintroducing gold as a global reserve currency, and - The «Bitcoiners», who hope Bitcoin can become a new global reserve currency. Unfortunately, the «monetary freedom» camp is almost non-existing. The main reason for this, I believe, is the following: - Rulers have carefully made sure to remove the traces of monetary freedom as a core feature of free civil societies - The political elite has gaslighted the people with false economic theories and ensured that we have a total lack of education of the general public concerning the evils of inflation. Luckily we still have a few resources about monetary freedom, which I also have described in Fraudcoin. This should suffice for now. My upcoming book, Arrow of Truth - from Forseti to Satoshi, will shed more light on these developments throughout history, as well as on the importance of Bitcoin in shaping the future of our belief system and in turn, our monetary system. *** Thank you for reading. Feel free to share it with others, here and in other forums. And if you liked this piece, I appreciate that you hit the like button and follow me.

It's ironic that Bitcoin enables people to use fiat indirectly as a means of wrestling power out of the hands of the rulers. But it begs the question, what will the rulers' countermove be?

You have 5 fundamental human rights: 1 Choose your own belief system 2 Free passage 3 Use the money you like best 4 Property 5 Trade Most other human rights derive from one of these 5. 99,9% of laws that politicians propose encroach on them. Check your belief system.

The importance of accepting the truth. 1. Not copper. Red. The bigger children in my Christian kindergarten bullied me and said, “Rune has red hair, Rune has red hair”. I complained about it to my mother, and I said that I wouldn’t go to the kindergarten anymore. She comforted me, and added, “it isn’t true, you have beautiful copper-brown hair”. My grandmother said the same, “no, Rune, it’s copper”. This didn’t, of course, stop any of the bullying. Christian adults who worked in the kindergarten didn’t try very hard to put an end to it either. They did, however, feed us with a lot of stories about Jesus Christ and how he handled conflicts. Jesus had said, “If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to them the other cheek also”. So, I found myself in some sort of a prison. I had to attend kindergarten, and the rules created by those in charge, meant that my days were awful. Until one day, when something clicked. I came home and said: “No, mama. It’s true that I have red hair”. When the bullies understood that I had accepted my faith, their incentives to behave badly quickly faded. Accepting the truth had made me impervious to their insults. When I look back at this story, I think it was fundamental in shaping my belief system, and that the belief system that I over the years would equip me with made the whole difference to me. 2. People’s belief system is civilizations layer zero. It affects all the other layers. If people have an antihuman belief system, it will harm the rest of the society. It will make us destroy more than we create, which is the very opposite of one of the superpowers that sets us apart from other species. Believing in things that aren’t true is one example of something that is antihuman. If, for instance, enough people believe that the state is benevolent, that it is a creator that helps us, and that we therefore need to be subservient to it, then this an example of a belief system that isn’t true, and that will punish us repeatedly. 3. The golden age At the turning of the 19th Century the western civilization was at the peak of the golden age. It had never happened before in the history of humankind that so many people had been pulled out of poverty. This period, which lasted from the end of the Napoleon war in 1813 and until WWI in 1914, also produced some of the greatest inventions, such as the telegraph, the internal combustion engine and the airplanes. These inventions also represented a tremendous promise to mankind – more freedom, and more safety. 4. The belief system in the golden age The golden 101 years from 1813 to 1914 came about because kings and their people alike where tired of endless wars. These wars had been fueled by inflation – the king’s ability to borrow money from their central banks, which printed money out of nothing. This evil innovation had started in Sweden in 1669. By printing money out of thin air to finance the wars, and requiring everybody to accept the states’ official banknotes, the kings could extract all of the savings of the people and the fruits of their labor, without having to levy unpopular taxes. When the delegates met in 1787 to write the draft paper that would become the United States constitution, several of the founding fathers argued that inflation was a crime against humanity. Their experience with how the Bank of England had supported the English war machine during the American revolution had a lasting effect on the United States. Despite many efforts from powerful financiers throughout the 19thcentury, the US government didn’t establish a central bank until before 1914. In addition to the principles of individual liberty, freedom of speech, protection of property rights and trade, recognizing as a fact that manipulation of the money supply was evil was at the core of the civilization’s development in the golden age. In much of the 19th century, the US was on a de facto “monetary freedom” standard, where people were free to use the money, they liked best. Towards the end of the century, most countries tied their official currencies to gold, ensuring that the money supply increased very slowly. 5. The size of the state in the golden age Sound money and a great deal of respect for individual human rights enabled a century which was unprecedented when it came to peace and prosperity. The flipside was that the state apparatus was very, very small, as compared to what the normal situation is today. The public sector’s use of money in 1900 was 6% of GDP in Norway, and in 1902 it was 7% in the United States. People rarely had anything to do with the state. 6. The tragedy of 1914 and its aftermath When World War I broke out in 1914, most states ordered their central banks to shut the doors to block people from withdrawing golds and their savings from their banks. This kicked off a century of wars and inflation, which has lasted up until today. Once governments again could create money free of charge, they quickly gained in power and size. Over time, the growth and strength they gained due to the inflation policy enabled them to increase taxes. As a result, the public sector’s spending is almost equivalent to two-thirds of the GDP in Norway, and a little less than half of the GDP in the US. This development has developed in tandem with the change in people’s belief systems. Today most people believe that they depend on the state apparatus, and not the other way around. 7. The redhead’s ancestors Let’s jump 1000 years back in time. In my region of Trøndelag, my ancestors enjoyed the rights to use the money that they liked best – monetary freedom. The Trønders’ right to life and property were secured by the law, which had developed spontaneously over generations. Unlike the other regions in the Nordic countries, we had some basic rules which were called the resistance provisions. The Frostating law stated: “No man shall do tilferd* to a man, neither the King nor any other man. But if the King does so, an army arrow [war messenger] shall be cut. It shall go in all eight counties, and all the peasants shall go against the King and kill him if they can. But if the King escapes, he shall never be allowed to return to the country. Whoever will not go against him shall make three marks, and likewise the one who does not pass on the arrow.” «Tilferd*» was the same as someone taking someone else’s property without the consent of the Frostating (the parliament in Trøndelag). The provision set up a principle of separation of powers aimed at protecting the people of Trøndelag against dictatorial royal power. Violation of the law led to harsher punishment for the king than for others. The law entailed both the right and the duty of the Trønders (residents of Trøndelag) to kill the King if he took people’s property, for example by imposing taxes, if it was not previously approved by the Frostating. 8. The belief system in the Viking Age in Trøndelag. The resistance provisions were likely born out of the acknowledgement of the fact that freedom comes at a cost. If you decided to live in this area, you would have to obey the law, pass on the war arrow, and risk your own life to kill the king. 9. The end of monetary freedom in Trøndelag My ancestors’ freedom ended in 1050. It broke down immediately after King Harald Hardraade killed the powerful Trønder, Earl Einar Tambarskjelve, and his son Eindride, and Einars soldiers and the people of Trøndelag didn’t dare to revenge their leader. As soon as Einar was out of the way, Hardraade establish the rule of inflation in Norway. 16 years later, he brought ruin to the Norwegian people when he lost the battle of Stamford Bridge in an effort to conquer the throne of England. 10. Conclusion Now in the last few years, after having studied monetary policy and written books about this, I have realized that there is a fundamental connection between the people’s belief system and the monetary system we get. I have concluded that the monetary system is civilization’s layer one. It’s built on top of the belief system, and it forms the basis for all the other layers. Rule number one in any healthy belief system is that you respect truth for what it is. For me it started when I told my mother about the color of my hair. As I said, my situation in the kindergarten had been prison-like. And with an ever-growing state and human rights that are being eroded in a frightening tempo by the politicians, you might feel something of the same today. As a first step, try to reorient your belief system. Try to identify what you think is true, and respect it. *** Thank you for reading. This piece was partly based on my book Fraudcoin, as well as my upcoming book Arrow of Truth. If you found this interesting, feel free to hit like and follow me here on X.

Once a rebel - always a rebel

It's about 300 years since Voltaire said it.

If I ran for office today, this would be my political platform: 1. Abolish the government's currency monopoly 2. Remove the capital gains tax 3. Cut taxes and public spending 10% per year, every year, in infinity

National currencies are debt money, a.k.a. analogue shitcoins. You must be a finance wiz working for the government to think that piling digital shitcoins like CBDCs on top of a landfill with analogue shitcoins will be a great idea. Good luck, schmuck.

#Bitcoin is self defense

Central banks essentially underwrite crimes against humanity. #fraudcoinbook #Bitcoin    #monetaryfreedom #inflation

Gathering is the new gold standard

There is never a boring moment in the Bitcoin space. The heated discussions on the Bitcoin Improvement Proposal 300 (BIP300) has been a thought provoking spectacle. The debate is in itself a healthy sign. It also reflects that open protocols create coordination problems that can be difficult to solve. The BIP300 debate BIP300 is a proposal which aims at tweaking the core of the Bitcoin network in order to facilitate the development of technical layers that can connect with the core, and which can provide a higher capacity for monetary transactions. The main argument seems to be that developing such services is too costly today because Bitcoin core is clunky, and that speeding up the development of these services is necessary, because governments might soon find out how they can destroy Bitcoin. The rationale seems to be that rapid Bitcoin adaption will make it politically difficult for governments to do this. Changing the Bitcoin protocol involves an unknown risk, and the first counterargument is therefore that the risk has to be close to zero. The Bitcoin maxis argue that it's more important to maintain a robust core network, than to lower the cost of development of services built on top of the core. Challenges with open protocols There are benefits and disadvantages of open protocols. One benefit can for instance be that they attract great minds, and that more brains produce better ideas. Another benefit is that these systems don't have a single attack vector that enemies can exploit. Take out one of the volunteering developers, and ten will replace him - it's a waste of time and money. A disadvantage can be that it can be difficult for the developers to coordinate themselves and agree on which ideas that are best. Another can be that it takes time to solve coordination problems when no single person is appointed leader. The importance of Bitcoin Bitcoin tries to solve civilization's worst problem: Governments' manipulation of the money supply. If it succeeds, it may become a public infrastructure which is as importance to mankind as the open seas. In this perspective, the impatience that some have with implementing BIPs to facilitate faster and better services built on top of the Bitcoin core feels a bit like someone wanting to mix chemicals into the water in an attempt to reduce its density, for the sake of enabling boats to travel faster. In this way, one doesn't have to invest so much in the development of boats. "Smart improvements at the first layer, saves money and time in the development of the second layer." The benefits of manipulating the water might seem obvious, but the risks are of course unknown and potentially huge. Central planners The proponents of rapid development of Bitcoin's core network reminds me of bureaucrats and politicians who always come out in favor of more central planning and technocracy, because they believe free people and non-governmental institutions are unable to coordinate themselves in an efficient way that can serve society. So they come up with plans with the promise of making huge benefits tomorrow, instead of waiting in years for selfish-minded players to get their act together. The government threat Although governments are able to slow down Bitcoin adaption, I have yet to find a convincing argument for how they could be able to destroy Bitcoin. So the question is, why don't the proponents of BIP300 instead try to communicate clear arguments of how governments could succeed with killing off Bitcoin, and facilitate a discussion about it? Do they think it's too urgent? Do we have so little time that we cannot afford to debate the risk first? Or is the argument that discussing the risk openly increase the risk of governments finding a way to destroy Bitcoin? I'm not convinced, but please enlighten me. How to speed up adaption I do think that there are many other reasons why it is good if we can speed up adaption. But there is much that can be achieved at the social layer, especially by making it easier for people to understand what Bitcoin solves, how it solves it and how fast it's already solving it. When I started looking into Bitcoin I noticed that many Bitcoiners said that you need to study Bitcoin and economics for "hundreds" or even "thousands" of hours before you can understand it. For me this looked like an exaggeration, like someone finally had found their tribe, and that they wanted it to be exclusive. But this thought gradually disappeared when I began looking at the litterature. Some of it was pretty good. But the general impression was that information about Bitcoin and the problem it's meant to solve wasn't communicated in a way that was easily accessible for the general public. Most of it was written by technical people for technical people. Other stuff was obviously written by economists for economists. And a suprisingly big share of the litterature was of a philosophical nature, written by and for people who were deep into Bitcoin, and who already understood its technicalities and the economics. The information was also very fragmented. And to make things worse - I often found information that was in contradiction with other information. To me the overall impression can be summed up as an intellectually noisy environment. I get the impression that many others have come to the same conclusion, and that things now seem to improve. I also suspect that we will see noticeable investments flowing into this corner of the Bitcoin space. Furthermore, the demand for information about Bitcoin seems to grow. A significant share of the population might soon begin looking for accessible information that enable them to understand what it is, especially if we get another bullrun. When that happens, we better have to be ready. Conclusion Technical improvements of the Bitcoin protocol might be necessary to tighten the network's security. However, improving the features of Bitcoin core to facilitate a higher adaption speed isn't a compelling argument. There is plenty room to improve things at the social layer instead, especially with regards to how we communicate what Bitcoin is and what it solves. I actually think that this is going to be relatively smooth sailing and that the effects will be massive. The reason why I am optimistic, is the following: Nothing beats the network effect you get when you combine a sound monetary system with sound ideas that are well communicated.

Q: Why does #Bitcoin keep growing so incredibly fast? A: Nothing has a stronger network effect than the combination of knowledge and money

Why does our media fail to see that the political scandals in Støre's cabinet represent a threat to Norway's security? Biden isn’t the only leader of a Western democratic country who has major problems with corruption and other embarrassments. The Prime Minister of Norway, Jonas Gahr Støre, who by the way has in common with Biden that he is one of the favorites of the World Economic Forum, presides over one of the most scandal-ridden cabinets in our nation’s history. Let’s take a look at what we have been entertained with during the last couple of years: In March 2022, Støre lost his Minister of Labor and Social Inclusion, Hadia Tajik. She was considered one of the top political talents in Norway. Tajik was forced to leave due to tax evasion that she started with when she was a member of parliament back in 2006. The scheme went on for several years. Immediately after Tajik left the government, the news broke that Støre’s Minister of Defense, Odd Roger Enoksen, admitted that he had an extramarital affair back in 2005, and that the woman was only 18 years old at the time. Enoksen, who was a member of the parliament while he enjoyed the benefits of being a powerful man, had since long been one of the leaders of the Center Party. Støre’s Foreign Minister, Anniken Huitfeldt, might not have too many skills that we want to brag about to the rest of the world. But she is definitely famous for her selfies. On 27 September she posted one on social media while she attended the funeral of Japan's former prime minister, Shinzo Abe, who was assassinated at a political campaign event. Huitfeldt's political career survived the incident, although I guess she didn’t score too many points with the many Norwegian and foreign diplomats that must work with her. She loves to be in the limelight, and we I'll shortly get back to her again. Two new members of Støre’s cabinet were forced to leave in 2023. Minister of Culture and Equality, Anette Trettebergstuen, lost her job in June due to repeated examples of illegally doling out positions to her friends. And in the beginning of August, the Minister of Research and Education, Ola Borten Moe, had to go. Moe is currently under investigation for insider trading. And finally - yesterday the media presented a new scandal from Støre’s cabinet. It turns out that Ola Flem, the husband of the minister who loves selfies, has had some extreme luck with his stock investments while she has been leading the Foreign Ministry. Among other things, Flem bought stocks in the Norwegian weapon manufacturing company Kongsberg, just two days after Huitfeldt met with Kongsberg’s top leaders. Two weeks after the meeting, Kongsberg’s CEO announced that the Norwegian government had bought several weapon systems that it would be donating to Ukraine. Flem also repeatedly bought and sold stocks in several seafood companies while Huitfeldt and the rest of the cabinet was discussing a proposal to introduce new and harsh taxation of the sea farming industry. Norwegian media now wants to know if Huitfeldt also might be guilty of insider trading. The Minister herself(ie), of course, denies any wrongdoing, and says that Flem never told her about his stock trading. Støre stands firm and says that he still trusts Huitfeldt “as Foreign Minister”. I guess she has in common with Nancy Pelosi that she cannot be blamed for talking while she sleeps. Jokes aside, what we are dealing with here is that we have an example of journalists and editorial boards who can’t see the forest for the trees. They eagerly zoom in on stories about money, sex and nepotism, while they at the same time miss the bigger picture, which in my opinion is all about national security. People like Huitfeldt and the four ministers who had to leave are favorites of the mafia and agents in foreign intelligence services. They just love to have meetings with them where they explain that they know everything about their past wrongdoings. And then they start to squeeze them slowly for confidential information. The main story therefore seems to be that Støre’s cabinet is riddled with scandals to such an extent that we should fear that there might have been several security breaches on his watch. Considering the rather tense geopolitical situation that we have in the world today, this is in my view extremely concerning. In conclusion: Støre’s time as Prime Minister of Norway has been a string of embarrassments. The greater scandal, however, is that our mainstream media fails to ask how big threat his cabinet poses for the national security of Norway.

Everything woke, manmade climate change, vaccination, public education, old media, fiat money and plastic politicians implodes.

I deeply admire the late Norwegian poet and philosopher Odd Børretzen. His poem "Det er ikke sant", which means "It isn't true", is a masterpiece, and I think we need to repeat his message to us as often as possible: *** It isn't true It isn't true that we are like animals that howl at animals with fur in shades of gray other than our own. It isn't true that we growl at shadows on the cave wall because we are afraid of strange shadows, for all animals are afraid of shadows. It isn't true that we creep forward, alert, like cats ready to pounce on sudden dangers and sounds, that we sleep on the run and wake up with open mouths, that we gape at unfamiliar smells, that human mothers hiss at other mothers' children... It isn't true that we are led like predators, blindly, by urges and fears, that we are driven forward by demons inside us, that we are like wolves that hunt in packs, that we must howl when the pack howls, that we can't do anything else because we are animals... It isn't true. It isn't true that we are led by fear of everything that is unknown - that it's not evil - it's horror - because we are animals and burn books on bonfires and scream in chorus with red, gaping mouths at pale, frightened strangers, and write PAKI with black paint in the subway stations, and do our duty with white, closed faces, and follow orders and pick up trembling victims and drive them away in trucks and haul them up in police stations and in sports halls and basements, or that we run in herds with torches and stones through the streets and break windows in shops owned by Jews, and scream "JEW! JEW! JEW!", because we are driven by urges - older than ourselves, urges that drive us, because that's how we are howling, scared animals in a herd... It isn't true. We are not ants or wolves. We are people. We want to whisper warm words to each other and look for each other and caress each other in the dark. The wolves howl in the streets. Afterwards they stand in the shards of glass and scream: "YOU ARE LIKE US! WE ARE WOLVES!" But that isn't true. *** What do you think of this poem? This was an unofficial translation that I made with a little help from google translate. If anyone has an official version - pls let me know.

Wealthy Norwegians relocate to a #Bitcoin city in Switzerland. This is today's frontpage of the biggest financial newspaper in Norway. The headline reads: "65 HAVE MOVED IN ONE YEAR" The news is that over the past 12 months, 65 of the most affluent Norwegians have moved from my country to Switzerland. They moved because they understand simple arithmetics. They are, for instance, able to calculate negative compounding interest. This is basically the same as calculating how fast your wealth halves in value. It enables you to find out if the taxes halves your wealth in for instance 10, 20 or 30 years. For those who already own wealth, this is THE basic lesson. So, the wealthy Norwegians did this calculation. And they didn't like the answer. And therefore they left. Interestingly enough, many of them moved to the city of Lugano. And what is Lugano? It's the city that is trying to become Europe's Bitcoin capital. Kjell Inge Røkke is one of the people who moved. Few Norwegians, if any, own more Bitcoin than he does, through the company named Seetee. Key takeaways: 1. Learn how to calculate negative compounding interest. 2. Choose the type of money you own and use, and where to live wisely. 3. And read up on Bitcoin

The State

Public restroom tagging with meaning: "When the economy crashes, say no to CBDC" Say yes to monetary freedom and decentralization"