0:20BI’ve been working on this book since 2019, and you’re right, it takes a lot of time and effort to write a book, particularly something that’s as well researched and documented as this book.
0:32AYou’re a scholar.
0:33BWell, thank you for that, sir. Uh, some might say that, but I’ll accept it. Um, in terms of -- well, let me tell you the premise of the book, then I’ll tell you what inspired it. Uh, the premise of the book is that as African Americans, our quest for power has been misdirected.
0:51ARather than --
0:52Bwhat we have tended to do is appeal to those who have power to share it with us. What we need to do is instead we need to understand what power is, where power originates from, and then build it for ourselves from the ground up. So what led me to this? Um, I had this question in the back of my mind just years going on from here. Uh, what is it that has been keeping African Americans from achieving power? And, uh, I came up with a definition The definition I use in the book is power is the ability to influence change that is both impactful and long-lasting, particularly as it pertains to the resources required for sustaining life and enhancing the quality of life, as well as generational livelihood.
1:56BSo with that definition, um, I had the I guess a fortunate opportunity to have a long discussion with former Ambassador Andrew Young, and I put that question to him: What’s the one thing you think African Americans need to take control of our own destiny? I was surprised by his answer, but when he gave it to me, it resonated with me. What he said was. African Americans need to understand money, what it is, and how it works. I resonated with it because at that point in my career, at least in my Bitcoin career, I had been studying Bitcoin for 2 years. One of the things I realized as I got deep into my studies of Bitcoin is that I didn’t understand money as well as I thought I did.
2:53BSo when Ambassador Young said that we need to understand our money, I said, bring my experience. So after that, I began doing research, and Ambassador Young recommended some books for me, and I read those. I started reading books on economics and social studies and everything, everything. And doing my research, and then I started Writing the book. And along the way, I took a break and I wrote my first book. It’s called First Steps: An Orange Pill Journey. It’s a beginner’s book about Bitcoin. I did that because I’d been in the Bitcoin space. A lot of people were asking me questions about it, so I wanted to have something that I could give to people who were serious about studying Bitcoin.
3:48AWere you already like a money person working in finance, something like that, before all this Bitcoin stuff? I want to get a little bit about like who we’re speaking to. No, no, I was 25 years.
3:58BEducationally, I have a BS degree from Michigan State. I majored in political science with a minor in economics. Then I went on to Northern Illinois University and got my MBA. Worked in corporate for 25 years. I think having spent that time educational anyway and understanding the political system and economics and then business, that I thought that I was fairly well positioned to be able to take a deep dive and try to understand how and where people reserve anxiety. So I began again, like I said, doing my research and writing a book. And I’m the type of person, I read a book, it cites footnotes, I go to the footnotes, and that leads me on another trip somewhere else. That’s why it took me so long to write the book, because the research was very extensive.
5:00ADue diligence.
5:01BDue diligence, yes, sir. But what the book really does, it’s a detailed -- it goes back to the motherland, back to Africa, pre-colonial days, and then moves forward telling our story as we went through enslavement, the Reconstruction era, Reconstruction era, the Gilded Age, of course with the Civil War, I skipped that. But anyway, fast forward into the Civil Rights era, the Obama era, and the post-Obama era. So up to the current day.
5:46AI haven’t heard it defined as the Obama and post-Obama era, but I like that.
5:49BOkay, well, essentially what What was identified as I looked at each of those specific eras, a common theme ran through them, and that theme was extraction. How our time and energy and value has been extracted from us through each of those eras.
6:10AEvery day, like it’s automated, like the chain of washing is working.
6:14BExactly, exactly. So, uh, recognizing What the problem was, then I had to come up with a solution. So the problem, again, we’ve identified. The solution proposed in the book is what I’m calling the Next Great Migration, a social movement, a mass social movement where African Americans en masse began a process of transitioning, transitioning from, transitioning from the fiat system To the Bitcoin standard, and the book outlines a comprehensive plan on how we go about doing it. Any questions?
6:58AYeah, yeah, I got don’t worry, I got plenty of questions. I can have you here for an hour if you let me.
7:01BWell, I don’t have. Don’t worry.
7:04AYou know, I’m really curious for someone who’s like all that is a casino, like people that scams crypto’s a casino. What do you say to that person?
7:13BI’d say you’re right. 99.999% of it is. I’m not talking about crypto, I’m talking about Bitcoin. Okay, um, sure, there may be some other cryptos out there where you can make money, and I suggest to people, if you can legitimately make money with them, make the money and take it and buy Bitcoin.
7:36AOkay, I hear that. Okay, your entrenchment is getting money, go buy Bitcoin with it.
7:40BI’m not gonna dog them out because I don’t know about I don’t know everything. And that’s one thing I say in the book. I’m not saying that this is the only solution to our problem. But what I do say is that I know for absolute sure what our problem is. And I will accept anyone’s challenge that wants to press me to say that it’s anything different than what we recognize it to be in the book.
8:07ASo I really wanted to get you -- I got what you said, but I think -- so what distinguishes Bitcoin from a casino? How do we look at that and know, like, this isn’t a casino? A lot of people don’t have the due diligence that you’ve done to even be able to distinguish, right? Which for them is why they’re like, I can’t even afford to do the research, play the game, find out. I’d rather do my thing. I believe, I believe in, I believe in the dollar. Dollar’s been here my whole life. What do you say to them?
8:28BI can show you why the dollar is actually a prank. Now regarding the casino, I can’t stop you from going to the casino if you think you’ve got a chance of winning the lottery. Okay? If that’s what you think, if that’s what you --
8:45AIt’s Bitcoin. Why is the dollar not our friend as compared to Bitcoin?
8:54BThe dollar goes up and down also. The dollar is not your friend because the dollar is losing value every day. We look at the high prices of things today. We think that, oh, they raised the prices. Well, the prices have increased because the value of the dollar has decreased. So now you got to have more dollars to buy the same thing today that you paid less for yesterday. So that’s why the dollar is not your friend. And in terms of the casino, casino is when you’re taking a gamble, you’re taking a risk, and you just, you just don’t know what might happen. And there’s an element to that with Bitcoin. We don’t know that Bitcoin is gonna go up in value. It may go down in value. But we do know for sure that the dollar, fiat money, loses value. It’s designed to lose value. The government tells you their goal is 2% inflation. So they tell you it’s 2% inflation. They don’t never get to 2% inflation. They tell you it’s 2%.
10:04AAnd they don’t promise to raise wages to scale.
10:06BNo, they don’t.
10:07ANever will.
10:08BSo let’s go back to, was it 2020 or 2021 when inflation hit 9%? And that’s the government admitted to 9%.
10:18AYeah.
10:18BYou know, if they admit to 9%, it’s probably more like 12%. All right, but let’s just round it up and say that it was 10%. If you’re planning to buy a home and you saved up, say it’s a half a million dollar home, you saved up your $500,000, your $50,000 to put your 10% down payment. When you went to buy that house, because of that 10% inflation, that house has now gone up in value to $550,000. So instead of that $50,000 you got in the bank, you gotta come up with another $5,000.
10:47AWell, your work is worth less in the first place.
10:50BThat’s right. So, so because of that fiat system and the fact that it’s, it’s built upon inflation, debt, and debasement, because of that, we as African Americans and, and people in general, but my focus is on helping my people, uh, the, the, the -- we cannot get ahead because while assets go up in value historically, We don’t own a lot of assets. We tend to operate more on the cash level. And so, you know, we are getting behind the 8-ball. Remember, we started, you know, after enslavement. You know, I used to use the analogy -- I guess I still use periodically -- it’s like, you know, we’re gonna run a 100-yard dash. Okay, but you’re gonna put a ball and chain around my leg and you’re gonna take a 50-yard start, head start, and then you’re gonna fire the starting pistol and say catch up. Okay, that’s what we came into post-slavery, and that, that weight on our ankles, that’s this economic system that we’re living in with today.
12:15AAbsolutely. And so I got 2 more questions. So I spoke to somebody in Times Square. Yes, sir. And, uh, this woman, she asked this question I love. I told her, I’m at this conference here in New York, crypto conference. What are your questions for the experts? I love the question so much I’m asking you. And she said, what are people in the cryptocurrency space, the Bitcoin space, doing to think about people who are in developing markets or in societies that have been, let’s say, colonialized, maybe living in neocolonialism? You know, how do they fit in third world countries people live in? You know, Without opportunity, maybe even power or food, you know, how does this technology consider them? Where do they fit into this picture?
12:45BWell, actually, I think, uh, they’re more fortunate than we are here in the States because they understand that they don’t have a, a financial infrastructure that’s as reliable as the financial infrastructure that we have here in the States. So it gives us a false sense of security here in the States. They understand their situation better. But as far as how that relates to the book, one of the things outlined in the book is what we call a Black Strategic Wealth Fund.
13:26ASo --
13:26BYou got my attention. Okay. Black Strategic Wealth Funds are used by nations to -- well, there are basically 4 things essentially that they do. One, they help to help to fund future generations. Okay, they protect their reserves, so they preserve their reserves with strategic wealth funds. They stabilize the finances within local communities, and they also. Direct, direct capital to priority projects. So the Black Sovereign Wealth Fund that the book proposes will be established not just to help African Americans, but across the diaspora. The fund will be available to do just those things. So we know that there are a lot of opportunities existing back in Africa, in the market, in several countries in Africa that are lacking for capital. Well, the Black Sovereign Wealth Fund, we can prioritize some of those projects and help to fund those types of things.
14:49AAnd really fund a difference at scale, realistically, right? Because your dollar is going to go farther right now.
14:54BThat’s right.
14:55ABut, you know, the reserve will go farther because it’s been built that way, right?
14:57BAbsolutely. Absolutely.
14:59AYou know, I think that’s remarkable. A big mission for me, I’ve been studying crypto the last 4 or 5 years, traveling around the globe until I met Amir, was through the Ethereum ecosystem.
15:06BYou know, I had the really fortunate to make money from NFTs.
15:08AAnd the big thing that I learned is that having really become really interested in Bitcoin, at first I was kind of like, I don’t understand, was the inflation conversation, right? And so I’m curious, what do you think the impact is of, or do you think we’ll see Bitcoin become the global reserve standard? And what does that mean for the dollar and for working-class Americans in a world that we don’t have, you know, then the privilege of this purchasing power that we don’t necessarily, that we do take for granted, frankly?
15:31BWell, I do think that Bitcoin will become a world reserve currency. In terms of what that means for the dollar, I think the dollar will exist alongside Bitcoin, particularly if the government is able to pull off what they’re trying to do right now with stablecoins, having to have to back them by bonds.
15:53ASo the dollar is now stacked on top of that instead of stacked on the rest of the world, even though they still want the reserve. Continue.
15:58BSo I do think that the dollar will continue But that it’s going to hold a different position. It won’t be held in high esteem like it is right now, because with the Bitcoin becoming the world reserve currency, people will have a screen.
16:18ARight now they don’t. We don’t want to lose that, do we? But we do.
16:24BBut I want to thank you for the answers.
16:26AI appreciate it.
16:27BAll right.
16:27AIt’s really nice to meet you.
16:28BIt’s good to meet you also.
16:29ASo I want to tell you one more thing. So We Them Media, right? We’re looking to pivot from doing crypto journalism alone to become a decentralized, like, citizen journalism network. So I have people in Nigeria, Kenya that are on my team, run our live stream, edit some of our content, run our social media, etc. And we want to go out in the street and talk to people. So we’ve been doing street interviews right now. We’re doing a series on inflation. So I’m excited for people to see this series and be able to really like, oh, you know, we’re talking to people in Nigeria, a country that’s seen hyperinflation, to really get their perspective, everyday people. And so if you could ask people around the globe one question, or you could deploy the We Them Media citizen journalism network on your behalf, What question would you want to ask the world?
17:04BWell, the question I would want to ask them is, um, if they really believe that it’s possible to achieve power to control our own destinies, if they believe it is and they just need a roadmap, I’d like for them To get a copy of this book. $5 from the sale of each book is going -- will go to help fund or establish the, the corpus for the sovereign wealth fund, the Black sovereign wealth fund that we’re building. So, uh, again, I would ask them if they believe that achieving power is possible. I think it is. I’ve done the research and it’s backed up and documented in the book. So if you get the book and you can read it and you find that I’ve missed something, um, by all means get in touch with me. But again, I don’t have all the answers. This is an all hands on deck, uh, mission that we’re on. And there’s a place, a part for everyone to play. So I appeal to you to get the book, learn about our mission. Again, the, the next great migration, it starts with us. It starts with you, you, and you, all of us. Thank you, my brother.
18:41AThank you. It’s really a privilege. Good luck with your book. I’m excited to be able to see this video. I’m gonna have it set up so that our videos, our short-form videos, funnel people to be able to purchase your book. So we can establish this fund, and I’m excited for people to be able to learn from it. So thank you for doing your research.
18:55BLet me give you a copy of the book.
18:58AI like an airdrop. Hardcover?
19:02BYou want a hardcover?
19:03ANo, no, I could go either way. I like a hardcover book, but I go either way. I keep books.
19:07BAll right, so, so you see, these are not for sale yet. The official launch is, uh, October 10th. On the 10th of October.
19:14AOkay.
19:14BAll right, so you’re getting, uh, but they got -- people can pre-order from there.
19:19ABut, uh, this is a book.
19:22BYeah.
19:22AProfessors are going to be having their students read this. This is going to be in syllabuses. It’s in my syllabus right now, that part.
