Crypto Critics' Corner

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Episode 175 – The Mythical Crypto Swing Voter (feat. Nitish Pahwa)

Crypto politics (feat. Nitish Pahwa) – Crypto Critics' Corner

Bennett Tomlin and Cas Piancey are joined by Nitish Pahwa of Slate to discuss whether or not there are actually cryptocurrency swing voters and what they mean for crypto politics and AmericaThis video was recorded on June 3rd, 2025.Additional episodes mentioned in this episode:Episode 171 – Is $TRUMP corrupt?Episode 126 – They May Be All-In, But We’re OutEpisode 166 – End the FedEpisode 167 – What happened to the SEC? (feat. Corey Frayer)Additional resources:Federal Reserve report

Cas Piancey and Bennett Tomlin are joined by Nitish Pahwa of Slate to discuss whether or not there are actually cryptocurrency swing voters and what they mean for crypto politics.

This podcast was recorded on June 3rd, 2025.

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English Transcript:

00:00:05:03 - 00:00:12:10
Cas Piancey
Welcome back everyone. I am Cas Piancey. I'm joined, as usual by my partner in crime, Mr. Bennett Tomlin. How are you today?

00:00:12:12 - 00:00:14:06
Bennett Tomlin
I'm making do. How are you, Cas?

00:00:14:08 - 00:00:28:13
Cas Piancey
Whatever. But we are joined by a very special guest. Nitish Pahwa. from slate. Journalist covering business, tech over at slate. We're having you on today. Very special guest. How are you? First of all.

00:00:28:15 - 00:00:31:01
Nitish Pahwa
I'm great. Thanks for having me. Big.

00:00:31:01 - 00:00:32:16
Nitish Pahwa
Fan of the podcast, as you know.

00:00:32:18 - 00:00:42:12
Cas Piancey
Well, it's been, it's been an exciting time to still be covering this. We're going to get into a lot of stuff today. But I think you wanted to start off today talking about

00:00:42:12 - 00:01:05:14
Cas Piancey
the kind of misconception that a lot of cryptocurrency lobbyists, executives, cap venture capitalists have put forward as to there being this huge swath of crypto voters, that they, they themselves, are responsible for the Democrats losing.

00:01:05:16 - 00:01:18:08
Cas Piancey
And then the now Federal Reserve report coming out, kind of pushing forward the idea that that is a bunch of baloney. But, yeah. Can you can you explain, both sides of this argument?

00:01:18:08 - 00:01:19:22
Nitish Pahwa
Yeah, absolutely.

00:01:20:00 - 00:01:31:04
Nitish Pahwa
So it was interesting. I, covered the SBF trial for slate, you know, going down to, Southern District, New York. Miss you all there. Hope you all are good.

00:01:31:06 - 00:01:33:19
Nitish Pahwa
And, when, you.

00:01:33:19 - 00:01:57:03
Nitish Pahwa
Know, after that was over, like a lot of my colleagues I remember kind of had the impression that that was like, over for crypto as well, like just as a whole. Right. And I think, you know, to be fair, that was a generally widely shared perception, even after like, the crypto winter of a 2022, which of course, was, very Sam Bankman-Fried fueled.

00:01:57:05 - 00:01:58:22
Nitish Pahwa
But what was.

00:01:58:22 - 00:02:06:09
Nitish Pahwa
Interesting was to see as, the election season was ramping up when, Joe Biden was still in the race. Remember that guy?

00:02:06:13 - 00:02:10:18
Nitish Pahwa
There was, this just like huge, huge.

00:02:10:18 - 00:02:31:01
Nitish Pahwa
Fundraising effort from a lot of big folks still in the crypto space. So like Brian Armstrong from Coinbase, most, infamously and most prominently, but also executives from places like ripple, from Solana, from other places that.

00:02:31:03 - 00:02:36:17
Nitish Pahwa
I think notably had, brushed up against, the Biden administration.

00:02:36:17 - 00:02:41:04
Nitish Pahwa
And, Gary Gensler in some, regulatory and,

00:02:41:06 - 00:02:49:19
Nitish Pahwa
Legal conflicts. So there they like, established all these PACs, these organizations.

00:02:49:19 - 00:02:50:12
Nitish Pahwa
And.

00:02:50:14 - 00:02:55:20
Nitish Pahwa
Just these other like, entities for taking.

00:02:55:23 - 00:03:25:11
Nitish Pahwa
And spending money on a bunch of, like, very closely targeted political races, like, I think their first really big victory was when they spent a ton in, the Democrats California Senate primary. And, because, then Representative Katie Porter, who was running, had had had a lot to say about crypto, much of it negative. They spent a lot on attack ads against her.

00:03:25:11 - 00:03:31:11
Nitish Pahwa
And I mean, Adam Schiff, one out. He is California senator now, for better or worse.

00:03:31:11 - 00:03:31:20
Nitish Pahwa
also.

00:03:31:21 - 00:03:35:05
Nitish Pahwa
Notably voting for crypto legislation. But we'll get to that in a bit.

00:03:35:05 - 00:03:36:15
Nitish Pahwa
You know, fresh off of.

00:03:36:19 - 00:03:38:10
Nitish Pahwa
You know, victories like that.

00:03:38:10 - 00:03:39:03
Nitish Pahwa
Which like,

00:03:39:03 - 00:03:40:00
Nitish Pahwa
there's only, I.

00:03:40:00 - 00:03:48:05
Nitish Pahwa
Think, so much you can attribute to them in terms of like the actual victory, like, you know, in that race in particular, Schiff had been polling already quite high.

00:03:48:05 - 00:03:51:05
Nitish Pahwa
Even before the attack ads were railing in. Yes.

00:03:51:10 - 00:04:10:09
Nitish Pahwa
And in fact, his own campaign had, infamously, my colleague Alex Salmon covered this for us, but, was, boosting his Republican opponent in the primary. California nonpartisan primary. So that, it could be an easy win and runoff come November.

00:04:10:11 - 00:04:17:22
Nitish Pahwa
Yeah. So you it's unclear, you know, how much this money actually contributed, but nevertheless.

00:04:18:00 - 00:04:32:14
Nitish Pahwa
It's obviously something you can just point to and then go from there. Right. And then these PACs, you know, they're raising even more money from a ton of, like, individual crypto company employees and executives. They're like putting out this.

00:04:32:14 - 00:04:33:10
Nitish Pahwa
Polling.

00:04:33:10 - 00:04:36:22
Nitish Pahwa
Saying, like, there are all these, people in swing states.

00:04:36:22 - 00:04:37:21
Nitish Pahwa
Who are.

00:04:37:21 - 00:04:46:16
Nitish Pahwa
Really concerned about crypto. They think every day about Gary Gensler, who haunts them in their nightmares and, is like ruining.

00:04:46:16 - 00:04:50:02
Nitish Pahwa
Their financial freedom. And it became.

00:04:50:02 - 00:05:13:16
Nitish Pahwa
Such a pitch like cause from these people specifically that, like, I think a lot of lawmakers and like, candidates were spooked into thinking that. Yeah. Oh my God, wait, the crypto thing is still going on. And I mean, the stink of the Sam Bankman-Fried campaign donations hadn't even really warmed up yet until this money started pouring in. And, I mean.

00:05:13:17 - 00:05:16:12
Nitish Pahwa
And I think, they were scared, not least.

00:05:16:12 - 00:05:38:18
Nitish Pahwa
Because, again, very strategically, these PACs were targeting very close in key races. There was the Ohio Senate race. There's the Montana Senate race. There were all these things that were going to be key for both, Republicans and Democrats. And, I mean, we all know what happened in November. It was, you know, there were quite a few Republican victories up and down the ticket.

00:05:38:18 - 00:06:01:11
Nitish Pahwa
And in cases where there were, Democratic victories like, Elissa Slotkin and her close race in Michigan, she had also received quite a bit of crypto PAC money. And now we're in a place where the president has a meme coin. And, crypto interest and God knows what else right now. Like the truth social crypto arm.

00:06:01:11 - 00:06:02:09
Nitish Pahwa
Right.

00:06:02:11 - 00:06:15:12
Nitish Pahwa
We have the AI and crypto advisors. We have, like, Brian Armstrong and all these guys just like dining out at the white House and Marc Andreessen and advising appointments and, it's weird.

00:06:15:12 - 00:06:20:17
Nitish Pahwa
It's a really weird time. And the thing is, you know, people are.

00:06:20:19 - 00:06:27:12
Nitish Pahwa
Again, people are thinking thanks to these, like, really mocked up polls and, you know, all this other like, electoral victory, they're like.

00:06:27:14 - 00:06:31:08
Nitish Pahwa
Okay, but are people, like using crypto now?

00:06:31:08 - 00:06:32:07
Nitish Pahwa
Is it back after all.

00:06:32:07 - 00:06:37:14
Nitish Pahwa
These years of scamming? And it's really not. And there are a few signs you.

00:06:37:14 - 00:06:40:14
Nitish Pahwa
Could point to there, but I'll stop talking. That's just.

00:06:40:14 - 00:07:22:00
Cas Piancey
Not no. So I like for me one of the things you brought up here, it just, struck a nerve for me because I had recently gotten into an argument with Mark Cuban on Blueksy and, and, multiple people basically got into my DMs to tell me that his take was identical to the take that venture capitalists and lobbyists for the cryptocurrency, you know, industry, had pitched this, like, as a bullshit propaganda concept in 2023, or 2022.

00:07:22:00 - 00:07:33:23
Cas Piancey
Like, they had long ago figured out how they were going to attack, politicians and pushed this idea on to influential donors, I guess is what I'll call someone like Mark Cuban.

00:07:33:23 - 00:07:47:00
Cas Piancey
And that Mark Cuban had completely fallen for it, right? That Mark Cuban here he was talking about these crypto voters. If if we had just convinced these 200,000 young white men to vote differently, everything would be different right now.

00:07:47:00 - 00:08:14:14
Cas Piancey
And I think, me, Nathan Tankus, other people jumped in to be like Mark, it's the money, right? And I think that's what you're talking about right now is that we can. I agree that crypto deeply influenced the election. And I do think that these people got Trump. They helped get Trump elected. But it's not because there's this huge swath of people from, you know, from the people stuck in poverty to the to the wealthy white people in the suburbs.

00:08:14:14 - 00:08:27:19
Cas Piancey
Like, I know that is not who cared about cryptos, a few executives, and they're hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars, right? Like it's just infuriating to invent an entire class of people that does not exist.

00:08:27:21 - 00:08:30:08
Nitish Pahwa
Right. And I think one of the.

00:08:30:09 - 00:08:38:01
Nitish Pahwa
Very key telltale signs of that fact was that the what one of the key PACs in question was called fairshake. A.

00:08:38:01 - 00:08:38:10
Nitish Pahwa
Lot of the.

00:08:38:10 - 00:08:43:18
Nitish Pahwa
Ads, they bankrolled did not talk about crypto at all. They were targeted.

00:08:43:18 - 00:08:44:01
Nitish Pahwa
In all.

00:08:44:01 - 00:08:48:02
Nitish Pahwa
These swing districts, states that, you know, they were just blanketed.

00:08:48:04 - 00:08:49:00
Nitish Pahwa
Did not talk.

00:08:49:00 - 00:09:00:09
Nitish Pahwa
About crypto even once. They were just like going off the normal, like, campaign issues that really were there in 20, you know, inflation, the economy, immigration, etc., etc.

00:09:00:09 - 00:09:01:06
Nitish Pahwa
You would think.

00:09:01:06 - 00:09:09:22
Nitish Pahwa
That you'd be finally honing this pitch to these supposedly like essential swing voters, like by speaking their language straight up.

00:09:09:22 - 00:09:32:18
Bennett Tomlin
And part of like this whole thing makes this whole thing interesting to me was kind of Sam Bankman-Fried was in some sense disruptive to like the existing political structures that the crypto industry was already building in 2022, when Sam Bankman-Fried decided to get involved in politics, he went through, like his mother, mind the gap in that kind of thing.

00:09:32:22 - 00:09:58:04
Bennett Tomlin
Instead of heavily interfacing with a lot of the existing crypto lobbying advisory and other organizations like that. And then he came in and he donated money to one out of every three members of Congress or whatever crazy number it was, and just, like, blanketed it and blew it up. And then more than that, he specifically used that huge amount of money that he invested basically out of nowhere, like 2020.

00:09:58:04 - 00:10:29:04
Bennett Tomlin
He was just focused, mostly just focused on the presidential. And then by 2022, like shortly before he goes bankrupt, he's giving to one out of three of the people in Congress. And so, like the speed at which he scaled that up meant he was like already outside of the existing structures. And then from outside those structures, he advanced things like the Digital Commodity Consumer Protection Act, which was not super popular among a lot of the cryptocurrency industry, because it would have effectively prevented a lot of existing DeFi.

00:10:29:05 - 00:10:47:23
Bennett Tomlin
So any like DeFi or what we would now call Web3 or things like that, companies were not in favor of a lot of the legislation and stuff that Sam Bankman-Fried was using his dollars to invest, and even some who could kind of like part of the thing with the digital, Money Consumer Protection Act is it was really centralizing.

00:10:47:23 - 00:11:15:16
Bennett Tomlin
You had to basically go through these centralized actors if you wanted to use these things. And even despite that, some people like, Coinbase were not super enthused about the way this bill was being advanced. And so, when Sam Bankman-Fried disappeared because of his criminality, it gave the industry the, opportunity to use all the money they still had, because anyone who didn't have money on FTX still did have some money.

00:11:15:20 - 00:11:39:20
Bennett Tomlin
And then they said, well, everyone's been compromised. Might as well keep the compromise going. And then start pushing for bills like fit 21, which, unlike DCCPA, was designed in a way to try to exempt a larger amount of the cryptocurrency industry from regulation rather than trying to make it like, if you want to access crypto, you have to go through one of these centralized intermediaries.

00:11:39:22 - 00:11:43:20
Bennett Tomlin
And so, like they were able to very quickly reengage in that way.

00:11:44:17 - 00:12:16:02
Bennett Tomlin
The other part that's kind of interesting to me here is like I was I thought there was an opportunity that crypto might effectively die in the United States. But I think for that to have happened, the like Democrats would have probably needed to win the House and the presidency. And then like, make it part of an anti-corruption like pitch or package where they're going after crypto to try to distance themselves from Sam Bankman-Fried and separate themselves out as like some kind of anticorruption thing.

00:12:16:04 - 00:12:23:11
Bennett Tomlin
And that didn't happen. And the pro corruption forces did win. And so like that to me, kind of like also

00:12:23:11 - 00:12:36:05
Bennett Tomlin
having Donald Trump available when he is so receptive to pitches that come from people with money is very useful for people with a lot of money. And that's the cryptocurrency executives.

00:12:36:05 - 00:12:37:19
Nitish Pahwa
Did did you guys see that.

00:12:37:21 - 00:12:53:09
Nitish Pahwa
Clip from the All In podcast where Chamath famous he played it in Solana Bowl. Was talking about how he could never get anyone on the line at the Biden White House, but under Trump now he can talk to anybody.

00:12:53:11 - 00:13:07:08
Cas Piancey
Yeah. And like saying it, saying it completely dis like disassociated from the idea that like, do you see the problem here? See the problem here, dude, do you understand how this could be an issue? Because, like, I can't get the president's ear.

00:13:07:08 - 00:13:09:21
Bennett Tomlin
never once had a president listen to me.

00:13:09:21 - 00:13:10:04
Nitish Pahwa
Yeah.

00:13:10:09 - 00:13:12:23
Bennett Tomlin
Says Cas

00:13:12:23 - 00:13:21:02
Cas Piancey
Well, it's just ironic to me that that mega, ultra wealthy guys like, I gave him a bunch of money, and now he's listening to me, and I love that. And I'm just like,

00:13:21:02 - 00:13:28:20
Cas Piancey
okay, that's called a club. It's called a kleptocracy. I like that it's fine. But you should understand what you're endorsing, which is just a kleptocracy.

00:13:28:20 - 00:13:31:22
Cas Piancey
You you don't care about democracy. You don't care about the issues.

00:13:31:22 - 00:13:36:10
Cas Piancey
It's more of the invented crypto voter. The all important,

00:13:36:10 - 00:13:44:08
Cas Piancey
part of this for me is like. And what jobs is this bringing to the to the mainland? Like, what are we fighting for right now? What exactly are these?

00:13:44:08 - 00:14:01:07
Cas Piancey
crypto like? What does Fair Shake want? What is it that they need that is going to benefit every American access to the slot machine? I don't think that that's benefiting most Americans. Right. So it's like what? What on principle, what are you fighting for? And I think you kind of drive a really meaningful point where it's like

00:14:01:07 - 00:14:02:02
Cas Piancey
nothing

00:14:02:02 - 00:14:38:10
Bennett Tomlin
And I think that also kind of is like a response to Mark Cuban's entire argument is like, what policy wise did you actually want to be different? And how much of that was just enabling a bunch of these people who you say are disadvantaged? You you say you're at this like problematic position where they are depositing their entire paychecks to Robinhood and putting their entire $20 net worth into Dogecoin or whatever, which was like a hypothetical Mark Cuban had like, is it good that that person with a $20 net worth can go and put it all on Dogecoin after depositing their entire paycheck?

00:14:38:12 - 00:14:57:10
Bennett Tomlin
Is that socially beneficial? Do we want to have a system in which that is the basis that we need that? Right? That's the person you want to appeal to. By making it as easy as possible to get to that slot machine. Like fundamentally, they're the crypto industry was never going to accept any kind of regulation. And they worked very effectively at like

00:14:57:10 - 00:15:11:04
Bennett Tomlin
after Sam Bankman-Fried set the standard of spending, so many of the other executives realized they needed to open their wallets, donate to the PACs, and create, like a similar size war chest so that they could continue that type of donation.

00:15:11:04 - 00:15:31:15
Cas Piancey
I have an important question, though, like, do you think having seen the numbers go up in not in terms of users, the numbers go up in terms of value. And a president that is incredibly focused on this stuff, it seems like over instead of like 100 deals in 100 days, he's putting out a crypto wallet.

00:15:31:17 - 00:15:47:15
Cas Piancey
You know, like we're we're doing, NFTs. We're doing meme coin. You went over it at the beginning. There's a bunch of stuff crypto related, that he's constantly pushing. We have an ROI in cryptos are with David Sax. We right. Like crypto is taking a front and center.

00:15:47:15 - 00:15:50:10
Cas Piancey
import for a bunch of these people.

00:15:50:10 - 00:15:52:12
Cas Piancey
And I'm just curious what you think that means

00:15:52:12 - 00:16:02:09
Cas Piancey
for the future of crypto, but also for the future politics, for the future of, your beat that you're covering. Like what? Like. Yeah. Like what do you what do you think?

00:16:02:09 - 00:16:03:22
Nitish Pahwa
Well, the future of my beat.

00:16:03:22 - 00:16:07:19
Nitish Pahwa
I mean, there's definitely no shortage of stories every single day. I'll tell you what.

00:16:07:21 - 00:16:12:15
Nitish Pahwa
But, I mean, same same for you guys. Do, I mean, I remember.

00:16:12:15 - 00:16:17:05
Nitish Pahwa
Cas, when I, reached out to you guys about a piece I wrote, like. Oh, yeah? Where where does.

00:16:17:05 - 00:16:17:21
Nitish Pahwa
Crypto media.

00:16:17:21 - 00:16:25:09
Nitish Pahwa
Go now after this, crypto winter and, guess what? Still around. But anyway, I digress.

00:16:25:11 - 00:16:27:16
Nitish Pahwa
Yeah, the value thing is.

00:16:27:16 - 00:16:28:14
Nitish Pahwa
Very interesting to.

00:16:28:14 - 00:16:29:03
Nitish Pahwa
Me.

00:16:29:03 - 00:16:29:19
Nitish Pahwa
I think there.

00:16:29:19 - 00:16:32:06
Nitish Pahwa
Are a few things to keep in mind here.

00:16:32:07 - 00:16:33:23
Nitish Pahwa
Because that's one.

00:16:34:02 - 00:16:47:18
Nitish Pahwa
Instance where you can just like look at these numbers and be like, oh yeah, number go up. Everything is looking peachy. You know, Bitcoin is finally at six digits. Congrats to, all pizza buyers everywhere.

00:16:47:18 - 00:16:48:21
Nitish Pahwa
know, and you mentioned.

00:16:48:21 - 00:17:01:03
Nitish Pahwa
This, the point Bennett, which is that the Bitcoin trading volumes, the actual numbers there are pretty down from where they were even just last year, like a few years before that.

00:17:01:04 - 00:17:05:18
Bennett Tomlin
Trading volumes are still decent. Transaction volumes are pretty low transaction volumes.

00:17:05:18 - 00:17:10:02
Nitish Pahwa
Sorry about that. Yeah. Big big difference. Big difference. Yeah.

00:17:10:04 - 00:17:39:02
Cas Piancey
Yeah I mean it does it's not a big difference insofar as like you're right that I guess for years now that's what they're they've all admitted that it's basically just speculation and trading. But like as Bennett is pointing out, if the if the transactions aren't occurring, it means it's not being used actually, and and it is an important it's only important insofar as like people aren't using it for what it's designed for, if it's actually designed for anything outside of speculation.

00:17:39:04 - 00:17:41:23
Nitish Pahwa
Right. 100% like.

00:17:42:01 - 00:17:44:15
Nitish Pahwa
And in a way you can see this.

00:17:44:15 - 00:17:54:14
Nitish Pahwa
As, crypto kind of like in its own, like self-perpetuating vibes feedback loop. It's like, you know, all the last year, it's like, okay, we're seeing.

00:17:54:16 - 00:17:55:05
Nitish Pahwa
Political.

00:17:55:05 - 00:18:01:22
Nitish Pahwa
Organizing. We're seeing, people make these very public statements. We're now seeing politicians flock to this thing.

00:18:02:00 - 00:18:03:17
Nitish Pahwa
For any other product or.

00:18:03:17 - 00:18:15:18
Nitish Pahwa
Sector. Obviously, that's going to lead to a stock, price increase, right? Whether or not that's actually warranted down the line, just general bullishness encourages encourages investor bullishness.

00:18:15:19 - 00:18:18:10
Nitish Pahwa
But if you look at.

00:18:18:10 - 00:18:19:00
Nitish Pahwa
The.

00:18:19:00 - 00:18:20:00
Nitish Pahwa
Federal Reserve's.

00:18:20:00 - 00:18:35:00
Nitish Pahwa
Report, that just came out very recently, I want to give a shout out to Molly White, who's been very good at both, debunking, these, organizers, polling methodologies and their, user ship numbers.

00:18:35:00 - 00:18:35:18
Cas Piancey
I legit that you're.

00:18:35:23 - 00:18:44:16
Bennett Tomlin
Saying sending a push notification to Coinbase users is a bad way to get a judge of the overall nation's use of crypto?

00:18:44:18 - 00:18:49:04
Nitish Pahwa
Look, I, I I'm not a pollster, but I, I'm not an expert.

00:18:49:10 - 00:18:54:18
Cas Piancey
But I thought you were going to say I want to give a shout out to Jerome Powell. And I was like, oh, wow, this is going in a weird direction.

00:18:54:19 - 00:18:57:08
Nitish Pahwa
Oh, I will say,

00:18:57:08 - 00:18:59:07
Nitish Pahwa
big shout out to our boy. I hope, he.

00:18:59:07 - 00:19:00:17
Nitish Pahwa
Can survive up there because,

00:19:00:20 - 00:19:06:04
Cas Piancey
Oh, no chance. Yeah. These days, his days are numbered for sure. Yeah.

00:19:06:06 - 00:19:10:12
Nitish Pahwa
He's kind of our last vote, but, yeah, as, the Federal Reserve for now,

00:19:10:14 - 00:19:16:03
Nitish Pahwa
Still remains, an independent institution. God knows what will happen when, that's no longer the case.

00:19:16:03 - 00:19:18:11
Nitish Pahwa
They've come out with a report showing that.

00:19:18:17 - 00:19:28:11
Nitish Pahwa
Ever since 2021, which is when they started tracking, cryptocurrency, like user ship, ownership numbers. It's gone down.

00:19:28:13 - 00:19:30:22
Nitish Pahwa
It's gone down every single year. And even at its peak in.

00:19:30:22 - 00:19:50:10
Nitish Pahwa
2021, which, you know, was actually a time when late night hosts were hawking the stuff, there was, you know, at least like a very well documented boom in NFTs from like, art world folks and, just general interest and some of these other alternative currencies, which, you know.

00:19:50:12 - 00:19:57:01
Nitish Pahwa
Whatever you make of it, there was a certain surge. But if you look at the actual.

00:19:57:01 - 00:20:06:12
Nitish Pahwa
Numbers for any use of cryptocurrencies since 2021, it goes from 12% all the way down to 8% as of 2024.

00:20:06:14 - 00:20:13:19
Nitish Pahwa
I mean, you you got you guys tell me I'm not a mathematician. Does that seem like, a lot of Americans are suddenly very enthusiastic about this stuff?

00:20:13:20 - 00:20:31:19
Cas Piancey
It doesn't. It doesn't. But I do want to say that part of part of this part of my questioning here, though, is that, like, so we've seen this decrease in numbers. But as you've pointed out, you know, it's not like I mean, Democrats are now just in the fold, right? Like there's no reason there is no opposition to crypto anymore.

00:20:31:19 - 00:20:34:16
Cas Piancey
I right. Okay. Right. If you if you want to push back on.

00:20:34:16 - 00:20:37:01
Nitish Pahwa
That, I mean it's it's it's Elizabeth.

00:20:37:01 - 00:20:39:17
Nitish Pahwa
Warren shout out to her. But yeah, I mean.

00:20:39:17 - 00:21:11:11
Bennett Tomlin
Diane, Diane Feinstein blew up the one vote for, to hold the bipartisan hearing or whatever. Like there's not no resistance. Gillibrand seems confused about what the bills she supposedly co-sponsored contains, but that's Gillibrand, you know, like, it's not that there's no risk. Like if there was really no opposition, both the Genius Act and the FIT 21 derivative that they're trying to get through as the Market Structure Act would have already passed and been signed.

00:21:11:11 - 00:21:20:16
Bennett Tomlin
Right. Like, clearly there is some amount of legal legislative difficulty in getting to 60 votes on those, you know.

00:21:20:18 - 00:21:21:17
Nitish Pahwa
That is a fair point.

00:21:21:17 - 00:21:24:05
Nitish Pahwa
That is an extremely fair point.

00:21:24:05 - 00:21:27:03
Nitish Pahwa
And I think, you can probably.

00:21:27:03 - 00:21:30:13
Nitish Pahwa
Attribute that to the fact that there have been like.

00:21:30:15 - 00:21:31:12
Nitish Pahwa
Local.

00:21:31:18 - 00:22:00:23
Nitish Pahwa
Regulations and problems even in like red states where like supposedly, you know, they're supposed to be all super pro, Bitcoin pro crypto. But, you know, there's a great, very sad and worrying, piece that, time magazine wrote, Andrew Chao, a friend of mine from the crypto, from the SBF trial room, where he talked to, like, these residents of a small town where a Bitcoin farm was set up and they're all like, hey, our.

00:22:00:23 - 00:22:02:01
Nitish Pahwa
Health has not been great.

00:22:02:01 - 00:22:03:20
Nitish Pahwa
Since, this thing came to town.

00:22:03:20 - 00:22:07:14
Nitish Pahwa
It's very noisy. We're getting extremely I remember this.

00:22:07:14 - 00:22:08:07
Nitish Pahwa
And.

00:22:08:09 - 00:22:13:12
Nitish Pahwa
We are also definitely not seeing any of the supposed, like, riches.

00:22:13:12 - 00:22:17:13
Nitish Pahwa
Benefits from having this thing here. Added to that,

00:22:17:15 - 00:22:19:22
Nitish Pahwa
Not too long ago, the state of.

00:22:19:22 - 00:22:40:04
Nitish Pahwa
Arkansas, which is otherwise been, you know, pretty pro crypto generally, they passed their own like environmental regulations on, crypto. I mean, they weren't like super extensive. I don't want to make it seem like they've, all of a sudden start caring about climate change, but, like, they have, like, their own, like, reservations about.

00:22:40:04 - 00:22:42:15
Nitish Pahwa
Like, okay, where should these things be built?

00:22:42:15 - 00:22:45:10
Nitish Pahwa
How often should these operating systems be hunting?

00:22:45:15 - 00:22:47:21
Nitish Pahwa
And it's also coming at a time.

00:22:47:21 - 00:22:52:18
Nitish Pahwa
When there's a lot of competition for you. Space from AI exclusive data centers. Right.

00:22:52:19 - 00:22:55:18
Nitish Pahwa
And I mean, you know, you can, put together the job.

00:22:55:18 - 00:23:00:12
Nitish Pahwa
Titles all you want, you know, David Sacks can be both AI and crypto, but.

00:23:00:14 - 00:23:01:09
Nitish Pahwa
The the.

00:23:01:09 - 00:23:12:16
Nitish Pahwa
Issue there is the fact that these AI training processes, data sets are going to require their own like huge data center complexes, and they're not going to.

00:23:12:18 - 00:23:13:21
Nitish Pahwa
Exactly play super.

00:23:13:21 - 00:23:17:05
Nitish Pahwa
Well with, the crypto towers are coming to town.

00:23:17:05 - 00:23:19:07
Nitish Pahwa
But to go back to an earlier question.

00:23:19:07 - 00:23:26:08
Nitish Pahwa
You were, saying Cas, which is like, what are the benefits here? What are people fighting for? I mean, like, they don't want these big ass.

00:23:26:08 - 00:23:31:07
Nitish Pahwa
Like, computer systems coming to their backyard. They want housing.

00:23:31:09 - 00:24:02:09
Bennett Tomlin
But and I think it's funny that you reference like, that the AI data centers are good for the crypto people because so many of the like, Bitcoin mining firms that had like secured power contracts or had started construction and data centers but haven't, like, actually gotten their antminers to shove in there yet, have started trying to convert their data centers over to AI data centers because they think they're merging is better running an AI data center than trying to mine Bitcoin, which it is, because mining Bitcoin is an awful business with awful margins that you could not convince me to get involved in.

00:24:02:11 - 00:24:07:02
Bennett Tomlin
But that's a separate issue. Yeah, I'm not Eric Trump. I don't need to try to make the numbers work.

00:24:07:03 - 00:24:09:12
Cas Piancey
He doesn't need to make the numbers work either, to be fair.

00:24:09:12 - 00:24:14:18
Bennett Tomlin
But yeah, I mean, I guess when HUT8 just gives you their machines for it or whatever, you can do whatever you want.

00:24:14:20 - 00:24:16:19
Cas Piancey
And Daddy President yeah for sure.

00:24:16:19 - 00:24:31:00
Bennett Tomlin
yeah. We don't see the jobs. We don't see these things actually embedded in the communities. And what's kind of interesting to me and what's been kind of hard for me to judge, is we've seen this fall from 12% to 8%. And I expect that kind of between cycles for crypto. Cas

00:24:31:00 - 00:24:54:03
Bennett Tomlin
And I have been around for a couple cycles now. And generally you see, like the price starts to surge, then people come in, then the price goes down and then people start to leave. But like the important part of that cycle has always been that the cryptocurrency community itself has been good at, like converting the mass. They convert some small percentage of the mass they attract into, like true believers.

00:24:54:05 - 00:25:19:14
Bennett Tomlin
Yes. And and they keep the true believers to stick around. And what's been kind of strange is like, and this is probably like a confounding variable is I, I feel like I see fewer true believers than I used to and like the confounding variable. I think here might be that Elon Musk broke Twitter and like crypto, Twitter was how I stayed connected to kind of like the true believers in the broader industry as a whole.

00:25:19:19 - 00:25:32:06
Bennett Tomlin
But like, there are a lot of dumb arguments for the prominent people in crypto. And like a lot of people who've gone silent or whose only posts are about politics and stuff now, like there has been some kind of

00:25:32:06 - 00:25:35:23
Bennett Tomlin
vibe shift in crypto, and it feels like it's related to the fact that,

00:25:35:23 - 00:25:49:12
Bennett Tomlin
it feels as though this particular increase in price was driven by like a couple things conveniently coming together, like, they got the approval for the ETFs under the despotic rule of Gary Gensler.

00:25:49:12 - 00:25:51:11
Bennett Tomlin
He allowed those ETFs to start trading,

00:25:51:11 - 00:26:12:17
Bennett Tomlin
which opened up more liquidity and made a bunch of like trad fi people see a place to earn fees, and they love places to earn fees. That's like their favorite type of business. And it also then, enabled a bunch of the, like, worst men on earth cryptocurrency executives to think, to act out power fantasies that they've had for a long time.

00:26:12:19 - 00:26:35:17
Bennett Tomlin
And like, like Sam Bankman-Fried was trying to do like Sam Bankman-Fried at some level felt like he believed his political donations bought him political access and political pull in a way that made him important enough that at times he pretended he might end up as president. And so, like, I think we're seeing from a lot of these, like, crypto executives now, they're doing the same thing.

00:26:35:17 - 00:26:37:05
Bennett Tomlin
They want to be the leaders.

00:26:37:05 - 00:26:38:17
Nitish Pahwa
Yeah. No I think.

00:26:38:19 - 00:26:46:23
Nitish Pahwa
That's an excellent point. And that's how they, it's like wriggle themselves into these positions. I mean like David Sacks has not been confirmed by the Senate.

00:26:47:01 - 00:26:53:13
Nitish Pahwa
You know like sure he's just kind of up there but and he just kind of hobnobbing with all these, senators anyway.

00:26:53:13 - 00:26:58:14
Bennett Tomlin
Like same with, Bo Hines, who is way more important than David Sacks

00:26:58:16 - 00:27:01:04
Nitish Pahwa
And yeah, the Bo Hines thing is just so.

00:27:01:04 - 00:27:02:05
Nitish Pahwa
Funny because it's.

00:27:02:05 - 00:27:03:16
Nitish Pahwa
It's so clearly just a.

00:27:03:16 - 00:27:10:08
Nitish Pahwa
Reward for him having lost two congressional campaigns, but loving Trump throughout all of them.

00:27:10:11 - 00:27:14:10
Nitish Pahwa
And not even talking that much about crypto in those campaigns. Yeah.

00:27:14:12 - 00:27:15:02
Cas Piancey
Yeah.

00:27:15:04 - 00:27:31:00
Bennett Tomlin
It was crazy when his name was announced because like, I got a ping in the in the company slack and someone was like, what do you know about this person? And I'm like, I don't know who that person is. I've never heard that name before. They're associated with no companies I've ever heard of. I, I don't know what to tell you.

00:27:31:02 - 00:27:32:17
Bennett Tomlin
They're a guy there. Dude.

00:27:32:17 - 00:27:37:10
Nitish Pahwa
Right. I mean, hey, for all we know, I've never seen him in real life. He could be like an AI.

00:27:37:10 - 00:27:39:09
Nitish Pahwa
Generated, like avatar, you know?

00:27:39:13 - 00:27:39:23
Nitish Pahwa
But who's.

00:27:39:23 - 00:27:43:03
Nitish Pahwa
From that? US servers? I, you know, I, I haven't seen.

00:27:43:03 - 00:27:45:19
Nitish Pahwa
Him. I'm just saying.

00:27:45:21 - 00:27:52:08
Bennett Tomlin
I, I think the, I don't think I servers get as many concussions as Bo Hines has had.

00:27:52:10 - 00:27:58:05
Nitish Pahwa
You know, fair enough. That's another thing they're going to take away from us the ability to get concussions.

00:27:58:05 - 00:28:00:22
Cas Piancey
the point I'm trying to drive home here is that

00:28:00:22 - 00:28:04:23
Cas Piancey
I'm in almost like a state of shock at this point because I don't know,

00:28:04:23 - 00:28:06:02
Cas Piancey
for the future,

00:28:06:02 - 00:28:24:11
Cas Piancey
I guess mostly for America, but for the world at large too. But I like I'm. I am concerned that it seems like there's been complete political capture and regulatory capture, by the crypto industry, which in and of itself

00:28:24:11 - 00:28:37:20
Cas Piancey
is so small and run by like, you know, basically like 16 people who are billionaires control the industry, and push now they're pushing through whatever they want.

00:28:37:22 - 00:28:53:02
Cas Piancey
And I'm curious, like, what are what what happened? Why would this stop now? Like, are we just is this hell? Are we in hell? Or is that or is there a path out of this crazy, crazy capture that we're seeing?

00:28:53:02 - 00:28:54:14
Nitish Pahwa
That's a great question.

00:28:54:16 - 00:28:58:00
Nitish Pahwa
And so one thing when I started.

00:28:58:02 - 00:29:15:13
Nitish Pahwa
Theorizing about, you know, this, like, sudden surge in, like, crypto political players, last year was, I kind of thought of it as like, this very convenient, marriage between, a lot of just like, general.

00:29:15:13 - 00:29:18:05
Nitish Pahwa
You know, government skeptical tech types.

00:29:18:05 - 00:29:31:10
Nitish Pahwa
Who like, for some reason, you know, Joe Biden and, Gary Gensler, like, drove them, like, completely batshit. Same with, Mark Cuban, also famous, Gary Gensler hater. But, I digress.

00:29:31:12 - 00:29:34:18
Nitish Pahwa
And like, you know, because you guys remember.

00:29:34:20 - 00:29:41:21
Nitish Pahwa
All those manifestos Marc Andreessen started coming out with, you know, late 20, 23, early.

00:29:42:02 - 00:29:43:10
Bennett Tomlin
Time to Build.

00:29:43:12 - 00:29:51:06
Nitish Pahwa
Yeah, exactly. It's time to build. It's the techno optimists agenda. We need to not we cannot stop now.

00:29:51:06 - 00:29:59:09
Nitish Pahwa
Otherwise, like billions of future, children who will, like, inhabit Mars and like, a glorious piece will die.

00:29:59:09 - 00:30:06:14
Nitish Pahwa
Or something like that. That was kind of the gist I got from it. But like, because but, you know.

00:30:06:15 - 00:30:19:15
Nitish Pahwa
Obviously A16z very, invested, steeped in both, crypto and AI just from a pure self-interest, perspective, they want to make sure that both those things keep driving up.

00:30:19:18 - 00:30:21:08
Nitish Pahwa
But the free market is not working.

00:30:21:08 - 00:30:32:14
Nitish Pahwa
For them. People are not buying in new, like startups or just not like IPOing or like reaching the same levels of success that they were maybe back when, interest rates were like negative.

00:30:32:14 - 00:30:35:10
Nitish Pahwa
They could just,

00:30:35:12 - 00:30:36:03
Nitish Pahwa
And more to the.

00:30:36:03 - 00:30:36:17
Nitish Pahwa
Point.

00:30:36:19 - 00:30:41:02
Nitish Pahwa
They viewed this as like, okay, we take these like.

00:30:41:02 - 00:31:03:12
Nitish Pahwa
AI bulls who maybe think like, oh, all that crypto stuff was a scam. This is like the real thing versus like the crypto folks who want to, like, keep their, you know, GPUs for Bitcoin mining instead of AI. It's like, okay, guys, let's, band up together here. Let's take out these, freedom hating libs, and then we'll figure out where to go from here.

00:31:03:14 - 00:31:05:20
Nitish Pahwa
And I mean, they.

00:31:06:02 - 00:31:06:11
Nitish Pahwa
It.

00:31:06:11 - 00:31:10:11
Nitish Pahwa
Worked for them. And but I think you're already starting.

00:31:10:11 - 00:31:13:09
Nitish Pahwa
To see so many of the cracks in that.

00:31:13:11 - 00:31:14:05
Nitish Pahwa
Pretty fragile.

00:31:14:05 - 00:31:16:18
Nitish Pahwa
coalition starting to pop up. Right?

00:31:16:20 - 00:31:18:17
Nitish Pahwa
Like when.

00:31:18:19 - 00:31:43:08
Nitish Pahwa
Trump started announcing, like, his, you know, currency reserves. Obviously the like Bitcoin hardliners versus the, you know, general crypto currency enthusiast types. Were like very upset. They were like, wait, how can you put in bitcoin in a stash with all these other like shitcoins? There were a lot of folks who were mad that Trump last launched his own meme coin.

00:31:43:08 - 00:31:46:11
Nitish Pahwa
They were like, this degrades the purpose of this thing altogether.

00:31:46:13 - 00:31:48:21
Nitish Pahwa
And you now again.

00:31:48:21 - 00:31:57:11
Nitish Pahwa
Also just have this, complete conflict between legislative priorities, right? I mean, I think you guys both made a good point here, which is that.

00:31:57:13 - 00:32:00:07
Nitish Pahwa
Yeah, there is still probably some.

00:32:00:09 - 00:32:24:06
Nitish Pahwa
Like, stickler, you know, sentiment within Congress, the fact that, you know, we have not all already had, like, this big, you know, bounty of, both pro AI and pro crypto legislation passed. I mean, infamously, in the budget bill, there's this, that the House passed. There's this, segment, where they're talking about preempting all state level AI regulations.

00:32:24:06 - 00:32:34:23
Nitish Pahwa
And, I don't know if you guys saw it, but, Marjorie Taylor Greene came out today and said that, she was shocked. She never would have voted for this. It's a violation of states rights. And, like.

00:32:35:01 - 00:32:36:02
Cas Piancey
Well, you should read the bill

00:32:36:04 - 00:32:37:00
Nitish Pahwa
Comes from.

00:32:37:00 - 00:32:41:02
Nitish Pahwa
Like, you should read the bill, but I usually tend to take out her word.

00:32:41:02 - 00:32:48:21
Nitish Pahwa
But, her still expressing the public sentiment when she otherwise, like, is just there to do whatever Trump wants is.

00:32:48:21 - 00:32:50:17
Nitish Pahwa
Like a little interesting to me.

00:32:50:19 - 00:32:54:04
Bennett Tomlin
See, I take her out of word. I bet she has no idea what's in that bill.

00:32:54:06 - 00:33:00:17
Nitish Pahwa
Yeah, no, I mean absolutely things a thousand pages long. I don't even know what's on the bill, man.

00:33:00:19 - 00:33:11:23
Cas Piancey
Yeah, but they have, like, teams of advisors telling them. Exactly. Or you would hope they would. Whatever. Right. It doesn't. It doesn't matter. But yeah, I like I guess that's true.

00:33:11:23 - 00:33:28:05
Cas Piancey
I guess I feel a little deflated in on that front just because I watch. I've watched free market libertarians suddenly switch and be like, yeah, but Trump's pro crypto and you're just like, wait, so you're cool with fascism now?

00:33:28:05 - 00:33:45:23
Cas Piancey
Like that doesn't make any sense, man. You can't you can't be a free market libertarian and then be down with fascism. Like, of course, you know, scratch a libertarian, get a fascist. But I like right. It it it it makes me feel like the easiest way to silence opposition. Actually,

00:33:45:23 - 00:33:49:00
Cas Piancey
is to give the loudest voices money.

00:33:49:02 - 00:33:51:02
Nitish Pahwa
And I think, this is also a little.

00:33:51:03 - 00:34:12:01
Nitish Pahwa
Bit downstream of, the Latin American political effect here. Right? Like we've had years now of, Bukele in El Salvador and, Milei in Argentina. They like, love those guys because, they do crack down also on protesters and lock up people in very awful gulags.

00:34:12:02 - 00:34:16:12
Nitish Pahwa
And, they're I think, they've just gotten used.

00:34:16:12 - 00:34:17:22
Nitish Pahwa
To that because.

00:34:17:22 - 00:34:20:09
Nitish Pahwa
At the very least, it's it's from a self-interest.

00:34:20:09 - 00:34:29:15
Nitish Pahwa
Perspective. Right? They can call it Bukele and be like, hey, buddy, can I stop over and, you'll say, yes, please bring your keys with you.

00:34:29:16 - 00:34:31:10
Nitish Pahwa
And, like.

00:34:31:10 - 00:34:36:23
Nitish Pahwa
As long as they're not the ones who are in any danger, they feel fine with it. And it's dark. It's terrible.

00:34:36:23 - 00:35:07:10
Bennett Tomlin
Cas getting kind of back to what you were saying before, like, is there is, is this it or are we stuck here? Does it just keep getting worse? Like, one of the things I keep thinking about is like, there is a chance that a pendulum pushed far enough will swing back, right? Is that Trump specifically embracing cryptocurrency as broadly as he has, and the cryptocurrency industry in turn embracing Trump instead of like, rejecting or trying to distance themselves from him?

00:35:07:12 - 00:35:17:10
Bennett Tomlin
There are chances where that ends up being unpopular enough at a future point that, like going after crypto again, has a bunch of political will behind it.

00:35:17:12 - 00:35:19:04
Cas Piancey
However, yeah.

00:35:19:06 - 00:35:43:10
Bennett Tomlin
Having said that, I thought that might happen after Sam Bankman-Fried to get back to what we started this episode with is I really thought there was going to be a moment like after November of 2022, where there was going to be like, I don't know, some kind of a bunch of new crypto regulatory actions, crypto enforcement actions, like some kind of investigation into, like crypto more broadly coming out of Congress.

00:35:43:12 - 00:36:00:07
Bennett Tomlin
But what instead we saw was they put Sam Bankman-Fried in prison and problem solved. Right. So I there's a chance, I think, that swings back the other way because Trump's made it too toxic. But there's also a chance that once Trump's gone, they'll go, problem solved.

00:36:00:10 - 00:36:18:09
Cas Piancey
I mean, I don't even think the I guess this is part this is part of my frustration as well. Like, I know that we mostly cover crypto. I know that we mostly cover finance. But when the president goes, okay, yeah, I'm going to take a $400 million plane. And then after I'm done being president, I'm going to take it with me.

00:36:18:11 - 00:36:34:13
Cas Piancey
And and people just go now, right? I like I'm just like, no, no, no, no, not all right. Like, this is not okay. We can't just wander past this story and be like, okay, going to read the news? I'm going to keep reading the news. Who cares? Whatever. Like, no, that's not allowed. That's crazy that we're allowing it.

00:36:34:13 - 00:37:04:11
Cas Piancey
We need it to stop. And so if that kind of corruption isn't making people pause and be like, this is bad, then I'm not sure there's any amount of corruption that hits that that hits that point. And because it's just so in your face that like crypto, isn't that in your face generally like unless it's Sam Bankman-Fried literally stealing money from people out of their bank account, like generally it's just, you know, like who who's getting harmed by Trump coin.

00:37:04:12 - 00:37:10:07
Cas Piancey
Nobody's fucking buying the thing, right? Except for people who want to bribe him. So nobody's really getting hurt.

00:37:10:09 - 00:37:14:20
Bennett Tomlin
And some idiots who are buying it too. Don't forget about the,

00:37:14:22 - 00:37:18:10
Cas Piancey
Not that many. And and they and I would suggest you.

00:37:18:10 - 00:37:18:20
Nitish Pahwa
See.

00:37:18:22 - 00:37:21:00
Nitish Pahwa
Elites looking down on the, for.

00:37:21:02 - 00:37:45:10
Cas Piancey
Whatever. Well, anyone who's stupid enough to buy the Trump coin is probably happy with their purchase, I guess, like, is is is basically what I'm saying. So I just yeah, I don't see it. And that's why I'm like, I'm asking you guys because I'm like, maybe you have an idea that's better than me or like a future outlook that is actually a little bit more optimistic because it's all gone downhill so much faster than I ever expected it to, to me, to be perfectly honest, you know?

00:37:45:12 - 00:37:46:17
Nitish Pahwa
No, I, I think.

00:37:46:17 - 00:37:51:01
Nitish Pahwa
You're not wrong about that. And, it is definitely troubling.

00:37:51:03 - 00:37:51:17
Nitish Pahwa
What I will.

00:37:51:17 - 00:37:52:06
Nitish Pahwa
Say.

00:37:52:12 - 00:37:53:16
Nitish Pahwa
There have been.

00:37:53:18 - 00:38:22:21
Nitish Pahwa
You know, in the midst of, like, bad news, like, every few hours these days, like, there has there has been one thing that, like, has given me a little bit of hope, which is, I mean, not just the sheer backlash to Elon Musk, which has already led, you know, Trump to like, at least publicly distance himself, even though he's probably not functionally actually distancing himself that much, he still wants to give that appearance, which, as we all know, is pretty wounding to Elon's ego.

00:38:22:21 - 00:38:24:05
Nitish Pahwa
But.

00:38:24:07 - 00:38:24:19
Nitish Pahwa
Regarding.

00:38:24:19 - 00:38:29:01
Nitish Pahwa
The crypto and just like government stuff, generally,

00:38:29:03 - 00:38:30:02
Nitish Pahwa
The Pew Research.

00:38:30:02 - 00:38:36:00
Nitish Pahwa
Center, which is a source of actually reliable polls, unlike, the crypto lobbies.

00:38:36:05 - 00:38:36:08
Nitish Pahwa
Are.

00:38:36:08 - 00:38:38:06
Cas Piancey
They woke communists? I thought they were woke

00:38:38:08 - 00:38:44:04
Nitish Pahwa
So, yeah. I'm, I'm pushing, woke agenda here. My, my mistake. But,

00:38:44:06 - 00:38:46:15
Bennett Tomlin
The Marxists at Pew Global.

00:38:46:17 - 00:38:47:12
Nitish Pahwa
Yeah.

00:38:47:13 - 00:38:49:20
Bennett Tomlin
Sorry. That's just a really funny concept.

00:38:49:20 - 00:38:55:04
Nitish Pahwa
Oh, my God. But, yeah, the, the DEI commies.

00:38:55:04 - 00:38:57:03
Nitish Pahwa
Over at, Pew.

00:38:57:05 - 00:38:59:12
Nitish Pahwa
Actually have been doing a lot of really interesting.

00:38:59:12 - 00:39:02:12
Nitish Pahwa
Polling coming out this year, which has shown that.

00:39:02:14 - 00:39:03:05
Nitish Pahwa
Over the.

00:39:03:05 - 00:39:16:18
Nitish Pahwa
Past decade, for one, like, Americans have completely gone from this, like, post Reagan era, like consensus of government should try to like, you know, back off our lives a little bit to being.

00:39:16:20 - 00:39:19:15
Nitish Pahwa
Pretty consistently in support of. No, actually, the government.

00:39:19:15 - 00:39:25:01
Nitish Pahwa
Should do more for us, the people, the taxpayers. And so.

00:39:25:03 - 00:39:26:16
Nitish Pahwa
And when you look at,

00:39:26:18 - 00:39:34:09
Nitish Pahwa
Also some of the polling that they've done around, like how Americans feel about the cuts to federal departments, agencies.

00:39:34:14 - 00:39:37:10
Nitish Pahwa
Most people hate it. Like this one.

00:39:37:16 - 00:39:54:16
Nitish Pahwa
Poll from, late April showed like 55%, you know, overall disapproving of the cuts, 44% approving, which is like, you know, 44 might seem a little close, but that's still like a pretty big margin in between those sentiments.

00:39:54:16 - 00:39:56:09
Nitish Pahwa
I mean, you also see all.

00:39:56:09 - 00:39:57:20
Nitish Pahwa
Those videos where it's like

00:39:57:20 - 00:40:03:09
Nitish Pahwa
when, you know, Chuck Grassley is getting mobbed by his own, like, constituents who've been.

00:40:03:14 - 00:40:04:07
Nitish Pahwa
Voting that.

00:40:04:07 - 00:40:13:03
Nitish Pahwa
Like, fossilized husk back into office for decades now and saying, yo, dude, what the hell? What are you doing here?

00:40:13:03 - 00:40:15:18
Nitish Pahwa
I mean, I remember talking.

00:40:15:18 - 00:40:29:05
Nitish Pahwa
To someone about this recently. It's like for the longest time, the consensus was like, yeah, you don't touch Social Security, right? You get the the seniors, the retired seniors who vote all very fired up no matter what their other ideologies are.

00:40:29:05 - 00:40:33:10
Nitish Pahwa
And that they're just they're not just touching the stove. They're they're like.

00:40:33:10 - 00:40:36:07
Nitish Pahwa
Laying their bodies on the stove at this point. I mean.

00:40:36:09 - 00:40:39:13
Nitish Pahwa
Yeah. Yeah. I mean, you saw that with Joni Ernst.

00:40:39:15 - 00:40:42:23
Nitish Pahwa
Little, town hall the other day, you know.

00:40:43:02 - 00:40:55:20
Cas Piancey
And after the gal to to to mock people. To mock people after you said, like, go die is just like, oh, wow. Okay. You don't want your job, I guess, like, you're going to lose your job. Babe, I don't know what you're doing. That's.

00:40:55:20 - 00:41:00:00
Bennett Tomlin
I live on the Iowa border, so I'm big fans of Chuck Grassley and Joni Ernst.

00:41:00:05 - 00:41:00:18
Nitish Pahwa
Yeah.

00:41:01:00 - 00:41:02:13
Nitish Pahwa
Like, I remember one.

00:41:02:13 - 00:41:11:20
Nitish Pahwa
Thing that gave me a lot of hope, even during the Trump, first Trump term was, so the parents, my, the district, my parents live in always been pretty.

00:41:11:21 - 00:41:12:13
Nitish Pahwa
Had had been.

00:41:12:13 - 00:41:37:10
Nitish Pahwa
Pretty red for decades. And, in 2018, like, leading up to, you know, this is right after, like, the big health care cuts, or the proposed health care cuts and like the protest to that fact, the longtime Republican representative was finally voted out. It was Elissa Slotkin. But, you know, and, until this year, it stayed blue.

00:41:37:12 - 00:41:55:05
Nitish Pahwa
And, you know, this time it had finally been redrawn and someone else not as well known had a comeback in. But it's like there are these things when like people do finally, belatedly realize. And it sucks. It sucks that it always happens. This way, that no one knows what they've got till it's gone.

00:41:55:07 - 00:41:56:10
Nitish Pahwa
But like a.

00:41:56:10 - 00:41:57:21
Cas Piancey
Different Joni, they're a different Joni.

00:41:57:21 - 00:42:06:08
Nitish Pahwa
Yeah, exactly. Different Joni. And shout out to her. I hope I hope she's doing okay. Not paying attention to the news. It's worse now, Joni.

00:42:06:10 - 00:42:12:08
Nitish Pahwa
But, like, the they do realize.

00:42:12:08 - 00:42:13:14
Nitish Pahwa
After the fact, like, okay.

00:42:13:14 - 00:42:14:19
Nitish Pahwa
Yeah, maybe.

00:42:14:21 - 00:42:21:15
Nitish Pahwa
Having, like, a federal agency that protects our deposits from being commingled with,

00:42:21:17 - 00:42:26:21
Nitish Pahwa
Random speculators is actually pretty good. That was, you know.

00:42:26:23 - 00:42:52:12
Bennett Tomlin
Well and like, so on that note, and, like, back to your question, Cas. Like, I think that's kind of the answer, right? Is like going back to the 1920s and 1930s, the Pecora Commission in the formation of the SEC was, like the compromise, moderate position with the financial industry. Right? We're out for blood. And Congress agreed to do these like deep investigations and set up a regulatory body to keep the blood from happening.

00:42:52:17 - 00:43:03:21
Bennett Tomlin
Right. Like there are cases where there is enough political will, there is enough interest that like going after the thing is the like moderate consensus choice. It's just rare.

00:43:03:23 - 00:43:23:17
Cas Piancey
Yeah. I it's you bring up a good point. I think there's two things I want to mention here. We had Corey Frayer on from who used to work for the SEC. And he specifically had said to us that this now rings in my head like a horrifying bell all the time, but that it's much easier to deregulate than reregulate.

00:43:23:19 - 00:43:45:15
Cas Piancey
So once you start deregulating this stuff, the drive, the push, and the willpower to make it regulated again kind of evaporates for a long time. I think that's correct. But I also you brought up, you know, the 30s and stuff. In it. And I think that's another great point, which is like, yeah, everything was bad. Like there there was a lot of corruption.

00:43:45:15 - 00:44:11:22
Cas Piancey
There was a lot of, you know, it's the Roaring 20s, but politicians were horrifying and corruption was everywhere. Ultimately, we got FDR, arguably one of the greatest presidents of all time, out of it. And a ton of regulation and infrastructure projects that pushed America forward in a really good way. In the deepest times of despair, you end up getting like some really great stuff out of it eventually.

00:44:12:00 - 00:44:18:20
Cas Piancey
It took a very long time and a world war, but you eventually get some good stuff out of it, so I like.

00:44:18:20 - 00:44:26:20
Bennett Tomlin
So that's your answer? Yeah. All we need is a global depression, like 30% unemployment and a world war and things make it better.

00:44:26:23 - 00:44:29:14
Cas Piancey
World war. Not a good idea. This time, methinks.

00:44:29:14 - 00:44:32:19
Bennett Tomlin
But yes, the Pecora Commission predated the World War by ten.

00:44:32:19 - 00:44:56:14
Cas Piancey
Years, right? No, but I just mean to get ourselves out of that mess. But, yeah, I like. I guess that's the most hopeful way to think about it. And it is something that I honestly wasn't reflecting on. It, it, it it's as as sad as that sounds, I think there is some optimism about the idea of like, you know, this won't last forever.

00:44:56:16 - 00:45:02:09
Nitish Pahwa
I mean, I think, I like I'm, I'm half joking.

00:45:02:11 - 00:45:20:15
Nitish Pahwa
Half, somewhat serious about this, but, I think once, the Federal Reserve is, finally ruled by our god King Ron Paul. And, the dollar, completely collapses as, world's reserve currency. We'll finally have room to rebuild.

00:45:20:17 - 00:45:22:20
Nitish Pahwa
I'm sorry. I'm sorry.

00:45:22:22 - 00:45:30:23
Bennett Tomlin
You're fine. You're describing a possible outcome. I mean, probably would be Ron Paul. It'd be someone else. But like.

00:45:31:01 - 00:45:34:12
Cas Piancey
What? He's not old enough.

00:45:34:12 - 00:45:37:18
Nitish Pahwa
amazing. The bro's out there still cooking crazy.

00:45:37:22 - 00:45:42:21
Cas Piancey
Crazy 99, 90 years old and still passing some, like.

00:45:42:23 - 00:45:48:11
Bennett Tomlin
Deranged newsletters and videos on a semi-regular basis for subscribers.

00:45:48:13 - 00:45:49:00
Cas Piancey
I'm sure.

00:45:49:00 - 00:45:51:05
Nitish Pahwa
Like the most racist shit you've ever.

00:45:51:05 - 00:45:53:01
Nitish Pahwa
Seen in your life. Yeah.

00:45:53:03 - 00:45:55:22
Cas Piancey
Did he become a hardcore? I'm so glad. I don't know, he doesn't.

00:45:55:22 - 00:45:58:22
Bennett Tomlin
He said a lot of racist things. If you go over his archives.

00:45:58:22 - 00:46:02:14
Cas Piancey
I'm good, I'm good. I don't need to know. It's fine. I just. I don't need to like him.

00:46:02:14 - 00:46:19:12
Cas Piancey
it is interesting. And we've had an end the fed episode two where, you know, I do think you're right that also that is a very real danger and the dollar not being I know a lot of other people just keep calling me crazy for being like, yeah, the dollar's fucked, but okay.

00:46:19:12 - 00:46:38:19
Cas Piancey
Like, you don't have to believe me. And I'm not even suggesting there's anything any of us could do about it. I'm not like the dollar's fuck. Put your money in gold or some crazy shit. I'm not, I'm not, I'm not Peter, Peter Schiff or whatever. But like, I do think there's a real danger there. And I do think that it's not crazy to try to reflect on it and think about it.

00:46:38:21 - 00:46:50:16
Cas Piancey
And you're right. If if that does happen, I do it. You don't. You don't know what you got til it's gone. Like you lose the fed and dollar reserve currency. Oof! We're in for some shit, boy.

00:46:50:16 - 00:46:53:01
Bennett Tomlin
So many things in play. Yeah, right.

00:46:53:01 - 00:46:55:16
Cas Piancey
Like yeah, yeah.

00:46:55:18 - 00:46:56:07
Nitish Pahwa
Yeah.

00:46:56:07 - 00:46:57:10
Bennett Tomlin
Anything.

00:46:57:12 - 00:47:01:08
Cas Piancey
Yeah. Good, good and bad. May you lead an interesting life as the Chinese say.

00:47:01:08 - 00:47:20:00
Nitish Pahwa
I think the last thing is, to, to probably note is that, I mean, we're, we're already seeing, like, a bunch of, like, politicking for, you know, special elections, next year's midterms. And, it'll be very interesting to see what, you know, the crypto lobby, how they act in those situations.

00:47:20:00 - 00:47:22:07
Nitish Pahwa
But I will.

00:47:22:09 - 00:47:36:05
Nitish Pahwa
I would bet a decent bit of money that they are not going to be running on crypto. None of the politicians, none of the ads, none of the PACs. Like it's not going to.

00:47:36:11 - 00:47:37:02
Nitish Pahwa
No matter how.

00:47:37:02 - 00:47:42:03
Nitish Pahwa
Much they bray about it now, it's never going to have been the campaign issue that they made it out to be.

00:47:42:03 - 00:47:42:19
Cas Piancey
It's a good point.

00:47:42:19 - 00:48:04:05
Cas Piancey
if anything, you're like they're Trump is extra poisoning a poisoned well, right. It's it is it's a really interesting point to say that he has done no favor despite being politically and regulatory open to crypto. He's really done the industry no favors, which is interesting. I don't I don't know if they've considered that at all.

00:48:04:05 - 00:48:21:04
Cas Piancey
They probably haven't. I think that they're more invested in short term gains than long term missions. So, you know, it is it. That is a really interesting point, and one I hadn't thought about it. The well is deeply poised for crypto in America. That's true.

00:48:21:04 - 00:48:27:07
Cas Piancey
On that note, buy CasCoin guys I like I keep telling everyone to buy CasCoin and they're not listening to me.

00:48:27:09 - 00:48:29:01
Nitish Pahwa
Yeah, I, I've already put all my,

00:48:29:03 - 00:48:31:23
Nitish Pahwa
Treasuries and, I've sold them off. Put them into cash coin.

00:48:31:23 - 00:48:32:15
Cas Piancey
Thank you.

00:48:32:15 - 00:48:35:12
Nitish Pahwa
Final.

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