Trump's 'Crypto Reserve' Is Such Brazen Corruption

I must have missed the memo, is cryptocurrency not being used to facilitate the illegal pornography and narcotics trade? Would be news to me.

in that case why not sell it immediately, turn it into real money, and then spend it immediately? why keep it as a "reserve" at all?

what's the point of having a "reserve" in magical internet money if it can fluctuate by 50%? that's not a reserve, that's gambling.

it's a non-starter of an idea. Trump wants it to launder money.

The United States needs to establish a crypto reserve to prepare for a permanent Martian settlement with an independent economy 100 years from now? It's difficult to think of something less relevant to the well-being of the American public.

> Unique take to be sure, but sharing because it was interesting.

I think the most interesting point in this is the level in which supporters have stooped to provide 'justifiable' arguments.

Having gold-equivalent reserves seems like the very last thing that Martian colonists need to worry about. I would suspect "how do we survive in an extraordinarily hostile environment with no hope of rescue when something goes wrong" is a higher priority one to solve.

It solves the problem? The problem of shipping gold to mars? This is as made-up a problem as you get. Might as well say "What if advanced aliens come to Earth who already use crypto based currencies and the only way to stop them from destroying the earth is to pay them in ripple. So basically we need the reserve to save all life on earth."

Mars lies just at the edge of the asteroid belt. There is plenty of gold in the belt.

But to state the obvious: the Martians can keep their gold in Earth banks, just like Russia used to keep its gold in UK and Swiss banks. Many European countries still do. Even on Earth, nobody prefers to move gold around.

> then you don’t want to pay to ship gold to Mars

yeah it would cost more to ship it to Mars then it would cost to get a team of the most expensive contractors you can find to dig it out of the surface of Mars with their bare hands.

Not to mention the absurdity of thinking crypto would be more usable over interplanetary internet than VISA/ACH, or that such a society on Mars, when more than a research outpost, would benefit at all from being economically bound and gagged to a distant terrestrial currency.

> Crypto solves that issue.

Asteroid mining solves the issue. Gold will be functionally unlimited. Cryptocurrency will be long forgotten in history books after the first self sustaining space colony exists.

> … that issue.

Maybe I am missing something, but what issue were they alluding to?

Yes, databases (anything digital for that matter) are easier to transfer over large physical distances. Why would there be a need to ship or transfer anything in that manner, considering we as earth bound humans have stopped moving around large quantities of gold for purely financial purposes quite some time ago?

Besides being a damning inditement of whatever interplanetary society they were envisioning, I’d be interested in what their view on modern day precious metal trading as a whole is.

Why not ship the gold to Mars?

> The difference is it's not using tax money. Using tax money is the entire premise for calling it "brazen corruption".

Maybe in this article, but the real corruption is in the insider trading.

That's still taking a source of government funding (the money gained by auction) and boosting cryptobro gambling with it.

No, we don't have that feature yet. Users can vouch for [dead] posts, but that's not the same thing as [flagged].

The alternative is to allow this site to burn itself to a crisp, an irreversible outcome.

Perhaps you think the this-time-is-differentness of this time is different enough to justify it, but (a) none of us can actually know that in advance, (b) the impact of getting it wrong is existential (if one can use that word about a relatively trivial thing like an internet forum), (c) people have often said such things in the past and it's clear that we were right not to pull the plug when they did, and (d) my job hasn't changed.

I'm happy to answer but I don't think I quite understand your question!

I don't think I said it was normal.

Hey, at least we got to see what NetBSD looked like on a JavaStation before the collapse. I'm sure voting-age US citizens will really appreciate the tech caucus' focus on the real issues facing a rapidly modernizing society.

"bongodongobob, why is the president's decentralized technology defrauding American citizens?"

"Dunno, haven't you ever wondered why FastDOOM is fast though?"

It really depends on the specific story. I agree that most of those threads are as you describe.

@reseasonable commented:

"A dedicated hacker news of politics site is long overdue. Civil discussions, amazing moderation, and the intelligent insight of experts to hash out complex issues. I’d be on it and participating nearly all day long."

Any thoughts on this?

Source: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43375462

Many years ago, I created a section of a site making the history of each commenter a major part of the discussion. This meant the trick of attempting a cleverly-structured and seemingly reasonable statement could more easily be revealed as a bad faith effort to promote hidden motives. It didn't tamp down moderation needs as much as it made the discussion far more useful for getting at how facts were related to how the discussion was being framed.

We required users to declare either neutrality or allegiance to one side of position on major issues and sub-issues. This forced users (in a limited way) to choose between spending time on honest, good-faith arguments for what they declared allegiance to, or be a "spy for the other side" and pursue dishonest, bad-faith arguments.

If a discussion site were structured to potentiate advanced moderation, you would be one of the world's premier experts in how to measure success, and in predicting the likelihood of success of different approaches. Somewhere, we need to be able to take the next step past sites like TheMotte.org

You still can, https://news.ycombinator.com/active will also show flagged threads.

How about Mastodon?

>Being born is rape. I didn't consent to choosing this country or mother or body.

But how would it be rape? Rape is non-consensual sex. No one is saying everything involuntary is rape, theft etc.

Im saying taxes are the government taking money from you whether you consent to it or not.

Force in want sense? It's non-consensual. Just like garnishing wages, etc.

>It is illegally depriving you of your property

The legality of it is the main distinction but its just coincidental. Theft could be made legal or taxation could be made illegal. If that's the primary distinction then I think it just makes my point.

I dont think what I'm really saying is even that controversial. The basic definition of theft is taking something from someone without their consent. I think the intuition is that I am arguing for no taxes, and that's what sounds so disagreeable, but thats not what I'm saying. The government has a monopoly on violence, theft, etc. Its just how it works. And we're better off with government than without it.

See my explicit note about taxes being necessary. None of what you're saying addresses my point that it is basically theft because the money is taken from you without your consent.

>"Netflix's prices went up!" "The store wanted me to pay for my groceries and wouldn't just let me walk out with them!" "I smashed my neighbor's car with a bat and now the judge says I have to pay for it." These things are not "literally" theft.

But who is saying they are? I certainly am not. I agree those things arent literally theft. I think the government deciding how much money you owe and getting it with or without your consent basically is theft. The main distinction is that its legal, but that is a coincidental distinction because theft could be made legal as well.

The current regime has never felt burdened by ethics in the past. Why would it start now, when so much money could be made?