WBD229 Audio Transcription

Bitcoin & Black America with Isaiah Jackson

Interview date: Wednesday 3rd June 2020

Note: the following is a transcription of my interview with Isiah Jackson, author of Bitcoin & Black America. I have reviewed the transcription but if you find any mistakes, please feel free to email me. You can listen to the original recording here.

In this interview, we discuss the killing of George Floyd and the subsequent protests and riots, racism in the US, and how the black community can use Bitcoin.

“The plight of black people is not going to change, before, or after this unless we do something about it, economically.”

— Isaiah Jackson

Interview Transcription

Peter McCormack: Isaiah, man, how are you?

Isaiah Jackson: Doing great man, glad to be here.

Peter McCormack: Well, finally! We went to do this in LA a few months ago, right?

Isaiah Jackson: Oh yeah, I was going to say it's about fucking time.

Peter McCormack: : Well that was my fault. That was my fault, because I cancelled on you. But in some ways I'm kind of glad that we did, because I feel like, whilst it's not a good thing, the stuff going on right now, which means that the conversation we're going to have, is going to be even more relevant, right?

Isaiah Jackson: Absolutely! Anytime was a good time. Like I said, just glad to be on the platform with you and discuss it. We talk in person, so glad to discuss more about the issues going on today.

Peter McCormack:  Yeah, there is a lot going on and listen, look, there's a lot of stuff I want to unpack with you and some of the things I won't know, won't understand, because not only I'm from a different country, but I face different issues. We have different cultural issues, even today, there's people in London fighting policemen and policewomen, they think they're fighting the same issues, but I don't think they are. So I'm not going to be afraid to ask you any questions.

If I ask anything that sounds dumb or I've kind of missed the step, you just let me know. But listen, what I really want to kick off with you on all of this is, obviously it's fucking crazy right now in America, things are going a bit crazy, what do you make of it all?

Isaiah Jackson: Well I will say the initial impact or what sort of kicked it off, another murder of another black man by the police is something we've seen before. I'm honestly tired of marching and tired of having to go through this process over and over. I feel like we've done it almost every election year since I've been alive. So it's one of those things that what kicked it off was the murder of George Floyd, but what's happening as far as the change in how people are protesting, looters, there's a lot of craziness going on. It could be outside forces that have something to do with it.

What I see is a bunch of frustrated, broke people, expressing themselves, along with people who are basically taking advantage of the moment. I think you have a combination of both at the same time. But all in all for the most part, as far as black community, we've been fighting this fight for so long, I think at some point we're like, "Well, enough is enough, violence is maybe the only way", even though I disagree, but that's how some people feel.

So unfortunately we have to get to that point, because I don't really care a lot if police like me per se, from a racist standpoint, but do your fucking job. At the very least, I pay your salary, that should be enough for you to do what you're supposed to do. So that is sort of the cries that are coming out from black community and I just want to do my part because I understand when the smoke clears economically, we have to have a plan moving forward so that something like this can be avoided, hopefully, down the line.

Peter McCormack: Yeah, that's interesting you should say that. I've got some notes here. I put a thing on Twitter the other day, trying to talk about the nuance of this. I think anyone who tries to come out with some kind of binary argument about what's going on is starting off from a kind of a bad place. I put it down into three categories. I put it down as the killing of another black man at the hands of police or a murder as you said, but also I think what we're seeing with this is that there is a wider issue with police brutality.

It seems to be disproportionately affecting black people, but there's this authority thing going on where I feel like the police think they have just the authority to beat the shit out of people. Then there's the kind of general distrust of the state and the economic issues that come with that, which again, seem to disproportionately affect black people more than white people and I do want to talk to you about that actually, because I was out running earlier and I was listened to this book called Homewreckers, which is about what happened during the financial crisis in terms of properties.

That talked about a lot of the discrimination with African Americans and then there's all the opportunists, whether it's the white supremacists and Antifa and people who have political agendas. So I think that's kind of the main three groups. Perhaps in that, then there's just a bunch of young people getting hyped up and just going fucking crazy. But what is it like for you as somebody... You say you've marched every year, but the same bullshit again and again, but you're seeing a protest being corrupted by other groups. Is that frustrating for you, or have you got a dual thing going on here?

Because there isn't just the killing of another black man at the hands of the police, but there is also the economic issues coming together. So I think two issues that are important to you have come together at the same time. So is it distracting? Is it a good thing? What do you think?

Isaiah Jackson: Well since I wrote the book, Bitcoin and Black America, one of the things I described was redlining, which is described in Homewreckers, which disproportionately forced black people to live in certain areas. They would not give you loans if you want it in a certain area, or you just couldn't get a loan at all. They sort of forced people to these areas and purposefully lower the property value by doing things like building highway straight through. If you come to America, anybody who's there, or if you're in America, when you go down these highways, look off the exits, they're almost always mostly black neighbourhoods because there was a concerted effort to drive down the property tax. Also if you go in a lot of black neighbourhoods, most of the old steel mills that have no use anymore are sitting there and that drives the value down. Trucking companies, which drives the value down, too much noise.

There's not really any residential area. So that was a concerted effort to take away economics, which started a long time ago. Generationally, even though it started 50 years ago, that's like one lifetime! My mum is 50, you know what I mean? So it's not like this was a long time ago. This has started fairly recently and because of that, those economic problems, along with the social problems that we're seeing, and some of our product we're seeing in protest, I am not surprised that it's happening. I think because it's happening at the same time, I think it's a perfect storm for people to read about something like Bitcoin as a solution either through my book or others, but also to focus economically going forward, because one of the examples I use in the book, the Jewish community in New York, the way they operate is so community-based and they have the money to back it up.

A policemen will not ever kill a Hasidic Jew in their neighbourhood, it just will not happen, because the police department would get sued. The police that does it may actually be in danger at that very moment. That's just an example of, if you have a strong community with strong small businesses and you're able to operate without that police force, you can actually move forward attentively. One of the things I want to point out too is, these protests, they're going to end at some point and I think some people have this mindset, like it's just going to go on forever and ever, they're going to end at some point and we need that strategy.

I agree with you, I think there are some people involved as far as protest is maybe with the looting and messing up businesses, but I think it's mostly Antifa and I've seen videos of people, random people, having kids and if you notice, it's always some kids with skateboards, knocking windows out of the bait car... There's a bait car at every protest and then they show the fire and then that's the front page thing, when in reality it was 14 kids, and all of a sudden they're like "A city on fire!" It's like no, it's not really. It's actually the other 95% were just marching and just there.

So I think people need to make sure that's not misconstrued and that the plight of black people is not going to change before or after this, unless we do something about it economically. I think Bitcoin is a viable option, and I think going forward we have to implement it somehow, so we move away from the state.

Peter McCormack:  We'll get into the Bitcoin stuff.

Isaiah Jackson: And I do want to mention, when you said, as far as the police turning into sort of military force for everybody, I want people to remember that if it happens to one community, they're coming for you next, it's just a matter of time until they militarize them. We've already seen the national guard out, we're seeing people getting tossed out of their cars for a curfew. You have grown adults who can't do it, so if you think it can't happen because of whatever reasons, sorry to say it is possible and definitely something you want to stop.

Peter McCormack:  All right, help me understand a couple of things. Not only because I'm not black, but also because I'm also from the UK. So again, it's different issues. I've been to the US a lot, but try and explain to me, as a black person, what it's like growing up in America. What are the things that I don't see that are day to day issues with you, either the direct racial discrimination or the subtle kind of insidious things that happen?

Isaiah Jackson: So from personal experience, some of the most insidious things I've seen is, for one, very recently actually last month, I was pulled over by a police officer because I fitted the description. They pulled me over, I had everything, license and registration, the ticket they gave me didn't even have a reason and they didn't make me sign it. They basically just wanted to get out of there. Shit like that is, why would I fit a description? How can you see me?

It was 11 o'clock at night and the windows aren't completely tinted, but they are tinted enough, you can't really even see my face at night. But they just happened to see that I fit a description from afar, from literally across the street. So that's one of the things is just annoying, that's the one thing. Gladly, it was nothing physical there, but I I've been physically assaulted on two occasions by police officers. Once, a police officer pulled me over, he didn't say roll the window down, he just opened my door and tried to pull me out. Luckily the seatbelt was on, so he couldn't take it.

I had three witnesses with me, so he kind of stopped, but that was his first reaction, was to try and pull me out. Like what?! It's so weird to me. Also case of mistaken identity. When I was in college, if they put out a report that said that somebody did some crime, robbed a bank, the description would say "Black male, black hoodie, between 5'6 and 6'3", and it'd be the middle of winter. So it's literally...

Peter McCormack:  So every dude!

Isaiah Jackson: Every single person will be walking around. So I got slammed on the ground by police right beside the bank and it's a store right there, because they thought I robbed the bank and came back to see it obviously. But yeah, they slammed me down because of that mistaken identity. The second cop was standing over me and I was there for an hour. For what reason? I don't know and had nothing to do with it. Like I said, the physical part of it is the crazy part, because it's like, that's not your job. Protect and serve has nothing to do with how I was treated and it's been more cases. I've had police that have done other stuff.

I've had police pull me over in my own neighbourhood, or running through a stop sign and they held me down for two hours, search my car, asked me did I have guns, did I have rocket launcher that I bought and it was just comical. I was just looking at these guys like, "What the fuck do you have to do it, it's 2.00 in the morning?" I just got off work, I used to work late shifts when I was in college, came back to my apartment, "Ran through a stop sign at 2:00 AM." There's nobody out here to go throw away trash and I got pulled for two hours, it's 4:00 in the morning. I got to go to class and shit, but that's little stuff that has happened to me personally. Now I don't know any black people that have not had run-ins with the law. So when you're saying, what's it like in America?

What it is, is a constant state of terror based on nothing, because there is no reason for a lot of the stuff that happens between cops and black people. However, it's really heinous when people are handcuffed and still get killed, and still get shot. So there's obviously the racist element there, and there's a power struggle, because there are a lot of cops who in my opinion, were dweebs in high school and they just don't know how to handle themselves around people. They get real flustered and a scared man will shoot before anybody else. So for the good cops over there, I would say for cops that are good, that are doing their job, it's your responsibility to call these guys out, tell them they're doing a shitty job, because unfortunately it's making you all look bad and in the black community, most black people have no trust in the police.

In fact, I have family members who are in their 60s and 70s who have never called the police in their life. They've had issues, never called the police, because they could show up and just start shooting at everybody there, and you could be the homeowner, which has just happened. Breonna Taylor, she was not well known. They went into the wrong house, shot her eight times while she was asleep. If that was the right house, that was the plan? To just bust in and shoot whoever it was? Not serve a warrant? So it is obviously more of a military mindset with black people in black neighbourhoods and I hate the fact that a lot of the people who are trying to do the right thing right now, especially at this moment, there is nothing they can really do unless the one's that are messing up are either gone or there's some sort of money insurance tied to when they do it.

If you could lose your pension because you shoot somebody incorrectly, people would think twice before they start pulling the trigger randomly on handcuffed people. I've heard some crazy stories of how cops have treated some of my friends. I have at least 7 or 8 run-ins with the law that were just inconvenient and then I've had a few that were physical. It was too many anyway. It was for no reason and something is as much as literally standing outside of the store, you can get body slammed to the ground.

So that's what it's like as far as police in the US and as far as mending those fences, I'm not sure how, unless there's some sort of money loss on their end. You have to basically take away something, but there's no recourse. They get paid leave and people just keep going on and they bury it in the news and there's nothing else. So there has to be something done there and just from my own experience, I've definitely protested.

Peter McCormack: Right, so there's two things there then, there's profiling and aggression. So we have racial profiling in London, I know that exists, but we have a fairly decent police complaints and a review process, but we certainly don't have the levels of violence. That's not to say it hasn't happened, and that's not to say... We had this famous case of this young lad called Stephen Lawrence who was murdered and due to institutional racism in the police, these five guys got away with it.

They weren't police officers themselves, but it was the police's bundled investigation. Okay, all right, I get that, what about outside of the police? What kind of things do you face? You talk about racism within the banking sector, what kind of other things do you face?

Isaiah Jackson: So as far as the social aspect of being black, some of the things that you face, some of them are smaller, so they don't really register anymore to me because I'm more focused on the economics part and moving forward in the future, but just little small things like when you get hired, being complimented that you speak so well, and I'm like, "I'm just speaking English as long as you have, why is that a compliment?" Sort of like a backhanded thing like, "I didn't realize you will be able to speak like that." I have sort of a beard and am tall, I played sports and I worked in IT, so literally almost every IT person I ever met was surprised like, "Oh, how did you find out about this field?"

Literally that's a question I got, "How did you find out about this field?" I was, "I got the same internet you do!" It's just little shit like that, it pisses you off. So some people that will be enough to piss them off for the rest... You know what I mean? The rest of the day, rest of the week and they will be telling all their friends about it. So most black people, we just deal with it, just keep on going, because it's same old shit. You know what I mean? So just little stuff like that. When I was at school, a lot of times, if you've made good grades and I would help out, I helped a lot of people when I was helping them write papers in college, mostly white guys, because my school was mostly white and they would get good grades and then they would take credit for it and make it seem like they were smarter.

It was just that whole thing sort of like, a lot of black parents that have kids, you got to work twice as hard to get half as much shit, because that is one of the things that you find yourself in the same spaces, but you're not on the same level because of either the economics wasn't there when you started, or because you're suppressed by people who feel threatened, because in my field, working in economics, there's a lot of people who genuinely do not trust black people with money. They really think that if you want to deal with money, use the Jews, or if you want to do a math, use Chinese, my accountant, it's that same thing. If it's a black dealing with money, it's like, "Oh, they're going to squander it or they're not going to be able to handle it" and unfortunately, in the venture capitalist market, I actually discussed this in the book, only 1% of venture capitalists money goes towards black owned businesses.

So if you think it's not a concerted effort to avoid black CEO's, then you're very, very mistaken because that is a very big problem. Even smaller, black women CEO's, only 0.2% I think goes to them. So we're talking about not a lot of the big money going into the businesses that could be comparable just as good. It doesn't matter! This is internal VCs, this is what they do. So as far as being black, that's a lot of the experience that I've had. Most of it does not affect me on a daily basis, I don't want to make it seem like every day I go outside something happens, but it happens enough to where for one, you don't forget it, and for two, it's annoying in spaces where it shouldn't even be happening, at work, at school, public places, even so far as...

Peter McCormack:  Well when you can measure it, when you can measure it like, 1% of CEOs or investments from investment banks, I think that becomes a little bit more interesting because you can actually measure it, you can actually statistically see there's an issue there. Okay, there's just one question that might be either a really good question or an ignorant question, but just tell me either way. Are there problems that are also internal within the black community that can't be solved by people outside of the black community? Are there internal issues that also need to be solved?

Isaiah Jackson: Oh yeah, absolutely. So in every community they have their own issues and they should be worked out by their own community. Solidarity is cool, but for some things black people need to work on for themselves. For example, within the black community, one of the things we have to establish is trust. A lot of black people don't trust other black people, over the simple fact that over the years, a lot of people have fed into the media narrative. Unfortunately, it's crazy kind of Stockholm syndrome, but unfortunately a lot of black people think white is right and it's always going to be better. So black people don't trust other black people, especially being in economics or economic thing like I am.

So trust is one thing. Also two, the ability to have a circular economy that comes with trust, but also having the mindset that we have to support each other. Some people have this mindset that I'm black, I made some money... I live in Beverly Hills, I'm not there now I'm in my other house, but I live in Beverly Hills and there's black people that live there and they think "It's over, I made it. I have nothing to do with black community, that has nothing to do with me!" But you can have somebody like Henry Louis Gates, one of the most prominent black people in the country, he got arrested on his doorstep because they thought he was breaking into his own house.

So it doesn't matter how high up you think you go. I think as far as black community, we have to understand we're in this together. I've seen a lot of communities, immigrant communities mostly, because they have a home country and because they can bring in people, they realize we have to stick together. The only way we're going to make it, is if we stick together. I had an ex-girlfriend that was Mexican and most of her family was still in Mexico and they had eight people living in a house. Everybody had a job, everybody put money in a pot every month to save for later, for whenever the next person's graduation, the next person's whatever, they would do that and they trusted each other because they knew, we're all we have. So I think black people have to get back to that point.

Within our community, as far as crime, I don't think black on black, white on white, is proximity. Crime is based on proximity. Most black people live near each other, so it's one of you there. But as far as some of the way we portray ourselves with crime, like making it seem like it's okay. It's fine in entertainment with rapping or whatever, because we have movies that portray crime, but we do have to work on that with each other. One thing I do every time I see a black person, I give them a head nod. You might notice, some people might notice that, random black people give each other head nods or at least say hello, you know what I mean?

Just to make peace between each other, because it's a lot of animosity built up and some people don't even know why they don't like other black people. It's literally because we've been taught that way, and taught to not trust them. So that division keeps you from having a community. So there's a few things we can work on in our community. It's a lot more... I mean if I had to throw another one in there, maybe more accepting of the gay community. Black community is, especially a lot of African immigrants and Caribbean, a lot of times have their stereotype as notoriously homophobic.

So with the gay community, LGBTQ community, to be more open to that, I think black community could work on that. I think we have deep rooted religious roots with Christianity and Muslims, so that may be the issue there, whatever that is, in my opinion, none of that shit should matter. If we all black and we're going to try to make it and economically we're trying to push it, we got to get rid of those old ways of trying to, we're just separating ourselves. So a few things we can work on and I can't come up with all the solutions, but there are people working on it now, and we're not destitute like we're dying, we're actually succeeding and getting better. It's just every community has to work on something.

Peter McCormack:  Right, so internal and external things that could be worked on. Okay, so let's go to the book. I've got a copy, I haven't read the whole thing, but I did look at it, because you gave me a copy of when I saw you in LA, but there will be people who can listen to this who haven't read the book. I'll probably give some out actually, but you talk about black economics. Talk about what black economics is?

Isaiah Jackson: Absolutely! So like I said before, the circular economy I'm describing, being in LA the last three years, one of the things I've noticed going to places like Koreatown, Chinatown, Little Ethiopia, different aspects where there's a community of people based on their economic mindset and upstanding with their race, in Koreatown, they don't even have stores sometimes in English, because they don't even need the outside community. That's how on point they are and that's sort of the mindset I want a lot of black people to get into as far as black economics, because what that means is, we shop with each other.

We actually buy from each other, and we invest in each other, because long-term, if our community is going to succeed, we can't have all of our dollars going to outside communities because there are a lot of people who have made a lot of money off some of our biggest name players. If you look at the black community, our biggest money-makers, athletes, entertainers, most of their money is gone to 80% white families by the time they leave, between their lawyer to agent, their team, which is fine. If they're the best for the job, that's who you want to choose, that's fine. However, some people are just as good in the black community, don't even get a second look.

For example, LeBron James, his agent, Rich Paul, he's not a formerly trained agent, but he's the biggest agent in the game right now and people like himself who may not even have that formal training or have just the resources, those people can succeed as well if the black community comes together and has those economics and in my opinion, it can happen a lot easier because we have the internet now. You can shop online, I just bought two items from two black owned businesses today. I usually try and buy at least one a week, just to make sure people realize I'm making money off of my book, I want to help other businesses make that money and then keep it going.

Because at the end of the day, we really are all we got, we shouldn't be looking for outside help and we don't get outside help. So why even fuck with this whole, we want to be friends with the oppressors that want to keep our economic down, because this affects everybody, but because black people have economically been pushed down already, then it really affects our community. How bad is it if the Fed is printing money and our money is going to get inflated and the value's going to go to shit, and we're barely...

It was in Forbes that black Americans are expected to be worth $0 in 2050, a net worth, because of no savings, because of debt. So all of that is all compounded unless we change and I think that's what black economics is, is having a circular economy and supporting each other and going forward.

Peter McCormack:  A bit like people are trying to do with Bitcoin, it sometimes creates that circular economy?

Isaiah Jackson: Absolutely. A lot of similarities when I first started.

Peter McCormack: So I know, because I listened to your interview with Pomp, it was 2013 you discovered Bitcoin. But what's your own kind of personal thesis. Are you Bitcoin only? What's the value you see in that? What draws you into Bitcoin?

Isaiah Jackson: So I don't want to say a maximalist, but I'm like a maxi-ish I would say. I like other projects for people to get involved or for people to learn, not necessarily that it will ever overtake Bitcoin or that it has the same censorship resistance. I don't think there's any other project that has shown that. However, I am open to other projects, just viewing them, trying them out, for different use cases. I don't think Blockchain is going to save the world, because Blockchain's only use case right now is Bitcoin. So that's why I say I'm maxi-ish. However I think it's not the end.

Somebody could come up with some innovation that could turn Blockchain into something better than what we have now and I think we have teenagers and college students working on that now and in 5, 10 years maybe I'll change my tune. But for the most part, Bitcoin maxi-ish, meaning all of the tools that we need to go forward can be built on Bitcoin and if we took all of this talent that was too busy trying to sell people vapourware or whatever they're trying to sell some of these coins, if they were working on just Bitcoin, we could advance a lot faster. So that's sort of where I am with Bitcoin.

Peter McCormack:  Right, okay. So talk to me about how you think it can help the black community. Also, we all go out there and try and convince people, I try and convince my dad and my brother, even my kids, I try and talk to them about Bitcoin. But you've talked before about, it's been harder to try and promote Bitcoin within the black community. Why is that?

Isaiah Jackson: Oh yeah, so unfortunately like I said, the trust back there in the black community, a lot of times people have been duped and people have been tricked into different multilevel marketing and whatever schemes, whatever people have done. Unfortunately when I first got into Bitcoin, the first couple of years I was learning about it, all I was hearing about were scams. I would look at it and be like, "That's an obvious scam." But people were like, "No, no, no, this is how you get involved Bitcoin." I was like, "No, it's not, this is how Bitcoin works."

So I went through that battle with a lot of black people to start. But the reason that I say it's a lot harder or it was a lot harder, was simply because of the trust factor and also most people didn't understand the why. Now that people are starting to get the why of Bitcoin, why we need Bitcoin, why it's important in the future, I think that's when black people were like, "Hold up, that's us. You mean the media makes Bitcoin look bad and they lie on it all the time?" Yeah, most likely black community, because it's a threat, because if it grows to where it can be, it can take away power from the state and I think the only reason it was much harder before was that they didn't know why.

The what, you could describe what it was, how you could use it, but if they didn't know why, they were kind of like, "Why would I use it over what I'm already doing?" Now that people have the why along with way more tools to invest and to use Bitcoin, I think that's become a whole lot easier. In fact, I've never had more people call me about Bitcoin since I've started. The second most was in 2017 when the price was going to $20,000. So right now it's actually better because people are more educated. It's been two years since then, or three years since then almost and I think now it's not as hard to talk to black people about Bitcoin. It's only hard to talk to people that built a career of hating it.

If they said they hated, they just got to stick with it, like Peter Schiff, because they just start off hating this so they just go "Double down, fuck it!" I've met some dudes who just doubled down on it and even when I'm doing presentations, they're like, "I don't believe anything you just said." I'm like, "That's fine, we don't need you. I don't really care." So as far as in the black community, it's not really much hard anymore, but that was a hurdle at first.

Peter McCormack:  Does the book help though in that you've specifically written it for the black community? Do you just show them a copy of the book and say, "Read this?"

Isaiah Jackson: Oh yeah absolutely, it's become a lot easier. That's why I wrote the book, to be more efficient. Instead of explaining myself for an hour, "Here you go, here's the book, read it and if afterwards you still don't believe it, then we can talk more." But most people after they read it, they're like, "Yeah, I could see a circular economy coming sometime in the future. I can see it as an investment" because that's all some people see it as, some just a store of value, as an investment and then when people start to read about the bank... I think the banking chapter is the one people have come to me and talk about the most.

They literally didn't know half of the stuff that banks were doing and these private institutions and how racist they are in the fact that they've paid out hundreds of millions, billions of dollars, in discrimination payments because of being sued. So these banks that you go to everyday, some of you work for them, I think that in the book really takes people into another thought process, like "Yeah, we got to find something different or at least give ourselves leverage to make them change their practices."

So I think the book definitely helps. I know for a fact there's some solutions in there that I'm working on personally, others are too and so far, it's been good organic growth and I just want people to see an example of what can happen if our community can use Bitcoin, but anybody's community, just relay it to your own personal community, Bitcoin can be used that way.

Peter McCormack:  Well I think the banking thing at the moment, we've realized there are universally fucking all of us. Again, more of an issue in the US, the way the Fed's printing money, the unemployment numbers in the US have gone way above say, what we had here in the UK, but I think that right now, I just think there's this general distrust. We've got billionaires and Goldman Sachs alumni in government, Mnuchin and Trump, they're clearly making decisions.

I've been looking into this Dodd-Frank thing that Mnuchin was looking to dismantle and it just seems right in front of our face, right in front of our eyes, they are robbing everybody to look after their friends and the incentive structure is all wrong and I think the US is painting the biggest picture for everyone, because it's not as bad in the UK, but it's making people realize what's going on.

Isaiah Jackson: Absolutely. I think the fact that I wrote the book for the black community is fine, but every community should be up in arms right now. I know that some people that will saying, "Hey, this protest isn't about that, it's about George Floyd" and I'm like, I don't think you understand! You have a nation full of people who are getting fucked by the Fed and some people realize that and this is just a by-product of that. It was a slap in the face to get a $1200 check to some people and they're like, "That doesn't even cover my rent! What are you even doing here?" Then to send propaganda like these, they send you a letter, "From your government, we have sent you this" and it's like, man, fuck you!

Peter McCormack:  Hold on, don't they have Donald Trump's signatures on the check?

Isaiah Jackson: I have seen one! I didn't qualify for it, but I've seen one. It has Trump's signature, like Trump's deceived America with this shit and I'm dying, like Jesus Christ, how ignorant can you be?

Peter McCormack:  I was joking to my friend, I was like, when they get the vaccine, the vaccine is going to have his signature on it as well.

Isaiah Jackson: Exactly, I would not be surprised! Some people are just pissed off because of that. If everybody that's pissed off right now turn their attention towards the Fed and they were like, "We need to find a way to take out the Fed". Of course, you really can't do it physically. I mean I'm not breaking into the Federal Building, but you can start slowly moving money out of your savings accounts and out of some of these other accounts into Bitcoin, either slowly with dollar cost averaging or all at once as a big fuck you.

So honestly, I think people who are in the street that are just mad, I don't blame them, this is a terrible time to not be already rich, because like you said with the incentive structure, there are people who are already millionaires getting millions of dollars. Then there's people who are already poor to start getting that $1,200 or $3,500 for tax returns or whatever, but that won't last them through the end of the year, if they can't go back to work. So it's a cry out for help from a lot of people. Everybody is getting fucked by the Fed right now.

Peter McCormack: It's the silent protest, right?

Isaiah Jackson: Yeah, that's the best silent protest you can have and some people are not people who want to march in protest. I'm one of those people. I've never really been to a march or protest in my life. Me, I protest economically by trying to build and in other ways as well, buying guns and preparing myself. But as far as going forward yet, protesting for other people, if they want to do it, you want to have those solutions available after the smoke clears.

Peter McCormack:  It's funny you said about buying guns. The footage you see of these armed militias standing outside protecting their businesses or protecting their streets, I don't know why it is, but I think I trust them more than I trust the police.

Isaiah Jackson: Yeah, I think so too. I think we had some sort of voucher for business owners to purchase a gun and if every single person, every single business on the street has a gun or a gun owner, it'd be a lot different. Some places don't, they just get robbed or whatever and they don't get it. But I actually trust them more than the police because they have to live there and they have to work there. It's a lot of police that come into these neighbourhoods that live 30 minutes away, they don't give a shit about the street, they don't care, it doesn't affect them.

So I think I trust them more and I think you should have police maybe as a perimeter or outside, and then maybe a security force. But a lot of times that can get sticky as well. So it would have to be something well thought about, like I said, this is argument. You have to be able to sift through a lot of the small factors that could affect it, but I'm with you there. I think I trust the business owners more than I trust just the police, because they are fighting for their lives and police is just fighting for a check to go home, sometimes.

Peter McCormack:  It's funny, I'm really intrigued to see how this all plays out. Again, I was talking to a friend earlier today and I was like, "If in a year's time, in 2021, we go back to where we were in 2019, it'll be a real shame if nothing has changed." Now the one thing is like, I've just seen this thing in London where they're fighting police and I'm critical of that, I think is just opportunist bullshit. But at the same time, one of the interesting things is the way this is spreading around the world.

I've just seen protests in France and in Amsterdam and it's a real chance to ask some really tough questions of the role of the state, the role of government, how money works and I feel like we really need to... It isn't just about teaching people about Bitcoin, it's actually educating them about money. But I just worry that in a year's time, I worry we'll miss this opportunity.

Isaiah Jackson: Yeah I'm with you there, I said the same thing. I said, "This should be the last time we protest, this should be it!" Of course it won't be. But if we're educating people on money and people are sort of getting that information, I'm going so hard right now for that reason because I don't want to see us in the same position a year from now and we're sitting here talking about more solutions and it's like, "Oh shit, here we go again". Because unfortunately, a lot of people who have been around, who lived through the '60s, who saw a lot of the struggle then, they're sitting here now like, "This is the same thing, 50 years later, I don't even know what to tell you, it's the same" and that can't happen, not for me.

I don't want to live another 40, 50 years of my life going through this. So you're right, it would be a shame and we have to do some of the changes. That's why I'm going so hard. I'm glad you're going hard, of course everybody in the Bitcoin community, but just money, period. I think most Bitcoin people have gone away from talking about Bitcoin as much, but talking about money period and how it works, and how a lot of what we do today is shaped off of money and how to use it. Yes, that's the conversation we should be having!

Peter McCormack:  Yeah, that is the thing that has made a difference before and it's like, "Oh, you need to buy Bitcoin, because it's censorship resistance and seizure resistant and blah, blah, blah." I just could not get people interested. I made the show called the Money Game, which was all about how the money system works, how inflation robs you, how the government steals from you, the different ways they kind of fuck with you and that resonated with people. Then people listen to that and they're like, "Oh yeah, I get it. Okay, this is why Bitcoin is important" and I guess that's something you're experiencing, yeah?

Isaiah Jackson: Oh yeah absolutely. Whenever I'm on my book tour and I speak to financial groups either with webinars, the first thing I talk about is money, I don't even go into Bitcoin. I'm like, look, most people don't even know what money is, the three pillars of money and then as far as US monetary policy, most people don't understand how the Fed lend to banks, who do not distribute money to you, usually through loans or whatever, it's usually distributed to the other rich friends and that's why you're left out of the economic system.

Then go into of course, the Bretton Woods Agreement and how we went off the gold standard, fiat currency, how the inflation like you said, it kills over time, that's why your grandmother could be a stay at home mom and grandpa would have one job and you all could buy a house, two cars and picket fence and now, I'm making more than they did, and I can barely afford an apartment. It's inflation, that's what did it. So I started off with that, and like you said, once people were like, "That's how money works?"

Yeah, this is how your money works and this is why you're getting robbed and now there's a better solution and then that's when I kind of go into Bitcoin. So I think the money part is very important, it has to be the foundation and we got to start now, because like you said, a year from now, we can't be having the same conversation, not on a broad scale.

Peter McCormack:  Yeah man, I'll be so disappointed if nothing's changed or if I'm out in LA and it's just, I'm talking to you and somebody else has been killed and I almost think this is like peak protests now. I think if it happens again, I don't even think you'll get the same protest. I think you'll probably even just get even more looting and violence and less actual real change behind it. I could be completely wrong though. But how do you think this is going to play out now? Because what was interesting last night is the protests seem to go back to being a bit more peaceful or less looting and less kind of violence.

I can't figure out if that's just because all the shops are smashed up so there's nothing left to loot, or it's just a change in dynamic and I can't figure out if the changing dynamic is a change in the police attitude or change the protesters, but how do you think this plays out? Because one of the interesting things is that it would be nice if there some kind of co-ordinated expectation of what people wanted and people kept protesting for it. So for example, the three other policemen who were sat behind…

I can't remember the name of the policeman, and that one on his neck, it's like those three guys need arresting as well. That's a clear thing. But we need some other kind of achievable goals, things of working towards and whilst everyone's protesting and shouting, I don't know if everyone is in agreement about what they're pissed off about.

Isaiah Jackson: Yeah and that's one of the biggest problems with protests, people are there for their own reasons and if there ever was a sort of leader that would come up with 10 bullet points, and this is what we want, he'd probably get killed, especially if he's black. Every black leader we've had that have tried, they got killed. Literally, that's why you don't see people stepping up as much. However, organizations that aren't funded by George Soros, like Black Lives Matter, need to come together to do it within their local communities, because there's never going to be a concerted effort, but if within your local community, all right. 80% of most people's lives are spent within a five mile radius.

So we need to figure out as a black community here in, let's say DC or wherever, here in DC as the black community, that will be easier to organize, to get it going, because a national one probably won't happen, but locally, you can get it done and have a very good quality of life, if you can get something done with those cause. But yeah, you're right. I wish we could say, "Yep, those three cops need to be arrested." Police need to have some sort of insurance, if they kill someone and whoever else's case that was funny, so to say like George Floyd, needs to be reopened. But there are a few cases like Sandra Bland, believe there's another one that's being reopened, Breonna Taylor's I think is being reopened, there's a lot of other cases that they should go back and be like, "No, those dudes need to pay for it at a certain point."

I'm sorry that it's later down the line, but that would be good to have on the list. I just don't know if we'll be able to make it and I just don't know if it'll get co-opted by some of the outside forces like we've discussed, because in case you're wondering, if you're white and you don't realize this, Black Lives Matter is not a black organization, it's black people in it. The actual statement, Black Lives Matter is a good statement, but I'm talking about the organization itself because they did not shit after Mike Brown. They're opportunists, they got their fame, the few that were in it and they haven't said anything since then.

So as a black person, I'm telling you, Black Lives Matter the statement, yes, I agree with it. The organization itself, don't send them any money. Help your own people, give it to the people directly that you see, because these organizations unfortunately have co-opted a lot of the wording and all of the things that actually go into a protest, and they just packaged it and started basically watering it down. So we need to avoid that as well, because they're not for us.

Peter McCormack: I interviewed a guy from New York, I think he's the President of New York, Hawk Newsome, President of Black Lives Matter, a while back and it was really interested in the interview because it ended up becoming all about social democracy and talk a lot about socialism projects. I was a bit lost actually because I was like, this isn't what I thought I would be talking about.

Isaiah Jackson: Yeah, I've only visited their site once. So this was maybe five years ago. But if you looked at the site, there wasn't really any solutions for black people. It was solutions for people in the gay community, one of them was to abolish the household or something like that, I don't know. I guess they wanted to make it so that nobody hates the other people, gay people get married or whatever. Then the socialist aspect of it, the money part is that we need to abolish capitalism, which I don't really agree with.

We haven't even seen real capitalism and in my lifetime, because the Bretton Woods Agreement since '73, if you have the freedom that we have now with the capitalism that's supposed to happen in a social safety net, that's actually responsible, not a corporate safety net, if they fuck up and you're a billion dollar company, your loss. You may have a social safety net for somebody here as far as if they're mentally challenged or if there's things that, so I don't think capitalism doesn't work at all. I think it's been bastardized and it's turning into colonialism. So when black people are starting to say that, I'm like, that's a very nuanced argument as well, is you can't just abolish it all together and let's go socialist.

Have you been to a socialist country? Everybody that I've heard that has been in a socialist country has had a terrible experience. They're running away for a reason, because as soon as you get a dictator strong enough to enforce the type of socialism they want, that probably won't be good for you. You will be trying to run away too. So I like the freedom, I'm more of a libertarian I guess, do your own thing, I don't even know if there's name for it, but yeah, Black Lives Matter, I haven't really spoken to a lot of them after that whole debacle back in 2015. So I don't know what they're up to now, but they always co-opted with signs and with statement, but the group itself, I don't give a shit.

Peter McCormack:  Dude I went to Venezuela, made a little film about it and nobody there wants... The only people there want socialism are the ones who are essentially slaves of the Maduro regime. They rely on it for their job or their education and if they don't support Maduro, they will likely lose those privileges. But everyone's leaving the country, 50,000 or whatever at this one border crossing I went to, traveling every day.

Nobody wants fucking socialism, it never works. I have the same argument with my socialist friends in the UK, especially during the last election, because there are quite strong socialist policies coming in from the Labour Party and a lot of my friends are like, "Oh, these are really great ideas." I was like, "These really aren't great ideas, you really need to look at socialist country and the history of socialism because it really, really doesn't work." So how do you think this is all going to play out? You're obviously watching the news every day. We're all going to put the TV on later and see if protests start again. How do you think this is going to play out?

Isaiah Jackson: Well, I think most of the protests died down. Amongst the black community, I've seen a huge wave of people who are now saying, "Okay, fuck it, this is it. We're tired of this, there's enough information out now." Business wise where people economically start to come together and also two, socially starting to see... We're still seeing the same problems we saw before, but the way I see it playing out is, unfortunately because everybody's unemployed and broke right now, you're going to still have looting. You're going to still have people who use it as an excuse to try and steal and do things, whatever.

But I think you'll see more and more protests that have a point in certain cities and unfortunately, I think it's the road to martial law because if they enforce the curfew, which they've already started and then the National Guard shows up, which they already have, it's martial law right now in Hollywood Boulevard I heard. I haven't been back, but it's literally National Guards all way down and the curfew's at 9:00 PM. I'm seeing people getting pulled out of cars like in Atlanta, just for going home. So I think that's where we're headed for the next few months until maybe things "Die down."

But I think if the economy doesn't pick back up, it's going to be more of the same, because people are only going to get poorer by the end of the year and no amount of Bitcoin can really save that. However, what I do realize is that, if people realize they're bankrupting us, they're literally stealing all our shit, all I got to do is say, Bitcoin is the opposite of what will happen before and I think we could take off from there in the future.

But I think socially, you're going to see more unrest and around the world, you'll see other countries starting to fight back, people that may have not had the gumption to do it will probably start themselves because it should be more of a worldwide protest if we start going against the Fed. So that's how I see it playing out. It'll take some time though.

Peter McCormack:  The other thing that crosses my mind, I'm sure it's crossed your mind, is that this guy killed George Floyd, he's going to have a jury trial. You know the next question I'm going to ask you and the next point I'm going to make is that it's a jury trial and we know historically the success rate of prosecuting police officers in jury trials is very, very low.

Isaiah Jackson: Very, very low and that's why they make sure that they're jury trials and usually they'll choose a location based on whether it's suburbs mostly white or is it going to be in the city with mostly black jurors, you know what I mean? Imagine 12 black jurors on there. He's guilty. All you need is one that disagrees, as if there's a mixed bag, black, white, Latino, whatever, you just need one to disagree and the case wouldn't go forward.

So I think that's one great way that you just pointed out that the judicial system doesn't give a shit about black people, because damn sure can't get a jury trial for most trials with black people, but the police get it every time and the success rate is really high. So yes, I do think that's an issue and unfortunately if he gets a not guilty or if he gets released, I think it'll turn up on a violent side, unfortunately.

Peter McCormack:  Of course, it will.

Isaiah Jackson: Only because there are people waiting for the... Because if he goes to jail, I think that'll be all right, you know what I mean? Even if they fake it and just say he went to jail and just keep him off the radar, for the next witness protection, who gives a shit? As long as he goes away, whatever. But yeah, if he gets a not guilty, I think you're going to have some people actually pop off and it's an unfortunate time we live in, but there's a lot of built up hate, and I can't really blame some people for how they get. If a police officer killed one of my family members, I don't know how to react. So I can't really tell people what to do. I do know that he should be convicted.

The other three police officers should be convicted and then from that point, you have to have some sort of police reform. If there's any time to discuss it... I'm like, if you think police department is perfect, you're insane. If you think the police department is 100% terrible, you're also insane. There is a happy medium that we need to come to and it's more on the edge of most of the police is something going on with black people, but you got to change it at some point. That'd be police reform.

Peter McCormack:  Well listen, look, I'm conscious of time. I want to get a little bit more Bitcoin in just before we close out. So look, Bitcoin world, I know you've got your book. You've focused on black economics and introducing the black community to Bitcoin. But just outside of that, where's your head at with Bitcoin at the moment? What are the key things that you're thinking about? What are you most interested in right now?

Isaiah Jackson: So right now the two projects I'm most interested in with Bitcoin is Lolli. I love the fact that you can get paid in Bitcoin for doing what you already do. That's very helpful for getting people into Bitcoin because usually when people have, they're like, "Yeah, I want to get some Bitcoin" and they're like, "How much does it cost?" And I'm like, "Well, you don't have to buy it. You can buy what you already buy online and you get free Bitcoin rewards for that." That's a good way to get people started.

They get a few bucks in Bitcoin, they're like, "I can move it, I can use it" and that's a very good entryway. I think Lolli, Fold App is very similar and you actually get a discount. That's another thing in the black community I tell people all the time, you can save money if you use Bitcoin sometimes, buying from these places. So I like Fold App, I like Lolli, I just signed up with Swan Force, with Swan Bitcoin, I like Swan.

Peter McCormack:  They've got the dollar cost average haven't they?

Isaiah Jackson: The dollar cost average, very simple, "I want to buy this much weekly or monthly from this bank account". Very simple and a shout out to Corey, I had lunch with him when I was out in LA and he's a big time Bitcoiner who's definitely in my mind, one of the top minds in the space. So I like those three projects. I've got a shout out from Jack Dorsey and one of the things I like is that Cash App is very simple for most people, even though you can't move it off, there are problems that you can't move the Bitcoin off and its custodial wallet that they control when people start off, if you tell them, "Yeah, Cash App" they're like, "Really?" Hold on, I can just get..."

And it's that simple. So shout out to Jack Dorsey for that, I appreciate that. But yeah, those are the products I'm focused on right now and as far as where Bitcoin's going in the future, I'm interested to see how it progresses if it is used by a country.

Peter McCormack: Yeah, we all want to see that dude!

Isaiah Jackson: 5 to 10 years maybe, but would it not be crazy if China sped that process up and declared like two years from now like, "We're going to use Bitcoin reserve as our..." I'm just playing, that would be one of the things that I'm excited about, because like I said, me and you, I think we're both kind of the same with price, we don't really care that much about price.

We know the scarcity aspect of it, so we realize that just getting as much as possible is how you can see in the future. But I just think it would be interesting to see if the price does something crazy, like 2017, except into the $100,000s. If Bitcoin crossed $100,000 in the next two years, there's nobody alive who would ever say anything bad about it, or couldn't, because we started at zero.

Peter McCormack:  Yeah, well that's funny you should say it, because I don't care about price day today, but I definitely care if it goes over $100,000.

Isaiah Jackson: I think that's just part of the course. I think it's coming, but I just don't look at it day to day.

Peter McCormack:  But it's like the ultimate play. If you're a country like, I don't know, say like Sweden size, I think the government just kind of stocked up and built a massive Bitcoin reserve and then just announced it to the world, the price will explode.

Isaiah Jackson: Yeah, the speculation itself would push it to six figures and then even if they were like, "Well we were playing", I'm good! But you're right, I think it's only going to take one major country or semi major country to say it, and even putting the thought out there, some countries may have it as a strategy, but maybe they were like, "Hold up somebody else is going to do it before us", they're competitive and they'll be like, "No, no, no, we want to do it first" because most of our government officials don't have an original thought in their head.

So it would usually be something that they copied from somebody else. But yeah, that would be amazing and that's what I'm really interested in to see going forward. Then also two, just how communities can start circular economies using Bitcoin as well. Because it's going to be tough...

Peter McCormack:  But you like the projects where it's all about the... It seems to me like you like the onboarding things, the UX things that make it easy to onboard, whether it was Lolli or Cash App, you've picked all the apps, you've got that kind of Silicon Valley design and what they're doing and making it easy.

Isaiah Jackson: Yeah, most of my consulting are people who have never used Bitcoin and at this point, a lot of people have heard of it, because when I started in 2016, a lot of people hadn't even heard of it. They didn't even know what the word I was saying. They were like, "Big coin?" But now onboarding they're like, "Okay, how can I buy something right now?" Because there are people who are like, "Now I've heard you've been talking about this for seven years now, I've literally seen it grow. How do I buy it?" I don't want to say, "Well you got to go to Coinbase and you got to sign up, you got to wait maybe a month because they might lose your shit" The onboarding process takes too long.

So if I'm like, "Oh, just get someone Cash App." That's why I like it. Or if I'm like, "Oh, you know Lolli, earn some money for buying. You bought your girlfriend something nice, yeah, go ahead and get some Bitcoin back there." So yeah, I like the onboarding stuff a lot, it gets people involved and it's easy to educate people when they have skin in the game.

Peter McCormack:  All right, so what stuff is coming up for you, man?

Isaiah Jackson: So coming up for me, I have some Bitcoin ATMs, I have my own and then also to installing them around the country, working with CoinFlip. So hopefully getting that international in places that don't have any type of monetary policy, but just starting here in the US. Also writing the second version, the one year anniversary of Bitcoin and Black America. Your show is the first to hear about this!

Peter McCormack:  Boom, exclusive!

Isaiah Jackson: Yeah, exclusive! Look out for that. July 11, the one year...

Peter McCormack:  Is it a new book or is it like an update?

Isaiah Jackson: It's an update and it will have some of the same stuff, but Bitcoin moves so fast in a year, it's about 60 or 70 more pages worth of stuff. Regulations have changed, my mindset has changed on the industry since I wrote the book, so a lot of different stuff. We'll have some of the stuff from before, but most of it will be new. New packaging and all that stuff. Then of course I want it to be more inclusive, because when I dropped it the first time I just put it out and I was like, "I'm an independent author, I'm just going to hit up who I know."

But this time I want it to be more of the Bitcoin community, being able to push it and then getting actual tangible results. I want to see how many people read this book and bought Bitcoin the next day, you know what I mean? So working on that! Then of course still dealing with the consultant part of it, the Bitcoin book tour, when it comes back, I'll be doing more of it, but still consulting via Zoom, webinar, you can contact me for a meeting on bitcoinandblackamerica.com. So still doing that, damn busy and always pushing it forward in the space. So yeah, staying busy right now!

Peter McCormack:  Wicked! Well listen, man, I'm glad we finally did this. I want to do in-person at some point. So when we can get back on planes and back in LA, because I do love LA, over there we'll hook up and we'll go and hang out and do this and maybe grab a beer as well, but just keep doing what you're doing dude, you're pushing Bitcoin in spaces that other people aren't. I know everyone appreciates your work, I know everyone likes what you do, so just keep doing what you're doing and anything I can ever do for you, just reach out to me. Yeah, can't wait for the next version of the book dude!

Isaiah Jackson: Yes sir. like wise man, appreciate you man!

Peter McCormack:  Where should people find you?

Isaiah Jackson: You can find me on Twitter @bitcoinzay, you can find me on Instagram, Bitcoinzayllc and the website bitcoinandblackamerica.com. Any of those three places and I will respond and we can chop it up from there.

Peter McCormack:  Alright man, well listen, I'll put it in the show notes, keep rocking, stay in touch and like I said, anything you need you can reach out to me man.

Isaiah Jackson: Absolutely, all right, I appreciate it!