Canada, Russia and Quarter Squat Trolling

Level 1 - NGMI

Welcome Avatar! Over the last two years, crypto in general adopted the “store of value” narrative since billions of people woke up to the fact that 7.5% is likely a cooked inflation number (closer to 20%).

BowTiedBull - Read Pinned Tweet or NGMI @BowTiedBull

Can’t fool people anymore.

Fast forward to 2022. If you’ve been on Twitter in the last week, you know the bird app is obsessing over Russia, Canada truckers and the implied potential for more protests/war. This represents the actual value of crypto which is bigger than a long-term store of value against money printing.

Part 1 - Canada - Truckers

While we’re not going to take sides on this (we’re not Canadian) you can simply take a step back and ask a few questions: 1) do you think it is good that the Canadian government can stop donations and 2) do you think that freezing of all financial assets - banks/credit cards etc is a fair decision against protesting?

Even if we assume that the truckers are in the wrong, the same questions should pop up. On this side of the web they are easy answers: No and No.

In a well run government, individuals should be allowed to protest against certain causes and have their voices heard. Assuming they are not creating violence there is no reason to freeze accounts (except to silence the masses). Without protesting we’d still be in an era with colored bathrooms and other such nonsense.

What you’re seeing live is the government weaponizing the financial system to get what they want. Step 1: they find every person who donated; Step 2: they block all of the people who funded the truckers; Step 3: they claim this is for the “greater good of society”; Step 4: they film everything and look for more people to lock out of the financial system and Step 5: they gather information on how to shut off all of their ways to transact in the financial system.

If you look at this and still don’t understand the power of crypto we just don’t know how to help you. Crypto allows you to send and receive digital money without an intermediary. If someone says your address is “bad” you can send it to different addresses and eventually get it to the right source. This is a huge net positive for individual empowerment. Before this? Your accounts could be bricked tomorrow and you are effectively “banished” from society with a few clicks.

The Downside: Before moving on, there is a clear downside. This means the new financial system will be full of questionable individuals along with straight-edged individuals. You can’t do anything about this.

The last part always scares new people. They want a system that is open and permission-less that can somehow shut down bad actors. You have to take the good with the bad. As a sliver of hope, we would expect a social credit score to eventually be developed.

Example: back in the early 2000s people said eBay would fail since no one would trust random people (to buy and sell using the internet). Over time, there were some scams however a “reputation system” was put into place. After the reputation system was put into place the majority of scams/frauds declined. While there is always some slippage when using Ebay, the social score effectively removed the majority of the issues. In general, people are pretty honest. It is just the smaller percentage of big scammers that cause fear and anxiety when using new systems.

Part 2 - Russia & Ukraine

Moving on, the next major item in the news is Russia/Ukraine tensions. This once again highlights both the good and bad of crypto. According to a wide variety of news Russia is reportedly working on ways to combat sanctions and Ukraine has recently legalized Bitcoin.

Conflict as an Example: We’re not going to pretend to be geopolitical experts. We didn’t even know (until recently) that the regions in question already speak Russian and are quasi Russian/Ukranian regions with some sort of separate military. In the end, that isn’t the point. The point is that crypto can be used for both good and bad. If you wanted to send funds to the region quickly (within minutes) your #1 option is likely crypto.

Good Side: On the bright side, if someone knows a person in the area, they could quickly transfer funds to them. If they are forced to flee the area and their bank accounts are locked, you now have a way of getting them financial assistance without an intermediary.

Bad Side: Assuming you believe the decision by Russia is a net negative, Russia can use crypto to avoid potential financial sanctions. Since crypto is outside of the traditional financial system, economic activity can occur in the new system and avoid financial issues.

Final Note: Looks like three for three on fading Twitter given the recent announcement from Russia. No idea how this ends at this point. If you force us to guess, money printing will occur if there is substantial need for military intervention from the USA.

Since it is unlikely that you can do anything about this, it is best to wait for the USA/China/UK to make their moves. Once the agenda is set you can follow the breadcrumbs (correct investment decisions)

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Part 3 - Lebron James Can’t Squat! (Joke)

We went overboard on purpose to thin out some of the low quality that accidentally found this side of the interwebz.

For those that believe they can train Lebron James with squat form, we’ll leave you with actual “sauces”. It is likely partial squat specific training (vertical jump - no one goes to parallel in a basketball game). When you run and jump the probability of doing full range of motion is next to zero (unless you want to guarantee you don’t jump fast enough to get a rebound).

Someone should tell these guys to get into full squat position! We’ve sent an email to NBA coaches to alert them of this missed opportunity.

Here is an example of explaining specialization/periodization (something a decent high-school athlete would know):

In the end, any time you see a professional athlete (golf, tennis, hockey, etc) there is a 99.999% chance they are doing it for a reason. Even with elite genetics anyone at the top wants to make sure they are training perfectly since *tens* of millions of dollars are on the line.

As a bonus, if you want more proof that elite athletes do tons of sport specific exercises just look at Yohan Blake, one of the fastest athletes of all time: 9.69 100 meter and 19.26 200M (hard to find good Usain Bolt videos but this was a training partner in Jamaica - quick search on YouTube)

As a point of emphasis, if you watch the whole thing there are a range of weird and/or “strange” exercises that we doubt anyone here needs to do or has ever done. That said, we’d happily bet it’s for a reason and is not “incorrect”. (note, we have no idea what some of the exercises are for either!)

Hopefully this has thinned the herd a bit. Anyone who believes they are in a position to give Lebron advice better be making millions as a professional athlete trainer already (otherwise… probably best to assume it’s a specific training exercise). The chances of a random buff profile twitter face being correct vs. a guy who has spent $40M+ on training isn’t really up for debate. Well… in 2022 it is… which is why it is the best time in history to be alive and get rich.

Bonus: 3:46 mark here you can see a wide range of stuff no regular guy should ever attempt at the gym.

Autist Note: As a rule of thumb. Pro athletes are on crazy regimens for diet, illegal substances (PEDs) and sport specific training. To get to a point where you’re in the top 0.01% in anything you have to dial in everything. Therefore, assume competence over a random opinion on a short clip from Twitter.

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Disclaimer: None of this is to be deemed legal or financial advice of any kind. These are *opinions* written by an anonymous group of Ex-Wall Street Tech Bankers who moved into affiliate marketing and e-commerce.

You’re Early: Remember that you’re early. If you need to zoom out see our post here on Crypto versus the Tech bubble (which was only the US stock market).

Below Chart in $Trillions of US Tokens