"I am Not Dorian Nakamoto"

The idea that the 64-year-old Japanese guy living in California was the lone engineer that wrote the code for Bitcoin is ludicrous.

I work with some of the top engineers in Japan. The oldest ones are in their late 40s. In the world of the Internet, those are the old men. 

Anyone should ask themselves: 

"How many over 60-year-old engineers have I met?" (I've never met/heard of one.) Hell, I've never met one over 50-years-old! 

A 64-year-old guy, the savior of the world, fighting the evil banking system and he's the descendant of samurai no less? Ha! Ha! Ha! Ridiculous!

And now, the online social account for Satoshi Nakamoto had sprung back into life after a 5-year hibernation simply stating, “I am not Dorian Nakamoto.” 

From CNBC:

An online social account for the creator of bitcoin, Satoshi Nakamoto, sprung back into life Friday morning after a five-year hibernation amid growing speculation about his identity. The username Satoshi Nakamoto used an online forum for the P2P Foundation - an organization that studies peer to peer technology - to introduce the virtual currency with a single post back in 2009. The same user returned on Friday morning in an attempt to deny a 4,500-word cover story in this week's Newsweek magazine. Newsweek claimed that the creator of bitcoin was a 64-year old Japanese-American living in California called Dorian Prentice Satoshi Nakamoto. But Friday's comment on the P2P Foundation website - using the Satoshi Nakamoto username - simply stated: "I am not Dorian Nakamoto." 

Of course not. 

What is it about Bitcoin that makes people throw clear thinking and common sense out the window?

I wrote: "The inventor of Bitcoin, being one guy, and actually Japanese with samurai ancestors is too fantastic to be true.... Hell, if he is a Japanese, he has a higher chance of being a relative to the inventor of Poke-Mon than having "samurai ancestors." Read all about why here: http://modernmarketingjapan.blogspot.jp/2014/03/newsweek-has-wrong-guy-with-this.html

I Think Newsweek Has the Wrong Guy With This Satoshi Nakamoto.... Here's Why...

(This blog post was inspired by: Is Bitcoin Legal? Illegal? a Currency? a Commodity?)

I read the Newsweek article concerning "discovering" Satoshi Nakamoto the inventor of Bitcoin... I also chuckled out loud when I read Newsweek's rebuttal about this Nakamoto guy's denial. It reads:

"Newsweek stands strongly behind Ms. Goodman and her article. Ms. Goodman’s reporting was motivated by a search for the truth surrounding a major business story, absent any other agenda. The facts as reported point toward Mr. Nakamoto’s role in the founding of Bitcoin." 

As a long time Japan resident, Japanophile, and all around half-Japanese born geek and well studied in Japanese history, I can tell you that when I read the first Newsweek article, "Discovering Nakamoto," I was fascinated too... 

Until, halfway through the article, I hit one sentence...

The sentence read: "Descended from Samurai and the son of a Buddhist priest, Nakamoto was born in July 1949 in the city of Beppu, Japan, where he was brought up poor in the Buddhist tradition by his mother, Akiko." 

I immediately stopped reading it right there because it lost all credibility at that point. Why? The "descended from Samurai" sentence defies belief. 

In the 80s I worked under a guy named Hasegawa who was a Japanese historian. I will never forgot the day when he showed me an English textbook, written by a caucasian American, that said, "Japan's economic recovery was due to hard working Japanese. The Japanese received their work ethic from their samurai ancestors."

Hasegawa threw the book down, scoffed and said, "Ridiculous. This is western romanticist fantasy that Japanese have samurai ancestors. No one has samurai ancestors! Absurd!"

After that, I began to look into it and, indeed, the numbers of people in this country who came from families who were samurai you can count on ten toes; they are basically non-existent because most samurai were too poor to marry and, in a class society, you generally marry within your social strata. That would mean that, generally speaking, samurai who married would have married the daughters of other samurai... (They certainly wouldn't marry the peasant class which was 98% of the population.)

I already mentioned that most samurai couldn't afford to marry. (At the peak of the samurai warrior class (about 1598) there weren't a few hundred thousand of them in total...) 
(See: http://www.alljapan1.com/counter/index.php?cat=175)

Sure, that doesn't dispute the entire Newsweek story, but that's not my point. 

Realistically speaking, it doesn't compute... The odds of this guy, Nakamoto, being the Bitcoin brain AND having samurai ancestors would be akin to, say, Steve Jobs being directly descended from George Washington or Benjamin Franklin... Or even worse odds than that as most of the samurai disappeared 400+ years ago. Yeah, I know... It's anal-retentive (I'm that way often)...But stuff like that bothers me... That this is in this article throws into question the entire credibility of the source of this information for this story.

It sounds like the fantasy script for a samurai anime about Japan, where the good guy, a "Son-of-samurai," against all odds, fights the bad guys... What? Is this the script for next Disney produced Star-Wars movie? 

Then when people say this is Newsweek article is "investigative reporting" I roll my eyes... Yes, I do have a problem with that... This sounds more like hype, promotion or simply trying to sell magazines (by the way, that issue of Newsweek was its triumphant return to the news racks....)

You can't make this shit up!.... Well, I take that back... You actually can!

I think this is just another farce that works to discredit Bitcoin... Not that it needs help in that department with recent news.... I also think this will make Newsweek and print media even more of a laughing stock than it already is.

This samurai business makes me extremely skeptical of this entire story.

The inventor of Bitcoin, being one guy, and actually Japanese with samurai ancestors is too fantastic to be true.... Hell, if he is a Japanese, he has a higher chance of being a relative to the inventor of Poke-Mon than having "samurai ancestors."

----------

This article inspired by my friends Peter Tilley (Bitcoin expert) and Mish Shedlock over at Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.jp/

An Interview With America's Top Bitcoins Expert: Bitram "Bitty" Coins

This interview with a Bitcoins expert is just too good to ignore...

---------------------

Reality Check: 

Today, I interview Bitram "Bitty" Coins, the nation's leading expert in the Bitcoins market. 

GN: Mr. Coins, I am happy you consented to an interview. 
BC: Call me Bitty. 
GN: OK, Bitty. I want to find out what this Bitcoins deal is all about. 
BC: It's about liberty. It's about a new international market. It's about a New World Currency Order. 
GN: It's also about buying 10,000 Bitcoins for $50 in 2009, which are worth $13,000,000 today. 
BC: I call this value-added investing. 
GN: I call it a digital tulip mania. 
BC: I see that you are a skeptic. 
GN: You have very clear eyesight. 
BC: Maybe I can persuade you otherwise. 
GN: Give it your best shot. 

BC: Let me tell you about the #1 benefit. You get complete privacy. 
GN: Complete? 
BC: That's right. 
GN: How does this work? 
BC: You go to an exchange and buy Bitcoins. 
GN: You mean like Silk Road? 
BC: Not Silk Road. The U. S. government shut it down. 
GN: Then maybe Sheep Marketplace, Silk Road's replacement? 
BC. It went out of business when someone stole $100,000,000 in Bitcoins -- maybe the biggest theft in history. 
GN: How did he do this? 
BC: Nobody knows. 
GN: Will the police catch him? 
BC: The police can't do anything about it. 
GN: Why not? 
BC: Because, with Bitcoins, you have complete privacy. 
GN: So does the thief. 
BC: That's the price of complete privacy. 
GN: Then what recourse do the victims have? 
BC: Well, one of them said this. "I won't find this guy. Somebody else will. I assume he'll be jailed, blackmailed, tortured or killed." I find this inspirational. It's 100% privacy at work. 
GN: Are these heists a pattern? 
BC. Not at all. They are random. 
GN: But there are so many of them. Here is a list. (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=83794.0)

BC: It's just a cost of doing business anonymously. 
GN: Because there are no contracts. 
BC: Correct. 
GN: Because there are no courts. 
BC: Correct. 
GN: Because no one knows who he is dealing with. 
BC: Correct. 
GN: So, if you get robbed, you lose everything. 
BC: Yes. But the risk is low. 
GN: How low? 
BC: No one knows. 
GN: Because the Bitcoins market is 100% secret. 
BC: Correct. 

GC: Let's get back to your account of how I get 100% secrecy. Let's say that I buy some Bitcoins on an exchange. A reliable exchange. 
BC: A good idea. 
GN: How do I get money to the seller of Bitcoins? 
BC: By a bank draft. 
GN: Is there a public record of this? 
BC: Not on a Bitcoins exchange. 
GN: I mean at my bank. 
BC: Oh, sure. It shows that you have spent the money. 
GN: So, I don't transfer the money secretly. 
BC: Correct. 
GN: Then how do I get 100% secrecy? 
BC: Because no one can follow your money after you transfer it. 
GN: Even me, if it gets stolen. 
BC: Correct. 

GN: What if I want to sell some of my Bitcoins? 
BC: No problem. You sell them, and you get dollars. 
GN: Untraceable paper dollars? 
BC: No. Digital money. 
GN: But digits can be stored only in a bank. 
BC: Correct. 
GN: Then the digits -- dollars -- wind up in my bank account. 
BC: Correct. 
GN: So, this is not secret. 
BC: Of course not. It's central bank digital money. 
GN: So, to maintain 100% secrecy, I must never sell my Bitcoins for dollars. 
BC: Correct. 
GN: What can I buy with Bitcoins? 
BC: Illegal drugs. 
GN: What else? 
BC: Computer programming. 
GN: Anything else? 
BC: Not much. But there are more things all the time. 

GN: So, let me be clear about this. I give up dollars, with which I can buy anything, so that I can buy Bitcoins, which can't buy much of anything. 
BC: You are buying secrecy. 
GN: But I can go to my ATM and get currency. I can spend currency anywhere. I can spend it on anything offered for sale for dollars. This leaves no trace. 
BC: But there is a record of this withdrawal. 
GN: There is a record of my withdrawal to buy Bitcoins. 
BC: True. 

GN: Then why should I buy Bitcoins? 
BC: Because they keep rising in price. 
GN: Why do they go up in price? 
BC: Because of success stories. 
GN: Give me one. 
BC: In 2010, you could have bought 10,000 of them for $25 in pizza. 
GN: But in 2009, someone paid $50 for 10,000 Bitcoins. He took a 50% loss. 
BC: The dollar-denominated price of Bitcoins is volatile. 
GN: So, I should buy them as a speculation. 
BC: We don't call this a speculation. 
GN: What do you call it? 
BC: Buying the money of the future. 
GN: Will it buy more things in the future than illegal drugs and programming? 
BC: Of course. 
GN: What is the evidence of this? 

BC: It is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. 
GN: That's the New Testament's definition of faith. 
BC: Say, you really know your Scriptures! 
GN: I do. This one comes to mind. "Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal." 
BC: Right! Lay up your treasures in the cloud! 
GN: But not in Silk Road or Sheep Marketplace. 
BC: Right.

It gets even more interesting from here on. Read the rest of the interview here: http://bit.ly/1bCOxNl

Never Mined the Bitcoins - Here's the Scam Pyramid

Gary North has written what I think is the best thing I've read on Bitcoin in quite a while. Please refer to: Is Bitcoin a Ponzi Scheme? 

I've spoken and written a lot about Bitcoin. I think the most popular was: The Bashful Bitcoin Numismatist. And I've even been on WHDT TV interviewed about the subject: Bitcoin Not a Feasible Currency.

Well, for the first time in a few months, I finally had a crerative inspiration. This "art" is everything I think I could possibly say about Bitcoin in one image. You know, they say that a "Picture speaks a thousand words..." 

I made this and must give all credit and apologise to the Sex Pistols. 

Here is my last comment on the Bitcoin subject. This says everything I want to say:

My Interview on WHDT TV Concerning Bitcoin

I was on TV in Boston and Miami being interviewed about Bitcoin and some other things. I hope I didn't sound too much like an idiot.

(Something might be funny with this link. If you don't see the video, click here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5XF7wd_Mfjk)

Bitcoin? Mt.Gox in Serious Trouble

"You folks who think that Bitcon can somehow "replace" national currencies without the consent of the nations involved have rocks in your head." - Karl Denninger

This came to my mailbox a few hours ago from the grapevine:

[*** NEWSFLASH: In another demonstration that the United States is no longer the Land of the Free, the Department of Homeland Security has just seized the US bank accounts belonging to Mt. Gox, the world's largest Bitcoin exchange. This certainly underscores the importance, once again, of diversifying internationally. ***]

This confirms the story:

Homeland Security seizes account of largest Bitcoin exchange, Mt. Gox

".......The warrant that DHS used to seize the funds in Mt. Gox’s Dwolla account has just been published, and it points to a significant problem with the service. As Ars Technica details, when Mt. Gox owner Mark Karpeles opened the Mutum Sigilum account with Wells Fargo, he was asked if Mutum Sigilum LLC was a business engaged in monetary services. From the warrant: 

The application asks several questions; to include, “Do you deal in or exchange currency for your customer?” and “Does your business accept funds from customers and send the funds based on customers’ instructions (Money Transmitter)?” Karpeles answered these questions “no,” indicating that Mutum Sigilum LLC does not deal in or exchange money, and that it does not send funds based on customer instructions. Money transmitting businesses are required by 31 USC section 5330 to register as such with FinCEN. According to FinCEN records on May 6, 2013, neither Mt. Gox nor the subsidiary, Mutum Sigilum LLC, is registered as a Money Service Business. 

Whoops."

Read the rest.

Oh, and please don't send me emails telling me that I don't understand how currencies work. It seems that the folks at Mt.Gox are the ones who need to study up in that area. (Disclaimer: I know that Mt.Gox is NOT Bitcoin, they are merely the biggest Bitcoin dealer in the world, handling 80% of all trades).

As Karl Denninger writes:

So you as a merchant want to take Bitcon, er, "Bitcoin", right? You want to put your money into this "currency" -- right? 

Um, you might want to think about that again: The Department of Homeland Security appears to have shut down the ability to use Dwolla, a mobile payment service, to withdraw and deposit money into Mt. Gox, a Bitcoin trading platform. A Dwolla representative confirmed the move to Betabeat. Chris Coyne, cofounder of OKCupid, posted a screenshot of an email he received from Dwolla, stating that due to recent orders from the Department of Homeland Security, Dwolla cannot complete the bank transfer to Mt. Gox. 

Or FROM Mt. Gox. And by the way, this is not something that only the US govenrment can pull. Any government can and will do this as soon as it decides to. Without notice or recourse. Don't like it? That's nice. What do you intend to do about it? Whine on a mailing list or forum?...

...FACT: The only "rights" you have are those that you are willing to enforce by whatever means are necessary in favor of every citizen equally.  

Everything else is a privilege and privileges can be withdrawn at any time by the entity that granted them. Since the list of those rights that you, the sheeple, are willing to enforce is in fact the empty set because at best you demand claimed "rights" for yourself but you refuse to enforce them for everyone or even worse, you demand that government prohibit for others the same freedoms you demand for yourself, you in fact ownnothing, all the way up to and including your own body. 

That, by the way, includes so-called "money" you claim you "invested" in Bitcon. 

And..... it's gone.

I Must Be Bitcoin's Bad Luck Charm!

I guess I must be bad luck for Bitcoin and MtGox, Bitcoin's biggest dealer...

Anytime I have anything to do with Bitcoin, the next day, they get bad luck.

I wrote an article for Lew Rockwell on April 9th (that was posted on April 11th at 9pm Pacific Time) entitled The Bashful Bitcoin Numismatist and guess what?  Bitcoin crashed late that next day on April 12th, falling about 70%! Please refer to: So, Bitcoin Crashed. Now What?

Well, the other day, I was offered another US TV news interview and asked to discuss Bitcoin and gold. Of course, being a media-hog, I said, "Yes! I wanna be on TV!" and jumped on the chance.

My Bitcoin

So, being a diligent reporter, I figured that I'd get the scoop on Bitcoin; and since MtGox is only 25 minutes or so from my house, door-to-door, I thought I'd mosey on over there and have a chat. So, I sent them an email. 

Here is what my email said:

From: Mike in Tokyo Rogers, May 06 14:38 (Japan Standard Time): (This is May 5th, Sunday in the USA - Mike)

Hi Folks, 
My name is Mike (I go by Mike in Tokyo Rogers) and I have been a regular columnist for Lew Rockwell since 2004. I also sometimes do TV interviews with stations all over the world and on this Thursday at 4 am Japan time, I will be interviewed for WHDT TV with Gary Franchi host (Watch this station for free online here: http://usmediavault.com/stream.php). We would like to discuss Bitcoin and gold. I'd like to come by your offices for a 30 minute chat if you have time. Maybe take some photos. 

Be forewarned I am a sort of skeptic (but Lew Rockwell is not, as you know)... Trust I don't come there to grill you guys, I am a humorist at heart and would just like to report more or less about what the commotion is all about. I do not want to damage, nor promote your business. 

I am hoping that you guys can convince me to convince the viewers how great of a thing Bitcoin can be. Anyway, to be fair, I did write a humorous article about Bitcoin that Lew ran a few weeks ago: http://lewrockwell.com/rogers/rogers259.html After that, Lew ran a blog post that was very supportive of Bitcoin. That was a good influence on me. 

I'm not sold, but I'm not against. Anything that gets people off the state grid is fine by me. As a true Anarchist (and humorist) I am happy to have people use whatever medium of exchange they wish. Far be it from me to decide what people should or should not do. 

Whaddya say? Give me 30 minutes and show me around your business? I hope so. I have time tomorrow (Tues) or Wed. I live in Futakotamagawa. - Best! Mike

To this, the good folks at MtGox wrote back to me:

From: Marcus, May 06 14:57 (JST): Hi,  Thank you for your email. We have forwarded this to PR team for consideration and our PR team will contact you.  Thanks,  MtGox.com Team

Well, that was yesterday... And, like I said, I must be bad luck for these folks. For one, they haven't bothered to call me. You'd think that if they truly were believers in their Bitcoin, they'd be happy to promote and tell the world about it on TV and on Lew Rockwell, but I guess not. 

Or maybe they have their hands full with a ship that could be sinking... Why do I say this? Well, this morning I saw this news and I'm sure this is terrible for MtGox:

CoinLab Files $75 Million Lawsuit Against MtGox

Last week, CoinLab, a US based startup that got attention last month for being the first venture funded Bitcoin firm, announced that they were suing MtGox for $75 million due to breach of contact. The lawsuit stems back to a partnership that was agreed between the two firms in February. Under the terms of the deal, MtGox, the world’s largest Bitcoin exchange, which accounts for over 70% of total daily volumes being conducted through its trading venue, had granted CoinLab as its exclusive partner in the US and Canada. In its case against MtGox, CoinLab is claiming that the exchange failed to provide data in regards to existing clients. Additionally, they accuse MtGox of continuing to market in the US and Canada, and failing to abide by their revenue share agreement; thereby breaching the partnership agreement between the two firms. According to CoinLab CEO, Peter Vessenes in his statement to clients, “what tipped us into filing the lawsuit was our complete inability to get MtGox to deliver on the few simple things left that were needed for customers to move over en-masse; we were often left just apologizing to our alpha customers while their own businesses suffered. I’m just not willing to put any of our customers in that position – if we can’t do a good job for you, I won’t promise that we can.”

See? If I even think about Bitcoin, something bad happens to them the next day! I guess the sh*t is hitting the fan right now at MtGox and if they (allegedly) can't even keep their promises to their strategic partners, I guess calling back Mike Rogers is asking a lot. Especially since, as I mentioned, I am a skeptic and an interview with me might be risky business and just asking to be railed on.... In a humorous way, of course.

Mt. Gox Provides Bitcoin Humor

Here's what Mt. Gox's new catch copy should be: "Reliability! Spelled 'We Lie Ability!'" (Just say this as if it is a Japanese who has trouble with "Rs" and "Ls.")

Mt. Gox is the world's largest Bitcoin dealer. To read their webpage is good for laughs. These people reek just like some slimy used-car salesmen. I laugh at how the spin the news. Total propagandists.

People need to be rationale and realistic. Read this stuff on their own webpage and tell me that this doesn't sound extremely "fishy."

Humor from the Mt. Gox webpage:

At the very top of their page they say that Bitcoin is a good currency because....

"RELIABLE We're always on. Buy and sell Bitcoin anonymously 24/7/365 with the world's most sophisticated trading platform."

Really? "We're always on"??? Not true. They arbitrarily shut down service for three days starting last Friday (April 12th, 2013). Please refer to: Bitcoin exchange Mt. Gox suspends service following huge swing in trading price:

Mt. Gox, the largest exchange for buying and selling bitcoins, is temporarily shutting down following an uptick in activity on the site sparked by a massive drop in the digital currency's price.

The Tokyo-based exchange is suspending trading until 10 p.m. Eastern Time as it allows the market to "cool down," Mt. Gox announced Thursday morning. People may still cancel their pending and open orders, the site said.

Facts don't need to have any relation to the sales pitch, right guys? Then, back to the current webpage, in their news page it has an article that says: 

"Since yesterday, we are continuing to experience a DDoS attack like we have never seen. While we are being protected by companies like Prolexic, the sheer volume of this DDoS left us scrambling to fine-tune the system every few hours to make sure that things don’t go beyond a few 502 error pages and trading lag."

Wow! This is the language we are expecting from the new currency? "...we are continuing to experience a DDoS attack like we have never seen." Really, I mean, like dude? That's like, totally rad like!

They were attacked? Really? Well, no. That's not true either. Their most recent news post says: 

"First of all we would like to reassure you but no we were not last night victim of a DDoS but instead victim of our own success!" (sic)

"we would like to reassure you but no we were not last night victim of a DDoS" Thank god these people aren't teaching English to the Japanese. This grammar and punctuation is worse than mine! Why don't they add: "Yeah and we're so screwed up that we can't keep our story straight.... Wanna buy a used car?"

Then, to top it all off, after they make an admission that they lied (and try to somehow spin that into a positive) they add: 

"...please note that we may have to close the exchange for two hours in the next 12 to 24hrs to add several new servers to our system." (sic) 

Rank amateurs. You know they are freaking out and are screwed up. 

Oh, no! I get it! "We're always on. Except when we're not." 

People want to call this a currency? I know even my shitty fiat currency is acceptable anywhere anytime even if the power is off.

Mt. Gox is not reliable and if this sort of "exchange" is what Bitcoin is depending on, then Bitcoin is in trouble. Mt. Gox is run like a shady fly-by-night used car dealer. I don't expect them to be in business for very long. 

How could they be?

Uncle Mike grading a Bitcon... Er, I mean "Bitcoin"

If people want a reliable and trustworthy Bitcoin dealer, contact Uncle Mike's... Tell them I sent you!

Why Bitcoin? Hooray for Stamp Collecting!

(I'm re-running this article because I just wrote another article for Lew Rockwell that should run tomorrow. Please read: The Bashful Bitcoin Numismatic  I'm sure that, after reading that article, Bitcoin fans will want to kill me!)

When I was a young boy, I loved to collect things. I collected them all; coins, stamps, comic books, baseball cards, football cards, fish, frogs and snakes.

I collected this stuff cause I knew that if I held onto it for just long enough, someday I would get filthy rich off of selling it. Later, I realized that my "just long enough" would have had to be about 250 years.

Let's face it, folks. You can't get rich off of collecting stuff. I don't care what Gary North says, either. Gold!? Pffft! Well you can't eat gold now can you?

So if you have been collecting any of the above mentioned items — in some rose-colored glasses effort to get rich, all I can say to you is start today in trying to find someone dumb enough to pay you even 10% of your money back! Because you have lost all your money.

(That is, unless of course, you have a Marvel Silver Surfer comic #1 in Mint condition! Keep that baby. It's worth dollars!)

One of my fondest memories as a university student was when I was sitting in my room one day and watching the TV news. On the news they spoke about a Mickey Mantle baseball card that had sold for $500 some dollars at a baseball card auction. I couldn't believe my eyes and ears! I had that card back at home.

I dropped whatever it was that I was doing (it certainly wasn't studying) and raced back to my parents home. There I found the card. I took it to a card dealer the next day and proudly tossed it on the counter.

"I'll give you $5 dollars for it." The guy said.

"What!? I saw on TV last night that it sold for $5000 dollars!"

"Yeah, well, that was in mint condition. This one looks like it has been through the washer."

I was insulted. I grabbed the card and headed out the shop.

"Washer, indeed!" I thought, "It wasn't the washer. I had hooked this card up to my bicycle spokes with a clothes pin so that my bike made a 'rat-a-tat-tat' sound when I rode it — Just like a P-52 fighter plane! The 'Cadillac of the Skies.'"

I then went home and looked at my entire collection of stuff. Yes, I had basically beat everything up pretty much (like any normal American kid would do.) I cut out all the cool pictures from my Spider-man comics; carried most of my sports cards in my back pocket when I was running around with my friends....

The only things that were in good condition were my postage stamps. I hadn't cleaned them with some super-cleano silver cleaner that you see on TV, like I did my Mint Collection of Franklin Half-Dollars.

"Darn! For a moment there, I thought I was gonna be rich..." So, depressed, I went back to college and figured that I had better start studying because I didn't want six (or was it seven?) years of college to be a total waste.

Years later, when I moved to Japan, I took my coins and stamps with me.

The Japanese post office is just a wee bit smarter than the U.S. postal service. Stamps of the U.S. postal service sometimes are way off center and the designs are poor. Many U.S. stamps are really cheesy and cheap looking. Japanese stamps usually have a very high quality design and excellent printing.

This is clever, you see, because the postal service wants you to collect stamps. They want you to give them money and then not use the stamps. In Japan, they have special issues coming out all the time — sometimes three times a week! And they also promote the selling of entire sheets of stamps to collectors.

Buying sheets of stamps is a sure-fire way of losing money. My mother-in-law had a friend that worked at the post office way back when. Her friend convinced her to buy sheets of stamps as an investment. She did. And years later, she gave them to me. I took them to a dealer and, even though some of the sheets were 20 years old, they told me that I could only receive 80% of face value.

Then I took them back to the post office and said I wanted my money back. They said that they couldn't give me back my money, but that they'd only trade me new stamps for face value.

Al Hitler received a royalty for each of these sold!

"What a rip-off!"

So now my wife and I are using 20 to 25 year old stamps on all our letters we mail, even today. I guess some stamp-collecting kid might get a kick out of that if they see one.

So I'm back at the post office the other day and I see the new issue of a "commemorative stamp" and it hits me like a ton of bricks! Okay, maybe I'm not the smartest guy in the world, and call me paranoid, but I realized that the government — All governments, use postage stamps as a method of propaganda.

What a scam!

There are stamps commemorating this and that. Showing you just how great is the country you live in.

Stamps showing the great deeds the government has done for us all. Famous statesmen, great leaders, wonderful monuments, holidays, and human achievement.

So this new stamp issue here in Japan, was just a shocker and eye-opener for me! It's the fifty-year anniversary of the "Police Law."

Hooray for the police! Hooray for the post office! Hooray for stamp-collecting!

That did it for me. I'm going to start collecting stamps again! I just can't wait!

There should be some really great ones coming out of Japan and the good ol' U.S.A. in the next few years.

How about these ideas?:

"5th Anniversary of the Fall of Saddam's Statue," or;

"10th Anniversary of the Homeland Security Act," or;

"15th Anniversary of the Patriot Acts 1 through 11" (probably a sheet commemorative.) Or;

"20th Anniversary of George W. Bush's Accession to the Throne."

Wow! A collector's dream come true. And I think you folks in the States had better start collecting stamps too. It's a way to show your patriotism, a way to show your pride.

And who knows, maybe someday your collection will be invaluable as proof of character in an American court of law!

Hooray for the police-state! Hooray for the central-government! Hooray for stamp-collecting.

This article originally ran on Lew Rockwell.com... For more, please read: The Bashful Bitcoin Numismatic