 The Mises Institute has a new free book for minor issues fans. Dr. Guido Hulsman's How Inflation Destroys Civilization. Learn how inflation isn't only making us poor, it's harming our culture, meant to well-being, and the moral foundations of civilization itself. Get your free copy today at mises.org slash issues free. Hello and welcome to another episode of the Minor Issues Podcast. I'm Mark Thornton at the Mises Institute. Well, here at the Minor Issues Podcast, we talk about positive uplifting issues on a regular basis. My producer assures me that it's at least 4% of all episodes. This is such an episode. I'm not sure if you would describe it as a world of golden opportunities or just a silver lining in an otherwise bad storm, but I'm an optimist and I have never been more optimistic about the future. We will start with gold here today briefly, but the real focus is on the future. Gold has achieved an all-time high price in terms of US paper dollars. The mainstream financial media took virtually no notice. Another nail in their coffin. It's a really good sign for the good guys. It's a bad sign for paper money and central bankers. In addition, the current trends, which are already established, point to a much brighter picture. They are, one, the world economic form agenda has been continuously losing in several respects recently as we expected. This would include their attempt at turning their own totalitarian zeal into science. The climate change agenda has been revealed as a hoax. Its leading scientists have been disgraced. Others are fleeing for cover to preserve their reputations, including journals and a few universities. The mass charade has been completely debunked. The vaccines have been revealed as intentional killing agents. The lockdown is already viewed as a totalitarian proving ground. I estimate that too many people around the world simply refuse to participate in such anti-human nonsense in the future. Although we, and especially children, will suffer for many years to come. I'm sure you know that many people out there still believe in the world economic form agenda and have no idea how things have changed beneath their feet, but those people hardly matter. The other aspect of this brighter picture is that there are now millions of hardcore anti-state libertarians around the world. These are primarily younger people and they will hopefully be a painful, unrelenting thorn in the side of the state for decades to come. To this, we can add a now radicalized rather than complacent base throughout the world. Middle of the road people are shifting to our side in droves. In America, they call themselves conservatives, while in Europe and elsewhere, they call themselves liberals, but they are similar in many ways now. The post-World War II propaganda that turned these people into cold warriors and leftists has melted away with the lies of the state. We now hear more and more of the one-dimensional political types who were the true pawns of the state, now laying down their green and pink banners with a retort that they just want to be left alone. Even the politically brain dead in the U.S. are having adverse reactions to the tearing down of statues, the trashing of history or boys playing in girl sports, or how about the failed government food pyramid and the state's attempt to get us to eat fake meat and bugs. Random people are finding that most any dietary change from going to keto or even raw milk makes them healthier than the government food plan to help make us fat and sick. There has been a tremendous adverse reaction to the state's plan for mass immigration in the so-called designation countries of Europe and North America. The state's plans for ongoing proxy wars are also in trouble. People don't see the point of ongoing killing in the Ukraine or in the Middle East, and they're right. Wars and destabilization covert efforts by the U.S. in places like Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria have been total failures. What good does that do anybody except the state and military contractors? Americans now view its own surveillance state like Russians used to view the KGB. That is not pro, but anti-American. We can see the world economic form agenda on the run around the world politically in places like the Netherlands, Sweden, Poland, Hungary, Italy, India, and most notably, and most recently in Argentina. Gains have been made or will be made in France, Germany, New Zealand, Ireland, and Australia, and elsewhere, maybe even Canada. Recent elections in Ireland and Portugal seems to have fallen in a good direction too. Even minor parties in those countries are a threat and a thorn in the side of the power elites. I mean, I may not agree to go skinny dipping with some of the political leaders of those efforts, but they represent established opposition to the world economic form agenda. Their countries are no longer the lap dogs of that agenda. Of course, cryptocurrencies are very popular and they are a major thorn in the side of the world economic forum and central bankers around the world. Cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin have already been adopted and accepted by the younger generations as the future of money. I do not in any way suggest that victory is assured. It will be extremely difficult, perilous, and probably very difficult economic times ahead. However, with victory, the rewards will also be great. Here are some of the things I imagine are the rewards that are currently available. One, the total end to the war on drugs, an end of a century of embarrassment, of racism, cruelty, family destruction, and that's all in reach and likely to occur soon. The end of central banking and paper money, this is also in reach and likely to happen soon because of the coming economic crisis will require radical changes if not abandonment of the system. Three, smaller states. Large states are often the most troublesome and the most destructive and dangerous to the individual and their rights. And these larger states will fracture as states crash and burn with their government debts. The bigger they are, the harder they will fall and the harder they fall, the smaller the pieces. Smaller states are better states. Entitlement programs will also be gone by either abandonment or phased out by bankruptcy processes. The burden of supporting and rehabilitating the less fortunate will be returned to the private sector and charities unless courts determine that legitimate claimants can access government assets. Government assets will fall to either claimants, subordinate governments, local governments, or the private sector. The maintenance of large standing armies will dissipate in favor of private and local approaches to security. The end of the public good is in sight. The end of the public enterprise is in sight. We already have the private sector in space exploration. This is not a complete list, but it does remove hopefully some of the worst aspects of the state and I think it's a significant possibility. None of these functions are either necessary or eternal. In fact, they are rather young by historical standards. In history as shown, none of them have remained robust for long. These are all things that I think can be accomplished in my lifetime. The state today is the modern dressed up version of Hitler's blitzkrieg, the Viking raid, the rampaging horde and the tribal invasion, conquest, death, rape, slavery, and destruction, including cultural and religious destruction, is that story. But today it appears to us in suit and ties, badges and legal documents. However, I think that people's eyes have been open to the reality of quote, us versus them, unquote. Them being the state, us being the productive, peaceful, tax paying class. When I grew up, I did not know anyone who had even gone out of the country. Now I don't know anyone who doesn't have friends on Facebook from other countries. Do we really need a state to protect us from that? I believe that it is possible to accomplish this in my lifetime. An ideology that strives for peaceful and voluntary society based on every individual's natural rights can achieve this. We can look backwards into history to see this and the great deal that has been accomplished by freer societies. An ideology that also reveals, in contrast, the horrors of history that repel us all and were brought about by absolutism, dictatorship, social democracy, and other forms of tyranny.