Libertarian Party of NH Chairman Darryl W Perry Takes a Rip
After it passed with veto-proof margins for the first time in New Hampshire’s history, cannabis decriminalization was signed today by new NH republican governor Chris Sununu.
This isn’t the best decrim bill possible, but it’s a big step in the right direction for the Live Free or Die state. Police have sixty days before the bill goes into effect to arrest as many users as possible, because after sixty days, they’re only allowed to ticket for cannabis possession. HB 640 eliminates criminal penalties for the possession of up to 3/4 of an ounce of cannabis and/or up to five grams of hashish for those age 18 or older. Under the new law, first time offenders will receive a civil violation punishable by a $100 fine. Unfortunately, if the person is caught three times in three years, then the fourth ticketing would be a class B misdemeanor, but the person still cannot be arrested. The first offense is fined at $100, but subsequent offenses within that three year period would be $300 each.
New Hampshire Loves Bitcoin and Cannabis!
Hopefully, after a year of this decrim, the state reps and senators will see that the world in NH has not turned into a satanic hellscape, and we’ll see further decriminalization in the future, right down to the total elimination of all penalties for possession, growing, or sale of any amount of cannabis. Ideally, New Hampshire, if it were truly a free place, would have no regulatory or taxation structure around the cannabis plant at all. If that miraculously happened, the cannabis industry would explode in the Shire and we’d all be better off for it.
If you like that vision and you’re a libertarian, voluntarist, or liberty-loving anarchist, we need you here to help make NH the best state for cannabis freedom. Sure, other states have legalization, but there’s an insane amount of regulation and tax around the industry. What if NH could be the one state without that legal garbage? It could happen if you were here to help. We need more people to move here and join the most successful freedom migration in the world. Here are 101 reasons why you should.
In a recent, in-depth article, I discussed the out-of-control fees to send bitcoin. The executive summary is that Bitcoin is somewhat broken due to the high fees that have been caused due to the Bitcoin network not being able to scale to consumer demand. The reason for this is because there has been an ongoing “geek war” for a couple years now behind the scenes that centers over some fundamental disagreements over how Bitcoin should handle its growing pains with scaling up. Meanwhile, the fees have been rising over the last six months and have killed off the previous usefulness that Bitcoin had for microtransactions, or even small dollar transactions. Again, see my original piece for more about the fee difficulties.
Now the ugly Bitcoin not-so-civil war that has been playing out behind the scenes on message boards, reddit, and social media for months and months is going to come into public view on August 1st. Here’s my non-technical explanation for what’s happening and how, if you’re a bitcoin holder or bitcoin-accepting merchant, it could affect you: (more…)
Charlie Shrem, COO of Jaxx, stumbled onto the lower fees, he told Free Talk Live.
I saw the headline in Coin Telegraph and couldn’t believe it: “Bitcoin Transaction Fees Significantly Decrease, Charlie Shrem Pays $0.25 Fee”. Even though I know and trust Charlie Shrem, I still thought this news was a fluke.
For those who haven’t been following the ugly geek war happening behind the scenes of Bitcoin, here’s a recap, oversimplifying a complex situation:
As little as two years ago, Bitcoin’s median transaction fee was as low as $0.02 worth of bitcoin. That means half of all bitcoin transaction fees cost less than $0.02 and the other half cost over $0.02.
With Bitcoin, there are fees to send, not receive. (This is the reverse of credit cards, where the merchant pays a fee to receive.) In the past, if one wanted, one could send bitcoin with no fee and it would go through, just without any priority. As you can see from this chart, the median transaction fee has shot up mostly in the last six months or so, and it has risen has high as $3.00 worth of bitcoin!
That means that had I wanted, in the last few months, to go buy a $2.00 drink at Corner News with bitcoin here on Main Street in Keene, NH, it might cost me $3 just to send the $2, making it a $5 drink! No sane customer would pay a crazy fee like that. This dramatic rise in fees has destroyed bitcoin’s previous usefulness for microtransactions. No more bitcoin-operated snack machines, no more using bitcoin for small online tips, no more Watch-my-Bit micro-donation video streaming service. (more…)
Bitcoin Front Page Article Delivered to 40,000 Homes!
Since 1958 the Monadnock Shopper News has been connecting the people of this region with local businesses on a weekly basis. They deliver to over 40,000 households via postal mail – basically every home in Cheshire county. How exciting to see a feature article about local bitcoin-accepting businesses here in the Keene area as their headline, front cover story in this week’s issue!
The Shopper News’ reporter went to visit with Chris Rietmann, one of the proprietors of Route 101 Local Goods, a unique store featuring locall-sourced products that’s also where bitcoin (and other cryptocurrencies) can be spent, plus bitcoin can be purchased from the region’s only Bitcoin Vending Machine, and you can even buy delicious Vietnamese food from the “Bon Vivant Gourmet Street Food” truck parked just outside at 661 Marlboro Road in Keene. (more…)
Just-Flipped-to-Libertarian State Representative Brandon Phinney
The Libertarian Party of New Hampshire held another press conference today announcing the awesome news that now a THIRD sitting state representative has flipped parties to the LPNH! The LPNH has already made two previous historic announcements earlier this year with state representatives Caleb Dyer of Pelham and Joseph Stallcop of Keene changing from republican and democrat respectively to the Libertarian Party of NH and then forming a Libertarian caucus in the state house for the first time in twenty years.
Representative Brandon Phinney, who was elected in 2016 as a republican, said during his official announcement at today’s press conference, that the republican party leadership has been chastising their legislators for not following the leadership’s demands. Phinney said in his speech that he was stifled by party leadership and that he and the other liberty minded reps were labeled “terrorists”! He said, “What I found was that both parties were seeking to manipulate the potential legislation and the legislative process for political gain…I was not elected to do the bidding of a political party at the expense of my principles.” He finished his speech by saying, “Integrity and a clear conscience is desperately needed in the New Hampshire house and together with representatives Dyer and Stallcop, I believe that our cause will ignite a shift in political affiliation in this state”.
Phinney was joined in speaking by the chairman of the national Libertarian Party, Nicholas Sarwark, who came up from their offices in DC to help commemorate the occasion. In his speech, Sarwark delivered an invitation to legislators, politicians, and others saying, “if you’re tired of living a lie, if you’re tired of standing up for things you don’t believe in, come out of the closet. Become a libertarian. Come home. ” It was Sarwark’s first time visiting the Live Free or Die state. Here’s the full press conference from this morning in Concord:
On Friday, New Hampshire’s new governor Chris Sununu signed a bill, HB 436, which makes NH the first state to explicitly protect cryptocurrency like Bitcoin from regulation!
This is a historic day and this move clearly positions New Hampshire as the most bitcoin-friendly state in the United States. NH was already the #1 most free state according to the “Freedom in the 50 States” study and this makes it even more free. New Hampshire also now stands in even more stark contrast to New York, the least free state, since New York a couple years ago did the opposite and attacked cryptocurrency businessess with their oppressive “bitlicense”, which drove bitcoin businesses OUT of NY. Now those businesses can escape safely to NH as this just-passed bill offers them a safe haven from the ravaging, destructive effects of government interference.
Persons who engage in the business of selling or issuing payment instruments or stored value solely in the form of convertible virtual currency or receive convertible virtual currency for transmission to another location.
Liberty Lobby‘s Darryl W Perry, who headed up a campaign to contact the governor about this issue said, “After nearly three years of trying to get virtual currency explicitly exempt from money transmitter laws in the Live Free or Die State, I am happy to see this first major obstacle cleared.”
In 2015, a bill (HB 666) was passed that spooked many in the international bitcoin community as it added cryptocurrency to the “money transmitter” statutes. This caused at least one bitcoin business to cease doing business with customers in New Hampshire and quite a bit of buzz about New Hampshire losing its vaunted crytpo-friendly status. How did this happen in a state with the largest concentration of bitcoin enthusiasts per capita? Honestly, we were caught off-guard, but now that’s all changed. In 2016 a state house committee to study cryptocurrency was formed, whose meetings I attended and video recorded.
Representative Barbara Biggie of Milford, Sponsor of Bitcoin Protection Bill
After hearing from multiple NH bitcoiners in the committee meetings, state representative Barbara Biggie stepped up and filed this bill. As Darryl and I pointed out at the hearing, the bill as filed wasn’t quite what we’d hoped for. It created a new definition and exemption for “virtual currency” in the statutes, but still left in statutes a definition and regulation for “convertible virtual currency”. We explained to them that this was confusing and they should be striking the regulation for “convertible virtual currency” rather than creating the additional terminology.
You know what? They listened AND did us one better! The commerce committee amended the bill and turned it into the best possible protection for bitcoin businesses in New Hampshire! (more…)
