US Councilman Buys Weed With Bitcoin Cash | Crypto News

Let's get to the news. Bitcoin has finally done it. It's made its way onto the biggest stage in the world. No, I'm not Talking about the 70 meter tall, 2,900 square meter villa mix stage in Brazil. Although that does look pretty damn cool. This is no festival, this is real life. This stage is green, outlined in white and contains beautifully simple geometric shapes like circles, rectangles and squares which are populated by 22 graceful figures who are in turn cheered on by the entire goddamn world. Yeah, I'm talking about the English Premier League of Football. Tune into Sunday's game and watch the bitcoin logo take the field adorned to the sleeves of the legendary, globally renowned club of Watford, who are preparing to take an early season beating at the hands of Europa League finalists Arsenal. Let's go, Arsenal. The reason behind Bitcoin's sudden appearance on the Watford jerseys is that the club has partnered with bitcoin betting platform Sportsbet IO. The club will be also accepting Bitcoin as a form of payment in its online merchandise store. According to the club's official post, the logo's addition to the uniform is part of a wider campaign to improve awareness around Bitcoin and educate the public on the benefits of using cryptocurrencies. That's pretty wholesome. Unfortunately for Watford, a good attitude still won't save them from defeat. But I will be incredibly happy to see two of my favorite things on the field at the same time come Sunday. Especially with the knowledge that that little iconic bee will be center stage in the world's eye. Now I'll be turning my analytical eye toward the unlikely relationship between bitcoin and vaping so we can determine what is the truth and what is bullshit. This is fact or fud. Recent research shows flavored e cigarettes may increase your risk of getting lung disease. Therefore, the Trump administration, in its all encompassing magnanimity, has decided to save us from ourselves by banning flavored e cigarettes. So please allow me a moment to take the last few breaths of vapor infused freedom while I let paragon of freedom, Ron Swanson explain why this government action goes against the very fabric of our nation.

The whole point of this country is if you want to eat garbage, balloon up to 600 pounds and die of a heart attack at 43, you can. You are free to do so. To me, that's beautiful.

That's right. Our freedom to self destruct is under attack. And by the transit of property, when one freedom is under attack, that means all our freedoms are under attack. At least that's how Tom Lee seemed to be feeling when he took to Twitter yesterday to voice his fear over the US Government's latest actions, saying the White House could even ban bitcoin. And that with the current White House, there is nothing out of bounds nor out of reach, implying that Trump could just as easily turn his banhammer on bitcoin as he did on vapes. Of course, Mr. Lee acknowledges in the very tweet itself that not only is this unrelated speculation, he's not even expecting any bitcoin ban to materialize. Which begs the question, what was the point of that tweet, and why are we even talking about this at all? Well, for me, it's a matter of principle. Saying that the Trump administration will ban Bitcoin is just like saying, maybe this vape will give me lung disease. It's all speculation and hypothesis designed to rile up fear, uncertainty, and doubt, which you know is fine until someone starts to manipulate that fear and uncertainty. Like, for example, when a president bans vapes over seven deaths while at the same time making no move against cigarettes, which are the cause of more than 480,000 deaths per year. I wonder why that is. Thus, this tweet receives my FUD stamp of disapproval. Now that I can't use that thing anymore, I might as well go back to my totally 100% healthy habit that I have most definitely not been trying to break for the past six years. At least this won't kill me. Speaking of smoking, have you ever wanted to get high with your local council member? Well, if that sort of thing tickles your fancy, or, to put it more bluntly, sparks your joint, grab some crypto and head on down to Emeryville, California, where Councilman Ben Bartlett has become the first elected official in the US to truly welcome the 21st century. On September 11, at a demonstration conducted by blockchain company CRED, as well as the Blockchain Advisory Coalition, Bartlett used bitcoin cash to become the first elected official in U.S. history to make a cannabis purchase with cryptocurrency. You know, for science, here we have Dan Schat, co founder and president of cred, to tell us a bit more about how this crypto payment service will affect the cannabis industry and. And the state of California. So could you please explain to me exactly how this process, this payment process works?

Councilman Ben Bartlett was able to basically use bitcoin cash from his personal wallet. I think he used the Coinbase wallet, but really, he could have used any wallet. What appeared on the screen was a barcode with the dollar amount and the Bitcoin cash amount, then typed in the exact amount on his Coinbase wallet app, scanned the barcode, and then there was a pretty much near instant confirmation that the payment had been received. Basically what CRED did was they took the bitcoin cash in purchased LBA tokens, which is the translation utility token, and and then settled in the form of a Stablecoin, which is the universal dollar that's pegged one to one with the US dollar. So ultimately the, the merchant received their proceeds in real time in the form of Stablecoin. And what excited, you know, Ben Bartlett and all of the elected officials in the room, and there were a number of elected officials beyond just Berkeley, beyond the city of Berkeley that were there, is that there's never really been such a great opportunity to do sort of one of three things. Number one, address safety issues associated with just cash and cash handling. Number two, address cost issues associated with the cost of cash and cash handling, armored car carrier costs, costs related to theft, etc. That are pretty enormous. And number three, have an opportunity to actually collect city taxes in real time. So this got all of the elected officials sort of excited about the opportunity to pass local ordinances that would allow the cities to receive Stablecoin. Because today a lot of people don't even pay their taxes. Only 17% have of the sales that are happening right now in California are actually sales that result in people paying their taxes. This makes it much easier, it's much better for the cities. And now we have legislation that we're introducing that's being passed that's going to be considered in January at the state level to accept Stablecoin as well.

Cool. Very cool. So now you've told me about what this means in terms of like the legislature and government. What does this mean for the cannabis industry itself?

It's enormous. It's enormous, right? Because today, you know, the general way that you go into one of these dispensaries and actually purchase something is you walk up to a counter, you ask for what you want, and then they point you to an ATM machine right next door, you pull the cash out and you make a. Make a payment. Imagine though, that now if all of these cannabis merchants can move into mainstream just like everyone else, and be able to accept crypto as well as debit cards and credit cards, what that means for their industry, the average credit card payment is over twice what the average cash payment is. So this could double or triple their sales. Easily, easily. As well as result in a lot more safety and lower costs in terms of cash handling. So it's a big deal for the merchants. They're highly incentivized to do it. Frankly, they're totally happy to pay their city taxes if it means double triple their sales and being treated like any other merchant mainstream Again, that was Dan.

Schat from CRED talking about blockchain use in the Californian cannabis industry. This has been the cryptocurrency news. My name is Jackson. Have a great day everyone, and always remember to like subscribe and hodl cointelegraph.

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