“This letter is featured in Bitcoin Magazine’s “The Primary Issue”. Click here to subscribe now.”
First things first, the primary function of Bitcoin is to remove the State’s special privilege of debt pardoning through monetary printing. Bitcoin is rules without rulers; a cypherpunk technology that empowers the individual with verifiable financial independence. A peer-to-peer bitcoin transaction is speech. The right to run a node, enforce consensus, and validate economic activity with impeccable fidelity to genesis should be upheld and supported by any person, even if not seeking public office in the most influential regulatory regime on the planet.
We may never know if Satoshi Nakamoto intended for Bitcoin’s halving cycles to overlay the Presidential elections in the United States, but the game set in motion with the white paper’s release in 2008 has brought us once again to the polls in preparation for the block subsidy getting cut in half. El Salvador’s legal tender law was the shot heard ‘round the world, and with only a couple years into their Bitcoin experiment, the American political landscape is taking note. The Orange Party’s campaign bus is barreling down Route 66, and The Primary Issue has its head out the window, sussing out the political thumbs stuck in the air on either side of the highway strip.
Prime yourself for some changes to the status quo. In 2024, we get another scheduled showdown between Red vs. Blue. But before the end of 2023, the two largest political parties in the States begin their primary process. Generally, voters don’t switch teams; they know what color they’d like to paint the Oval Office, but they haven’t quite yet found the exact shade. The primary is a free home consultation for redecorating the highest office in the free world, complete with side by side comparisons of paint swatch candidates and floor-tile campaign platforms.
In color theory, one refers to Blue, Red, and Yellow as the primary colors due to their ability to be combined to make any color visible to the human eye. While the Blue and Red political parallels are easy to make, perhaps we should also consider the cautionary hues of Yellow. With a touch of Yellow, Blue becomes Green, beckoning our bus through the crossroads ahead. And when you mix Red and Yellow, our familiar Orange actualizes in the mixed oil and pigment.
The primaries give politicians an opportunity to separate themselves from the worn-out pantones of yesterday’s primer; this is when platforms are built. This is also when candidates are looking for populist movements and campaign financing. Understand that a lot gets said when someone is vying for your vote. Make sure you open your ears before you open your wallet in order to take advantage of this rare moment of accessibility and willingness for discourse before the election cycle really takes off.
Bitcoin can afford not to care about politicians, but no longer can politicians afford to ignore Bitcoin. Ultimately, this will undoubtedly be a good thing. But there’s a first time for everything, and Bitcoin is only now of age to officially be on the ballot. And the polls look good.
-The Editors
