Think outside the box.
It's been interesting to see yet another string of frustrations spewing from Elon Musk's X profile. And I can't blame him. He put his reputation and money on the line last Fall by endorsing and actively campaigning for President Donald Trump with the expressed intent of helping President Trump reduce the waste, fraud, and fiscal abuses that exist within the U.S. federal government once he got into office.
As we all know, he put his best foot forward with the Department of Government Efficiency and did unearth a ton of overt waste, fraud, and abuse, highlighting a number of line items that proved that U.S. taxpayer money and cash raised from bond issuances were being spent on ridiculous things like gender studies in foreign countries, the funding of NGOs which took money to propagandize the American people and people around the world with narratives that were counterproductive to the interests of U.S. citizens, and Social Security and Medicaid fraud that was paying out to people who have been dead for decades, among many other things.
These are all things that any sane American citizen should recognize as waste, fraud, and abuse that should be eliminated from the federal government budget. Fiscal spending, as we all know, has gotten out of control. And as our friend Lyn Alden likes to say, there's no stopping this train. Unfortunately, for those of us who would like to rein in the spending of the federal government, the mathematics of the equation are such that the government can't stop and has to perpetually issue debt and have the Federal Reserve monetize that debt by printing new currency units to sustain the circus. It is politically unpalatable to do anything else. The charade must continue so that the United States can project strength internationally.
This is of no fault of President Trump himself, who I truly do believe would like to see the waste, fraud, and abuse eliminated from the federal government. Unfortunately for him, all of us citizens and Elon Musk we live within a system that has checks and balances and the Legislative branch has been completely co-opted by special interests and has succumb to laziness in the form of omnibus bills that force legislators who would like to do the right thing into a tough position by lumping in the good stuff with the bad. They are forced to make concessions by voting for everything all at once. Representative Thomas Massie explained this very well during a recent conversation on Theo Von's podcast. I highly recommend you all go listen to that when you get a chance. The message he really tried to get through during that conversation was that we need to stop with these omnibus bills and have the legislator vote on individual issues so that congressmen and senators aren't forced to make drastic concessions when the spending bills arise every year.
With all that being said, I think Elon Musk is a bit naive when it comes to actually solving this problem. I don't think a third party is the solution. If anything, a third party would divide the Republican side of the aisle and hand future elections to the Democratic Party, which is guaranteed to not only continue but significantly increase the wasteful spending that currently exists within the federal government. The real solution, in my opinion, is to make sure that the Republicans keep the Senate, the House and the Executive, execute on domestic and foreign policy by ensuring that the illegal immigrant situation is taken care of, the border is secure, we don't get into any more foreign wars at scale, trade deals are made and we clean up the woke madness that has infected our country over the course of many decades.
In parallel, if you truly care about reducing the runaway fiscal crisis that we're all watching unfold, we need to accelerate the demise of their funding mechanism; the market for US treasuries. This entails encouraging people to stay away from U.S. Treasury bonds and instead store their wealth in bitcoin long term. You can only solve this problem by taking away the ability for politicians to print money ex nihilo and spend it on all these wasteful policies. This is a bit extreme, but if you truly care about reining in fiscal spending, you have to take away the mechanism that has enabled it to get out of control. And one of the only ways to do that is to accelerate the debasement of the purchasing power of the monetary units they are raising while transitioning to a harder money.
The less aggressive path that would lead to a more soft landing of the U.S. Treasury market would be to highly encourage the issuance of BitBonds, which would enable the Treasury to issue debt, but force them to use a portion of the cash raised at Treasury auctions to buy bitcoin that sits within the bond structures. This would, at the very least, create a viable path to defeasing the debt in the long-term. If BitBonds become the predominant avenue for the federal government to raise funds they will act as a natural forcing function for fiscal responsibility because BitBond holders will leave the auction markets if it becomes clear that the federal government is egregiously wasteful those buyers will decide to buy private market debt that's partially collateralized with bitcoin or simply just buy spot bitcoin.
The thing that seems most clear to me at the moment is that this problem doesn't get solved with a third political party. I don't think you can materially change the dynamics of the runaway fiscal train from within. You must find a sly, roundabout way that takes the control of money out of the hands of the government and federal reserve and reorient the economy around that. This isn't an easy task and it's certainly not a quick fix, but it is the only sustainable and practical solution that we have today. The sooner people like Elon recognize this, the sooner we can fix the core of the problem.
During my conversation with NVK, he presented a sobering reality check about Bitcoin adoption that challenges popular narratives. NVK argues that with only 2.1 quadrillion sats in existence, the math simply doesn't support everyone holding Bitcoin on-chain—even with a 10x improvement in wealth distribution, only 1% of the global population could realistically access base layer Bitcoin. He points out that most retail investors today don't even have enough Bitcoin to justify purchasing hardware wallets, making the "grandmother Bitcoiner" narrative nothing more than wishful thinking.
"The reality is like Bitcoin on chain, Cypherpunk Bitcoin is for very few. It's a niche." - NVK
This perspective isn't defeatist—it's pragmatic. NVK emphasizes that while self-custody requires significant learning and responsibility that most people won't undertake, this creates opportunities for different solutions. The majority will likely use custodial or semi-custodial Lightning and eCash solutions, which is perfectly fine. Understanding this reality helps us build appropriate products and set realistic expectations for Bitcoin's evolution as a global monetary system.
Check out the full podcast here for more on AI disrupting labor markets, Canada's brain drain, and Bitcoin treasury strategies.
Crypto Market Bill Fast-Tracked for September - via X
Trump Says US Signed Trade Deal With China - via X
Trump's Ex-Chief Economist Says Bitcoin Plays Key Role - via X
Figma Has $70m worth of Bitcoin ETFs on Their Balance Sheet - via X
No Di Minimis Bitcoin Spending Exemption in the BBB - via X
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Final thought...
I can't believe the weather in Austin is more pleasant than it is in South Jersey right now.
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