Matthew Pines is a Fellow at the Bitcoin Policy Institute specializing in national security. In this interview, we discuss modelling complex systems, current US national security priorities, and how Bitcoin can help maintain US hegemony.
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We live in unprecedented times. An emergent battle for hegemonic power is occurring during a period of unparalleled advances in technology that politicians are struggling to comprehend. What was previously deemed to be settled global economic and geopolitical strategy is now in flux. Up may be down. The unthinkable suddenly thinkable.
This is the environment in which Bitcoin, revolutionary money, is going through its puberty stage. It is to be expected that incumbent US (and other western) power structures are nervous about such an immature innovation, particularly in uncertain times. Yet, as counterintuitive as it may seem to them, Bitcoin offers significant strategic advantages for the US.
For Bitcoiners, the issue is not that a case needs to be made, but rather how that case should be presented and conveyed to politicians and bureaucrats. So far the message has been conveyed through grassroots advocacy: orange pilling individuals. But how do you orange pill the world’s major power centre?
Bitcoiners are disrupters and predominantly work outside of the sphere of government. Bitcoin itself seeks to challenge the status quo. However, the government needs to hear the message in a language they understand, via channels they can trust.
This is the gap Matthew Pines is seeking to fill. And “Bitcoin and U.S. National Security” is the report that aims to orange pill the US government.
