Bitcoin. The Buck Stops Here.

The Buck Stops Here, a phrase commemorated on a sign on the desk of President Truman, reminding him that as the highest office, the ultimate responsibility rests with him. The phrase is believed to have originated from Poker where players take turns dealing the cards and the position of the dealer is tracked with the passing of a button, which could have been buckhorn. With a number of countries using the colloquialism of Buck to mean dollar, I would suggest it too may have come out of the use of commodity deer antlers or deer meat as money. With antlers being used both for ceremonial purposes and decoration even today and being used in tools, they would have been quite valuable. The skill involved with hunting deer was so important for survival. The protein from the meat and calories from the fat being able to sustain a family through winters and the leather and fur representing another important part of the hunt

We can no longer Pass the Buck, or divert responsibility for the problems at hand. This shifting of blame is like the economic system, with the Buck a coincidental euphemism for the dollar. Since each dollar represents a claim on the debt of the central bank, the passing of bucks is quite literally passing the debt from claimant to claimant. Much as we’ve moved past the need to use leather, and fur and even some would argue meat from wild animals (or animals at all) so too have we moved past the need to use Central Bank bucks.

We have man-made alternatives to leather and fur as clothing that offer better insulating properties, better water repellency, that are more durable and more sustainable. We have synthetic plastics, composites, and metal that have replaced the use of bone, horn, and ivory.  Now, with Bitcoin, we have a man-made, synthetic currency, that is more divisible, more fungible, more easily transported, more durable, and for the first time perfectly scarce.