By C. Edward Kelso (NBTV contributor) and Naomi Brockwell (NBTV creator)
Ross Ulbricht’s Case Reaches Trump
The Daily Beast made Bitcoiners’ collective hearts skip a beat this week with the headline, “Trump Is Considering Clemency for Silk Road Founder: Two sources tell The Daily Beast that the president has expressed sympathy for the situation of Ross Ulbricht, who is serving a life sentence without the possibility of parole.”
The article reads:
“According to three people familiar with the matter, the White House counsel’s office has had documents related to Ulbricht’s case under review, and Trump was recently made aware of the situation and the pleas of the Silk Road founder’s allies. Two of these sources say the president has at times privately expressed some sympathy for Ulbricht’s situation and has been considering his name, among others, for his next round of commutations and pardons before the Jan. 20 inauguration of his 2020 Democratic opponent.”
The attempt to get Ross’s case in front of Trump has been ongoing for the last 4 years.
Ross Ulbricht’s court appeals were denied, so the focus for those fighting for justice on his behalf switched to presidential pardon. A petition was started on change.org, which has since garnered over 367,000 signatures.
Gathering support for the petition was easy, once education about the case increased, and the myths created from the smear campaigns began to be dispelled. People across the political aisle have championed the cause, from Noam Chomsky and Ron Paul, to Keanu Reeves and Russell Brand, plus a slew of successful Silicon Valley giants.
The next step was getting the attention of the president. This took a hopeful turn in November of last year, when Charlie Kirk, founder of the nonprofit Turning Point USA, which already had the attention of Trump, became involved in the fight for justice for Ross. Charlie tweeted:
“The more I learn about Ross Ulbricht and his over-prosecution the more outraged I am about this total miscarriage of justice. Ross, a first time NON VIOLENT offender got TWO LIFE sentences for building a website. Meanwhile Epstein got a slap on the wrist in early 2000’s. Outrage.”
Charlie again this week tweeted his support:
“Time to grant Ross Ulbricht clemency President Trump should grant Ross a second chance at life. He was targeted by our government and Trump now has a chance to make this right”
Some Bitcoiners recognized the significance of the event, due to Kirk’s connection to the Oval Office.
Unfortunately, many ignored it, because of the toxic nature of US politics, and the fact that almost anything connected to the Trump administration, no matter how important the cause, tends to draw ire. The Kirk tweet should’ve received more attention and encouragement from the ecosystem.
It is impossible to tell where an Ulbricht clemency stands. But it is amongst the latest in a flurry of pardon-rumors, including that of Edward Snowden and Julian Assange, both heavily championed by the cryptocurrency world as well.
Ross has just begun his eighth year of a life in prison. Assange sits in jail awaiting extradition to the US for being a journalist, and Snowden lives in exile for revealing that the American public was being lied to, and courts have since found the NSA’s mass domestic surveillance to indeed be illegal.
If I get any wishes this Christmas, I wish for a pardon for Assange and Snowden, and clemency for Ross.
Click here to sign the petition for clemency for Ross Ulbricht.
Quick Bytes
Morgan Stanley Global Strategist Sees Bitcoin Challenge to Fiat
Ruchir Sharma, Morgan Stanley Investment Management’s chief global strategist, began the week with a revealing Opinion piece featured in the Financial Times, Will bitcoin end the dollar’s reign? Digital currency poses a significant threat to greenback’s supremacy. Sharma’s arguments aren’t really important at this juncture. It’s worth repeating just for its own sake, a Morgan Stanley global strategist worriedly opined about Bitcoin in the Financial Times. It’s probably worth restating that line over and over. Is this real life?
JP Morgan Chase Moves Billions Through Their Blockchain
That was followed by a piece in Bloomberg by journalist and author Matt Leising’s article on how billions of dollars moved through JPMorgan Chase’s custom Ethereum-based blockchain in a repo market (to conduct intraday repurchase agreements) which might eventually include Goldman Sachs participation.
Crypto Stigma Lifting for Wealthy
Edward Robinson and Benjamin Stupples mused in Bloomberg how a “massive wave of quantitative easing and fiscal stimulus, which shows signs of continuing next year, is also burnishing cryptocurrencies’ credibility as an alternative asset class.” They conclude that the early stigma of bitcoin for wealthy investors is fading. This is helped by a Bitcoin (BTC) surge since March which, more recently of course, included new all time highs above $23,000.
Number of Crypto Developers Growing First Time Since 2017
Maria Shen of early stage venture firm, Electric Capital, published the outfit’s Developer Report for 2020. It concludes 1,500 new developers are coming into crypto every month, a net-positive statistic for the first time since 2017: 15,300 new developers through October of this year versus 12,600 in all of 2017, and 27,500 in all of 2018. Though active developers remain rather flat, the incoming wave looks to perhaps move the needle through 2021, maybe better than offsetting previous losses. Dev numbers in the top 200 projects are at all time highs.
Find more of Kelso’s work here: @coinfugazi / coinfugazi.com