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Have you ever been in one of those love-hate type relationships?
If you believe the UK mainstream press, the Bank of England (BoE) is currently locked in just such a scenario with Bitcoin.
Different elements of the press have spun the news of potential interest rate hikes and financial instability in completely opposite directions.
Express newspaper declares it's a love match as the BoE won't be able to contain itself and will eventually pounce on Bitcoin like a dog in heat...
The Guardian on the other hand has recently emphasised the hate by threatening a BoE-BTC smackdown to prevent a fiat meltdown...
BoE = Bitcoin Maximalists or No-coiners?
So which is it? Does Governor Andrew Bailey and the central banking cartel want to snuggle up to Bitcoin or kick it in the proverbial crotch?
Perhaps there really is a complex dynamic at play here. So multi-faceted is the affair that there are two different realities manifesting before the poor reporters eyes.
The topic is so perplexing that straight questions are rendered useless and the basic concept of yes or no answers is immediately shattered.
But then again, is the mainstream reporter's job really to inform or confuse the public?
After all, it was Mark Twain... probably him, no guarantees... that said:
“If you don’t read the newspaper, you are uninformed. If you do read the newspaper, you are misinformed.”
Don't trust a possible misquote from Mr Twain? Then how about Thomas Jefferson who proclaimed in 1807 that:
"Nothing can now be believed which is seen in a newspaper. Truth itself becomes suspicious by being put into that polluted vehicle. The real extent of this state of misinformation is known only to those who are in situations to confront facts within their knowledge with the lies of the day."
Fact Checker Bible Thumpers
Those laughable fact-checkers who have assumed oracle status through social media and mainstream media platforms would no doubt direct me to the likes of Reuters to confirm the essence of the 'truth'.
As Reuters provide 'approved' source material for the mainstream, it is perhaps not surprising that they favour the aspect over desire, or when discussing inflation prefer to ignore alternative hard assets completely.
At least Reuters' livened up their dull news story with an all-action-hero posed photo of the Governor, striding manfully down the halls of power. Anyone seen the movie Zoolander? Sorry, I digress.
So, is it love or hate?
The Governor knows. His contemporaries at other central banks know. Everyone from the cleaner up at the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) probably knows.
But the mainstream press? Yes, odds are they know... but they're not spoiling the fun by telling you.
Which I guess brings us back to Thomas Jefferson:
"I will add, that the man who never looks into a newspaper is better informed than he who reads them; inasmuch as he who knows nothing is nearer to truth than he whose mind is filled with falsehoods & errors."
At the end of the day, we should look at a newspaper the same way a kid looks at the Beano. It is a comic, meant to distract and amuse, nothing more.
Will the BoE ever hold Bitcoin? Will the BoE want to regulate crypto? Will Dennis the Menace and Gnasher get in trouble?
Probably, yes.
