Another entry in the “you cannot make this stuff up” category:
Ohio Rep. Warren Davidson has drafted a bill, called the “Buy a Brick, Build a Wall Act,” that he says would enable the government to raise money for a border wall by creating a cryptocurrency.
I don’t get it either. All I can think of is, “How much coin would a wallcoin coin if a wallcoin could coin walls?”
Some details:
The bill itself, which Davidson submitted on Nov. 30, makes no explicit mention of cryptocurrency, but rather allows the Secretary of the Treasury to accept monetary gifts on the condition that it be used for a border wall. However, Davidson on Wednesday elaborated to NPR on the form that those gifts could take. “You could do with this sort of, like, crowdfunding site,” he said. “Or you could even do blockchain, and you could have wall coins.”
Personally, I think he recently learned the word “blockchain” and just wanted to take it for a spin on the ol’ media circuit. Sounds all techie, right? In the know?
Now, this article stirred something in my loony brain, and I thought, “Golly gee, this sounds familiar.” And I was right!
- Back in September, the National Sheriff’s Association announced a crowdfunding push to “build the wall.” Bristol County (Mass.) Sheriff Thomas M. Hodgson put his face on the effort, saying, “We believe the people of our nation are ready to stand with America’s sheriffs to jump-start one of the most significant public safety and border security programs in our nation’s history.” Well, their website, www.sheriffswall.org, redirects to fundthewall.com. As of this writing, toward a goal of $450 million (!!), they’ve raised …….. $131,077.
- But, as is regrettably often the case, Arizona was ahead of the curve in this lunacy. Back in 2011, the legislature created a trust fund to accept donations for building border fencing. Predictions held they would raise as much as $50 million! But, alas, in 2017 they shut the fund down, having raised $270,000, most of which went to Cochise County to pay for — get this — a “virtual fence” with surveillance cameras and that sort of thing. (In other words, not an actual fence.)
So sure, lets build the wall with donations (that won’t come in) or a cryptocurrency (that won’t get off the ground). Actually, Donnie Cheeto Bandito might like that wallcoin idea — it seems a lot of those currencies are scams. Trump would love to be in on that. What would he call it? “Donnie Dollars”? The “Trumpero”?