If you're not tracking the name, then you're not paying attention to early movements in U.S. elections. That's okay; it's more of a domestic issue at the moment. And for one candidate named Vivek Ramaswamy, it may very well be his 15 seconds to shine in the sun. Let's face it, Ramaswamy is a moth flittering between two raging fires. He has Donald Trump on one side, itching for a fight and feeling cornered, and Vivek DeSantis on the other, sizing a run for President in a weakened GOP race and looking to make a jump up in his own personal power climb. Both are giants in their own regard, and Ramaswamy is a new flea hopping around at their feet. However, even a flea can be felt if its makes a strategic bite once in a while.
Interestingly, Ramaswamy is angling for a youth and modernity vote. Unlike Trump and DeSantis, neither of which probably know the right end of a motherboard, Ramaswamy is going right to the heart of the next generation focusing on the most visible angst: cryptocurrency regulation status. Staking out an early position on the matter, Ramaswamy recently issued a few short but interesting comments regarding 1) having a draft crypto policy already prepared and 2) focusing easy anger on the primary agency involved in the latest regulatory pains: the SEC. Both are an easy target and low-hanging fruit for any GOP candidate, but notably Ramaswamy is the only one to actively court the crypto vote early.
Trump has already stated repeatedly he thinks crypto in general is a bad idea, and DeSantis only bites on anything associated with current President Biden, namely central bank coins resistance, which few are very much worried about at the moment. Ramaswamy is the only one smart enough to figure out immediately that the innovation factor and most of new business money is threatened by the regulation factor on the until-recently wild wild west of the crypto markets and DeFi.
DeSantis and Trump are catering to their base, older Boomer types who flood election booths and storm the neighborhood in golf carts decorated with stars and stripes and Tommy Bahama spare shorts. That said, the assumption that the middle range of conservatives is represented by truck-driving, Calvin-peeing sticker blue collar workers may very well be an illusion this time around. While they may dominate a lonely ranch highway in Idaho with oversized Dodge and Ford trucks, Ramaswamy is betting that the real conservative vote is now in a more tech-savvy population. However, what the younger Republican candidate may not be acknowledging is that the kingmakers of the GOP still sit with the Boomer types, their established lobbyist network, and the CEOs. Unless Ramaswamy is going to drop a lot of his own money into the race to get serious traction, more than likely he's going to burn out spending a lot of energy in 2023 and then get steamrolled by DeSantis and Trump pounding through 2024 to the GOP primary.
The youth tidal wave failed multiple GOP players before Ramaswamy; he's not the first. Regardless of what Vivek Ramaswamy can argue technically and logically, the GOP will consistently be led by old guys spouting low-thinking phrases of "Go Murica" and "We Win, they Lose!" While Ramaswamy might actually come up with very plausible and smart solutions for the country going forward, his priority target population isn't listening and historically won't. They could care less about BTC or ETH. They focus more on the gas pump price, access to red meat and retirement accounts. And that's why Ramaswamy's crypto plan probably won't see the light of day after November 2024.
