Obviously you are not an economist or historian (I'm neither). "Why can't our government print their own money?" pretty much gives away that you haven't put in

Obviously you are not an economist or historian (I'm neither). "Why can't our government print their own money?" pretty much gives away that you haven't put in any effort to learn how banking, money or a central bank works. All the examples you mention don't hold up. Not even in their own time, much less in a modern time where we need private finance. "Cryptocurrency" is a new kind of knee-jerk reaction to "everything perceived to be wrong with money". There's a reason why conspiracy nuts flock to cryptocurrencies in droves. Turns out that ordinary people get screwed over with bitcoins far more easily than with the "evil" fiat currencies. Also there is no reason why you can't have a sort of reserve-banking, or even monetary expansion in a bitcoin-based economy. They just don't do it yet, because Bitcoins at the present moment have negligible impact on the real economy (which might change).