A lot of this is getting off topic.  I think the TC's point is fundamentally sound.  I think the way to pursue is to make it possible for businesses to "accept bitcoin without accepting bitcoin".  That is, make it so that they list it as a payment option, but once you choose to pay with bitcoin, it automatically converts (perhaps through some intermediary service) into the currency the merchant wants and pays the merchant that way.  This would significantly increase bitcoin's visibility and remove a lot of the frictions and uncertainty associated with it.

Maybe if we could get a major BTC exchange to go along in and reduce the fee on such currency trades in exchange for all the business that would come their way?