Gavin knows blocksize increases are a problem in the short term, that 1MB is too big right now to do anything except damage decentralisation of nodes. That's why he's been pushing as hard as he can for as reckless increases as he could possibly get away with; every increase in the default limit in Bitcoin Core was pulled and merged by Gavin Andresen.
You only have to take a look at the node count decreasing slowly over time, as many as +8000 back in 2011/12 before the era when the blockchain hit dozens of gigabytes in size. We've lost over 2000 nodes since then. Until a significant majority of ordinary internet users can download the full blockchain without spending weeks doing so, the decentralisation of the network is in jeopardy.
Gavin and Mike Hearn expressed their aim in the past to reduce the node count down to something Google datacenters could handle all on their own, so the
marks users could get transferred over to powerless non-validating SPV wallets. Let's not forget the extreme propaganda tactics these rogues have imposed in the past in an attempt to get their way:
- setting doomsday deadlines that no-one paid any heed to (Gavin and Mike)
- writing the system off publicly and sulkily (Mike Hearn)
- starting 2 separate (now failed) development teams to wrest control from the Core team (Gavin and Mike)
- enlisting major mainstream corporate mouthpieces like The Guardian to sell their propaganda (Gavin)
- enlisting the socialist/Marxist sympathising doyen of Russian TV, Max Keiser to sell their propaganda (Jeff Garzik)
- enlisting "freeeeedum" oriented pedophilia advocating US talk-radio show FreeTalkLive to sell their propaganda (Gavin and his friend Roger Ver)
- using fake Satoshi wannabe Craig Wright as a mouthpiece to promote their propaganda (Gavin)
I expect they don't intend to stop here, but christ allmighty, who will they approach next, internet cult leader Stephan Molyneux? (I seriously expect this to happen, incidentally)
And just look at the sheer range of questionable outfits those pushing this blocksize agenda are willing to use to prosecute their case. Anyone getting the sense that Gavin&Co might be just a little short on principles?
And compare all that to how the Core team behaved: the only media coverage they got was at CoinTelegraph.com, and CoinTelegraph showed them all the graciousness of a petty street mugger (presenting the story as straight reporting, then adding in an editorial sucker punch at the end of the article to disparage their plans)
One question for the die-hard "blocksize-is-the-only-way-to-scale" propagandists: aren't you embarrassed? You've thrown so much mud, from so many different angles, and you've achieved a grand total of nothing. Core runs the Bitcoin network.
