A New State

By trade I am a Computer Scientist, by passion I am a politically driven news reader. It's funny how more and more often, in the age we live in, our questions of who we are, what is wrong and right, are colliding with technology. During the times of the Romans and Greeks, true democracy was decided to be chaos, for it was simply impossible to account for everyone's opinion for every state decision that was made. Understandably, representation, a republic, was the only viable solution. The politics we live with today is what it is largely in part due to logistics. It was logistically impossible to hear everyones voice when your means of communication is a letter and horseback. Yet, times change, and for some reason as our knowledge and developments of technology change at an exponential rate, our governments and state structures lag behind. A huge revolution is upon us, decentralized technology is still in it's infancy, and an explosion of ideas is coming with it. Yet, have we stopped to think beyond our money driven thoughts? Have we thought about the potential usage of decentralized technology state-wide?

As the human race advances in progress, we notice a trend in our advancements. We don't just advance out of thin air, we advance because we reach obstacles. Without problems, what need do we have to advance, or what would we have to solve? It is in our nature, it seems, to overcome obstacles. It's why all stories that are told have conflict, they would be quite boring without it. Progress cannot occur if we simply perceive the world without problems. Many speak of American exceptionalism, as if just being an American is an exceptional attribute. Yet the problem with spreading such a belief is you squeeze our room for improvement. If we are already exceptional, where do we go from there? However, if we look at the United States as a "fixer-upper" nation that has much room for improvement and modernization, which I'd argue is the correct view, then we suddenly look at our State as having problems that need solving.

Well, this leads me into my discussion, if we could imagine a state much improved from our own, what would it look like? Well there are always going to be more problems for us to solve when we engage in such abstract thought, but that is the beauty of progress! More problems to be solved. When looking at a major problem within many systems, including my own, accessibility is a problem. Accessibility in terms of just about every aspect of the government. Most blame "bureaucracy", though I would argue it's just lack of modernization. Rather than waiting two hours at the DMV, why can't I apply for a license online? Why can't I vote online? Why can't I get a visa online? The most standard opposition to such "minor convinces" is the potential for hacking , a word that scares most, and rightfully so.

Sensationalized hacking stories enter the media all the time, while others that aren't sensationalized, quietly depart. Whether you're willing to accept it or not, your social security number, if you live in the United States, has a 50/50 chance of having been stolen in one of the most recent exploits with Equifax. Equifax had a massive breach that allowed 50% of it's social security numbers to be stolen. With a social security number, hackers can steal your identify quite easily. The truth is every fear you have of hacking, of elections being influenced of private information being stolen, it's all already happened, and it really cannot get much worse. The Russians influenced our most recent campaign (?) with social media, probably one of the biggest nightmares any true American could dream of, likely happened. Rather than defending against these hacks, rather than investing heavily in developing secure networks, secure technology to hold our information, new an innovative ways to "number" our citizens (not just a social security number printed on a card), we sit stagnant, waiting for our archaic form of tracking identities to get highjacked. The truth is, rather than shying away from change, and allowing something like the Equifax breach to go unanswered, we need to create security standards, we need to embrace change and, ideally, prepare for it - a lot better than we have.

Sitting in our limbo of anti-technological adoption at the state level because it's "not secure" is an idea that is based on fear and lack of understanding. The new state I wish for is one that adopts technology because there is no escaping it's influence and power. The new state is one that invests heavily into the development of security standards while also taking advantage of the potential for far reaching, and country influencing, accessibility that technology enables. The new state I want is one that embraces change, rather than runs away at the face of it, undoing progress that was done. The new state will be controlled by all of us. For change will cause many new problems, all of which have the potential to be solved.