I think the lack of <insert specialty here> in the US Government is becoming a bigger liability every year. Here science is changing the globe at an ever increasing pace and our congresspeople are baffled and confused by the word <insert specialty lingo here>
Lets play some word-games:
* Doctors : Disease, Ebola, Health Care costs
* Accountants: Corporate Taxes, Tax Loopholes, Economic Stats
* Programmers: Encryption, Websites, "Internet is Tubes", Infrastructure as a Service
* Army Generals: War against ISIS. War against Taliban. War against (any other enemy here).
* Civil Engineers: Bridge design and safety, Urban Smart Growth, Gentrification, Water Rights management across rivers.
* Energy Engineers: Power Plant construction, Nuclear Safety, Solar vs Coal investments.
* Farmers: Patent law applied to GMOs and ownership of genetics, Legal Insecticides and whether or not they are damaging the local ecology, legal limits to water-consumption across various states and locals
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Believe it or not: US Politics involve more than just programmer issues. We care about programmer issues because Hacker News attracts programmers. But as soon as we leave the subject of programming, we (as a community) will become blubbering idiots in the face of Hospital issues, Child-care laws, foreign policy and Tax-fraud.
The entire point of a Congressman is to specialize in the ability to talk to a wide variety of experts. Congressmen are "experts at politics": the ability to make a decision WITHOUT being an expert in a subject.
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Our job, as experts in our field, is to form a cohesive argument that Congresspeople understand. Well, that's the point of lobbying: hiring specialists who know how to talk to Congressmen, so that our interests are communicated more effectively.
And lets be frank: there are plenty of lobbyists who are actually representing technology's point of view at the moment. Google, Facebook, Microsoft, IBM, and other big-tech all ensure that Congress is keenly aware of the issues affecting our field.
Other fields are not quite as lucky as ours. I don't think we have any right to really complain about the Programmer's role in modern US politics.
Lets play some word-games:
* Doctors : Disease, Ebola, Health Care costs
* Accountants: Corporate Taxes, Tax Loopholes, Economic Stats
* Programmers: Encryption, Websites, "Internet is Tubes", Infrastructure as a Service
* Army Generals: War against ISIS. War against Taliban. War against (any other enemy here).
* Civil Engineers: Bridge design and safety, Urban Smart Growth, Gentrification, Water Rights management across rivers.
* Energy Engineers: Power Plant construction, Nuclear Safety, Solar vs Coal investments.
* Farmers: Patent law applied to GMOs and ownership of genetics, Legal Insecticides and whether or not they are damaging the local ecology, legal limits to water-consumption across various states and locals
--------
Believe it or not: US Politics involve more than just programmer issues. We care about programmer issues because Hacker News attracts programmers. But as soon as we leave the subject of programming, we (as a community) will become blubbering idiots in the face of Hospital issues, Child-care laws, foreign policy and Tax-fraud.
The entire point of a Congressman is to specialize in the ability to talk to a wide variety of experts. Congressmen are "experts at politics": the ability to make a decision WITHOUT being an expert in a subject.
-----------
Our job, as experts in our field, is to form a cohesive argument that Congresspeople understand. Well, that's the point of lobbying: hiring specialists who know how to talk to Congressmen, so that our interests are communicated more effectively.
And lets be frank: there are plenty of lobbyists who are actually representing technology's point of view at the moment. Google, Facebook, Microsoft, IBM, and other big-tech all ensure that Congress is keenly aware of the issues affecting our field.
Other fields are not quite as lucky as ours. I don't think we have any right to really complain about the Programmer's role in modern US politics.