Early disclaimer: I’m not a McCain supporter. I’m not a non-supporter, either. I’m about as undecided as any swing voter can be (luckily there’s no pressure for me, since I live in a decidedly non-swing state).
K, disclaimers done. Now then, to the topic. A recent NYTimes story included some quotes from a conversation with McCain in which he admitted that he didn’t know much about the internet.
He said, ruefully, that he had not mastered how to use the Internet and relied on his wife and aides like Mark Salter, a senior adviser, and Brooke Buchanan, his press secretary, to get him online to read newspapers (though he prefers reading those the old-fashioned way) and political Web sites and blogs.
Obviously, the tech press is howling this week. My boss’ boss, Editor-in-Chief Lance Ulanoff, wrote this column, for instance, and everyone’s saying he isn’t fit to be president because he doesn’t…what? Facebook? Leave snarky comments on Gawker? Should he ricroll us just so he can Twitter about it later?
Lance’s point is that he’s been in the Senate for decades. But the counterargument is right there too: He’s been in the Senate for decades! What would he do with the internet?
Gather info, right? The most useful tools on the Internet right now are info aggregators. In fact, there’s a revolution going on in the way content is collected from across the web and aggregated for easy and customizable digestion. Google News does this. Digg does this. Techmeme does this. And you know what? I bet McCain’s office has staffers and interns whose job it is to aggregate online content for his easy consumption. In other words, he may not read Drudge himself, but he gets fed the Drudge info anyway.
Let’s see, what else should he be using the web for? Banking? I bet he’s got a good accountant. Watching YouTube videos? I’m sure his campaign has someone doing that, along with Facebooking, etc. Viewing porn? Egad, if that got out…
Should he be emailing? It’s taken as a given that he should be, but the NYTimes story itself says that he’s constantly surrounded by staffers on BlackBerrys. If an email has info that needs to get to him, the info will get to him. Besides, I’d imagine a man running for president could use a couple human email filters in his life (way more effective than white-listing filters!).
To the next point: McCain’s tech-illiteracy disqualifies him because he can’t pass informed judgment on tech legislation. Sheesh, really? We expect our presidents to know the nuances of net neutrality now?
Look, I’ll be the first to agree that tech policy is important. It’s just less important than foreign policy, fiscal policy, education, national security, disaster relief/preparedness, agricultural policy, energy policy, trade policy, and 50 other issues. And yes, technology will play a role in all of those issues. And that’s why you have staffers, including cabinet members who in turn have their own staffers, and you have governmental agencies with THEIR staffers. Each of those staffs needs people with real tech knowledge. Similarly, every big company needs someone with HR knowledge–but it doesn’t have to be the CEO, and in fact it probably shouldn’t be.
Closing argument: The web is basically a universe of info and content, along with many many different means of filtering to get the info and content that’s relevant to you. McCain has access to all that info and content, and I’m guessing his means of filtering are even better than mine or yours. Pick your candidate based on the war, or the economy, or future Supreme Court nominations, or hairstyle. But don’t pick your candidate based on web-savvy.
