If we a had a Secretary of Technology, the healthcare.gov website would have worked the first time, and the NSA wouldn't be out of control. As technology becomes a bigger part of our lives, our country needs a high level official who understands technology to advise the president and oversee the government's implementation of new technologies. The cabinet exists because we don't expect the president to be a doctor, a lawyer, an engineer and a teacher; we expect the president to find the best and brightest in each of those fields to advise him. Why shouldn't we expect the President to find one of the best and brightest technological minds to advise him as well?
Without a cabinet level technology position, who explains to the president what "intercepting major fiber optic connection points" means when the NSA asks him permission to do it? Who is responsible for seeing that a half a billion dollar technology contract, like healthcare.gov, is managed properly?
The problem with healthcare.gov is that no one is responsible; no one person was responsible for making it work in the first place. It's not Kathleen Sebelius' fault the web site is broken, she isn't qualified as a system administrator, web developer, or project manager, and neither is anyone responsible. We need a person qualified to oversee massive technological projects who is responsible to the President and the people for their success or failure.
If we want the best and the brightest in the country advising the president on technology we should create a cabinet position for that person. Appointing a Secretary of Technology, who has the background to make educated decisions and oversee multi-billion dollar technology contracts, would save taxpayers money in the long run, and may help fix and politically defuse the healthcare.gov mess.
If we create a secretary of technology, they should be responsible for...
- Advising the president, congress, and other federal agencies in areas that require technological expertise.
- Keeping America technologically competitive.
- Preventing violations of Americans privacy and/or legal rights through technological means.
- Ensuring federal workers have access to the technological tools they need to preform their duties, without unnecessarily wasting tax payer money.
- Helping protect government agencies, the private sector, and individuals from cyber security threats through security research, development, and education.
The Secretary of Technology would not be involved in law enforcement; their position should be a check on law enforcement's use of technology. They would interact with the Department of Justice much like the Department of State interacts with the Department of Defense. They would work to increase computer security through research and education only.
There may be bipartisan support for appointing such a person, and immediately tasking them with fixing healthcare.gov and reining in the NSA. Considering how much Republicans have been complaining about those things, I think they'd be hard pressed to try to prevent the President from creating a new cabinet post for someone who would be responsible for addressing these issues.
If I was president, I'd appoint Edward Snowden to the position, but I would settle for the CEO of a technology company who has shown their politics are relatively in line with the Presidents.