Silicon Valley has been one of the great drivers of American prosperity: six of the ten largest companies in the world were founded here. They disproportionately drive the American stock markets; virtually every American retirement account depends on them.
I am running in Nevada. Answered you on X, and I hope you don't mind me answering here. If you do, feel free to delete my comment. I won't be offended.
I have seen cynical comments about politicians, and frankly, I agree with them. I am cynical and criticize them from my armchair. I have never been one, nor want to be a career politician. But, @JohnLoeber is right, people like us have to run. They will rob us blind if we don't.
I picked the State Treasurer's race for a lot of reasons, but the biggest one is that it fits my background. Others might pick different races, and I encourage them to think about local school boards all the way up to a state race. Even getting involved with your local political party to vet candidates so you get competent ones can help. I'd suggest that you use this app before you decide: app.candidatepathways.com. It is very helpful. Don't know if that link will work, but maybe candidatepathways.com will.
There is a lot to understand about running. This is not like a startup because there are election rules and laws. You don't want to wind up in jail for fundraising or reporting improperly. I blogged about it at my Substack, and will continue to blog about it, but one of my first hires was incompliance.net.
We tend to think about the campaign and forget about the plumbing. You have to create a good backoffice before you can do anything. Once you get into it, you realize it is a multibillion dollar business and there are plenty of ways to build things that might make it easier for people to run. However, state election laws are diverse, so what works in California might not work in another state. Local county rules might layer on something else, depending on state rules.
Everyone hates the "money in politics," but the fact is, you can't run without raising money. Even if you put your own money in the race, which I am doing, you need to raise. Otherwise a lot of voters think you are just trying to buy an office; even when your intentions are good.
Both my opponent in the primary and potential opponent in the general have no financial experience in their life, and want to be career politicians.
Downballot races in states are becoming more and more important. The fraud in Minnesota is just one example where a down-ballot executive could have stopped or at least blown the whistle on the fraud. Because a lot of people see politics as a career, they will run a down-ballot race in hopes of pursuing a higher office, like Governor, where they can do major damage to an economy. In my state, socialists are putting money into local judge races so they can control the judiciary.
Here are some reasons to support me if you aren’t from Nevada:
· Your hard-earned tax dollars are being shipped to Washington DC and back to state governments, only to vanish into waste and outright fraud. Putting someone you know and trust—someone with a proven track record—in control of the purse strings is the single most effective way to slam the door on corruption and ensure every dollar is spent responsibly.
· With the financial expertise and innovative mindset that people like us bring to the table, Nevada is the perfect proving ground. A smaller state lets us implement bold, cutting-edge reforms quickly and demonstrate undeniable results. When Nevada succeeds, other states will follow—and we’ll lead a nationwide financial revolution.
· The path from private citizen to public servant feels impossibly steep—especially for those of us who’ve never been career politicians. That’s exactly why we desperately need people like us to step up and run. Backing me now and watching me win will shatter that barrier, inspire a wave of principled, non-career citizens to run, and finally begin draining the swamp of entrenched, self-serving politicians.
· For the first time, the tech, trading, and finance community has a real champion running for office—someone who actually understands our world, speaks our language, and will fight for our interests.
This framing of California's budget as a resource curse is realy sharp. The parallels to European wealth tax failures and capital flight are worth noting. However, the assumption that technologists would necessarily govern better than career politicians needs more examination. Competence in building companies doesnt automatically translate to managing public budgets with entrenched constituencies and union contracts.
Saving the golden goose from the stew pot may require more than a couple candidates. We are in a deeply populist political era. We've got two generations who are so economically illiterate that many of them truly think this is a zero sum game whereby tech billionaires get wealthy by stealing/hoarding money instead of by creating goods and services people want and willingly pay for. This is why the DSA and all the failed policies they champion have made such a come back in political discourse in the last couple years.
There's a propaganda war being waged and capitalists are the losing side.
Do you really think SV needs more representation? Zucker, Thiel, Altman, at this point SV runs a shadow government. Why do you think they want to be "in the light" if they can have all the power (while bribing trumpo) without any scrutiny.
Having some temporary influence by lobbying the president is not the same as actual political representation. Much of my essay concerns the local/state level: seats of mayors, governors, congressional representatives, etc.
Your basic assumption is still that powerful actors actually prefer navigating a lengthy, "democratic" process to become public servants bound by laws and obligations. But why would they? Even at the local or state level, if you need something (whether it’s a tax break, approval for a data center, or any other favor) it’s far more 'efficient' to deploy an army of lobbyists, lawyers, and PR agents to charm, pressure, or wear down decision-makers.
History has shown us time and again, from the Robber Barons to today’s Big Tech oligarchs, that public scrutiny is the last thing these actors want. Influence is for them best wielded behind closed doors, not in the open.
I think the "behind closed doors" approach is not preferred at all, because you can lobby for one thing one year, but then your opponents will lobby for the other thing the next year. The lengthy, public, democratic process of building genuine consensus remains the way to drive real change.
I think what you’re asking for is basically “ability and willingness for our representatives to exercise second-order thinking and sell that to their constituents”. Which would be a dream come true. But many people have that ability, so IMO casting “tech founders” as the only saviors is overly restrictive and amounts to identity politics with all its pitfalls. I’d even argue that it’s a bit of a trope that wouldn’t help the image of tech.
Tech actually created the problem. Most of Silicon Valley was pretty moderate just a few years ago but we had Tech Founder go all in on democracy and bring in people who wouldn't have normally gotten elected. For e.g. the previous Mayor of San Francisco. Only now are we seeing the ideologies normalize.
I am running in Nevada. Answered you on X, and I hope you don't mind me answering here. If you do, feel free to delete my comment. I won't be offended.
I have seen cynical comments about politicians, and frankly, I agree with them. I am cynical and criticize them from my armchair. I have never been one, nor want to be a career politician. But, @JohnLoeber is right, people like us have to run. They will rob us blind if we don't.
I picked the State Treasurer's race for a lot of reasons, but the biggest one is that it fits my background. Others might pick different races, and I encourage them to think about local school boards all the way up to a state race. Even getting involved with your local political party to vet candidates so you get competent ones can help. I'd suggest that you use this app before you decide: app.candidatepathways.com. It is very helpful. Don't know if that link will work, but maybe candidatepathways.com will.
There is a lot to understand about running. This is not like a startup because there are election rules and laws. You don't want to wind up in jail for fundraising or reporting improperly. I blogged about it at my Substack, and will continue to blog about it, but one of my first hires was incompliance.net.
We tend to think about the campaign and forget about the plumbing. You have to create a good backoffice before you can do anything. Once you get into it, you realize it is a multibillion dollar business and there are plenty of ways to build things that might make it easier for people to run. However, state election laws are diverse, so what works in California might not work in another state. Local county rules might layer on something else, depending on state rules.
Everyone hates the "money in politics," but the fact is, you can't run without raising money. Even if you put your own money in the race, which I am doing, you need to raise. Otherwise a lot of voters think you are just trying to buy an office; even when your intentions are good.
Both my opponent in the primary and potential opponent in the general have no financial experience in their life, and want to be career politicians.
Downballot races in states are becoming more and more important. The fraud in Minnesota is just one example where a down-ballot executive could have stopped or at least blown the whistle on the fraud. Because a lot of people see politics as a career, they will run a down-ballot race in hopes of pursuing a higher office, like Governor, where they can do major damage to an economy. In my state, socialists are putting money into local judge races so they can control the judiciary.
Here are some reasons to support me if you aren’t from Nevada:
· Your hard-earned tax dollars are being shipped to Washington DC and back to state governments, only to vanish into waste and outright fraud. Putting someone you know and trust—someone with a proven track record—in control of the purse strings is the single most effective way to slam the door on corruption and ensure every dollar is spent responsibly.
· With the financial expertise and innovative mindset that people like us bring to the table, Nevada is the perfect proving ground. A smaller state lets us implement bold, cutting-edge reforms quickly and demonstrate undeniable results. When Nevada succeeds, other states will follow—and we’ll lead a nationwide financial revolution.
· The path from private citizen to public servant feels impossibly steep—especially for those of us who’ve never been career politicians. That’s exactly why we desperately need people like us to step up and run. Backing me now and watching me win will shatter that barrier, inspire a wave of principled, non-career citizens to run, and finally begin draining the swamp of entrenched, self-serving politicians.
· For the first time, the tech, trading, and finance community has a real champion running for office—someone who actually understands our world, speaks our language, and will fight for our interests.
https://secure.winred.com/jeffrey-carter-for-nevada-531b0a14/donate-today
This framing of California's budget as a resource curse is realy sharp. The parallels to European wealth tax failures and capital flight are worth noting. However, the assumption that technologists would necessarily govern better than career politicians needs more examination. Competence in building companies doesnt automatically translate to managing public budgets with entrenched constituencies and union contracts.
Saving the golden goose from the stew pot may require more than a couple candidates. We are in a deeply populist political era. We've got two generations who are so economically illiterate that many of them truly think this is a zero sum game whereby tech billionaires get wealthy by stealing/hoarding money instead of by creating goods and services people want and willingly pay for. This is why the DSA and all the failed policies they champion have made such a come back in political discourse in the last couple years.
There's a propaganda war being waged and capitalists are the losing side.
Do you really think SV needs more representation? Zucker, Thiel, Altman, at this point SV runs a shadow government. Why do you think they want to be "in the light" if they can have all the power (while bribing trumpo) without any scrutiny.
Having some temporary influence by lobbying the president is not the same as actual political representation. Much of my essay concerns the local/state level: seats of mayors, governors, congressional representatives, etc.
Your basic assumption is still that powerful actors actually prefer navigating a lengthy, "democratic" process to become public servants bound by laws and obligations. But why would they? Even at the local or state level, if you need something (whether it’s a tax break, approval for a data center, or any other favor) it’s far more 'efficient' to deploy an army of lobbyists, lawyers, and PR agents to charm, pressure, or wear down decision-makers.
History has shown us time and again, from the Robber Barons to today’s Big Tech oligarchs, that public scrutiny is the last thing these actors want. Influence is for them best wielded behind closed doors, not in the open.
I think the "behind closed doors" approach is not preferred at all, because you can lobby for one thing one year, but then your opponents will lobby for the other thing the next year. The lengthy, public, democratic process of building genuine consensus remains the way to drive real change.
I think what you’re asking for is basically “ability and willingness for our representatives to exercise second-order thinking and sell that to their constituents”. Which would be a dream come true. But many people have that ability, so IMO casting “tech founders” as the only saviors is overly restrictive and amounts to identity politics with all its pitfalls. I’d even argue that it’s a bit of a trope that wouldn’t help the image of tech.
Tech actually created the problem. Most of Silicon Valley was pretty moderate just a few years ago but we had Tech Founder go all in on democracy and bring in people who wouldn't have normally gotten elected. For e.g. the previous Mayor of San Francisco. Only now are we seeing the ideologies normalize.
Just leave for the sunbelt. And please, stop voting democrat.
California is too demographically gone to be saved. Silicon Valley is a leftover institution from a totally different political era.