- October/November 2000
- Opinion
Our Tech Future is at Stake in this Election
by Jill B. Hart
If you care about technology, your vote in this election is supposed to be a no-brainer. Al Gore walks around with a Palm organizer clipped to his belt, and “the inventor of the Internet” is comfortable chatting tech topics with anyone who’ll listen.
But a funny thing happened on the way to Election Day.
Four years ago, tech company executives flocked to the Clinton-Gore campaign. Today, the Gore effort boasts some big tech names on its list of supporters (you can go look them up yourself) but lots of tech folks are keeping the Veep at arms-distance. Why is that?
Reputation vs. Record
There are lots of reasons, which I’ll outline in a moment. But one big reason, according to several tech people, is George Bush’s record in Texas. “We have operations in Texas,” said one executive on a national business cable show, “and we like the way he runs things.”
Or put more bluntly: Al Gore likes technology, but he has a long record of regulating business activity -- and he’s shown no signs of making an exception for tech businesses.
The phenomenal growth of tech companies over the past decade has been, in part, due to the lack of regulations encumbering their operations. Tech executives know they won’t get much help from an Al Gore administration (just as they’ve gotten little help from the Clinton administration), and they’re afraid Al Gore will tie them up in taxes and red tape.
Besides, that whole “I invented the Internet” thing has really ticked a lot of people off.
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©2000 Jill B. Hart