Barack Obama has a nice-looking technology plan at his campaign site, a chunk of which is devoted to the appointment and responsibilities of a "the nation's first Chief Technology Officer (CTO) to ensure that our government and all its agencies have the right infrastructure, policies and services for the 21st century."

Who would make a good national CTO? Why? (question shamelessly lifted from Jeff Jarvis; one of his commenters replies, "Anyone under the age of 25.")

Is this even a good idea in the first place?

It's hard to look at the long line of federal IT disasters and think otherwise.

More on the job as described by Obama: "The CTO will ensure the safety of our networks...[and] use [of] best-in-class technologies and share best practices...have a specific focus on transparency...focus on using new technologies to solicit and receive information back from citizens to improve the functioning of democratic government...ensure technological interoperability of key government functions."

Hillary Clinton has a more general "innovation agenda." John McCain scatters some tech stuff (no internet taxes!) in his economic policy statement.