The blog Marginal Revolution considered the question a few months ago: "What is the political equilibrium when insect-sized drone assassins are available?" htt

The blog Marginal Revolution considered the question a few months ago: "What is the political equilibrium when insect-sized drone assassins are available?" http://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2013/06/what-is-the-political-equilibrium-when-insect-sized-drone-assassins-are-available.html http://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2013/06/wha... Adapting my comment from there: One possibility is that in the future, high-status (and thus also high-office) can only be safely held by pseudonymous cryptographic identities that can’t be linked to soft, locatable, assassination-prone meatspace bodies. Note that this also makes it possible for a high-status identity/officeholder to be a branded collective (or AI) that continues beyond the death of any its members. So, potential news from that future: The Supreme Court, on a 5-4 ruling authored by Chief Justice @CyberJeffersonian_7, rejected the suspiciously-late election returns from Puerto Marte, throwing the 2096 election to Senator @Verax1983 over Governor @Locke2001, in the closest Electoral College contest since Bush-Gore in 2000. From his/her undisclosed location, President-Elect @Verax1983 praised the ruling and again denied allegations that he/she has been a software-only entity for the last 17 years. I, for one, welcome our new pseudonymous overlords.