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.