Benghazi. The IRS. AP phone records. The failures for which Barack Obama will be remembered are not just those of one man or one administration. They are the failures of an old idea, that big, old, dumb, top-down, factory style government can manage the complexities of modern times. The institutions of the past had their day but can’t keep up with the hyper-connected, adaptive society we see emerging.

One hundred and sixty-five years ago, in Coloma, California, a carpenter named James W. Marshall built a sawmill to harness the power of the American River. Below the waterwheel, he saw flakes of metal where the spent water flowed. Marshall marked the moment saying, “I have found it.” He had discovered gold in California and more: For the next century, our nation would mine its future in the Golden State.

Republican or Democrat, we would all like to see a new era of progress and prosperity for our country. We all hope this president will allow our economy to be as successful as his campaigns were. To that end, perhaps we should explore if there is another, more modern way to deal with our evolving challenges and their accumulated complexity.