TheRedSquirrel87Manchester, Greater Manchester, England UK1,107 posts
TheRedSquirrel87: What great leaders are is awesome talent-spotters. But unlike a football team's head coach who's best prepared by at one time being a footballer the politician is not necessarily best prepared for by a career in politics. Professional politics and good governance are not necessarily, or even very often, the same thing. So how do you accredit that talent-spotting and man-managing ability which is the most important quality of a leader?
Ideally he needs to be both an extroverted peoples' person and an introverted thoughtful thinker. A person who is as motivational as he is analytical. Normally these qualities don't arise together in the same person and maybe it's not to have one leader and instead replace it with rule by cabinet like in Ancient Greece.
Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump would be much better in power if they were both equal leaders. This populist rebelling against his sandal-wearing class and this popular dissident rebelling against his own billionaire class, as strange as it may seem, have a congruence between them. You should have both for president and be ruled by complimentary opposites. Behind every great man there is a great woman and Sanders would be the woman in this presidency.
TheRedSquirrel87Manchester, Greater Manchester, England UK1,107 posts
TheRedSquirrel87: Ideally he needs to be both an extroverted peoples' person and an introverted thoughtful thinker. A person who is as motivational as he is analytical. Normally these qualities don't arise together in the same person and maybe it's not to have one leader and instead replace it with rule by cabinet like in Ancient Greece.
Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump would be much better in power if they were both equal leaders. This populist rebelling against his sandal-wearing class and this popular dissident rebelling against his own billionaire class, as strange as it may seem, have a congruence between them. You should have both for president and be ruled by complimentary opposites. Behind every great man there is a great woman and Sanders would be the woman in this presidency.
Natural born citizen. Military service desired. Spiritual believer. Employment history outside of government. Big set of nuts or lots of attitude. No lawyers!
Does the leader of a country need any special training to rule a country or can anybody just walk into office and rule?
This could make for a hilarious topic with truly bizarre rulers coming on stage. You seem to favour the ruler as having some type of "education"...that covers a very wide spectrum (remember Idi Amin Dada...prior job/ experience was a shoe/ boot shiner...before promotion) We can go back to at least the Bolshevik Revolution to have lots of examples of all your choices; Most of the top leadership of the Bolsheviks had degrees, none of which were of any relevance to ruling a country and ability to operate a machine shop at that. On the opposite extreme, we had Pol Pot and his boys who almost to a one never attended any schools except those run out of back alleys . They targeted anyone that had an education, especially any degrees. They wanted to kill ann of those and nearly succeeded. Only those exiled had the educational needs fit for operating a state had to be coaxed to return...That took years. The proverbial 'eggheads' or the illiterate morons seem to define the parameters for suitable candidates. Having 'a degree' is absolutely no guarantee of having simple common sense. Common sense, is always at a stage of virtual non-existence among those wishing to obtain any office from which to launch a political career, much less a position of 'dictator-of-life' or president, Chancellor or Prime Minister; a lot of it comes down to "it's who you know..."This does not build confidence in any poor ,sub-elite voter that must fend for themselves...Competent?? ummm, Idi, baby couldn't read and neither could I find any of his 'Ministers' that could...his driver Astles could, but he was British...but on the plus side, Amin did have Kyeamba, a former Cabinet minister, one of a few that survived and in one piece, literally. His Chief of Internal Security was another Brit..(.keeping his citizenship upon return to Britain after Amin fled to Libya)...Amin, Pol Pot were just a couple of the more murderous comic book type leaders. They have, to some degree, set the bar of what it takes to be a leader at its lowest possible setting. This type seems to prevail throughout the world. If there be courses on how to be a Dictator until exile or death, we need a magazine devoted to exile...how about "Budget Exile" Living in a Paradise with all you could loot, plunder, steal ...they all run into money problems; they never seem to steal enough...
Catfoot: Does the leader of a country need any special training to rule a country or can anybody just walk into office and rule?
Yes, I know he can appoint advisers who are competent, but will he accept advice if he cannot understand the reasoning behind it?
Critical thinking skills, and the interests of his/her country and people as a no. 1 and the only priority. Something like what Icelandic and Hungarian presidents have.
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