Or, you know, maybe some basic stuff, like not having committed treason, not having been convicted of 34 felony counts of fraud or been civil convicted of rape. Little stuff.

The last few prime ministers in the UK have all been extremely well educated. Attending private schools such as Eton and Uxbridge and then attending top universities.

On paper they have been incredibly talented. In reality they were fucking useless.

The best leaders are the ones who seek the views and advice of experts in their respective fields. They appoint advisors based on their experience, skills and qualifications.

The shitty leaders surround themselves with yes men and sycophants

It’s fundamentally more democratic. A president isn’t simply a job, but meant to be a representative of the people, so it should be a role that’s open to whoever the people choose.

As for the problem of horrible people becoming president, I think the better way to tackle that is to limit and distribute the president’s powers. Presidential systems suck, having so much power rest on a single person, even a democratically elected one, is just a bad idea.

If it is important to the public, they will use it as a selection metric when voting. Otherwise, it could be manipulated by the current government as a way to restrict future candidates.

The moment you start allowing limitations on who can or can’t be president you open the door to politicians shifting the requirements to fit their political needs. The legislature would immediate start the game of updating the requirements in a way that seems benign but is primarily calculated to hurt their opponents. Within 2-3 election cycles you’d have bills up specifically targeted to exclude their most popular opponents.

Have you seen starship troopers? The book goes more into detail about their politics.

But the TL;DR is that you can’t become a politician without serving for three years. You’re not fit to make choices for everyone else’s good if you’re not prepared to give your own life for the common good.

A bit more grim, even. Service is required to become a citizen, it’s not by birth. Also, it’s easier for citizens to get a baby license.

Better question: Why don’t we just pull like 501 names out of a hat from the general public and let them be the “political class” for 4 years at a time? Seems all we’re doing is injecting a layer of corruption as it is.

IIUC, Trump graduated from the University of Pennsylvania, while Dubya Bush got an MA in Harvard.

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wp:George W. Bush

In the fall of 1973, Bush entered Harvard Business School. He graduated in 1975 with a Master of Business Administration. He is the only U.S. president to have earned that degree.[16]

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However,

wp:Abraham Lincoln#Early life and education

(my bold)

Lincoln was largely self-educated.[20] His formal schooling was from itinerant teachers. It included two short stints in Kentucky, where he learned to read, but probably not to write. After moving to Indiana at age seven, he attended school only sporadically, for a total of less than 12 months by age 15.[21] Nevertheless, he was an avid reader and maintained a lifelong interest in learning.[22]

elsewhere in the article:

He gained a reputation for strength and courage after winning a wrestling match with the leader of a group of ruffians known as the Clary’s Grove boys.[45]

…

In adolescence he was tall and strong, participating in jumping, throwing, wrestling, and footraces, and demonstrating exceptional strength.[337] Burlingame notes that Lincoln’s clothes “were typically rough and suited to the frontier”, with a gap between his shoes, socks, and pants that often exposed six or more inches of his shin; “he cared little about fashion”.[338]

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I think becoming a US President, VP, and a Congressperson should be more open, including to those not born in the US and ≥18 years of age.

What qualifications would that be, that helped in the job as president im what way exactly? A master in not-being-an-asshole? Or a bachelor in Listening-to-experts-while-deciding-in-favor-of-all-humans? Surely the US could use a requirement of a PhD in Anti-Corruption.

That snarky list aside, what makes leaders great/very good is not learned in higher education. Yes, in some situations having a bit of knowlege can help, but it is far from the most important (additionally even with a PhD you would only be expert in one field). It is not missing education, that made people like Trump, Putin, Xi or any other of the world leaders that bad. You can even be very intelligent, smart and highly educated and still be an asshole ready to through everyone in the wood chipper to gain more money and power.

Add to that, that higher education is already more available to rich, white people (especially in the US) and you essentially excluded most people from minorities with that rule. The capitalist world is already bad enough in that regard without some education requirements.

Formal education is a shitty predictor of presidential effectiveness—one of the most academically-accomplished presidents was Herbert Hoover, and one of the least-educated was Abraham Lincoln.

Do you really believe a degree is the main thing stopping heads of states from acting in the service of others instead of themselves?

Literacy tests have historically been a way of disenfranchising minority (typically black) voters, so just think of a worse version of that. Also as other people have said most politicians are very well-educated as is. More fundamentally, though, restricting political participation in this way runs directly counter to what democracy is; the question that needs to be asked is “is there a dire problem you’re solving by compromising democracy in this way” and the answer is “no.”

Why isnt their a minimum set of knowledge, skills, or abilities? … In the cronyistic world of politics today this would absolutely get abused. Imagine the redistricting fight brought to resumes for office.

My ramble on this topic:

Politicians should be of the people elected by the people to serve in the people’s best interest. Being a constitutional republic / representative democracy, in the U.S. politicians can act without full consensus while remaining accountable to the electorate. That’s the ideal anyway

The real question here is about who gets elevated within each party to be on the ballot. Which occurs through systems that are outside of the electoral process – and often beyond the reach of people who only participate by voting

So then how do normal, centric folks have a chance to get on the ballot, then have any chance of being effective without having to immediately give into the extreme partisan culture? That’s the question I see here.

We need centric leaders with diversity of opinion.

US Constitution citations:

House of Representatives: (Article I, Section 2, Clause 2): Person shall be a Representative who shall not have attained to the Age of twenty five Years, and been seven Years a Citizen of the United States, and who shall not, when elected, be an Inhabitant of that State in which he shall be chosen.

Senate (Article I, Section 3, Clause 3): No Person shall be a Senator who shall not have attained to the Age of thirty Years, and been nine Years a Citizen of the United States, and who shall not, when elected, be an Inhabitant of that State for which he shall be chosen.

Power and money attract a certain type. Unfortunately that same type builds and maintains the current governmental system.

Democracy means will of the people, not best result. People are bad at judgement. That’s why he who controls the media weilds so much power.