Experience

I like Barack Obama. He is intelligent, charismatic, and capable. As much as I prefer to remain aloof from this absurdly premature presidential race, I have to say that he's my preferred candidate.

But there are some who argue that he lacks experience. He's young - if 46 can be considered young - and he's 'only' a first-term senator. Thus some say that he lacks the worldly political knowledge necessary to be president.

The flimsiness of this critique becomes apparent when one consults recent history. In the past twenty years, two presidents have emerged as icons: Reagan for the right wing, and Clinton for the left. Both of these men had only been state governors before assuming the office of president; they hadn't even had any federal government experience, let alone experience in foreign policy! And yet each man continues to enjoy the reputation of a very successful presidency.

But if you're still concerned with experience, perhaps you should consider the resume of one of the most experienced presidents in our history. The son of a blacksmith, he had pulled himself up by his own bootstraps, attended Stanford University, and made his wealth as a mining engineer. He served as a humanitarian administrator who oversaw food and disaster relief to millions of people inside and out of the US, for which actions the New York Times named him one of the Ten Most Important Living Americans. He then served as US Secretary of Commerce, and he was so good at the job that he often overshadowed the sitting presidents he was serving. He was, thus, a natural choice for the presidency, to which he was elected in a landslide election. That man's name was Herbert Hoover, and his presidency is regarded as one of the most disastrous in US history.

So much for experience.