Contest! Why should there be a President?

Actually I just joined this contest because I find the topic a very interesting one, and one that I myself have many times wondered about. Like for example is it really necessary to have a President or any other type of head of state? But let's get into the question itself and how the contest is set up.

What does the election of the Head of State (Election) mean to you?

A long time ago, when I was young and naive, well at least I hope, more naive than I am now, election time was the opportuntity to change the authorities that had for four years mal governed the country. As a caveat, I must say before 1982 when I turned 21 we had a series of military coups so we had very short lived governments, even the military governments didn't last long, the younger upcoming military leaders would want the leadership for themselves so we had very fragile governments. But finally in 1981 it was decided we would have civilian governments and elections every four years. In this country, Honduras, we had two big political parties Liberal and Nacional, both conservative only the Liberal slightly less so. The formula was the Liberal won twice in a row and then the Nacional won once. This could have gone on forever but politicians are never satisfied with what they have, greed takes over. And now, by this time, I knew that these parties were useless, they were just employees of the big moneyed people and corporations so the common people would never see any quantifiable benefits. And actually to this day things remain the same. So elections to me hold absolutely no thrills. I do vote, just to try to hit the guy who is most likely to win, in the end all of them are the same thing.

Why does the president have to exist?

Unfortunately I have to concur with the fact that there does have to be a person who at least appears to wield some power or things would be even worse. We cannot afford anarchy, I know sometimes anarchy is appealing, but thinking things through we do need a lot of things that only happen through a central governance, we need a police, we need firefighters, we need health services, we need education centers, we need prisons, we need a lot of things that can only be had via a government even if we don't like a government. Yes, I agree, a government should be limited in what its duties should be, but that it is needed it is needed, and that this government needs a visible head in the way of a President, Prime Minister, King or whatever is a given.

What are the criteria for a Head of State/President that you like?

The one thing, the only thing I would like is the one thing I am sure no President is going to give, and that is honesty. Just think this through, whomever holds this office is beholden to whomever has helped him get there, to his family to his friends, to his organizations to his ideals, there is no way a person can be honest as a President. And that is the one thing I would want. And paradoxically that is the one thing they all promise.