In a presidential candidate, what is experience to you?

[angus]

To me, military service is important.  Neither Clinton, Bush the Younger, nor Obama has had any.  (Well, Bush had a pseudo-military experience which he never showed up for, but not much.)  As a result, none of them appreciate sending men into battle.  All of them showed a willingness to involve the US in foreign entanglements.  I think a man who has crawled under barbed wire while dodging enemy fire, or has had to order men to their deaths, would be much less likely to take us into the fog of war.  This was in particular evidence when Colin Powell was the most reluctant of Team Bush when it came to the invasion of Iraq. 

It is also evident to me that chief executive experience is helpful for gauging a presidential candidate.  Bush, for example, had a miserable business record in the private sector.  It should come as no surprise that he left us in such poor economic shape.  Obama's executive experience is limited to that of a community organizer, so it should come as no surprise that he has not been able to keep his own campaign promises.  Clinton, on the other hand, came from a strong governorship (Arkansas' Governor having much more executive authority than Texas') and had also been the attorney general of the state of Arkansas.  Clinton left us with a budget surplus.

Another experience that I find helpful in gauging a presidential candidate is that of making one's way in the world from humble beginnings.  This is not necessary, and we have had a number of excellent presidents who came from aristocratic, wealthy, slaveholding, landed families, but I regard it as an experience that makes sense to me.  Nixon, for example, as well as Lincoln and Reagan all had relatively humble origins.  They were all re-elected as President and they all contributed long-lasting effects on the political culture of the United States.

Of course, there are qualities that I look for in a presidential candidate that trump all these experiential concerns, but these are the things that "experience" brings to my mind.