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1. Head of State - what does that mean? Obviously the US President is head of state. Who else, in the absence of a monarch, would be head of state in the US? Not exactly sure what the benefits of "head of state" are.
From Wiki: A head of state is the individual who serves as the chief public representative of a monarchy, republic, federation, commonwealth or other kind of state. His or her role generally includes legitimizing the state and exercising the political powers, functions, and duties granted to the head of state in the country's constitution and laws. In nation states the head of state is often thought of as the official "leader" of the nation.
From Me: Some countries have a formal Head of State who is politically impotent, others like mine have an entirely non-democratic Monarchy, others such as yours is also a political heavyweight.
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2. Veto Powers - The President can veto legislation passed by Congress, but the veto can be overridden by a a two-thirds majority of both houses of Congress. The US President cannot initiate legislation, the can only sign or veto legislation passed by Congress. The US Supreme Court has the right to decide if any legislation signed into law is constitutional or not, and can overrule the President in that regard.
In the UK, our political system is very different in almost every way, no-one has any Veto ability within the UK political system.
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3. Media Spotlight - You can't be serious. Tiger Woods and Lebron James get a lot more media attention. Who the f--K cares?
When the Iraq war started Bush jnr was in the spotlight constantly, as was bLiar, but the Queen was not even though she is the Head of State, effigy's were burnt in the streets of Iraq of Bush and bLiar, but not our head of state. The main point of the difference here is that your entire country was to blame in the eyes of millions of Iraqi's, whereas the leading member of the political party in power in the UK was to blame, but not our figurehead.
Who the hell is Lebron James.? Not that I care.?
4. Lifetime benefits - The US President only earns a salary of $400,000 per year, which puts the President about at the 1% level of income in the US. In other words, if there are 200,000,000 million people employed in the US, then there are 2 million people in the US who make more money than the US President. Plus, their dry cleaning bills are outrageous. Former presidents do get some lifetime benefits (mostly security), but not all that much compared to any other corporate executive.
A UK Prime Ministers salary is $110,000, they get a fraction of the security (if any) that they had whilst in office, and unlike US Presidents they can be prosecuted for things that the did whilst in power, I am thinking of Nixon.
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5. Term of Office - A king/queen obtains office via heredity reasons, and the US President is elected. A king/queen has a lifetime office, whereas a President must be elected every 4 years and cannot server more than 10 years in office.
No-one is doubting the unfairness of heredity Monarchy, however no-one has ever persuaded me that there is a better solution. It would be impossible to "create" a royal family as a non-political head of state for a country that has never had one, however we do have. Ignoring the financial benefits (yes the Royal family is a net producer of wealth) the current Queen has been almost impeccable carrying out her job - she has been a much better head of state than a combination of the last 12 US Presidents - specifically because she has nothing at all to do with politics. Whether Charles will be as good is to be seen.
Andy