Most able at what? Most people who are in elected office, or who have been in elected office, have a certain repertoire of skills in getting along with other people and in keeping track of mutual obligations that helps make the political process work. Some scientists or engineers who become politicians
Of course, if a technologist tries to get elected on his own, he won't win because he isn't a natural politician. What I'm saying, with all the talent that exists in this the sceience/engineering/programming community, if they organized, built software systems and mathematical models etc, I believe they could get "their man/woman" in every office in the country.
Most able at what? Most people who are in elected office, or who have been in elected office, have a certain repertoire of skills in getting along with other people and in keeping track of mutual obligations that helps make the political process work. Some scientists or engineers who become politicians
http://www.whitehouse.gov/about/presidents/jimmycarter
http://mcnerney.house.gov/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vern_Ehlers
http://holt.house.gov/
http://olver.house.gov/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Foster_(Illinois_politicia...
http://sharp.sefora.org/issues/111th-congress-degrees-by-typ...
have had some degree of those skills, and some people with other academic degrees have gained understanding of how science relates to public policy.
http://press.princeton.edu/titles/9226.html
But scientists and engineers are still fallible human beings,
http://yalepress.yale.edu/book.asp?isbn=9780300123852
and the political process will still come under influence of concentrated interest groups
http://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/PublicChoice.html
regardless of which people fill the offices.