Leaders are great people, because they can make change just like Obama (Whoo go Obama) Sorry for all of you McCain people. :(
Any way, what it takes to be a leader is mostly courage and to be able to stand up for your rights.
Rights are so important because if there we no rights then by now men would have taken over the earth, which is bad, but now that women rights have come, both sexes are equal.
Courage, courage, courage... YOU MUST have courage in order to be a leader, courage allows you to tell some one that some thing they are doing is really annoying them, if you didn't have courage, then you would not be able to tell that annoying person to stop. Courage also allows you to stand up for your self, because if you were shy and didn't have the courage to do that then you would never advance up a step to a different scenario.
Those two charachteristics I think are the most inportant to have in order to be a leader.

Here is a viedeo on Rights, and the person singing the song, I would consider a leader: