Perl as a language is friendly and fun, and tends to attract people who are friendly and fun too ;-)

Personally, I have learnt and used many languages over the years but have loved Perl since we met, and have stayed faithful ever since. And that is probably at least partially because something in my brain resonates with the way(_s_) Perl allows me to do things.

I'd also suggest there is a correlation between Perl users and the FLOSS community in general. It's hard to be a Perl user without picking up a lot of the larger open source mind set - co-operation, collaboration, tolerance and acceptance - all of which are a Good Thing for making one's way in the world in general.

As for making Perl knowledge a job requirement for holders of public office - sounds like a wonderful idea, but I recall how optimistic the U.K. media were when M Thatcher was running for PM because she was a science graduate and therefore was it was believed that she would be a more rational leader ... 'nuff said.