Re: Edge of the Empire Skills
No, a starting character is not at Han level. Leia and Luke perhaps, and no where near Obi-Wan, that is simply laughable.
These skills are not as interchangeable as you may think. For one reason they aren't nearly as broad as other games. For example Charm is described as sincerely flattering someone in order to get something out of them. Their examples are: persuading an individual to make an exception to his usual practices through flattery flirting and grace, appealing to one's better nature even if they don't have it, and seduction for most species.
On the other side they describe Negotiation as this: The art of negotiation deals with determining exactly how much of what a subject wants must be surrendered in order to get a particular good or service in return. Buying, selling, agreements, and treaties. This is a very different beast than Charm. Same goes for deception, leadership, and coersion.
As for others you mentioned, ask anybody in the military if it takes the exact same training to use a pistol as it does a belt-fed turreted machine gun. It does not, hence why two different skills for blasters. This isn't rare, as the d20 system has separate feats for such weapons, and other great games such as Shadowrun separate types of weapons into separate skills.
You also stated a true fact, that 2 ranks is enough to be damn good at something, which defeats your arguement about needing to condense them. Think about it, they give you the ability to get a different class specialty within or outside your career, with no limit upon how many except for xp cost. This means that if a player truly wants to be able to do everything he can mix the right combos together to be able to put 1 or 2 into every skill. If you condense them, then you run the problem of everyone being able to excel at everything leaving very little to separate each character as their own individual.
As someone who has played a ton of this system I can reassure you it is very solid (except for the Force and Destiny book but that's because it is currently a Beta). If it wasn't my friends and I would still be using the old d6 Star Wars which was our choice before. Any character can attempt to do anything, as there are no "trained only" skills. Talents increase what you can do, but if someone wants to be personable they can even if they aren't very proficient in it. Alot of difficulties are moderate which isn't hard for someone with a 3 presence.