All about the ideas

Those who've visited here over the last three-and-a-half years or who've read our editorial page will not be shocked to hear that I did not vote for Barack Obama. He represents the antithesis of the restrained-government approach I've always sought in candidates. But, come Jan. 20, he will be my president, too. I wish him well, because I wish the country well. If there is to be Obama Derangement Syndrome, I will try (and fail occasionally, probably) not to be a participant.

By "wish him well," I partly mean I hope he is wise enough to realize he can't possibly do all the things he has promised to do and that some of them might actually be harmful to the country. But I suspect he will be trying to do a lot of what he said he would try to do, so I expect to have a lot to write about and be critical of. But with a certain coolness, as suggested by Glenn Reynolds in Forbes:

You don't have to love the "other guy." You don't have to hold back on fighting against policies you don't like. You don't have to pull punches. But once someone is duly and legally elected president, you do owe some respect to the office and the Constitution. And to your fellow Americans.

What we all have to try to do is get back to arguing about ideas instead of sniping at personalities. Might be hard in the blogosphere, I know, but people once believed such arguments actually accomplished something.