I don’t want to start this column off with a bunch of clichéd sayings about how glad I am to be back at The Crimson White this year. I know you don’t want to read that sentimentalist drivel, so I won’t write it.

Obviously, I’m looking forward to this year at The CW. We have the best staff I’ve ever worked with, and everyone — myself included — is absolutely dedicated to providing you with a newspaper that is informative and useful.

That said, I’m sure a few of the juniors and other seniors remember 2008 when I was opinions editor. I liked to stir the pot back then, and while I can’t promise to avoid controversy this year, I can give you my word that some of you might be surprised at how some of my thought processes have changed.

Enough about that, though.

Some of you will remember that I did not support the election of now-President Barack Obama, and, yes, I know that’s an understatement.

I’m not going to say I support everything Obama has done since his election, because that would be patently untrue. I will say, though, that I’m willing to give him a chance, just like I’m not going to write his agenda off — as I was more than willing to do in 2008 — as typical tax-and-spend liberal nonsense.

Let me qualify that with an example, though.

I don’t think we would have seen the passage of massive social overhauls like the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act — more commonly referred to as the 2010 healthcare reform act — without the massive amount of political capital Obama brought with him when he moved into the Oval Office.

However, I think it’s too early to say with any amount of substantive thought whether or not the health care reform laws will help or hurt in the long run.

Best guess, though? I’d say, in the long run, it will probably help us more than it will hurt our pocketbooks.

I know it might come as a surprise to many of you to read that, especially after reading my byline, but college has had a cumulatively moderating effect on a number of my opinions.

Don’t take that to mean that I’ve sold out whole hog to the left, because I haven’t and probably never will.

Rather, I recognize now, as I hope more and more of you do, that the best solution to the problems that face our country is rarely at one of the political poles, but is rather somewhere in the middle.

The continued polarization to which I once contributed strikes me now as nothing more than pundits — on both sides — being divisive just to drive people apart. Along the way, they line their own pocketbooks at the expense of the best solutions to our issues.

I’m not trying to pontificate from the middle and say, “can’t we all just get along?” because I know better than to assume that could ever be true.

What I am saying is that we should all stop listening to the pundits, look up the facts ourselves, and make informed decisions.

If I can start thinking that way, so can you. And you should.

I’m talking to you, far-leftists, tea partiers and members of the religious right. I understand your frustration, and, under different circumstances, I might have even joined you. Well, maybe not the far-leftists.

 Now isn’t the time for baseless division, though. It’s time to grow up, act like adults, and try to engage in civil debate on issues that actually produce something valuable.

Believe me when I say I haven’t always supported what Obama has been doing, and I still don’t. I’m not asking the far right to jump on board with healthcare reform, gay rights, abortion rights, or the far left to support Ten Commandments displays, our involvement in the Middle East or whatever the hot-button issue is next week.

I am saying that there is a way to disagree with your neighbor without completely building a wall between the two of you.

It has been said that the house divided cannot stand, and while I doubt that’s true in a purely literal sense, I’d rather not find out for sure.

The farther pundits on either side push us apart and tell us we should hate, even despise what the other side is saying, the closer we come to finding out if what Abraham Lincoln said is true.

Paul Thompson is a senior majoring in political science and the staff development manager of The Crimson White. His column runs on Thursdays.