This is stirring. As much as I tend to the cynical, I believe it is heartfelt. I would love to see a President Obama — any president, for that matter — put it into practice.

But this is not — although it could have been — the way that candidate Obama has run his campaign or the message he has run it on. I believe he sincerely would have preferred that it be different: more elevated and more honest, less beholden to party orthodoxy and less slashing toward opponents.

Yet Obama has run a rather standard Democratic campaign, largely obeisant to party constituencies and allergic to difficult choices. Run it brilliantly, yes, but not with much more than a passing hint of the new politics he envisions. Better angels, it seems, do not make the best campaign strategists…

What evidence is there that a President Obama would govern differently than candidate Obama campaigned?