Speaking for those of us who have not been cutting out recent Tribune editorials on the
                   Florida mess and happily affixing them to the fridge with magnets in the shape of little
                   elephants, let me say this:

                   George W. Bush will be the president of the United States. But we will not be badgered,
                   belittled or soothed into accepting him, uniting behind him, granting him legitimacy or
                   respecting Tuesday's ruling from the U.S. Supreme Court, no matter how many
                   contemptuous, argumentative e-mails we get or how many political leaders,
                   ours and theirs, suggest that we take the high road.

                   We're mad as hell. Just like U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, we pointedly
                   decline to affix "respectfully" to our dissenting view--that powerful partisans abused their
                   authority and discretion in order to make sure that possibly decisive ballots were not examined
                   and counted (the name as published has been corrected in this text).

                   We think that stopping the recount Saturday was "not only legally wrong but
                   also most unfortunate," that most of Bush's legal team's argument Monday
                   was "wholly without merit" and that Tuesday's election-ending, 5-4 ruling was
                   "another erroneous decision," to quote, in order, Justices Breyer, Stevens and Souter.

                   We'll get beyond it, eventually. But we will not be hurried by slogans, by
                   repetitions of familiar pro-Bush arguments or by invective from our political
                   opponents--the folks who, last we checked, were still picking at the
                   impeachment scab and fuming about a legal outcome that didn't go their way.

                   Right now, we're in the position of kids whose mom has just married a guy
                   we don't like much, yet who insists we call him "Dad."

                   He wasn't our choice. We consider his claim to the position dubious. We'll grudgingly
                   afford him the title because we don't really have much choice, now, do we?
                   We will defer to him, but we won't pay him deference.

                   We won't be browbeaten or shamed into loving him in the name of unity; we
                   won't grant him the emotional perquisites of legitimacy on someone else's
                   say-so, whether that person's name is Mom or Albert or Antonin.

                   But we will, by and by, I hope, set aside the irreconcilable and unrevisitable
                   disputes of the past. We will give the guy a chance, if not for his sake then our
                   own: How are we going to make the best of what looks to us to be a bad
                   situation? Never mind him, what's in our interests?

                   We won't give him our respect, but we will give him the opportunity to earn it.
                   His part of the bargain will be to exhibit grace: not force the issue too hard;
                   not presume to claim any territory he has not first conquered.

                   And if he proves worthy, someday we'll find ourselves referring to him by the title he prefers
                   without the word sticking in our throat. Whole weeks will go by without the bitter memories
                   of how, back to the political realm, we were called seditious crooks and crybabies for
                    backing a legal challenge to a very close election.

                   But we won't totally forgive and forget.

                   To those who now warn angry Democrats not to let lingering acrimony destroy them, as happened
                   with the Republicans during their extended orgy of Clinton hatred, I ask, "Oh, you mean the
                   Republicans who now control the House and the Senate and the presidency, the majority of
                   state governments, talk radio and the U.S. Supreme Court? Those self-destructive Republicans?"

                   And to those who purr that even a closely divided Supreme Court decision
                   ought to be revered by those on the political left, I ask, "Oh, you mean the
                   way the right has revered the court's 5-4 decisions in 1992 to uphold Roe v.
                   Wade and in 1989 to uphold flag desecration as a protected form of speech?
                   That kind of reverence?"

                   And to the editorialists who took a contemptuous whack this week at "the amateur
                   Earl Warrens of the Florida Supreme Court." I ask, "Oh, you mean the former U.S.
                   chief justice who did so much to advance the cause of minority rights and civil liberties
                   while odious lawmakers dragged their feet?      That Earl Warren?"

                   We hope to channel our indignation toward politically productive ends.

                   George W. Bush will be the president of the United States.
                   We can accept that.
                   Just give us time.