I, for one, am looking forward to the election. Not because I'm particularly excited about either candidate; rather, I look forward to the end of campaign season, and to the end of the unreserved ardor in people's voices as they espouse the virtues of their chosen candidates. According to the Constitution, the president is supposed to be an ambassador, commander-in-chief and an executive, nothing more. Congress makes the laws, the courts analyze them, and the president, with his Cabinet, executes them. Yet Americans have come to uphold the presidency as some kind of divinely anointed, holy office. We want our president to be the conqueror of our economic and social problems, the role model for the entire nation, and the larger-than-life hero at the center of our country's history. All of these things fall far outside the president's true role, and much of today's red-vs.-blue partisanship, as well as the vast expansion of executive power over the last eight years, results from equating a political executive with a religious, intellectual or cultural figurehead. Until we realize that our president is not intended to shape, or even reflect, our culture, our national elections will continue to be dominated by platitudinous talking points, candidates' style over their substance, and tenuous policy proposals that offer sound bites instead of solutions. ELIZABETH JACOBSON, MANKATO