Barack Obama made history on Nov. 4 when he became the first African American president elected. The electoral college voted for him 364 votes to McCain’s 163 votes.

As an editorial board, we are excited about the opportunity that Obama promises and the change he says he will bring. We are wondering how the transition will go and what Obama has planned for his first 100 days as president. Hopefully they are slightly more productive than our current president.

The media are too busy talking about what kind of dog the Obama girls will pick out when they move to the White House. All the way up to the New York Times, the media is infatuated with this human interest story. Of course, the White House pets have been of interest to the media for some time.

We’re pretty sure no one cares. We are happy the girls are getting a dog. We love pets, but when someone makes the promises that Obama made, there needs to be some discussion of what happens after the election whirlwind of Obama’s charisma and the incessant use of the word “maverick.”

Maverick.

The Obama camp has set up a Web site, www.change.gov, which is the Web site of the “office of the President-Elect.” This is interesting, it has blogs, events and a place for information about Obama’s budding staff.

Now that Americans have elected Obama, the country as a whole needs to be thinking about what he is doing and why he is doing it. We want the country to come together to figure out how to solve environmental issues, the bad economy and what to do about the foreign policy mess.

We also hope that the media will actually do their jobs, now that Obama has been elected. What will the impacts of his decisions be? Why is he making these decisions? While Obama is a great choice for president, he is not perfect and the media should make sure to be a check, rather than a lapdog.