During the last presidential cycle, the Examiner didn't just endorse John McCain — it did so in flowery language better suited to endorsing William McKinley. ("For all her faults, America remains for billions of people around the world the light of freedom, the shining city on a hill that must be defended and preserved," as if Barack Obama opposed this notion.) Well, that was then and this is now. In 2012, after being shed by messianic right-wing billionaire Philip Anschutz and clearing the troglodytes off its op-ed page, the Ex this year editorialized against sensational coverage of pedestrians being killed by cyclists. In an overt potshot at the Chronicle's C.W. Nevius, the Ex lambasted "curmudgeonly columnists" who make a living by "pandering" to a "mostly older, mostly cranky" audience — in other words, McCain voters. It seems the Ex has pulled a welcome 180, which is ordinarily much easier to do with a bike than a newsroom.