Cass Sunstein runs regulatory policy in the Obama White House. The administration’s goal, he wrote last month in The Wall Street Journal, is “creating a 21st-century regulatory system that protects public health and safety while also promoting economic growth and job creation.”

In a follow-up interview with The New York Times, he criticized conservatives who oppose virtually all government regulation and liberals who never met a rule they didn’t like. “Both are silly political claims that have no place in a serious discussion,” said Sunstein, a former law professor at the University of Chicago and Harvard.

He’s absolutely right. All regulations have both costs and benefits, and an all-or-nothing approach defies logic. The better course is to strike a reasonable balance between competing priorities. But in today’s Washington, anybody who tries to do that, to occupy a pragmatic middle ground, is immediately caught in an ideological crossfire.

Look what happened recently when the administration decided to postpone stricter ozone pollution standards. There’s no doubt that tighter rules would improve public health, but they come with a high cost to industries that must comply with those rules – as much as $90 billion a year, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.

With the unemployment rate at 9.1 percent, and no improvement in sight, it certainly makes sense to weigh the economic burden more heavily and come down on the side of delay. Losing a job is as dangerous to your health as breathing smog.

But that sort of reasoning doesn’t sell very well these days. Liberals went nuts, with Frank O’Donnell of Clean Air Watch calling Obama’s decision “an act of political desperation and political cowardice.” Justin Ruben of MoveOn.org added: “Stuff like this is devastating to the hope and passion that fuel the volunteers that made the president’s 2008 campaign so unique and successful.”

Conservatives, who find it impossible to say anything nice about the president, were not appeased. Majority Leader Eric Cantor called the administration’s efforts “underwhelming,” and Diane Katz, a research fellow at the Heritage Foundation, added: “It’s significant that the administration is acknowledging that regulatory costs matter. But are the savings they’re proposing significant? Not compared to the torrent of new regulations.”

Still, the White House is following the right course. Be careful. Judge each regulation on its merits. Don’t fall into ideological traps.