The most scandalous aspect of the coal-plant controversy is the refusal -- yea, the inability -- of coal-plant foes to describe just how they'd go about providing for Texas' large and growing energy needs at a time of shrinking natural gas supplies and deep opposition to nuclear power. We hear about "conservation." We hear about wind power, solar power; we sometimes even hear about coal gasification. We never hear coal-plant foes explain how that's going to happen, and what it would mean and cost.

They say that McCain’s victories prove that opposition to amnesty is a losing issue. Actually, the anti-amnesty candidates — including Mike Huckabee, who has been running as a deportationist — have gotten majorities in most states. Even in Florida, where strong Hispanic support gave McCain a decisive win, the anti-amnesty candidates got nearly half the vote. McCain’s success proves that Republican politicians can survive supporting amnesty if they have compensating strengths. It does not prove that the issue helped him. As Ramesh Ponnuru writes in the upcoming issue of National Review, conservatives cannot reasonably ask McCain to abandon his convictions on immigration. But they can ask him to say that he will defer any action on amnesty, or guest workers, until a few years after enforcement has been put into effect.

Barack Obama is not only popular among Democrats, he's also an appealing figure to many Republicans. Former GOP House member Joe Scarborough, now a host on MSNBC, reports that after every important Obama speech, he is inundated with e-mails praising the speech — with most of them coming from Republicans. William Bennett, an influential conservative intellectual, has said favorable things about Obama. So have Rich Lowry of National Review and Peggy Noonan. And so have I.

A number of prominent Republicans I know, who would wage a pitched battle against Hillary Clinton, like Obama and would find it hard to generate much enthusiasm in opposing him.

A colleague in Savannah says she hasn't seen anybody have a problem producing an ID to cast a ballot. I haven't yet seen any reports out of Georgia of a problem. If that bears out, it will certainly bolster those who support voter ID, because they'll be able to say that it doesn't have any impact on turnout. The flip side is that, potentially, the people who didn't have ID simply didn't bother to go to vote. So it won't settle the argument, but at least this will give us a little more data. There isn't a lot of data. Both sides in the photo ID debate have spent more time knocking down each other's arguments than advancing their own.