Energy is surely a winning issue for McCain. The enormous and very recent leaps in natural gas production attest to the synergy that can result when high-tech and the market coalesce to create incentives and profits; even the mere discussion of further drilling in the US, the world’s largest consumer of imported oil, has had a dampening effect on speculation, and led in part to a lowering of prices. The good news is that this is not antithetical (at least as long as prices for oil and gas do not crash) to encouragement of alternative fuels.

But the contrast with Obama is telling and analogous to the surge in Iraq where McCain was likewise vindicated by events. Supporting more gas and oil production has already refuted the canard that any improvement would take a decade and save only a few cents. We knew that when the Democrats (1) were dismissing increased oil and gas production at home, as unimportant, while (2) at the same time begging the Saudis, threatening to sue OPEC, and wanting to tap the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, all for amounts of 100,000-300,000 barrels a day. The rule seems to be a 100,000 barrels pumped out of the Arabian desert or Persian Gulf is an enormous amount, a million barrels pumped from ANWR or off Florida and California is a pittance.

McCain should run ads stressing that this can-do strategy on gas and oil is already having positive psychological effects, and will soon save the country billions in the our balance of payments.

Watch Obama–as in the case of the surge in which events required a reversal of course– suddenly support the recent successes in natural gas production. His new strategy seems to be to talk up wind and solar, then say nothing good or evil about nuclear, natural gas, or even additional oil production–with the expectation that the latter will coalesce to bring down energy prices so that he can give credit to the insignificant former.

All this is simply Obama’s surge strategy in which his opposition to all phases of it naturally led to its measured success, proving the wisdom of his timetable withdrawal.

A footnote: the market and profits really do matter: NB: Al Gore is enthused with his greenhouses gas campaign in part because he is heavily invested in a profitable multi-media campaign about a carbon Armaggedon that apparently requires his further interest in carbon-offsetting, for-profit consulting firms–in the manner that Nancy (“I’m trying to save the planet”) Pelosi is at least not opposed to new gas explorations (a carbon emitting, fossil fuel requiring as much land intrustion and water as oil drilling) and thus has invested in the natural -gas burning car industry. The suddenly mega-rich Gore and the suddenly Wall Sreet savvy Pelosi ll is Orwellian when juxtaposed to the sermons about “Big Oil” greed and the need for windfall profits new taxes. Makes the”two-nations” Edwards mansion seem small in comparison.