Dakota Megawatts

Kotkin might be embellishing (a true sign of an idealist) a bit, but he's got it right as far as NoDak's lignite coal, and untapped oil reserves go.

"We're on the verge of a gold rush driven by energy," crows Bob Valeu, state coordinator for North Dakota Sen. Byron Dorgan. Mr. Valeu and other leaders here in both political parties see their state as a growing bastion of energy production for the U.S. Already North Dakota is among the major exporters of energy to the rest of the country, exporting roughly three-fourths of its 4,000 megawatts of electricity.

If anything, this is pleasing in the sense that it takes a bit of relief off our dependency on mid-East oil. Americans, still, will have to figure out if they want bigger Hummer's (and thus become even more dependent on the stuff), while physicists try to make those floating, anti-gravity cars that we were teased with back in the '80s.

And as AI has reminded us, "It's good to walk."