I'm torn. I really am. I thought I could think about T.Boone Pickens as an unambiguous dick. Pickens, a life-long republican, put 3 million dollars into the verb-creating, candidate destroying Swift Boat Veterans for Truth. He then offered a 1 million dollar award to anyone who could disprove their claims. This happened. He changed his mind.

Now it gets complicated. The next time Pickens is in the news, he's building the worlds largest wind farm in Texas. I like wind farms. Now he's following up a publicity blitz and the release of the Pickens' Plan, his plan to use wind to replace natural gas as a power source, and then use that natural gas to replace oil as a fuel source.

 Now does he have ulterior motives? Sure. He wants to make money, so he wants the public on his side, to get the government on his side, to get the subsidies on his side.

 Yet in the end, the man who did more to get George Bush elected than anybody except for John Kerry might change the debate on energy for better. The candidate who embraces the Pickens Plan the most completely will be able to say they have a plan that's not a big ol' monkey on their back, like drilling is for McCain or Biofuels is for Obama. Obama gets an added bonus that if he supports the plan, he gets bragging rights about "reaching out to Conservatives for ideas..." even if they're ideas that Conservatives ripped off of Progressives to make a buck.