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Last week Alaska Senator Lisa Murkowski unveiled the Republicans’ new plan for energy development. She called for a partial opening of the Alaska National Wildlife Refuge, the development of offshore oil tracts plus more production from federal lands. Within hours the Natural Resources Defense Council had dismissed the whole thing as “a plan from the past.” And in fact it was little more than a reiteration of the four-year-old cry, “Drill, baby, drill.” Anyone who thinks this signals another four years of energy stalemate, however, is sadly mistaken. The very next day, energy expert Daniel Yergin was telling a hearing of the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee that, if anything, Washington is completely out of the loop as to what’s happening in energy. “Our thinking...