Abrand new feeling blew into town.

That's likely to be the thinking after a series of four public hearings - with the first today - on plans to create an offshore "wind farm" in the waters of Nantucket Sound off Cape Cod.

The most recent polling on the Cape Wind proposal, which would install some 130 wind turbines in the sound, shows that a great majority of residents of the Bay State have been getting solidly behind the wind farm. Most who live on Cape Cod have been getting on board, too.

Massachusetts has a real opportunity here, a chance to lead the way on clean energy. Cape Wind would provide the equivalent of three-quarters of the electrical power used by all of Cape Cod. Clean, green energy that would not contribute to global warming.  The winds that blow as a matter of course across Nantucket Sound would be put to great use - with little negative effect.