Watching the Jan. 26 GOP contenders' debate, it suddenly occurred to me what Newt Gingrich's uncanny ability to resonate with the right, and immigration patriots, in spite of his appalling record, must mean: he's a boggart! Boggarts are shape-shifters, able to assume whatever form they want. But Harry Potter scholars in my family tell me that they typically assume the form of your worst fear—so that, because Gingrich is cleverly saying what the Republican base desperately wants to hear, he must technically be an inverted boggart.

There was actually some interesting stuff about immigration and the National Question in the debate tonight, which I regard as confirmation of my argument that elections concentrate politicians' minds wonderfully. We'll comment further tomorrow. But the big negative: everyone shied away from criticizing legal immigration. We have miles to go before we sleep, or even yawn.