I’ve been discussing with friends in recent weeks about the phenomenon of why gas prices have been steadily rising, despite a confluence of factors which should be having, and have characteristically had, the opposite effect.  To wit:  1) The price of crude has been steadily falling, 2) demand is clearly lessening, 3) the biggest US (and global)  recession in decades is deepening, and 4) hundreds of thousands of layoffs and overall cutbacks on spending means many people are driving less.  Yet, the price of a gallon of gas (where I live) has increased 50 cents a gallon, or almost 40%, over the past 2 months.  US Department of Energy statistics show the US average increase of a gallon of regular unleaded up nearly 40 cents a gallon since Christmas, despite nothing but bad economic news and a rapidly slowing economy since then.  What explains this?

To my lucky surprise, ABC News Nightline steps up with this piece of journalistic claptrap to answer my question!

Note in the piece how even the hired expert, plus several of the interviewed consumers, refer to the manipulation of supply/prices, yet ABC either blithely ignores that angle or consciously chooses not to address it.  While I am not specifically accusing anyone of price fixing (even though I readily admit I believe it’s happening), how can ABC run a story about rising gas prices in a market exhibiting falling oil prices, demand, and a wicked recession and not address something that is PLAINLY suspicious to nearly everyone with at least one active synapse in their brain?

But even if ABC did address it, undoubtedly it would be couched as some kind of crazy conspiracy theory, with no basis in reality.  Kinda like this story from the Today show in 2006.  In it, there is zero analysis of or interviews with any proponent of the price manipulation position.  From the very beginning, the piece is heavily stilted to the “If you believe this, then you’re a nutjob” side of the aisle, vs trying to do an objective presentation of both sides of the story, using the best interview and data from each competing point of view and allowing the viewer to draw his or her own conclusions.

I’m just certain this kind of coverage has nothing to do with how much coin Big Oil is dropping on all the major media outlets for PR commercials and full page newspaper ads that you can’t avoid seeing every 6 minutes or every 6 pages.  Some estimates put the ad spending at or above $100,000,000 in the last year or two alone, as oil companies scramble to appear “green” and to feebly attempt to explain away the reasons for them gouging consumers while raking in obscene profits with little regard for alternative energy development.

To be fair, the work ABC, NBC, and CNN has done here is no better or worse than any other MSM outlet in covering the “gas price story” over the past year or three.  But that isn’t saying much since much of it has been truly uninformative, reaction-driven infotainment, with no teeth and nothing of value beyond a “at least I’m not the only one” built-in sentiment.   But that is the standard, no-effort, formulaic bilge they always use to cover stories of this type, especially when it involves major corporate sponsors.  The template goes like this:

• Report how much prices have risen over “X” period,
• Throw in a few nifty graphics and stats from around the country to show the disparities,
• Conduct “man-on-the-street” interviews of several hapless consumers to “whine it up,” and don’t forget to
• Include a random “expert” to give us the exact same devoid-of-detail answer every single time:  “Demand is up, refinery capacity (and thus supply) is down.”

No real attempt is ever made to investigate any of the underlying reasons why prices do what they do, or why refineries are acting in conjunction to reduce refining output.  If you think otherwise, please link me in the comments section to all of the MSM stories over the past year which take an in-depth look at whether price manipulation has anything to do with the problem.  Unfortunately, you won’t have much to choose from, because the “hard-hitting” investigative journalism of today’s MSM is saved for online predator stories and local housing contractors who bilk little old ladies–not that there’s anything wrong with such coverage.  Curiously enough, however, neither of these populations happen to be big network tv ad spenders.  Nightline’s most recent effort is just another example of “Mailing It In” with superfluous distraction vs doing the kind of investigation that leads to real answers about topics considered important by most Americans.

In the words of Stephen Colbert, “Make. Announce. Type. Just put it through a spellcheck and go home.” That is the essence of effort put into almost all MSM stories related to gas prices.  For more examples of lackluster media coverage of this topic, see here, here, and here.

In the last example, CNN brilliantly spends almost 8 full minutes on this topic, but manages never to even mention the possibility of price manipulation, regionally monopolistic selling practices, or unfair competition (e.g., undercutting your competitors’ wholesale gasoline prices until they leave the market) on the part of gasoline suppliers, or the lack of regulation of oil speculators on Wall St.  They do, however, manage to spend lots of time plugging all of their in-house “experts” and their associated specials, radio shows, and new “desks” from which to report this hard-hitting journalism.  So much for the network that’s supposedly “Keeping them honest.”

Frankly, if this is the best investigative journalism we can expect on a topic that affects everyone and their pocketbooks in such a meaningful way, I’d rather leave it to a 4-year old to explain it to me:

Or, you might get just as much benefit from a Red State Update on Gas Prices: