If the White House encouraged Americans to prevent colds by wearing sweaters, one would hope that media outlets would point out that there's no evidence that being chilly has anything to do with catching a cold.

Likewise, if the Interior Department green-lights a plan to drill for oil in the Arctic Ocean in order to demonstrate "a willingness by President Obama to approve expanded domestic oil and gas exploration in response to high gasoline prices," as John Broder and Clifford Krauss wrote in the New York Times today (8/5/11), then reporters really ought to point out that expanded offshore drilling can only have the tiniest impact on the price of gasoline, since oil is  a global commodity and the United States does not have enough offshore oil to meaningfully increase the world supply.

But don't hold your breath.

There was an interesting piece in the New York Times yesterday (8/1/11) by Elizabeth Jensen about plans to ship PBS programming across the pond. It's a hard concept to get your head around, especially if you're under the impression that Britain's public broadcasting system is superior to our own.

That might not be the strangest part, though:

W. David Lyons, chairman and chief executive of the Orca Exploration Group, which operates a Tanzanian natural gas field, is backing the PBS UK project financially. PBS described him as "a Canadian-born entrepreneur and venture philanthropist" who "grew up on PBS programming and is interested in bringing such content to the U.K."

There's something perfect about this. PBS--long criticized for being  too cozy with giant energy industry sponsors--is trying to get into Britain with the backing of an energy company CEO. British viewers might not understand that the word "Public" in the name is intended to be ironic.

Calling for more drilling for domestic oil to do something about rising gas prices makes little sense. This should be a simple matter of economics or math--there's not enough oil to recover from U.S. territory to affect global supply, and since oil is a commodity traded on a global market, only an increase in the global supply can affect the price.

Nonetheless, one major political party in this country holds out more drilling as the solution to high prices, and thus that point of view is treated with respect. Take the Washington Post piece today (5/4/11) by Juliet Eilperin, headlined "Soaring Prices Alter Energy Debate a Year After Gulf Spill: A Drive for More Drilling."

The article manages to convey--in passing--that this policy solution wouldn't really work, but nonetheless treats it as if it were a respectable policy option:

Just one year after the explosion of the Deepwater Horizon killed 11 and triggered a massive oil spill, there's little appetite among legislators for new safety regulations. Instead, a single concern is prompting a drive for more drilling: $4-a-gallon gas.

Increased drilling won’t bring down the immediate cost U.S. consumers pay at the pump, but soaring fuel prices have transformed the U.S. energy debate, motivating the House this week to take up at least one of three bills that would ease the way for more energy exploration off both coasts and in the Gulf of Mexico.

So more drilling won't help in an "immediate" way, but as a response to high prices Congress is considering bills to encourage more drilling. The piece does quote critics who point out that increased drilling isn't going to matter, immediately or otherwise--the Post attributes this analysis to "Democrats and environmentalists." As Dean Baker put it, "Tell the Washington Post that All Non-Flat Earthers Believe that Oil Prices Are Determined in a Global Market."

Veteran actor and activist Peter Coyote (SFChronicle.com, 5/30/09) writes about big media's overriding response to the "Largest Environmental Lawsuit in History--Silence." Taking a look at "the practices that are going on behind Chevron's carefully cultivated 'green' image" as they "drill for oil in the jungles of the Ecuadorian Amazon," Coyote does give credit to the Washington Post reporting of "several damning letters" like "an internal 1972 memo...instructing Texaco [now Chevron] officials in Ecuador to report only spills that attracted the attention of the news media." Nonetheless:

This is a case of epic proportions, where our commons, the lungs of the planet, have been violated needlessly and carelessly, to save money with no thought whatsoever paid to the thousands of people, and millions of species, that would be poisoned while the American media basically slept. Those of you who may have noticed the cozy interview with the [executive vice] president of Chevron in the SF Chronicle last week might not have noticed the small article in the Chronicle's business section mentioning the protests outside of the Chevron stockholders meeting in San Ramon on May 26. Cofan Indian leader Ermenegildo Quillolo, and lead-American attorney for the defense Steve Danziger, Ecuadorian community organizer Luis Yanza, members of Amazon Watch and a host of NGOs seeking to protect the Amazon were there protesting the actions of Chevron, and alerting stockholders that their company paid $30 billion dollars for a company with $27 billion dollars of liabilities attached, a gross failure of due diligence. We, the public, were not offered a comparable interview with the Ecuadorians, Steven Danziger or members of Amazon Watch.

Even though "this spill dwarfs the Exxon Valdez," Coyote notes that it, "aside from an excellent piece on 60 Minutes, remains virtually unreported. How many of you know about it? And if not, why not?" Listen to a similar story of oil company crimes and media neglect on the current FAIR radio program CounterSpin: "Han Shan on Shell & Ken Saro-Wiwa" (5/29/09).

In his introduction (TomDispatch, 5/12/09) to Pepe Escobar analyzing the current politics of the Aghanistan/Pakistan region, Tom Engelhardt describes how "there, the skies are filled with planes and unmanned aerial drones, and civilians as well as combatants die every day in increasing numbers as ever more frequent attacks and expanding conflicts make daily headlines." But there's more to the story:

Those are, of course, the front-page stories. Energy, especially in the form of oil and natural gas, fuels everything from civilization to its various discontents and means of destruction, and yet it remains largely on the business pages of our papers. Even in a time of relatively depressed oil and gas prices, energy runs like an undercurrent just beneath global headlines. Under the carnage of war, that is, courses what Escobar likes to call the Liquid War, and just how the energy flows and through which territories controlled by whom does turn out to make--quite literally--a world of difference, even if that isn't what captures our attention most of the time.

Of "The Real Afghan War," Escobar writes in his essay: "In the ever-shifting New Great Game in Eurasia, a key question--why Afghanistan matters--is simply not part of the discussion in the United States. (Hint: It has nothing to do with the liberation of Afghan women.) In part, this is because the idea that energy and Afghanistan might have anything in common is verboten."