Oil & Gas Prices

An hour before the disastrous June jobs report was released yesterday morning, NewsBusters publisher Brent Bozell chatted with "Fox & Friends" anchor Brian Kilmeade about the media's spin job on the Obama economy. [See video of the segment embedded below the page break]

Warning: The following cop-out explanation by Associated Press Retail Writer Mae Anderson will make many readers' heads hurt. Knowledge that she found an economist willing to support it may cause migraines. Consumer confidence as reported by The Conference Board fell to 60.8 in May from 66.0 in April -- "unexpectedly," of course, as the headline for Ms. Anderson's article indicates. But…

On Wednesday's NBC Today, co-host Matt Lauer invited on Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood to tout federally mandated stickers that detail the fuel efficiency of new cars: "Another way to save money is to buy a fuel efficient car and today the federal government is unveiling new fuel economy labels that you soon will be seeing on all new cars." Lauer asked LaHood, "$3.81, the average for a…

Many have noted that homelessness seems to always become a concern for the legacy media when a Republican is president. Similarly, during Democratic administrations, media outlets always seem to find good things about bad economic news (remember "funemployment"?). The latest such attempt comes from MSN Money, which on Wednesday tallied ten reasons that "you should love $5 gas." While keeping…

Senate Democrats failed to push through a proposal that would have deprived the five leading oil companies of tax breaks, New York Times reporter Carl Hulse reported Wednesday. Hulse’s headline writer, meanwhile, used the same ideologically loaded "big oil" terminology a liberal Democrat used in Hulse’s story: "Senate Refuses to End Tax Breaks for Big Oil." The phrase "Big Oil," redolent of…

People who approach an issue with certain beliefs are generally less likely to check claims that comport with those beliefs. It's called confirmation bias. Observe: Tuesday's New York Times carried this correction, highlighted by John Hinderaker at Powerline: An article on May 7 about the Obama administration's appointment of a panel of experts to find ways to make hydraulic fracturing safer…

On Friday's Early Show, CBS's Jeff Glor played up West Virginia Democrat Jay Rockefeller's browbeating of an oil company executive during a hearing of the Senate Finance Committee. The Senator interrupted Chevron Corporation CEO John Watson with a sarcastic reply: "Lovely statement, but do you understand how out of touch that is?" Glor first noted during his news brief 12 minutes into that 7…

Just barely a year after it derided the establishment media's obsession over oil-affected birds in the Gulf of Mexico while virtually ignoring the loss human life in awful floods in Tennessee (noted at the time at NewsBusters; at BizzyBlog), Investors Business Daily's editorialists are calling out the press for oversaturating us with Obama-OBL victory lap coverage at the expense of informing…

If CNN's Roland Martin gives the same answer as a tea party conservative, you know you've asked him a pretty bizarre question. On Monday's 10 a.m. EDT news hour, CNN anchor Carol Costello asked the panel if Obama is now "unbeatable" due to the killing of Osama bin Laden, falling gas prices, and a positive May jobs report. Of course, the election is over one year away, not all of the possible…

New York Times congressional reporter Carl Hulse, whose reporting has been somewhat more balanced of late, reverted to old partisan habits in Monday’s story, "Democrats’ Plan Would Offset Deficit by Ending Big Oil’s Tax Breaks." Hulse pushed Democratic enthusiasm over the party's latest talking points attempting to place Republicans on the defensive, this time managing to find Democratic…

First quarter profits for American oil companies are jaw dropping. Exxon earned nearly $11 billion, up 69 percent from a year ago. Royal Dutch Shell PLC, Europe's largest oil company, announced it made $8.78 billion in the first quarter, a 60 percent increase over last year. Much of it, but not all, is due to higher gas prices, over which the companies have very little control due to our heavy…

Here's a non-rocket science question: If you expect a reduced harvest of wheat, corn, rice or any other commodity some time in the future, what would be the wise thing to do about your consumption today? I bet that the average person would answer: Consume less now so that more will be available in the future. But how in the world can people be encouraged to consume less now? Enter the futures…

New York Times environmental reporter John Broder, who writes like a firm believer in human-induced global warming, provided a little political cover for Obama in his front-page story Saturday on rising gas prices, "Gas Cost Spurs Fight Over End Of a Tax Break." The problem is more than perception. As Julia Seymour of the Business and Media Institute reported, on April 25 the average price…

MSNBC's Chuck Todd rattled off a list of reasons to explain the sharp rise in the price of oil – none of which included Barack Obama's offshore drilling moratorium – and was "confused" about why anyone would blame the president for the prospect of $4 per gallon gasoline. On the April 28 "Daily Rundown," Todd suggested the Federal Reserve's quantitative easing measures and increases in global…