A profile on Rachel Maddow, who just got her own s...
A profile on Rachel Maddow, who just got her own show on MSNBC, and is one of my favorite news personalities. Watching her go head-to-head with Pat Buchanan on MSNBC has been the highlight of the Democratic convention for me.
Unlike Olbermann, Maddow plans to interview some conservative guests. But she is determined to avoid the left-right pairings that sustain much of cable news. “It creates fake balance,” she says. “I’m sorry – we’re going to have a debate about whether or not the Earth is flat? It doesn’t make sense to have a debate about whether offshore drilling is going to bring down gas prices. You know what? It’s not. The fact that it’s false ought to be reported, or you’re advancing a lie.”
Comments (4)
"It doesn't make sense to have a debate about whether offshore drilling is going to bring down gas prices. You know what? It's not."
So, that leaves the options that offshore drilling will raise gas prices, or have no effect. I'm not sure I have heard a solid argument that convinces me of either of those options. Maybe that is because the issue has been poorly framed. There might be some longer range price effects that, so long as they are discussed as long range effects on price, need to be included in the public part of the debate over energy policy. The media as a whole, conservative and liberal (and this snippet from Maddow included), has been an abysmal failure when it comes to educating the public on matters of policy analysis.
I'm not endorsing drilling here--I don't know crap about the geology or the economics. I'm just pointing out that Maddow has, in the name of balance, recast the argument in a way that takes drilling off the table entirely--and not because of conclusive evidence/logic. The debate should be whether drilling will reduce prices. She's not engaging that debate at all. That doesn't seem like fair policy discussion.
Maybe it is more concise to say that I hate her analogy. Whether the earth is flat is categorically a different question than whether drilling will reduce the price of gasoline.
The closest thing to a convincing argument that I've heard on this front is that at best, government experts estimate that increased offshore drilling plus drilling in alaska might lower gas prices by 4 cents per gallon within a decade. The only thing I've heard in the other direction is, "NOOOO, that's not necessarily true. Maybe there's more oil that we haven't found yet." And, "we should be taking every measure possible, including increased offshore drilling and drilling in Alaska," seems to be the Republican notion of a greener platform. So Ms. Maddow may be guilty of a bit of hyperbole, but if you ask me, it's perfectly warranted.
In other words, I agree that the conversation around this in the media could be better, but it's not true that Maddow is only trying to create balance, and that there's been no fact-based analysis available to the public. Google "alaska offshore 4 cents" or something to that effect, I believe you'll get some decent returns. She is in fact responding to analysis of data by those who are at least supposed to be qualified to analyze these things. It seems 100% clear to me that offshore drilling, and especially drilling in the wildlife refuge, should absolutely be off the table. It's putting our environment further at risk for political points and oil company profits.