I've already posted about some of the nonsense being propagated about oil reserves on the internet by campaign groups, but it seems the woo is spreading. Matt Nisbet at Framing Science has cottoned on to my point last month, that it seemed oil and conservative lobbyists had joined forces to make this a key election issue. Now the left-wing lobbyists at Media Matters have uncovered an increasing amount of Oil-Balls - "mis-speech" about oil - appearing in the media [1].

Take a look at Glen Beck in this 30-second clip from June 18th this year:

He states there that "... drilling in ANWR alone would yield 100m barrels a day." This ridiculous figure has about as much basis in reality as Don King's hairdo (don't look). It's not even slightly out - the real estimate is more like a peak production of one million barrels a day. Christ, given the estimated size of the reserves, at that rate they'd run out in a month anyway. It's a nonsense figure, but I somehow doubt we'll see a retraction.

Earlier in the year, the gloriously-named Charles Krauthammer published an article in the Washington post, in which he stated: "a million barrels a day from the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is 5 percent of our consumption. In tight markets, that makes a crucial difference."

Now, a million barrels a day is indeed about 5%, but that's not what the ANWR will yield. As I reported previously, production might peak at over a million barrels a day (sometime near 2030), but for most of the ~20 year life of the reserve it'd be considerably lower than that, and the economic effect - which Krauthammer suggests would be "crucial" - would be pennies.

Next up we have a clip from right-wing pundit Sean Hannity's radio show, in which he makes this claim: "I mean, you know, we've got China, you know, joining with Cuba, they're drilling 60 miles off our shores of Florida." (mp3). George Will of the Washington Post was forced to retract the same claim, which Media Matters traced back to a Speech by Dick Cheney, who also issued a correction.

The "China Imperative" meme neatly illustrates the problem with propaganda, that a piece of "mis-speech" from an interest-conflicted guy who made millions from oil, gets out into the public arena, and then takes on a life of its own. I'm sure this won't be the last time that we here the suggestion that "China is stealing our precious national fluids" The claim is made in one place, and while we're busy refuting it there it pops up in another, like a persistent strain of Flu.

Is all this mis-speaking a deliberate strategy, or are Conservative pundits simply making a lot of mistakes lately? Either way, it seems to be paying off, according to a new Pew Survey, with nearly as many Liberals as Republicans now agreeing that increased drilling is a more important priority for energy policy than increased conservation and regulation. As Nisbet points out, "among liberals, it's an unheard of 23 point shift in preferences since just February of this year and... there's been a 15 point shift among moderates."

So McCain's energy policies are appealing across the board, dragging moderates onto his side. Meanwhile, Obama's views on this biggest of issues are beginning to look out-of step with opinion in his own party, let along the middle ground. If McCain manages to win the election in November, you can bet that the energy crisis will have played a major part in his victory.

[1] Note, I appreciate that Media Matters have a strong bias, and so I'm reporting using their primary sources, not any of their own assertions. I distrust MM as much as any lobbying group.