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Sunday, June 29, 2008

And in other news, continued.....

If the papers can repeat like a broken record, then so can I. Two weeks ago, I posted a link to a NY Times article which as usual blamed the increasing oil prices on rising demand from China and India. Well this sunday's NY Times has another article which gets a bit creative when blaming increasing oil prices to problems in Nigeria along with sharply declining production in Mexico and slowing production in Russia, the North Sea and Venezuela, all in the face of steadily rising demand by fast-growing behemoths like China and India..

If it were not for the addition of these inventive words fast-growing behemoths.. then the article would have looked quite stale!

Graham Bowley's article has the sensational headline:
One Reason Gas Is Emptying Your Wallet: Nigeria

Wow. Really? You mean this is a new development? What about the mid 1990's when crisis in the Niger Delta caused the prices of oil to jump to $50 a barrel? Haven't things in Nigeria being in a downward turn since then? Apparently not according to Mr. Bowley because he is really concerned about the current problem.

How about the following headline?
One Reason Gas Is Emptying Your Wallet: Because you drive a gas guzzling vehicle!!

Come on Mr. Bowley, why don't you mention that? Why go on blaming the rest of the world when people all around you are wasting gas by driving gigantic behemoth vehicles!

It does seem that the editor of the NY Times section wanted to balance things out because right below Mr. Bowley's article is the following article which shows how cheap gas is in America.

I guess no one stops to think that it is quite strange that oil extracted from Canada and transported to the US is cheaper at the pumps for Americans than for Canadians who live around the oil fields. Why? Because of higher gas taxes in Canada. And errr, something about a Free Trade agreement between Canada and the USA as well...I should not mention that though...

Instead, Daniel Plainview cue music...

1 comment:

Pacze Moj said...

Hehe.

I think the only time Nigeria is ever mentioned in the NYT is when they write articles about how much oil it's consuming...

It's not just Canadians that have it bad, though. Gas in Alaska is crazy expensive, too. I think it has the highest in the US.