When You Don't Have Facts On Your Side, Make Some Up!

Conservatives are trying very hard to sustain their coastal drilling propaganda campaign, which is difficult when you have no facts to sustain your case. They have to stay one step ahead of the fact-checkers, which means regularly concocting new lies that make objective facts appear to be subjective debate points.

The latest lies?

The first lie: as Steve Benen at Crooks and Liars flags, that every political stunt conservatives do on drilling has magically lowered the price of crude oil [1] — be it President Bush's symbolic lifting of the executive order banning coastal drilling, or the current conservatives' Twitter temper tantrum on the House floor. [2]

By lowered crude oil prices of course, we mean they're down from $147 to $119 per barrel [3]. Now, they've only quadrupled in price from when Bush came into office! Bravo!

The real explanation for the nudge downward is more depressing: The recession is reducing oil demand.

From that great bastion of liberal media, Fortune Magazine [4]:

But falling oil prices also suggest that the recession the U.S. has so far avoided is well on its way, as consumers pull back from the spending spree that drove economic growth earlier this decade. A weakening economy will mean more layoffs, further pressuring already reduced spending.

"There is no doubt that with gasoline prices dipping below $3.90 a gallon we have a bit of a reprieve on the energy front," Merrill Lynch economist David Rosenberg wrote in a report Monday, "but the reality is that this is a chicken and egg game because the decline is reflecting the consumer recession."

Perhaps the biggest factor behind the recent 18% drop in the price of a barrel of crude is sinking North American demand. Federal Highway Administration data show the number of miles driven in the U.S. dropped from year-ago levels for the seventh straight month in May.

The fundamental cause of high oil prices remains: global supply is dwindling and global demand (primarily from China and India) is rising. That's not going to change over the long-term.

If we want to keep driving energy costs down, we can increase supply ... of clean energy, since there's barely any more oil off of our coasts.

And we can reduce more demand .. preferably through energy-efficient technology and conservation, not an even deeper recession conservatives appear to be celebrating.

The second lie: Coastal drilling can get oil into marketplace within months.

Sen. John McCain launched this one by citing unnamed "oil executives" who told him there would beneficial effects "within months." [5] (hat tip: Friends of the Earth [5]) This has metastized into a talking point claiming prices would be lowered within a "year and a half." [6]

However, Bush's Energy Department [7] says otherwise:

The projections ... indicate that access to the Pacific, Atlantic, and eastern Gulf regions would not have a significant impact on domestic crude oil and natural gas production or prices before 2030. Leasing would begin no sooner than 2012, and production would not be expected to start before 2017.

Conservative lies. As regular as the sun coming up. Do you want to buy a used oil derrick from these clowns?