Volume CCXXXIII, Number 37        September, 2003              Page 4

All papers refueled:

GAS PRICE STORIES
REACH NEW HIGH

By A.J. Liebling
Press Correspondent

A totally unexpected surge in late-summer vacation driving has led to an astonishing 30% increase in the number of newspaper stories and TV news packages about rising gas prices. "This is the largest increase we've seen in these stories for a number of years," commented Rip N. Read, noted TV news consultant.

According to statistics made up from nowhere, the number of gas price stories has risen from 1.50 minutes per broadcast to 1.75, 1.85 and in some California media markets, as much as 2.20 minutes per newscast. Media experts trace the increase to a number of factors, including the hot weather which has led newsmakers such as George Bush, Madonna and Christina Aguilera to take vacations far from the TV cameras.

Further complicating the increase in gas price TV packages is their ease of creation. "You can take the lamest blow-dried bimba out to a gas station, film the price at the pumps and ask drivers whether they like higher gas prices," explained Read.

"You've got to remember it's a perfect TV story: it affects everyone, it can be covered live and nobody expects you to make any sense out of it," Read added. "If we didn't run more stories about higher gas prices, we might have to run stories about the disasters in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the viewing audience doesn't like that."

But others caution that the public may be running out of patience with the apparently endless increase in gas price stories. "I don't know how much more of this I can take," said Old Sludgebury resident Jimmy Burke as he pumped another 40 gallons into his Chevy Suburban. In addition to the beer, he bought $20 worth of gas. "It's like every time you turn around there's another gas price story. Goddam Dukakis."

And there's no relief in sight for irritated TV viewers and newspaper readers. Although experts expect the increase in stories complaining about gas prices to level off and even decline as vacations end and viewers realize the real price of gas is cheaper than it was during the Reagan Administration, they say it may be a long, hot fall and winter.

"We expect a huge surge in stories complaining about increases in heating oil prices to begin in October with the advent of the fall heating season," said Read. Others expect an equally large increase in the number of column inches devoted to more expensive natural gas.

One thing's for sure: no matter how high the number of rising energy price stories gets, don't look for stories about our continuing failure to conserve energy through mass transit and fuel-efficient hybrids. "Our research shows that 4 out of 5 viewers aren't interested in that tree-hugging shit," Read concluded.

 

OH, THAT'S OK, THEN

Three of Mr. Ridge's former aides, incluidng Mark A. Holman, who was Mr. Ridge's chief of staff when he was governor of Pennsylvania and who joined him at the White House as deputy assistant to the President for homeland security, work for Blank Rome. . . .

Blank Rome's Web site invites clients to a seminar next month at the Four Seasons Hotel in Philadelphia for the first in a series of "executive briefings on homeland security" featuring Mr. Holman and Carl M. Buchholz, who also worked in Mr. Ridge's White House office and is now executive partner at the law firm.

The two men will offer "their unique views of the decision-making process and the decision makers within the Department of Homeland Security." A spokesman for Mr. Buchholz said that he was not personally lobbying the Department or Congress but was instead overseeing the work of other lobbyists.

– The New York Times, April 29, 2003 at A12.