The Tire Gauge Election

There is something seriously wrong with a person that claims that the answer to our energy problem is properly inflated tires. That would be true of the person in question were running for school board or city council.

A potential President should not even think that statement.

In an effort to make the claim that Barack Obama made regarding the fuel saving of proper tire inflation less ludicrous, the MSM actually tried their best to cover for him.

John Hinderaker at Powerline tells why:

Two points: First, even if Obama's "3 to 4 percent" claim about tire inflation were true, it would not validate his original assertion that proper inflation would equal "all the oil that they're talking about getting off drilling." That assertion was, and remains, false.

Second, Obama's claim that "every expert" says that tire inflation would "reduce our oil consumption by 3 to 4 percent" is ridiculous. No expert says any such thing. What experts do say is that properly inflated tires can improve gas mileage by approximately 3 percent compared to grossly underinflated tires. But since most people know this and inflate their tires, the actual potential savings is some much smaller amount. Moreover, the U.S. consumes around 20.7 million barrels of petroleum per day. Only about 9.3 million barrels per day are used in motor vehicles. So a 3 percent improvement in automobile mileage would correspond, at best, to a 1.3 percent reduction in total oil consumption.

Barack Obama's ignorance on the subject of energy is remarkable.

In case anyone is wondering what the numbers look like:

Just for fun, I did the math. Properly inflating your tires can improve gas mileage by 3%. Of course, many people already keep their tires properly inflated, and many more are at least close to being properly inflated. Let's be generous and assume that one-half of the total possible savings would be realized if we all inflated our tires properly; that's a net gain of 1.5% fuel efficiency.

Americans drive approximately 2,880 billion miles per year. If we average 24 mpg, we use around 120 billion gallons of gasoline in our vehicles. If, through perfect tire inflation, we improved our collective fuel efficiency by 1.5%, that would be 1.8 billion gallons. A barrel of oil produces around 20 gallons of gasoline, so the total savings available through tire inflation is approximately 90,000,000 barrels of oil annually.

How does this stack up against "all the oil that they're talking about getting off drilling?"

ANWR: 10 billion barrels
Outer Continental Shelf: 18 billion barrels (estimated; the actual total is undoubtedly much higher, since exploration has been banned)
Oil shale: 1 trillion barrels

So, on the above assumptions, it would take only 11,308 years of proper tire inflation to equal "all the oil that they're talking about getting off drilling."

Obama is a curious case. He gives the impression of being an intelligent guy, but through his unscripted comments we have learned that he knows little about history, science or mathematics. He also seems rather shockingly short on common sense, as this most recent gaffe illustrates.

The Lord Obama is never wrong and never in doubt, so he doubled down and claimed that his answer to the energy problem put John McCain in the wrong. The MSM decided to increase the American people’s loathing of them by actually writing stories supporting this ridiculous claim.

When a friend is busy making a fool if himself, perhaps having a glass or two too much vino, a friend will take him aside and warn him. The MSM has no friends, only sycophants so there is never anyone to tell them when they are making fools of themselves.

Time magazine's Michael Grunwald tries to finesse Obama's ridiculous claims. Hinderaker takes him apart so badly he may never write again (read the whole thing including the outdated assumptions used in the Time article):

Grunwald is trying, through sleight of hand, to conceal certain basic facts: Obama said that tire inflation could save energy equal to "all the oil that they're talking about getting off drilling," not just the outer continental shelf; the outer continental shelf, ANWR and Rocky Mountain oil shale contain an estimated one trillion, 28 billion barrels of oil--an estimate that is undoubtedly low--while the maximum savings that could be attained through tire inflation and tuneups, assuming that every single vehicle in America is driving around with semi-flat tires and has never had a tuneup, is a mere 420 million barrels per year.

Chris Matthews had his “thrill up my leg moment.” The NY Slimes believes that Americans all run on under-inflated tires and that putting a little more air in will be the equivalent of drilling for oil on the continental shelf.

Here’s the picture of the Times Writer who believes that.

I’m thinking of running a contest. How many barrels of oil has this dingbat ever produced?


UPDATE: Newsbusters rips up Time's Tripe Is 'Tired': Mag Claims Obama Is Right, Ridicule Is 'Smear'

But let's look at the bright side. Given how misstep-prone and gaffe-prone their candidate has been in recent months, the Obama campaign can seize upon the fact that he is less than 100% wrong on anything as a tangible improvement.