No one should expect the Daily Caller to be accurate, given that its managing editor Michael Bastasch is a career Koch operative who's injecting even more climate disinformation into its stories, but given that he was trained with Koch money, you might expect the outlet to at least know the difference between different types of fossil fuels.
Because it's one thing for them to be stupid about legal matters they "report" on, like we noticed a couple weeks ago, but now they're showing they don't even know the difference between “natural” (methane) gas, and gasoline. Or maybe they do, and they're just being deliberately misleading. We report, you decide!
On August 24th, "energy and environment reporter" Jack McEvoy wrote about how "Attorney generals [sic] (AGs) from California, Oregon and Washington are calling for the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) to stop the expansion of a crucial gas transmission project, arguing that it will violate climate laws; despite the states facing some of the highest gas prices in the country as well as the prospect of blackouts."
Impressively, McEvoy made a mistake in literally the very first word of the story, because it's actually "attorneys general", not "attorney generals." But that's a tricky one. One that only competent political reporters and editors should be expected to know, and clearly that's asking too much of the Daily Caller.
In the next paragraph, McEvoy again proves that Managing Editor Bastasch, and the rest of the Daily Caller's editors, are just objectively bad at their job, writing that the Attorneys General "filed a motion on Monday asking the FERC to deny the proposed capacity expansion of TC PipeLines’ Gas Transmission Northwest (GTN) XPress pipeline project (GTN), according to a press release."
Apparently no one noticed that McEvoy repeated the "(GTN)" twice, where the second one should be "GTNXP" to describe the company's pipeline, per a GTN spokesperson's comment McEvoy updated the story to include (though the note at the end saying they didn't respond to a request for comment remains.)
Even that isn't the biggest and funniest error though. And to be fair, it's not like we're perfect and never make any typos or other simple mistakes in the copy here. (If you'd like to help make us more perfect though, we're hiring!)
But immediately after writing about the states objecting to the pipeline, McEvoy notes that "the three western states currently hold some of the highest gas prices in the nation and may be at risk of suffering blackouts." Then, the next paragraph was about the average gasoline prices in California, Oregon and Washington.
Then McEvoy writes that "The GTN pipeline delivers natural gas from the Rocky Mountains and western Canada to the Pacific Northwest and its expansion would upgrade existing natural gas compressor stations in Oregon, Washington and Idaho…"
So this is a natural gas pipeline! Which is not gasoline! And isn't used to make gasoline! And has essentially zero bearing on gasoline prices!
Clearly undeterred by things like facts and reality, the story continues with a statement from TC Energy's spokesperson, who explicitly says that the GTNXP will provide natural gas, illustrated by a photo showing "gasoline fuel prices" in Los Angeles.
Why? Who knows! Maybe McEvoy and the Caller's editorial team genuinely don't know the difference between what the industry calls “natural” gas and gasoline. Never ascribe to malice what can be explained by incompetence, after all, and the multiple other errors in the piece certainly support the theory that they're just stupid and bad at journalism, and not intentionally spreading disinformation.
But obviously lots of people who are dependent on their cars in this auto-centered American society have a visceral reaction to gasoline prices, because it's a regular part of their lives and a potentially significant portion of their budget. Natural gas prices, on the other hand, are not something they "feel" quite so directly, aren't plastered on big signs along roadways, and are paid only through utility bills, so there isn't the same first-hand relationship between prices and feelings and pocketbooks.
So if you wanted to attack politicians for taking climate action by blocking natural (methane) gas, and rile up your ignorant readers, and you have no particular desire to be accurate because your job isn't to inform but misinform, then it would make total sense to gaslight on gas.
Which makes it the latest of many reasons why the Daily Caller being included in Facebook's fact-checking program makes it clear the company has zero intention of actually addressing disinformation.