PDHblog
This is a place for members of Progressive Democrats of Hawai‘i to express their thoughts
and exasperations about political happenings. The opinions and views are not necessarily
those of PDH's steering committee or membership as a whole.

There is a decent article in the Advertiser today about the gas cap.

According to Advertiser calculations, Honolulu drivers would be paying $3 a gallon for regular gasoline this week were the price cap still in effect.

Instead the average price for gasoline in Honolulu was about $3.25 yesterday, within a few cents of where it was on May 5 when the gas cap was suspended.

With the cap no longer controlling the market, Hawai’i prices have returned to their pre-cap pattern of remaining high and stable compared with Mainland prices.

I know there were problems with the gas cap, but it seemed fairly obvious that gas prices were at least fluctuating with the national average rather than bumping up and staying there as they always had before… It would have been nice to see an analysis to that effect BEFORE the cap was repealed. Instead, the local media went around interviewing consumers at the pump asking them what they thought about the gas cap. Since prices were high, people expressed their frustration and these polls helped spur the public outcry that led to the repeal of the cap. The problem with polls like that is that the average consumer isn’t paying attention to the intricacies of an issue and may not know enough about the topic to have an informed opinion on it. In this case, I would rather see an analysis by consumer and industry analysts as to whether the cap was working or not than to see how frustrated consumers are.

This is true with most polls that we see in the media - both local and national. I remember a poll taken shortly after we invaded Iraq that asked whether Iraq and 9/11 were connected… a large number of Americans said “yes.” Did that make the association true? No. Just indicated how well of a spin job the Bush administration was doing. It would be better if the media would do its job and help to inform us about an issue rather than reporting opinions from “both sides” without any indication as to which “side” is supported by FACTS.