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Columbia Journalism Review content tagged oil

1. May 27, 2011 08:07 PM

   Audit Notes: Saudis Blame Wall Street, Made in the U.S., Victims’ Big Haircut

   By Ryan Chittum

   This is very interesting: Kevin G. Hall of McClatchy reports on some Wikileaks cables that show the Saudis telling the Bush administration in 2008 that speculators were to blame for the megaspike in oil prices. Prince Abdulazziz was "extremely worried" that high prices would destroy the demand for oil, according to the May 7, 2008, account of his meeting with...

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2. September 27, 2011 12:20 PM

   Boom Towns Amid the Bust

   NPR finds "man camps" and $1,200 parking spaces in North Dakota

   By Ryan Chittum

   This paragraph jumps out from an NPR's All Things Considered report on an oil boom town in North Dakota: Two years ago, America was importing about two thirds of its oil. Today, according to the Energy Information Administration, it imports less than half. And by 2017, investment bank Goldman Sachs predicts the US could be poised to pass Saudi Arabia...

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3. May 25, 2011 02:56 PM

   How to Corner the Oil Market

   CFTC suit says traders manipulated crude prices in 2008; revisiting a Journal piece

   By Ryan Chittum

   The papers all play up the big news that Commodity Futures Trading Commission lawsuit is accusing three companies of helping cause the oil spike of 2008 by illegally cornering the market on physical crude oil. The New York Times and Financial Times signal this is big news by putting it on page one. The Wall Street Journal plays it atop...

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4. January 24, 2012 04:30 PM

   Keystone XL Jobs Bewilder Media

   Reporters still fumbling numbers in wake of pipeline’s rejection

   By Curtis Brainard

   God help the poor news consumers of America, especially the would-be voters. President Obama’s decision to reject the Keystone XL pipeline last week incited a new wave of coverage and speculation about how many jobs the line would create. Unfortunately, many outlets are still citing inflated and unreliable industry figures in the tens to hundreds of thousands while ignoring more...

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5. June 13, 2012 03:37 PM

   The pen and the pump

   Why are nations that rely on selling resources so often free-speech poor?

   By Justin D. Martin

   Doha, Qatar—The rent goes up, the democracy goes down, or so they say. This small Arab Gulf nation is what political scientists refer to as a rentier state, generally defined as a government that receives at least 40 percent of its revenue from the export of primary products, often fuel—the collection of foreign “rents.” Qatar’s crude oil will likely dry...

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