The original Messiah selflessly died for his disciples’ sins, so it’s truly touching to see how eager today’s disciples are to return the favor. The new meme seems to be to ignore whatever outlandish claim the Obamessiah may make, and pretend he said something far more sensible instead. The virtual ink had barely dried on Powerline’s fact-checking of Time’s lame defense of the Gaffemaster when Mark Silva of the Chicago Tribune chimed in with an even more outlandish defense of the same:

After all the grief that Obama has taken from the RNC and from rival John McCain this week over the Democrat’s comment that motorists could save some more oil if only they put some more air in their tires, it turns out a search of the clips — conducted by a motivated party — has found that the administraiton [sic, three layers of editors notwithstanding] of President Bush — George H.W. Bush — was telling Americans the same thing back in 1990.

Note how easily and effortlessly this alleged journalist managed to convert Barack Obama’s howler about proper tire inflation supposedly saving “all the oil that they’re talking about getting off drilling” into a common-sense observation that it could save “some more oil.” No, duh. Of course it can save “some more oil.” If all Obama had said last week was that proper tire inflation could save “some more oil,” or that good maintenance is generally a good idea, there would be no controversy now. Math may not be Mr. Silva’s forte, but here’s a free clue: “some oil” does not equal “all the oil that they’re talking about getting off,” nor does it come close.

This sleight of hand is reminiscent of the Gorons who defended their Messiah’s outlandish claim to have “[taken] the initiative in creating the Internet” by pointing out that he had sponsored some legislation to promote it, decades after others had taken the intiative in creating it. Gore was never the media darling that Obama is, so he took his share of ridicule over that infamous quote, tempered by the fact that it was frequently misquoted and for some, the fact that he was widely misquoted was bigger news than the goofy quote he had actually made. As for Obama, one has to wonder if there is any claim so outlandish that he could not make it and expect his disciples in the media to try. If anyone working for the Obama campaign is reading this, here’s how to test my theory: feed some line into Obama’s teleprompter stating that all experts agree that an apple a day will increase your life expectancy by 230 years. We’ll have our laughs for a few days, buttressed by even more laughs when Barack tries to turn it around by claiming Republicans are opposed to healthy diets. Within a week, some “journalist” from Time, Newsweek or the Chicago Tribune will come back claiming Obama was right after all, because some obscure bureaucrat from the Eisenhower Administration made a vague pronouncement that apples really are good for you.

But did some some obscure bureaucrat from the Bush-41 Administration actually say “the same thing” as Obama is saying now? Per this alleged journalist’s article, the answer would be … mmmmmm … no. We didn’t have YouTube in 1990, so the PSA itself is not on the web, but according to the N.Y. Times article:

The new public service announcements give drivers tips on how they can save gasoline. One television ad, which will be broadcast later this year, shows a gigantic oil gusher that is not coming from a well, but bursting forth from the valve on a tire. The announcer tells viewers that by slightly increasing the air pressure slightly in their tires, they can save 50,000 barrels of oil each day.

Well, hey! There’s your smoking gun right there, as 50,000 barrels of oil a day constitutes “some” oil, and so does “all the oil that they’re talking about getting off.” Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to quantify that “some” by determining how many years it would take us, at a rate of 50,000 barrels a day, to save as much oil through proper tire inflation as we would hope to obtain from the shale and the Outer Continental Shelf combined. [I deliberately left out ANWR since Obama's "they" presumably includes McCain, who is scared to death of that place.]

UPDATE: Dave Price has more.