Amid the absurdities of trying to pawn Sarah “Pit Bull with Lipstick” Palin off as the nation’s top energy expert (http://climateprogress.org/2008/09/03/note-to-media-pork-queen-palin-is-earmark-expert-not-energy-expert/, here, or here) the simple reality is that neither John McCain nor Sarah Palin can get their energy facts right.
The latest: John McCain stated that 
“the world’s largest oil reserves are in the United States of America.” (video)
Huh …
Double-take …
Okay, let’s revisit reality.
According to the latest data on oil reserves (yes, understanding that many of the specific figures are highly dubious), the United States is not number one, but in a weak position as #14, with 22.5 billion barrels of reserves and #15, China, registered with 18.3 billion barrels. #1? Saudia Arabia with 262.7 billion barrels of stated reserves, or more than 10 times the US figure.
We need to be wondering whether this is simply arrogant ignorance in support of drillusion or whether something else is going on.
Getting facts wrong when it comes to energy issues is becoming standard for the Palin-McCain ticket.
There was Sarah’s statement (echoed by John)
Let me speak specifically about a credential that I do bring to this table, Charlie, and that’s with the energy independence that I’ve been working on for these years as the governor of this state that produces nearly 20 percent of the U.S. domestic supply of energy, that I worked on as chairman of the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission, overseeing the oil and gas development in our state to produce more for the United States.
This is quite off the market. US oil production alone? Alaska produces about 14 percentage of US production. But US oil supply? Less than 5 percent of US use.
Furthermore, Palin said “energy,” not “oil,” so she was actually much further off the mark. According to EIA, Alaska actually produced 2,417.1 trillion BTUs [British Thermal Units] of energy in 2005, the last year for which full state numbers are available. That’s equal to just 3.5 percent of the country’s domestic energy production.
And according to EIA analyst Paul Hess, that would calculate to only “2.4 percent of the 100,368.6 trillion BTUs the U.S. consumes.”
Factcheck continues to highlight that, on at least two recorded occasions, McCain repeated the false figure.
Sigh …
We need to return to Republican energy guru Matt Simmons,
“John McCain is energy illiterate,” Simmons is saying. “He’s just witless about this stuff. As a lifelong Republican, I’m supporting Obama.”
Let us review, according to Matt Simmons, “John McCain is
Nuff said?
Evidently not:
… McCain’s midsummer move to begin campaigning on a platform of more offshore drilling has only hardened Simmons’s position. “What a hypocrite… Here’s a man who for at least the past 15 years has strenuously, I mean strenuously, opposed offshore drilling. And now it’s ‘drill, drill, drill.’ And he doesn’t have any idea that we don’t have any drilling rigs. Or that we don’t have any idea of exactly where to drill.” (As for McCain’s running mate, Sarah Palin, Simmons says: “She’s a very colorful person, but I don’t think there’s a scrap of evidence that she knows anything about energy.”)
There is one thing that is quite clear about all this: 
When it comes to knowledge about US energy challenges and developing meaningful answers to a prosperous, climate-friendly society, John “Truthiness” McCain and Sarah “Energy Expert” Palin are running on empty.