Energy is widely rumored to be one major focal point of the president’s State of the Union speech tonight – so be prepared to have your head spinning around on a swivel and keep all sharp objects safely out of easy reach. The gas production out of the president may rival what we’re seeing from the Bakkan formation.

There's good news and bad news from Detroit this week.

The good news, according to this blog, is that greens and automakers, after decades of being at loggerheads, now seem to be singing from the same sheet music on the need to produce environmentally-friendly cars like the Chevy Volt and Nissan Leaf. The shaming, badgering and blunt-force bludgeoning of automakers by Gang Green and government regulators finally has bent Motown to the will of the efficiency enforcers. Now these former adversaries are as cozy as two peas in a pod.

And the bad news?

You'll probably be hearing a lot more about how so-called renewables are overtaking nuclear power as a national electricity provider. But like just about everything else involving alternative energy, it's mostly just hype, generated by those who want to show progress where progress is lacking.

Much depends on how one defines "renewable energy," as this Washington Post blog explains. Subtract hydropower, which isn't exactly a newfangled thing, and the slice of America's energy pie being supplied by solar, wind and gerbil wheel power is still embarrassingly small -- especially in light of all the government support they get.

News consumers who don't read past the headlines can sometimes be led astray. They often get only part of the story. And that can create misconceptions and distortions of reality. Legendary broadcaster Paul Harvey knew this well, which is why be became famous for telling his legion of loyal listeners "the rest of the story."

This news story, "Top U.S. Export for 2011 Was Fuel; U.S. Gas Prices at Record High,"provides an excellent case in point. The headline will be seized-on by some to argue that there's no demand for more domestic drilling, because the U.S. is now, suddenly, an exporter of certain fuels. But a look beyond the headline tells a more complicated story.

It's election season, in the midst of a prolonged economic meltdown, so it's not surprising to hear presidential candidates making superhuman claims about the miracles they can do for the economy. But in a truly free market system, and under the Republican form of government Americans inherited, in which the president's powers are limited, a chief executive's real influence over the economy should fall somewhere between modest and minimal.

It’s a bit disconcerting, therefore, to see self-styled conservatives playing a game of Job Creation Derby with the President, given that the Right has traditionally been far less interventionist, and far more laissez faire, than the command- and-control, pump-priming Keynesians on the other side.