Who would have thought that this year's World Series would provide a battleground for energy politics? Coverage hosted dueling advertisements from General Motors (through Chevrolet) and ExxonMobil. Just as the blue Tigers and red Cardinals echo the political buzz-colors of the election season, these ads more heavy-handedly represented a political split in America: "New Patriotism" versus "Stay the Course" "Political Dynamism"; conservative versus liberal; energy independence versus…stay the course?

On the liberal side, Chevy led its campaign with a John Mellencamp-driven paean to post-Katrina, post-civil rights, post-9/11 America. Entitled "Our Country. Our Truck." The ad shows Rosa Parks, Vietnam, Martin Luther King, Jr., Katrina, Mohammed Ali, Dale Earnhardt, and, of course, big shiny trucks in support of "An American Revolution" – which, if it wasn't obvious, is the Chevrolet Silverado.

Chevy's campaign also features ads in which gas pumps take revenge upon Chevy cars while their drivers are off hunting down pre-packaged meat snacks. This sequence – trumpeting the EPA-rated fuel economy of Chevy cars – boasts that "gas pumps hate us." Chevy aligns itself with home-grown Ethanol (E85) and fuel efficiency, and against oil giants like ExxonMobil.

On the conservative side, ExxonMobil's ads carried the slogan "We understand. We're drivers, too." This campaign consists of a female voice-over sweetly reminding us that life is hectic, crazy, unpredictable... but also fun. The images depict Americans as busy, family-oriented, hard-working and hard-driving Exxon-goers. The advertisement comes at the heels of an Exxon-funded campaign to refute global warming and to promote their generous contributions of CO2 to the atmosphere.

Exxon's ads are designed to repair its injured public image. Global Warming's emergence as a true political issue, thanks as much to USAToday's coverage as to Al Gore's movie, has left Exxon in a predicament. The company is still affiliated with the Competitive Enterprise Institute and other climate change deniers. Yet, they are presenting materials that promote their carbon sequestration efforts. Exxon has to be very careful how they present themselves, because they run the risk of being seen as hypocrites on global warming.

GM, on the other hand, is a member of CERES , an organization that institutes corporate sustainability reporting and recently reported ExxonMobil's lack of planning and corporate governance with regard to climate change. This is a corporate battle that most of America's baseball lovers probably did not see in the ads, but it is just as political as the mid-term elections. Of course, GM is also facing a widening financial crisis. Plus Chevy has its own role in the problem as its consumer generated viral ads reveal.

Of course we still need gas to drive today's cars, so while America's corporations bicker for our affections, we need to find transportation alternatives. Beyond the slogans, the bigger picture is much clearer: we have to develop a new energy strategy as a nation, and we all have to do our part.

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Judd Franklin Shift's media analyst, spends his days trawling the internet for good deals on movie rentals, mortgages and medications. In his spare time, he works towards his Master's degree in Media Studies at the New School, works on sustainability communication strategies, basks in the warmth of his marriage and writes.