Friday morning headlines

Gas under $3: Not everywhere, mind you, but the Auto Club's weekly survey found pump prices at below $3 a gallon at some individual stations in the L.A.-Orange County area. The average price of self-serve regular is $3.183, which is five cents lower than last week, nine cents lower than last month but 39 cents higher than last year. The Auto Club says it's been a whacky summer for gasoline, with prices up when they should be down and down when they should be up.

Di-Fi on global warming: Sen. Dianne Feinstein outlined a legislative package for the next session of Congress that would require carmakers to improve mileage and coax power producers to meet emission standards. She also wants to extend California-style green-technology programs nationwide. "There now is a scientific consensus that global warming is happening and we can't stop it," Feinstein told the San Francisco Chronicle. "The effort we have to make is to restrict it." She obviously wants voters to think about the possibilities as the mid-term elections draw closer.

French Open win: The L.A.-based Tennis Channel, which has struggled to become a major cable presence given the sport's waning popularity, scored an ace by acquiring cable rights to the French Open, beginning next year and potentially running nine years. NBC still broadcasts the weekend matches. The Tennis Channel has 10 million cable subscribers and is also available through satellite. That's not a big number - perhaps because many cable companies only offer the channel through a premium package. By the way, the channel has a pretty impressive list of investors that include Frank Biondi, the former CEO of Viacom (now he can tell you Sumner Redstone stories), Andre Agassi, Pete Sampras and IMG, the big sports marketing outfit.

The Daily Cruise: Coverage seems to be finally tapering off, though Patrick Goldstein in the L.A. Times gets his two cents in, shifting the conversation away from Cruise and Redstone and towards the running of Paramount Pictures. He's picking up complaints about what seems to be a confused management structure, with studio chief Brad Grey described as "distant and aloof" (what CEO hasn't been called that at some time?) and Gail Berman, who oversees film production, as afraid of her shadow. Grey told Goldstein: "We should be defined by our pictures, not our process." You mean substance over style? Nah, it'll never work.

Housing intervention: Cute story in the Daily News about how 4-inch statues of St. Joseph are flying off Christian gift store shelves. Home sellers have long turned to Jesus' earthly father for help locating a buyer - and apparently sales of the statues reflect how well or poorly home sales are going. "Whether it is divine intervention or faith - or who knows? - definitely something is working," said Brian Moore, a Glendale real estate agent.

Speaking of real estate: John Karevoll of DataQuick Information Systems says one reason the July sales numbers look so bad is because they're compared with those of a year ago, when the market was peaking out. By that reasoning, the percentage declines should start to moderate in the fall because that's when sales began to slow last year. That's why some analysts prefer to look at month-to-month numbers. (Too bad those numbers don't look so great either).

Nissan gets custody: The Japanese automaker picked up its 11 electric cars that had been leased to the city of Pasadena - despite efforts by the city to either renew the leases or buy the cars outright. Nissan said it relied on special exemptions to operate the cars, and that the exemptions were set to expire. The cars are now being stored at Nissan USA's former corporate headquarters in Gardena. The standoff was no doubt fueled by this summer's documentary, "Who Killed the Electric Car."

Think green: That's the color of CW, the new network that's the sum of two unsuccessful networks, UPN and WB. NYT columnist Stuart Elliott lays out CW's advertising campaign that has the theme "Free to be" (signs, transit posters and billboards are up all over town). The marketing effort, which is being handled internally and by a Hollywood ad shop called Troika, is laid out in a sea of green - recalling ABC's ill-fated efforts at yellow in the 1990s. The green apparently worked well in focus groups, which of course is what really counts in these things.