There is a reason the absent minded liberal far-left carries signs that say "war for oil". Too bad they don't have enough grey matter to really figure it out.

     On the front page of today's Dallas Morning News Business section is a headline, "OPEC is facing growing drama". Since this same story, or one very much like it, is on every major newspaper in the country and all over the news networks, I'd like to think that some of the more shallow- minded and short-sighted among us will finally get the picture. But since I know America (being a life-long American myself), I know that most of you are far too busy -Sitcoms, sports, Playstation. Its no wonder we're the most stressed out nation in the world with so much to do. With that in mind, and with the knowledge that many need an actual picture to maintain anything resembling an attention span, I will attempt to spell it out (sorry, no actual picture available).     OPEC is a coalition of eleven of the world's most oil-rich countries. Together they produce about 75% of the world's consumption of gooey black stuff for our enjoyment. Since they have so much of it, they get to regulate how much is made, manipulating the price by turning the tap on and off.

This is where Iraq comes into the picture.     Iraq is one of the founding countries of OPEC. It holds the second largest oil reserve in the world. Since 1990, Saddam decided he didn't want to play in his playground anymore and went to make some new friends in Kuwait. But Saddam doesn't play well with others so the UN (read "USA") put Saddam back in his playpen and grounded him from selling any more oil. The remaining ten countries then get to make more ooze for the world to take up the slack, and more money for their pockets.     Fast forward, 2003. The US decided that Saddam's playpen should have real bars and went in to go get him. While they haven't (yet) acquired the middle east's least personable playmate, they did succeed in booting him off his palacial petrolium playpen.     Now there's no Saddam. And since the US (read "the biggest kid on the block") did most of the butt-kicking, they get to pick who's in charge. This could be a problem. You see, America will likely (duh) put a US friendly government in power. Why is this a problem for OPEC? Let's look at the other kids in this club:

Algeria, Indonesia, Iran, Kuwait, Libya, Nigeria, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Venezuela    Hmmmm. It seems there's only two kinds of countries in OPEC; those that hate America and those that don't really matter too much. Having what is essentially an Americanized powerhouse at the top of this heap does not make for happy OPECers. Now not only do they have to cut back on the oil they are making since Iraq turned the pumps back on, they have to let an American-friendly country into their club. That makes it much harder to manipulate prices in the most oil hungry nation on earth. Bad business.

But there's more.     As a late complication, Russia seems to be getting their act back together. Turns out they want to play too; and to prove it, they put out 8 million barrels of oil per day, second only to Saudi Arabia's 8.6. Russia is remembering the good 'ole days when they pumped out 12 million barrels of bubbling black stuff and want to take a literal trip down memory lane. Well, all this oil floating around will have the tendency of drastically reducing how many greenbacks we need to fill up our SUV's. OPEC thinks that's bad for business as well.

So now the OPEC clubhouse is full and they are meeting to work all this out. How does the story end? Tune in next time.