Five years ago crude oil cost 20 or 30 dollars a barrel. The prospect of a $50 dollar barrel would have been considered terrifying. We passed that mark after the Iraq invasion, people said the Iraq war would bleed the US dry just like Vietnam did. Now in 2006 we are edging towards $80 per barrel. The world economy is still ticking over. Oil companies are now so rich they can afford to fund all the alternative fuel research they can think of. Not for the public benefit but simply as a profit maximisation exercise. No point in focusing too much on oil these days, the profits roll in whatever they do. If the black stuff runs out then BP and their buddies will simply start selling us more bio-diesel and bio-ethanol from the plants the current high oil prices have paid for.

Adam Smith's invisible hand strikes again. Back at the ranch the risk of increasing oil prices no longer worries the cowboys in the Whitehouse, oilmen to their fingertips. $80 a barrel is a price they have dreamt of all their lives. Now does this mean they will have any concern about attacking Iran if the chance arises, nope they'll go in with all guns blazing.

High oil prices doesn't hurt the West like it used to. Our manufacturing base has shrunk, we don't need the same volume. China and India on the other hand need millions of gallons of the stuff to run their emerging industries. Maybe the sabre rattling in the Middle East is really a cunning tactic to take some of the force out of Chinese and Indian economic juggernauts. The big conflict of the future will be between China, India and the USA for the status of the world's most powerful nation.