"Crude oil truly will become black gold"

TomDispatch features an article that brings up some overlooked recent events.

1. Independent truckers have started to block traffic in L.A. to illustrate the effect that rising diesel fuel prices have on their livelihood


2. Rising oil prices have brought chronic blackouts to cities throughout the southern hemisphere


3. John Kerry has mentioned consolidating with Canadian and Mexican oil resources as a means of creating an oil independence alliance

They also do the math:

The rising value of an increasingly scarce resource is a form of monopoly rent, and a future permanent crude-oil regime of $50 per barrel (or higher) would transfer at least $1 trillion per decade from consumers to oil producers. In plain English, this would be the greatest robbery by a rentier elite in world history. Someday, Enron may seem like the equivalent of a liquor store hold-up by comparison.