It's the Oil Stupid

Immediately after a report about the record price set for a barrel of oil today (March 5, 2008), Fox's "premiere business news" show aired a segment blaming it on Hugo Chavez.

Brenda Buttner was the substitute host and one of her two guests was Fox fave Bob Bevelacqua, who was identified simply as a "former Green Beret" (though that's not the half of it).

Buttner asked Bevelacqua the first question:

Bob, let me go to you first. I mean, we've got more instability -- a crazy, U.S.-hating leader now with troops and tanks in an area that has a lot of oil. What's that spell?

Bevelacqua:

Oh, that spells disaster. Any time you have oil and instability we're going to have to get involved. I mean, we're in the Middle East because of oil, not because we like sandy beaches.

With that he went on to explain that we will probably "send a fleet" down to Venezuela, park it off the coast and say, "Hugo, we're here."

Comment: It's good to hear some truth tellin' on Fox for a change, albeit probably unintended. If Neil Cavuto had been there I'm sure he'd have tried to cut Bevelacqua off. Nonetheless, just think of all the work we could have done over the last five years to rid ourselves of oil dependence if we'd invested the $15 billion we're spending in Iraq every month on that instead. But, alas, if Chavez doesn't do what we want him to do, we might have to do some more killin' to satisfy our jones.