Well, I know the whole thing is veering rapidly away from vans and I
apologize in advance for furthering that. But I agree wholeheartedly with
John: the vast public investment in the supply and consumption of petroleum
is not included in its price at the pump.

And as for Iraq, here's the lead of a recent piece from The Observer, of
London:

Seizing reserves will be an allied priority if forces go in

by Faisal Islam and Nick Paton Walsh in Moscow, The Observer
January 26th, 2003

Facing its most chronic shortage in oil stocks for 27 years, the US has this
month turned to an unlikely source of help - Iraq.

Weeks before a prospective invasion of Iraq, the oil-rich state has doubled
its exports of oil to America, helping US refineries cope with a
debilitating strike in Venezuela.

After the loss of 1.5 million barrels per day of Venezuelan production in
December the oil price rocketed, and the scarcity of reserves threatened to
do permanent damage to the US oil refinery and transport infrastructure. To
keep the pipelines flowing, President Bush stopped adding to the 700m barrel
strategic reserve.

But ultimately oil giants such as Chevron, Exxon, BP and Shell saved the day
by doubling imports from Iraq from 0.5m barrels in November to over 1m
barrels per day to solve the problem. Essentially, US importers diverted
0.5m barrels of Iraqi oil per day heading for Europe and Asia to save the
American oil infrastructure.

The trade, though bizarre given current Pentagon plans to launch around 300
cruise missiles a day on Iraq, is legal under the terms of UN's oil for food
programme.

More here:

http://www.targetoil.com/article.php?id=34