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On Oil and Its Manipulation

Andrew,

GREAT job with this article! Please stay on this topic and keep digging and keep posting. Make sure you see all the Senate Commerce Committee hearings from June; the video is at the cspan web site.

Some things you can dig into:
- Intentional conflation by Big Oil sycophants of the terms "speculation" and "manipulation", to mislead listeners about what's being stated and discussed by experts
- Republican use of filibusters to prevent debate (on CFTC-related legislation) which would clarify the manipulation issue and expose the current crop of Phil Gramm wannabes
- Conflation of sweet crude (for which demand is outstripping supply) with sour crude (of which supply is abundant) by Saudi Arabians and Libyans, to hide their inability to increase supply of sweet crude
- Ignorant conflation of sweet vs. sour crude by mainstream media (including online sources like MarketWatch), exacerbating misunderstandings of Saudi and Libyan statements
- Israeli cabinet members helping Goldman-Sachs and Morgan Stanley further drive up WTI oil futures by hyping mideast tensions, thereby manipulating more retail investors and fund managers into buying more USO, XLE, etc.