High Anxiety as US oil fields dry up and prices soar

http://www.nationmedia.com/eastafrican/current/News/news2101200820.htm

By CLIFFORD KRAUSS
Special Correspondent

Now that the price of crude oil has crossed the $100-a-barrel threshold, and then retreated slightly, what direction will it take?

Many experts say it will go up, then down, and then maybe up again. That, anyway, has been the pattern of the last several years of volatile prices.

The arguments for even higher oil prices are well known. The economies of China and India are booming and hungry for energy.

Oil fields in Mexico, the US and several other oil producers are drying up, tightening world supplies. President Hugo Chávez of Venezuela is using oil as a political weapon. Rebels in Nigeria are creating havoc in some of Africa’s most productive oil fields.

The war in Iraq rages on. The dollar is weakening, causing hedge funds and traders to flee to oil and other commodities as a safe haven.

Xanax with every tank of gas you purchase.