Good Luck, Britain! Good Luck, World!

Oil production in the UK will take a 40% hit today due to a strike at a Scottish pipeline. Supply and demand are the greatest determinants of price, and since spring typically causes gas prices to shoot up like the dandelion stalks in my front yard (two feet tall, no kidding), I think we can safely say that Monday morning is going to be ugly.
Remember world - what happens to one part of the oil supply/demand chain, happens to all. Have fun!

Elections in Iran

I love it when the Tehran Times prints garbage like this.

President Mahmud Ahmadinejad here on Thursday urged the regional countries to be vigilant in the face of conspiracies by the United States and be prepared to foil them.

“We should always be prepared and have a plan for foiling the U.S. movements in the region,” Ahmadinejad told visiting Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Muallem in Hamedan where he was on a provincial tour.

Great. Awesome.
This is in the wake of the Iranian Majiles (Parliament) elections, which resulted in a victory for conservatives - both Ahmadinejad's party and his conservative critics. At least the Washington Post bothered to report on it for a change.

It's my birthday!

Happy Birthday to me, Ella Fitzgerald, Justice Brennan, Al Pacino, and Oliver Cromwell.

Iran, the Chador, and Prostitution

Slate, Washington Post's online nook for B-grade news for the twenty-some set (news with an attitude), wrote a brief piece explaining prostitution in Iran. According to the authors, prostitution is rampant in Iran, even though it carries an incredible sentence for both man and woman/women involved. Because prostitutes wear veils and chadors, it can be rather challenging for a potential John to approach the right lady. Perhaps because of this, any wary John can bring the prostitute before a cleric and arrange a "temporary" marriage. Perfectly legal in shari'a, the temporary marriage lasts for some specified amount of time, no need for witnesses.
The Tehran Times, to its credit, acknowledges the problem of prostitution in the holy city of Qom. In 2001, a group claiming to want to "clean up the streets" killed a dozen prostitutes, sparking an investigation. Tehran Times did not report on the outcome of the investigations, and the articles were little more than blurbs.

Side Note: there seems to be a distinct difference in how Tehran Times reports on crime, compared to the Western style, but I can't quite figure out what it is. To some extent, it may be the lack of standard phrases such as "allegedly" or "The Washington Post does not identify victims of rape or sexual assault". Interesting.

Oil is to blame for... Starving Palestinians

So:
Palestinians are starving
Because UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine had to halt food deliveries
Because Israel cut off fuel to the area
Because Hamas was firing rockets at civilians
Because Israelis have taken their land
Because the British gave it to them
Because the Jewish people had no home
Because of the diaspora by the Romans
Because of....

So, yeah, oil IS to blame.