Is this going to be a fight?

Dude... the analogy doesn't work. Windows (and Microsoft) own 88% of the market on PC operating systems... very true. But taking away Microsoft tomorrow doesn't "crash" the economy. Lest we forget... there still isn't anything that can be done on a computer running Windows that can't be done without it, either. Sure, Excel spread sheets are handy, fast and convenient... but if you can work a spread sheet on Excel, then you can work a spread sheet with a paper and pencil, too. Can't email? There are fax machines in every office in America. Not where you work? Spend the $.44 and put a stamp on an envelope. There isn't a business in America that doesn't have SOME kind of back-up plan in case the power goes out... in which case there would be no Windows running, either.

This makes MY case, however... no oil means no power, no phones, no cars or trucks, no generators, no economic viability whatsoever.

Which is the greater "choke point" in our national economic system: our dependence on foreign oil imports or our preference for the Microsoft Windows OS?

When I speak of (or have spoken of) obscene profits, my problem with the profits are when they are at the expense of our national interests.

If a company that developed nuclear weapon technology decided that it could double its profits for the year by selling what it had already sold us to the Chinese or the Russians or the Iranians... that would be bad.

If a company that produces crude oil for the US can increase profits by manipulating a speculation pricing market through futures contracts with other oil producing companies in other regions... that's just good business, right? If you say yes, then you SUPPORT the ability of multi-national organizations like OPEC's ability to dictate to the US how much America is going to pay for crude oil, rather than the other way around.

In a REAL free-market economy, the company making the nuclear weapon technology would be perfectly able to sell its products to the consumer willing to pay the highest price rather than to the government they are working under, while the oil company would be setting its oil prices based on the price consumers are willing to pay per barrel rather than the speculated price that consumers might be willing to pay months from now.

The US is the single largest consumer of crude oil on Earth... even the entire EU burns only 75% of what we do... and no facet of our society wouldn't be rocked to its foundations if nearly a THIRD of the oil consumed each day was removed from the equation (we import between 30% and 35% of our daily oil needs). How can you argue that OIL is the life-blood of the American way of life? How can you deny that any aspect of security we wish to implement in our society must ensure an adequate flow of oil into our economy... or fail utterly right from the start?

Reagan ended the days when the "futures market" dictated the price of the most precious and vital commodity available to our nation... until 2001, when Bush Jr. removed the curbs and bans Ron had put in place. Since that time, we have seen fluctuations and spikes in pricing both INSIDE and OUTSIDE of crisis environments (9/11, the Iraq War, etc) and record highs in both crude and refined oil pricing each year since.

And don't tell me its a "global formula" when it comes to crude pricing, because that doesn't wash. Where are more than 95% of ALL global oil contracts bought and sold each and every business day? Chicago, IL... Kansas City, MO... and New York, NY... in that order. Not Berlin, or Moscow, or Tokyo, or Riyadh... right here in the US of A. As the largest consumer and the primary marketplace for the trading of oil, anything we do or don't do to drive pricing has a HUGE effect. I think speculation pricing has a NEGATIVE effect on our economic and national security... even if it costs the Big Oil companies a percentage of their profits to see it done away with.