**>> "But "evil oil company executives" fit the current Accepted Template For Villainous Types"

Except that anyone who's researched this knows that the oil companies' profit margin has actually dropped in the last few years. If you want to blame anyone for this nonsensical situation, I can think of two places:

(1) oil speculators, who manipulate the price for profit on Wall Street

(2) the White House, whose little foray into Iraq destabilized the region so much that prices, by necessity, skyrocketed. Remember that in November.
**

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