by John C.K. Daly Washington (UPI) Oct 8, 2008 Since its founding in 1960, the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, a cartel of 13 countries rich in hydrocarbons, has been a favorite whipping boy for Western governments and media seeking an organization to blame for high energy prices. For those with a sense of the ironies of history, OPEC was founded in Baghdad in response to a law promulgated by U.S. President Dwight Eisenhower that imposed quotas on Venezuelan and Persian Gulf oil imports in order to protect U.S. production while favoring the Canadian and Mexican oil industries. Now Russia is advancing a proposal that soon could result in a similar cartel being formed of Caspian riparian states. Given the deteriorating state of U.S.-Russian relations and the current global financial turmoil, such a move will...
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