Today’s lead editorial in the Wall Street Journal makes the excellent point that Hussein’s oil stoppage is “a stupid and futile gesture.”

I couldn’t agree more. “It will neither help the Palestinians nor hurt the global economy,” the Journal writes, then continues, “though it is one more reason for President Bush to begin marshaling his coalition to depose Saddam.” Huh? If Hussein’s action is so harmless, why does it provide any rationale for ousting him?

The Journal’s editorial writers are again on the mark when they write:

What matters much more to the price of oil — and there is only one global price — are events in Venezuela. That country exports 2.5 million barrels a day, and for six weeks President Hugo Chavez, a Fidel Castro wannabe, had been messing around with the state-run oil company. And indeed after the military forced Mr. Chavez to resign Friday, oil prices dropped to just above $23 a barrel, after surpassing $28 a week earlier.

So Venezuela matters much more than Iraq, and things look to be going in the right direction there, precisely because Venezuelans punished their leader for trying to use their oil reserves as a political tool. They export 1 billion more barrels of oil a day than does Iraq. Sounds good. But the Journal editorial then concludes:

And if [Dubya] really doesn’t want to worry about an Iraqi embargo, he can go to the source of so many security problems and finish the job his father started against Saddam.

What? The entire editorial is about how what Hussein is doing is of little lasting consequence, and concludes with a call for Dubya to take out Saddam. If you can follow this logic, please enlighten me, as I’m a little lost. Wouldn’t a war on Iraq make other Arab dictatorships nervous about their own future and more likely to manipulate their own oil supplies for political reasons? Iraq is not the only country in the region hostile to the United States, and Hussein is not the only ruthless dictator in the region.

Taking on the entire Middle East is not a good idea and, furthermore, is completely unnecessary — as the first half of the Journal editorial makes clear — since the price of oil is global and not completely or even mostly dependent on the Middle East. Oh, well. I guess the answer to every question nowadays is to take out Saddam. Perhaps Dubya will somehow find a way to pin the Enron situation on him too.

Sounds ridiculous, doesn’t it? Well, it’s equally ridiculous to fret about the supply of oil coming from the Middle East stopping anytime soon.

As Michael Lynch writes in a great new column, “For Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq, or Kuwait to give up pumping oil would be the equivalent of Microsoft boycotting the software business.”

A perfect example of this phenomenon is the Venezuelan revolution to overthrow anti-trade president Hugo Chavez. While there were many factors involved in his ouster, his using the national oil company as a tool for political manipulation — denying much-needed revenue to that country’s poor people — was certainly a big one. A political leader may get away with oil boycotts for a while, but not for long.

In fact, the only thing that can really endanger U.S. access to Mideast oil — as I’ve said before — is heightened political tensions. You know, like threatening to invade a Middle Eastern country and overthrow its leader, or continuing to involve yourself in a territorial dispute that has no impact on your country’s security. Not that our country’s wise leaders would ever do anything like that.

Sure, handing over a chunk of change to Uncle Sam every year hurts, but there are plenty of other reasons to dislike the current tax system in America, as Chris Edwards explains. Even if you think the government deserves your money more than you do, you should still be upset about the many violations of civil liberties that go on in the name of paying for the many wonderful services government provides (including tax enforcement!).

What do the ACLU, right-to-lifers, the LP and the Christian Coalition have in common? Not much, except they hate each other’s guts and all have this odd affection for being able to speak their point of view.

Which is why they’ve joined forces with Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-La.) to fight the campaign speech — er, finance — reform bill signed into law by Dubya. They’re all co-plaintiffs in a lawsuit challenging the law’s constitutionality.

McConnell, who has blocked speech control for years, was finally defeated this year as Dubya hoped to hush Democrat bleatings about the Enron controversy by passing the law. McConnell said that when it comes to free speech, ”There is no ideological divide. There is only one interest: freedom.”

Here is the complete text of the suit McConnel & Co. have filed. Most likely to fail constitutional muster is the provision which bans independent expenditure by political pressure groups in the final 60 days of a campaign. If there were ever a more blatant attempt to protect incumbents than this bill, it would be hard to pinpoint.