Isopetroleum Projection

Via Andrew Sullivan; the Atlantic. Sullivan's blog is an amazingly prolific and interesting source of news from Iran, Iraq and Pakistan.

Unstated and so far unexamined: the oil from Iran is still flowing. Discontinuing engagement with Iran would require worldwide participation and would cause a huge price spike. I suspect Eisenhower or Kennedy in a comparable situation would not hesitate to lead the world to embargo Iran.

Sullivan implies that the belligerent "neocons" are talking embargo. It's very odd for me to be inclined to agree with them on anything. But the negative impact on the fragile economy would be very substantial. I think Obama's realpolitik puts relative economic calm ahead of any other goal. And oil being what it is, it requires universal participation by all major economies to make an embargo bite.

But it's not as if we had no influence on the situation. And the economic disruptions, which are likely to come anyway, embargo or no, could be blamed on external events.