Bill Moyers hasn’t got a lot of time for Rupert Murdoch. He has said, “Rupert Murdoch is no saint. He is to propriety what the Marquis de Sade was to chastity. When it comes to money he’s carnivorous – all appetite and no taste.”

For some time now, we’ve been banging on about Rupert Murdoch and his “$20 a barrel for oil”; in fact we’ve been banging on since 13 May 2007, when oil was about $66 a barrel. Seems cheap now.

We’d love to think that our banging on and on had filtered through the intertubes and was part of the reason Murdoch’s extraordinary financial and political prescience has been brought up now, and by someone we respect so highly. Of course it’s not; but whatever the reason we are glad that it has been, and by one so wise and universally respected as Bill Moyers. And in such an excellent smackdown as this against the forces of evil themselves:

If you missed it in the Rare and Spotted Bulletin (I think that should be the “rarely-spotted Bulletin“, now unavailable online) the Murdoch quote comes from an interview by then Bulletin Managing Editor, Max Walsh, with Rupert Murdoch on Wednesday, February 12, 2003. You can still find a version of it on the Newsweek site.

Max Walsh: Let’s start with Iraq and the war because that looks like being one of those inflection points in history, with the world, financial markets and the business environment all being affected by what happens. How do you see events unfolding at this stage?

Murdoch: Oh, I believe Bush is right. We can’t back down now. I think Bush is acting very morally, very correctly, and I think he is going to go on with it…

Max Walsh: What happens after the war? Reports say that the allies will occupy Iraq. What are the implications for the Middle East and the world’s stability?

Murdoch: I’m not close enough to know what [the allies] really are planning. They’d certainly want to establish a democratic regime as soon as possible and get out as soon as they can. It’s got to be a question of handing the assets of Iraq back to the people of Iraq under a responsible government as soon as possible. The greatest thing to come of this for the world economy, if you could put it that way, would be $20 a barrel for oil. That’s bigger than any tax cut in any country.

[ ... ]

[Bush] will either go down in history as a very great president or he’ll crash and burn. I’m optimistic it will be the former by a ratio of 2 to 1.

[ ... ]

Bush has surprised everyone. Even his opponents have a great deal more respect for him than they did when he was elected. One senses he is a man of great character and deep humility.

Ah, such wisdom from the bloody, dripping lips of the Master, the Chancellor, the Emperor, Darth Sidious.

Meantime, the price of oil has been up to about $139 a barrel. Well foreseen, my Master! Surely the power of the Dark Side cannot be conquered!

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