The joint hearing of the US Senate's Energy and Commerce committees on oil profits had its comical side. Republican and Democratic lawmakers, many of them millionaires themselves and recipients of fat campaign contributions from the oil companies, feigned dismay and even outrage over the vast sums that have poured into the coffers of big oil—and the pockets of its CEOs—as a result of soaring fuel costs over the past several months. The exercise recalled nothing so much as the scene from the film "Casablanca" in which Inspector Renault—himself on the take—declares that he is "shocked, shocked to find that gambling is going on here."
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