WASHINGTON -- Sky-high oil prices are keeping Iran's government flush with revenue. But they are also contributing to Iran's soaring inflation, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's worst economic woe.
Pain at the pump for consumers of oil-importing countries usually translates into political gain for authoritarian leaders in oil-rich countries who use oil rents to buy political support. As Thomas Friedman famously put it, "the price of oil and the pace of freedom always move in opposite directions." ...
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