I am 20-year financial journalist, and have had two books published on Wall Street by Bloomberg Press.

In something of a switch, I began investigating oil markets a year ago. I had planned to grow an oil-bearing plant (jatropha) in Thailand (my ex-wife is Thai). But the more I researched oil markets, the more I began to wonder if oil is setting up for a replay of the late 1970s-early 1980s. In other words, oil hits a peak amid predictions of gloom, but within a few years the crisis has passed, while prices go into in long-term secular decline. I have a very long-winded explanation of why this happens.