Governments like to believe they're in charge of things but they are fooling themselves most of the time. This is the age of globe-girdling corporations and most of the time they do pretty much as they please, whether it is pricing, pollution, profit or monopolistic habits. For about half a century, the oil giants, for instance, controlled not only the extraction and refining of petroleum but also the prices by virtue of long-term contracts that gave them super-cheap oil, wh