Chicken or egg?
I'm enjoying the current media dialog about democracies and oil. Cheney says it's an unfortunate but sorry coincidence oil isn't found under more democratic states. This reminds me of a creationist view of evolution.

Could it perhaps be true that having oil, inherent national wealth through natural resources, doesn't encourage democracies to flourish, Mr. VP?

All the recent Asian tiger economies, democracies, sprung out of a condition where they had no resources. They had to create vibrant economic environments to grow. Democracy seems to thrive in such environments. Whereas, you have places like Saudi Arabia, Nigeria, Venezuela, etc. There, not only are the regimes essentially dictatorial, things like illiteracy are embarrassingly high. There's no need for democracy, when you've got a tap into the macro-economic equivalent of a trust fund.

I heard a lot of this from some interesting commentators. Unfortunately, I don't have a link to share. Wish I could footnote the thoughts.