A tragicomic history of violence

Did you catch Jim Reed's "Viewpoint" on cbc.ca? Go! Go now!

Hint: it begins with this quote from Col. Larry Wilkerson (Colin Powell's former chief of staff):

We had a discussion in policy planning about actually mounting an operation to take the oilfields in the Middle East, that's how serious we thought about it.

Ok, ok...hint #2: Reed discusses British historian-cum-comic Robert Newman's "act". He provides a link to the video too (must watch!). Par example:

In a devastatingly funny, but tragi-comic impersonation of the Nazi propagandist Joseph Goebbels, Newman has Tony Blair saying that, "…if there were any other way…at all…of uniting the forces…of secular Arab nationalism…with those of militant Islam…then you know…I'd like to hear it…."