These are busy days in the oil business. Prices keep shooting up. Motorists are pinched at the pumps. Speculation in oil futures spurs further price hikes -- or so some politicians speculate. And others place their bets on a renewed push to find new oil supplies in this country and off its shores.

Four-dollar gas, it seems, makes Texas oilmen out of lots of people, including North Carolina Republicans who long were part of a statewide consensus that drilling for hydrocarbons off the Outer Banks poses more peril than profit.

Now, Sen. Elizabeth Dole has cooled to the federal moratorium on offshore drilling; she, along with Sen. Richard Burr, is willing to let each Atlantic coast state decide its own level of oil involvement. Gubernatorial candidate Pat McCrory, having reflected for a few days, also adopts that stance.

Democrats Beverly Perdue (running for governor) and Kay Hagan (Senate, against Dole) say the risks of ruining tourism still outweigh petroleum's possible payoff. Unfortunately, neither side in this campaign-season controversy has much to offer a price-shocked public, not right away.

It's a Gulf thing

Alternative-energy options take time to develop. Oil and (particularly) natural gas still have a future, but the route to more domestic production isn't a simple matter of unchaining Exxon Mobil to work its will off the Outer Banks.

U.S. offshore oil and natural gas production is mainly a Gulf of Mexico phenomenon, and for bottom-line reasons is likely to remain so. So the issue isn't whether drilling off the East Coast might be profitable. It's whether that's the smartest place for oil companies to make a huge, risky investment when there are hotter prospects.

It's likely, as the United States tries to boost fading domestic production -- and yes, we should -- that North Carolina will not be in the picture for quite a while. Good for us. The oil isn't going anywhere, and extraction technology can only improve.

The Iraq factor

Barring the discovery of big new fields, however, this oil-thirsty world must get by on increased energy efficiency and on the petroleum it already produces or can profitably pump up. Iraq's oil fields, it happens, fall squarely in the latter category.

Even though Iraqis, enjoying a degree of civil safety these days after years of terror, still endure long gas lines in a country brimming with oil, hope is on the horizon. The government is opening six major oil fields and two natural gas fields to development by foreign firms. There's talk of an achievable 60 percent increase from current production levels. That would mean more oil for the world and more revenue for the government, already set to take in $70 billion this year.

Americans can cheer that. A richer Iraq can be expected to pay more of its own way as it rebuilds. More oil on the world market -- maybe even the prospect of it -- helps to lower prices.

Of course, nothing is assured. Iraq's decision to ramp up production (from 2.5 million barrels a day to 4.5 million in five years) by inviting in foreign oil firms, several of them U.S.-based, could inflame Iraqi nationalism even though the government retains ownership of the oil. And while Iraq's reserves are proven and world-class -- most of ours aren't -- its pipelines and shipping points are potential targets. Finally, the prospect of another oil-rich, Shiite-led Mideast state (see Iran) carries its own set of risks.

So was this, after all, a war for oil? Given the terrible costs, it's a hard question to ask, or answer to everyone's satisfaction. Americans could be forgiven for thinking, however, that at least there's finally some oil in sight. Although Iraqi oil won't spur energy independence here, it might help put a lid on fuel prices.