MOSCOW -- Occasionally, we all get wrong ideas about ourselves. A middle-aged person starts dressing like Leonardo di Caprio, a pizza deliveryman begins emulating "The Godfather," a school teacher turns herself into a Gestapo interrogator.
Recently, Russian President Vladimir Putin decided he was Napoleon. Two centuries ago the French emperor attempted an economic blockade of archenemy England. In January 2006, Putin tried the same on Eastern Europe.
Back in the '50s, when the world economy was making the big transition from coal to oil and gas, journalists started referring to natural gas as industry's "blue blood." Assuming the metaphor still stands, in January the blood arteries of Eastern Europe became clogged.