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Given that oil is a limited (and unfortunately important) resource and the existing investements by US oil corporations I'd say they do care about middle eastern oil.
At the moment for example the USA owes some money to the Libyan government for all the oil they purchased previously. Rather than pay the amount owing they decided to go for a slightly different payment plan (funding & arming a few local dissidents to try to destabalize the local government and then to directly help overthrow the government as the "heroes"). You may have heard about it  |
"Libyan government" is an oxymoron, things as they are. And sure, oil is a necessary and limited resource, but realistically speaking... what's the likelihood of the run-out-of-oil-by-such-and-such-date happening before viable alternative fuel/production/energy reach a large enough scale to comfortably sustain ourselves? If it's not the private market saving the day, than it'll be government funded research that makes the breakthrough. After all, there's *HUGE* international profit incentive for whoever can significantly help advance that area. Greedy ol' American loves its black gold, but it also loves its money, and science is a hell of a lot more fiscally efficient way to save the day than overseas wars. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure that one out, just a halfway decent economically cognizant politician.