Alan, great chemical explination, one thing though, "oxidation" refers to ALL reactions where something loses an electron to another thing, even if it doesn't involve oxygen! this is a convention dating back to when these types of reactions were first really theorized about.
As to Trumpy's greasy connections, any non-polar substance will prevent oxidation reactions, for instance sodium, which will BURN in water (well, produce hydrogen and enough heat to ignite said hydrogen) can be stored in oil, and kept lustrous i.e. not corode, it doesn't have to have any "special" anti oxident properties, even plain graphite would work.
-Will
