Look, nobody loves OPEC but the price of oil is what it is not because OPEC is fixing it, but because the market for oil products has exploded into parts of the world that never used much in the past (including, BTW, Saudi Arabia). This has enriched not only OPEC, but non-OPEC countries as well.
OPEC enforces it's market influence by controlling supply, but there is ample reason to believe that it's member nations aren't in a position to increase supply by enough to make much difference. Rumors that the Saudi oil fields are beginning to run dry have been rife for years now; Uganda has labor and local troubles; Venezuela would produce more if it could but it can't, etc., etc. Could OPEC produce more oil? Surely. A LOT more -- enough to make a serious difference in the price of gasoline. Almost certainly not.
Add to this the fact that the Saudis and other oil states are now the lenders of last resort for much of American bank fuckups and NOPEC becomes a DANGEROUS idea. I'm not so much worried about OPEC cutting off our oil. Why would they do that, when we've been such good customers and show no signs of changing our ways? I'm worried about their cutting off our MONEY -- no longer bailing out failing banks or businesses and no longer financing our deficit by buying T-bills.
Conservation and the development of alternative fuels aren't the best way to deal with OPEC. They're the ONLY way. And any politician who says otherwise is either very stupid or lying to you. And Hillary Clinton is not stupid.
