Several years ago, the oil cartel said they wanted gas at $3.50 per gallon in the US, since the EU was paying about that. Outrageous price fixing.
OPEC has almost no impact on oil pricing in the U.S. anymore. One bit of news that seems to have escaped the attention of a lot of folks here is that Canada has now surpassed Saudi Arabia as the largest foreign source of oil for the U.S. And two of our largest foreign sources of oil (Canada and Mexico) aren't even members of OPEC.
F*ck the cartel. We need to take MAJOR steps towards energy independence NOW.
Add this to terrorism, border control, and private property rights as hot 2006/2008 election issues.