[ZULU]

Energy is an essential to all segments of the marketplace. Its required to keep the nation and its defense establishment operating. The ripple effects of expensive energy can destroy our economy, undermine our national defense and erode our lifestyle.

Its doing it now.

Having to pay high prices for the product to the producers is bad enough, but having a legion of scalpers intrude themselves as middle-men in the form of speculators is despicable.

These are the kind of people who would be involved the black market and war profiteering under other circumstances.
Equating them with honest businessmen, capitalists, etc, who create jobs and wealth is an error.

They produce nothing but misery and I despise them.

[HereInTheHeartland]

Speculating puts liquidity into markets; and it has for thousands of years.
Without liquidity, end users and producers would not be able use essential tools to protect their positions.
Southwest Airlines was famous for hedging their fuel supply before the 2008 price spike.

The speculators that you don't like; were on the other side of those trades and lost their rear ends.
Their money on the other side, allowed SouthWest to execute it's fuel hedging strategy.

Same with a farmer planting a corn crop right now. Or Ford Motor locking up input prices.
Or a mortgage lender offering mortgages to customers today; but that won't close for 3 months.

Illiquid markers make these things hard to do.