Government regulation is needed to stem speculators' robber-baron mentality

Important reading this:AC Grayling: Government regulation is needed to stem speculators' robber-baron mentality | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk And the real bite to the article, I think, is here:
"With central banks and governments loth to let a bank go under, the cowboys can manipulate matters knowing that they are in no danger whatever of losing out, though lots of other people will do so – and, in the end, mainly the taxpayer. They know, in effect, that at the limit they can put their hands in your pocket and mine and help themselves to our cash: their own pockets are absolutely safe. Alistair Darling says that the short-selling ban is temporary because in normal times the technique is acceptable and indeed useful for providing liquidity and funds for investment. But at the moment it is seriously damaging and irresponsible; and this moment is always waiting to repeat if the reckless push to maximise profits overrides all other considerations, not least among them stability."
Basically it exposes the mendacity at the heart of neo-liberal politics: the market is invoked as the be all and end all in such a way as to hide what is really going on. It's not really about whether or not we have markets, nor even whether they may be a particularly successful way of creating wealth. It's actually about regulation. No market can exist without a regulatory framework. Actually strike that: no market can sustain itself without mechanisms that enable trust; hence regulations (weights and measures, contract law etc). And in fact there are various things which we have learnt not to leave to market forces; hence outlawing child-labour and slavery. So the real issue is how to regulate not whether to. When we hear someone invoking market economics we should reach for our torch and look in the dark corners for the 'racket' they are into.