FTC, Senate and House Democrats looking into the price of oil and the role of oil companies. Republicans want hearing on the fall of the dollar, the flalout on comodity prices and the Fed's role in the whole mess. The regulators growling at oil producers and the Fed will slowly realize, provided this crisis continues, that they have the wrong target.

In times of financial crisis there is always a call from somewhere for financial firms to be regulated further. Gordon Brown has recently talked of creating an ‘early warning system’ in the financial markets if not from voluntary submissions then by regulation.