“Fighting to contain voter anger over sky-high gas prices, President Barack Obama urged Congress to toughen penalties for improper manipulation of oil markets and called for stricter government oversight of energy markets.”

“‘None of these steps by themselves will bring gas prices down overnight,’ the president said in the White House Rose Garden. “But it will prevent market manipulation and make sure we’re looking out for American consumers.”

“The American Automobile Association puts the national average price for a gallon of regular at $3.904.”

…

“You want the CFTC to have more cops on the beat, but there’s a confusion here. They really have to focus on speculation,” said Dennis Kelleher, president and CEO of Better Markets, a nonprofit organization that promotes the public interest in capital and commodity markets.”

“‘It’s like a town that’s suffering from a string of bank robberies and you send all of the cops to the penny-candy store to see whether anything’s been stolen,’ Kelleher told Yahoo News by telephone ahead of Obama’s announcement.”

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Read full Yahoo News article here.