WASHINGTON, June 22: White House hopeful Barack Obama pushed on Sunday for a clampdown on energy speculation with new proposals that his campaign argued would more than halve the record-high price of oil.

The Democrat attacked the so-called Enron loophole, a 2000 deregulation of oversight by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission that critics say opened the way to a speculative free-for-all in the oil markets.

“For the past years, our energy policy in this country has been simply to let the special interests have their way — opening up loopholes for the oil companies and speculators so that they could reap record profits while the rest of us pay four dollars a gallon,” Obama said in a statement.

“My plan fully closes the Enron loophole and restores common-sense regulation as part of my broader plan to ease the burden for struggling families today while investing in a better future,” the Illinois senator said.

After a week of furious controversy over Republican John McCain’s call for energy companies to be allowed to drill for oil off the US coasts, Democrats said they would introduce new anti-speculation bills in Congress this week.

Congressman Ed Markey, the Democratic chairman of the House of Representatives select committee on energy independence, said a new rise in oil production by Saudi Arabia would have only a “marginal” affect on prices.

“There is without question, in my mind, speculation going on, manipulation going on,” he said on ABC News. “The Democrats are going to put bills on the House floor this week to deal with that issue.” Obama’s campaign noted that the Enron measure was shepherded through Congress by former senator Phil Gramm, who is now the campaign co-chair for McCain — proof, it said, that the Republican was out of touch with US voters.The loophole, enacted under strong lobbying by the Enron trading company before its spectacular collapse, exempted energy traders who deal electronically from US regulation against price manipulation.

Traders were allowed to deal in oil without taking physical possession of the commodity, so speculators have since been able to rapidly buy and sell futures contracts on overseas markets such as London for maximum profit.

According to Florida’s Democratic Senator Bill Nelson, the real price of oil based on the laws of supply and demand should be about 55 dollars a barrel — but he said that speculation has driven it up to nearly 140 dollars.

The Enron loophole was dealt with partially in a recently passed Farm Bill, but Obama said he would go further by requiring all US energy futures to be traded on regulated exchanges where suspected manipulation can be monitored.

After announcing the Saudi output boost at an emergency energy summit in Jeddah, King Abdullah on Sunday railed against speculators but US Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman said the real problem was lack of supply.—AFP