Capitalists are not evil. They are capitalists.
Speculation is no different from investment, except in the fevered imagination of moralists.
Capital can't bare its teeth because a) it is not a person and b) it has no teeth.
We can see political responses taking shape in response to various complexes of economic, social change. Ted Morgan analyzes that fairly well, and he does so without personifying "Capital" or "Media." And he grounds the backlash (which is what is being discussed here) in specific economic, political, and ideological history of the last half century plus.
We don't have a theory of the capitalist state that all can agree on. If we recognize that we can work in terms of actual events and tendencies without falling in to the superstition of hurling moral epithets at unspecifiable entities with mystical names ("speculators," "capitalists," "capital," "Wall Street")
Whether "economics" exists or not is an epistemological and historical question, not an 'economic' question or a question of whether this or that economist is right or wrong on this or that question.
Carrol
P.S. Note that on a whole series of debates recently both here and on pen-l there are "good" or "intelligent" "economists" on both sides (or all 4 or 5 sides). You can't solve them by calling some of the debaters stupid or ignorant -- or even "toxic." Extremely toxic characters can still be correct on this or that question.