From http://mises.org:

The events taking place in the financial market offer an illustration of the soundness of the Austrian theory of money, banking, and credit cycles, and Mises.org is your source not only for analysis of these events but also the economic theory that helps explain what is happening and what to do about it. There are many thousands of articles available, and also the full text of thousands of books as well as journal articles. It is impossible to draw attention to the full range of literature one can use to understand the crisis.

However, below we offer a brief look into the topics most discussed in these times, with extended treatments of each in the sidebar. Mises.org also offers both a blog and a community forum for reading and discussing them all.

It’s never been more important to spread a sound view of money and banking, not only as a protection against the fallacies of “stabilization” and “reflation” but also as way to see what kind of reforms are essential now.

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac

• Freddie Mac: A Mercantilist Enterprise, by Paul Cleveland, March 14, 2005
• Fannie Mae: Another New Deal Monstrosity, by Karen De Coster, July 2, 2007
• How Fannie and Freddie Made Me a Grumpy Economist, by Christopher Westley, July 21, 2008
• Who Made the Fannie and Freddie Threat? By Frank Shostak, March 5, 2004
• Are Fannie and Freddie Too Big to Fail? By Frank Shostak, September 17, 2008
• Fannie Mae Distorts Markets, by Robert Blumen, June 17, 2002

The Housing Bubble

• The Real Cost of a Full Bailout, by Don Rich, August 22, 2008
• The Subprime Mortgage “Crisis” Will Fix Itself, by Steve Berger, May 30, 2007
• Did the Fed Cause the Housing Bubble? By Robert Murphy, April 14, 2008
• The Mortgage Market Mess, by Christopher Westley, May 17, 2007
• Housing Bubble: Myth or Reality? By Frank Shostak, March 4, 2003

Inflationary Finance

• What’s Behind the Financial Market Crisis? by Antony Mueller, September 18, 2008
• Our Financial House of Cards, by George Reisman, March 25, 2008
• Will Central Bankers Become Central Planners? by Robert Blumen, July 31, 2008
• Inflation is a Policy that Cannot Last, by Thorsten Polleit, March 14, 2008
• The Widening Safety Net, by Christopher Mayer, March 19, 2004
• The Fed’s New Tricks Are Creating Disaster, Frank Shostak, March 18, 2008
• The Fed’s War on the Middle Class, by Mark Thornton, June 4, 2008.

Community Reinvestment Act

• The CRA Scam and its Defenders, by Thomas DiLorenzo, April 30, 2008
• Regulatory Sneak Attack, by Thomas DiLorenzo, September 16, 1999

Short Selling

• Short-Sale Restrictions Are an Exercise in Naked Power, by Robert Murphy, August 11, 2008
• The Social Function of Futures Markets, Robert Murphy, November 29, 2006
• Don’t Sell Short Selling Short, April 6, 2007

The Austrian Theory of the Business Cycle

• The Idiocy of Wall Street, by Don Rich, September 24, 2008
• The Fed is Culpable, by Hans F. Sennholz, November 11, 2002
• Skyscrapers and Business Cycles, by Mark Thornton, August 23, 2008
• Economic Outlook 2008: Darkening Clouds, Dominick Armentano, January 2, 2008
• Business Cycle Primer, Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr. February 8, 2001
• Economics Depressions: Their Cause and Cure, by Murray Rothbard

Who Predicted This?

• The Financial Apocalyptics are Back, Robert Blumen
• Sowing the Seeds of the Next Crisis, Thorsten Polleit, April 25, 2006
• Credit Crisis: Precursor of Great Inflation, by Thorsten Polleit, February 7, 2008
• Mr. Bailout, by Anton Mueller, September 30, 2004
• America’s Unsustainable Boom, by Stefan Karlsson, November 8, 2004
• Who Predicted the Bubble? Who Predicted the Crash? By Mark Thornton, July 14, 2003

What To Do

• Don’t Bail Them Out, by Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr., September 10, 2008
• How to Avoid Another Depression, by Mark Thornton, September 10, 2008
• Taking Money Back, By Murray N. Rothbard, June 14, 2008
• Beware the Alchemists, by Ludwig von Mises, February 3, 2006
• Reflation in American History, by H.A. Scott Trask, October 31, 2003
• Money and Freedom, by Joseph Salerno, February 2, 2002
• The Case for a Genuine Gold Dollar, by Murray Rothbard

Books to Distribute

• The Theory of Money and Credit, by Ludwig von Mises
• America’s Great Depression, by Murray Rothbard
• The Mystery of Banking, by Murray Rothbard
• Prices and Production, by F.A. Hayek
• Causes of the Economic Crisis, by Ludwig von Mises
• Austrian Theory of the Trade Cycle and Other Essays, Ludwig von Mises et al.
• Understanding the Dollar Crisis, by Percy Greaves
• The Case Against the Fed, by Murray Rothbard
• Money, Bank Credit, and Economic Cycles, by Jesus Huerta de Soto
• History of American Currency, by William Graham Sumner
• Banking and the Business Cycle, by C.A. Phillips
• Fiat Money Inflation in France, by Andrew Dickson White

http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/…

Senator John McCain, who was criticized by Democrats Monday for saying that the fundamentals of the economy were strong on a day that the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers and the sale of Merrill Lynch sent stocks plunging, went out of his way Tuesday to make it clear that he understood that Wall Street was in “crisis.’’

At a rally here, Mr. McCain vowed to take aim at what he called the “unbridled corruption and greed that caused the crisis on Wall Street.’’

Mr. McCain – who has said for moths that he believes that the fundamentals of the economy are strong – has used the word “crisis” a lot on the last day to describe the financial situation. He did so in a series of television interviews Tuesday morning, where he called for the creation of a commission to study the problem, along the lines of the commission that investigated the Sept. 11 attacks.

“We need a 9/11 commission, and we need a commission to figure out what went wrong and how to fix it,’’ he said. “And I know we can do it and how to do it.”

OH OH!!! May I recommend some individuals to head up the commission? Ron Paul, Lew Rockwell, Hans-Hermann Hoppe, Robert Murphy, Joseph Salerno, Walter Block… just about anyone from the Austrian School.

“They have broken the social contract between capitalism and the worker.” It’s entertaining that this “conservative” is railing against the so called free market. Of course he’s no fiscal conservative and the US, as is much of the world, has a corporatist system. A system with a centrally controlled money supply which creates these monster corporations. He is either an idiot or a lier. Neither quality should be desired in an executive. The same can be of Obama.

This morning I met a few bloggers though one in particular I’ve had some more extensive discussion with was Julia Rocchi of the Case Foundation. She’s blogging at their site SocialCitizens.org/blog. I’m glad to see some of my criticisms were noted by her on the post “questioning service.”

Voluntarism can be a great thing and the inhabitants of the United States are these most generous people in the world. State involvement taints this. While the service itself is not mandatory (for the moment) the taxes used to fund these state run projects makes all tax payers participants regardless of whether or not they agree with the way it’s being spent. And given the governments track record on thriftiness we may as well hand out cash on the sidewalk. Yes, that same argument may be said about all tax money utilization. I would argue that’s one of the reasons to oppose taxation in general (and that it’s theft). Government incentivized voluntarism, isn’t. Just as welfare is not charity. The government is taking money from one individual in order to pay another to “serve.” True voluntarism is completely from oneself. It is the “altruistic” (non-tangible selfishness) spending of time, money, labor, and skill.

As I’ve mentioned so often before, there is what is seen when the government promotes these projects and that which is not seen. What does not get seen is the potential lost because of government incentivizing individuals away from their free market path. The investments which would have been made with the money which was taxed away. The capital which would have been created due to those investments in the private sectors need to serve the customers. The jobs that were never created, the businesses never started. Many may scoff at these suggestions but that’s why it’s the problem of the seen and not seen.

As government grows, and we all know it does, more and more resources will be taken from the tax payers to be thrown around by politicians at their whim until such time that we have a near complete centralized control of resources. At which point our society will crumble.

Those who advocate more government involvement in anything let alone voluntarism need to take a serious look, both practically and morally, at what they ask for. Does government interference in the market lead to lesser or greater standard of living? Does the threat of violence, which is how government functions, not negate the good they intend to perform with the money and capital obtained?

Society would not accept as a defense from a theft that he was robbing John in order to feed Paul who’s starving. Society should also not accept that defense when the government uses it.

For those interested in this topic I recommend reading:

• The Road to Serfdom by F.A. Hayek
• Healing Our World by Mary J. Ruwart <== this one in particular for liberal leaning individuals.
• The Market for Liberty by Linda and Morris Tannehill
• and other works by those at Mises.org including Murray Rothbard, Ludwig von Mises, John Taylor Gatto, Robert Murphy, Henry Hazlitt, Lew Rockwell, etc.