The crisis continues

After recovering somewhat in the past few days from their slow-motion crash of recent weeks, stocks are down again today. But really, the news coverage of this financial/economic crisis has been far too stock-focused, and specifically Dow-focused. Even if the Dow's squiggly line goes back up, and we manage to go a few days without any new doom-and-gloom headlines about the happenings on Wall Street, that doesn't mean the broader crisis is over. On the contrary:

The commodity and emerging market booms are breaking in unison, leaving no more bubbles left to burst. Almost every corner of the world is now being drawn into the vortex of debt deflation. ...

From what I have been able to find out, shipping is slowing as fast as it did in the grim months of late 1931. “The crisis is now in full swing across the entire world,” said Giulio Tremonti, Italy’s finance minister. “It is hitting the real economy, the productive forces of industry. It’s global, it’s total, and it’s everywhere,” he said.

(Hat tip: InstaPundit.)

P.S. On other hand, there's this chart and this analysis suggesting that the credit markets are not "frozen" anymore -- they're "melting," slowly but surely.