Markets keep falling, Fed cuts key rate, could crisis spur fundamental change?

Following more dramatic stock market declines worldwide, the Federal Reserve ordered an emergency cut in a key interest rate this morning.

Jesse Jackson explains that "We are witnessing the collapse of a failed ideology -- what the famed investor George Soros calls `market fundamentalism,' the belief that markets are always perfect and government should deregulate, cut taxes and get out of the way." The $700 billion bailout, Jackson argues, does nothing to address the real problems facing real people in the real economy. I would add that even financial markets have some inkling of this reality--and that is why they are continuing to fall.

Meanwhile, economists attending the IUCN World Conservation Congress in Barcelona say that the worldwide economic crisis may offer the chance to rethink neoliberal economics and create a sustainable economy.

Let's hope they're right.