This is a book (like our many other books) that collects our posts on the ongoing financial crisis (which I've dubbed "The Great Meltdown" The Big Shit Storm* The Big FAIL**).

The book begins with extensive coverage of the bailout, and then expands to cover broader concerns like the progress, or lack thereof, of the TARP, the program the bailout created, and the effects of income inequality generally. Obviously, the book is massive -- during the passage of the bailout, we did several hundred posts on it, in near-real time -- but I hope the table of contents makes the organization of the book sufficiently clear.

(And if you wondered why a large number of posts shows up under "Recent Blog Posts" without appearing on the front page, those are "chapter" posts I used to organize the book.)

Now, why did I create the book?

First, this book is in keeping with one of the missions of our site: To set the record straight. If there's another non-financial blog that has covered the crisis in the depth as consistently and thoroughly as we have, and if there's any blog that's covered the intersection between politics and economics like we have, I'll play Kevin Drum, and make and eat a chocolate hat.

The second reason comes from the first: I wanted to be able to cite back to posts we'd written before, and organizing the posts makes it easier for me (and for you) to do that.

Third, I hope a simple link to the book (or portions of it) will provide ammo against detractors and trolls. Obviously, when you write several hundred posts on The Great Meltdown, there's little time for obsession with Village minutiae, or froth about the transition (though such posts are fun and easy to write).

Finally, a vocabulary note: It's a curious fact that there's no name for the financial mess Our Betters on Wall Street and the Village have dragged us into; and what you can't name, you can't claim.

So, the name I picked for this book, which I'm also proposing for the name of the mess, is "The Great Meltdown," echoing other past economic "greats." An alternative is "The Big Meltdown," which is somewhat more euphonious.

Readers, suggestions?

NOTE * Some have suggested that, in line with Atrios's "Big Shitpile," which refers to the toxic derivatives that nobody knows how to value, we call the current situation "The Big Shitstorm." Works for me. Readers?

UPDATE ** 2009-07-02 I've updated the title to The Big FAIL. Hat tip, LOLfed, where I first encountered the term.