Check this out

Economist.com on the mortgage crisis of the 1870s
"(T)he contraction that followed as being more severe and causing more social unrest than the Great Depression. He even believes the financial hardship that followed is what spawned a wave of American religious fundamentalism. The 1873 crisis also provided ample financial opportunities for the few with cash. The robber barons of the day—the Rockefellers and Carnegies—bought under-valued assets in the depressed market. As markets recovered, inequality grew and gave rise to the subsequent gilded age in America."

The upside is that whereas this is where America began to supplant Europe economically because of our superior wheat production costs, China is not currently poised to dispose so easily of the Americans. Mainly this is because our trade with China is so beneficial to us that it actually enhances our economic position vis-à-vis China. The downside is now is a historically unfortunate time for another 'Great Awakening' (yeah, I know, there's no 'good time' for it but now seems worse than usual). And as for the inequality that will arise from this, we've already seen it: dude, Warren Buffet is where companies go to get their capital now. Fortunately, Buffet is a much much cooler guy than Rockefeller, Morgan, Vanderbilt, etc. But, just like then, the government now is going to work in favor of whales like Buffet, whether they tell us that or not.

The real danger is that as the capitalist world rides this crisis out--oh yeah, we've got a coupla years of crisis ahead!--the dictators and oil-rich autocrats are free to tyrannize for the foreseeable future. Could Putin's Russia (oh, I mean Medvedev's Russia) and the Ayatollah's Iran perch themselves at the center of a non-aligned movement? They could but I suspect that once you get beyond those two the power is pretty slim.

The foreign policy agenda for the next president of the United States is clear.