An email exchange with a reporter. My view is informed by the observations of Jerry O'Driscoll and George Selgin.

1. If the U.S. was currently on the gold standard, would we still be
experiencing the current credit crunch that resulted after the collapse
of the subprime mortgage market?

It can't be claimed that a different monetary standard would mean that mortgage lenders would never make errors. But to the extent that the recent errors were encouraged by inappropriate Federal Reserve policy one can say that under a gold standard, without a central bank, mistakes would be fewer and less clustered than they have been in the subprime mortgage mess. Fed policy has been inappropriate in two ways. First, it has inflated recent asset price "bubbles" by using overly expansionary monetary policy to hold interest rates too low for too long. Low interest rates, caused by expansionary monetary policy, raise the relative prices of interest-sensitive long-term assets. When monetary expansion makes the inflation rate rise and thus interest rates rise again, asset prices crash. Bernanke's statements indicating an overly strong bias against deflation, and his recent hyperactive rate-cutting, suggest that he will continue to make this kind of mistake. Secondly, the Fed has encouraged moral hazard by promising and acting to ease interest rates to diminish investor losses when asset bubbles deflate. This second policy used to be known as the "Greenspan put"; it seems alive and well in Bernanke's emergency rate-cutting to shore up stock prices and battered subprime mortgage portfolios.

2. Taking that first question further -- if the gold standard was in
place, would there have been the disastrous rise and fall of the housing
market and the mortgage-backed securities attached to it? Or was that
scenario an inevitable happening?

Some ebb and flow in housing prices is inevitable. But the recent housing bubble was pumped up in large measure by overly expansive Federal Reserve policy. A gold standard constrains money creation, so it would not exacerbate swings in the housing market the way the Fed has.

3. Realistically, what are the chances of the U.S. going back to the
gold standard?

Realistically? Approximately zero as long as inflation stays in single digits. But just as Ecuador switched to the US dollar standard when inflation got out of hand, the US could switch to a gold standard if inflation got out of hand. I hope that the Fed knows better than to pursue a policy that makes that happen, but the gold standard is an option waiting on the shelf if it does happen.