Financial crises have many causes and multiple actors. Sometimes, though, a single, electrifying interpretation emerges to capture the public imagination and dominate the political response. It has yet to happen with the current crisis. But for the Depression it struck dramatically over a mere ten days in early 1933, just before Franklin Roosevelt took office. In the years after the 1929 crash, Wall Street, except for a few scoundrels, had largely escaped broad condemnation, portraying itself guilty of nothing more than the same irrational exuberance that had seized ordinary investors.
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