Week 4: Vae Victis - Strategies for Winning Public Opinion

Dear all,

For millions of people around the world, the last couple of days of the clown circus in the U.S. was, and still is, entertainment at its worst. For millions of others, it was a moment of vengeance to celebrate and enjoy—vengeance, sharp blades, and limitless power concentrated in the hands of a few super-rich individuals.

Watching this rather tragic spectacle, you could almost feel the hypnotic, dramatic energy such events create. The faces of the victorious, the cheers of the crowds, and the numb eyes of the defeated—all of it radiates a dangerous energy, one that is hard to control and extremely contagious. At this point, making historical references no longer seems to matter.

Cycles of turmoil in our shared history occur within a range of 80 to 120 years. It’s like receiving a letter every century—a letter that, once opened, ushers in radical change for a time. These are cycles of faith, hope, pain, and evolution. We cope, we adapt, and those who move forward will tell the story of what comes next.

In the meantime, the reality of such radical change will erode, more or less, all the boundaries established by democratic regimes to protect us from exactly what is happening now. What was once unacceptable becomes acceptable. Lies become truths. Many of us are left with an unsettling feeling, a kind of mental paralysis, as we try to comprehend and process information but fail to find clarity.

In democratic nations, politics and those working within political systems were once, at least on paper, a counterbalance to private interests. Now, in the U.S., politics is no longer separate from private interests—it is private interests. The question of whether the U.S. can still be considered a democracy is more relevant and urgent than ever before.

The impunity with which this elite group operates is no different from that of ruling classes in other autocratic regimes. The only difference lies in the packaging: the U.S. version is flashier, the wrapping a bit shinier, but the content is more or less the same.

The Nazi salute directed at millions of people around the world—and at those present in that hall of shame—by the world’s richest person speaks volumes about the level of societal decay we’ve reached. And yet... nothing happens.

Millions of people around the world want this. They need this, or at least they’ve been convinced it is the right choice for them and their children. Bread and circuses.

For the rest of us, there are only two choices: resist—and resist even more.

What comes next is the question that looms over us.

"Vae victis." How do you win public mass opinion? You tell the masses a lie they want to hear, not the truth they need to hear. Then you take all their money. And they will love you for it.

What’s next?