In ancient Egypt, pharaohs were considered gods. Egyptians believed that when a pharaoh died, he would continue to lead them from the beyond, which partially explains why they had such ornate tombs. Beginning 2,600 years ago, Japanese emperors were similarly thought to be gods, a practice that continued until 1945, when, after WWII, the emperor was required to explain to his people that he, in fact, was not a god.

In the Roman Empire, although emperors were not considered gods while living, most were deified upon death. However, during their lives, they were thought to have authority that had been divinely endowed, and some thought their bloodlines were touched with divinity. Julius Caesar, for example, claimed to be Venus’s descendent.

Image by Vince Coyner

Later, through much of European history, monarchs were often thought to be divinely inspired. There existed a concept called the Divine Right of Kings, which suggested that kings were anointed by God and ruled by his grace. As such, they did not have to answer to anyone on this earthly plain, whether the Pope, parliament, nobles, or anyone else. Of course, ruling via God’s grace didn’t always protect kings from earthly dangers—in the form of assassinations or wars between two simultaneously divinely inspired enemies or your run-of-the-mill usurper—but it was a great gig if you could keep it.

As regal and majestic as all of this sounds, “divine” rule was actually nothing more than a tool to help establish legitimacy and maintain power for the ruling elites. Who could be a more powerful ally in demonstrating that an individual or a group should have more power than God (or the gods)?

Using armies and weapons to keep subjects from questioning authority or revolting could be expensive. It was cheaper to do so through or with the assistance of religious beliefs. If one could convince a man that his king was acting in the stead of God, the threshold of abuse he would accept before revolting would be much higher than if the king were just a man.

While the United States has never had a king—divine or otherwise, as George Washington quashed that when offered the crown—our Declaration of Independence, the document that established our nation, looks to God for inspiration.

That doesn’t mean we aren’t ruled by gods, however.

I’ve always wondered why some of America’s richest people, particularly tech and finance types, lean to the left. How could someone who has benefited so extraordinarily from the American system support ideas that are anathema to its very existence? The things they support generally include bigger government, higher taxes, and limitations on free speech and the right to bear arms, among other constitutional rights.

The most frequent cancerous idea our Brahmans embrace is bigger government. Many corporations see increasing regulations as a means to limit competition. By supporting minimum wage hikes or increased reporting regulations or mandates, large companies—many of which billionaires control or own— can and do use the government to impose costs that cripple small competitors. At the same time, they themselves have the resources to comply easily. Tacitus would recognize this, for he once said, “The more corrupt the state, the more numerous the laws.”

These same elites, particularly those in tech and on Wall Street, have little connection to the real world most Americans inhabit. From farms to restaurants to retail stores to truck drivers, the elites are minimally affected in their remote offices and relatively low regulatory environments when OSHA, the DOT, or EPA issue new regulations that handicap small business owners. While Wall Street may be heavily regulated regarding advertising and fiduciary responsibilities, the actual buying and selling is relatively unregulated when compared to the red tape that blue-collar industries face.

When it comes to higher taxes, this is usually a red herring for America’s barons. Many of America’s wealthiest leftists call for higher income taxes, but they don’t pay income taxes. That’s because most don’t pay themselves much of a taxable salary. Most of their liquidity comes from stock sales or dividends, which are typically taxed at a lower rate. Even if capital gains taxes were increased, they’d find opaque tax avoidance schemes that would reduce their taxes to zero or less, options that are rarely available to the average millionaire, never mind the average Joe.

Free speech is another element of American culture that elites don’t seem to appreciate. Leftists of all income ranges favor curtailing conservative speech, with violence a common tactic on college campuses. The elites don’t dirty their hands with violence, of course. Instead, they act through their control over social and traditional media or via the DEI coercion tactics of firms like BlackRock and Vanguard.

Lastly, there’s the Second Amendment’s right to bear arms. While many elites push gun control and the defunding of police, they rarely must live with the consequences of such actions. With their armed bodyguards and their homes in safe communities, behind walls with security systems, their calls for gun restrictions never put them or their families in danger, even as they increase the risks to law-abiding citizens.

Taking all this together makes one think of the nobles of old Europe. They often thought of themselves as superior to the kings, and only by accident of birth or treachery were not kings themselves. Frequently, financially strapped kings were in their debt and, as such, allowed them great latitude in dealing with the world within their realms.

So, too, with America’s billionaire elites. From Gates to Hoffman, Zuckerberg, Sandberg, Powell Jobs, Soros, Buffett, Omidyar, Bloomberg, and so many others, these leftists see themselves as kings or queens, or, at the least, high nobles, unaccountable to anyone and anything. They use their tremendous wealth to push for policies that don’t affect them but harm common citizens.

They assume that because they’re brilliant in one area of commerce, they’re somehow qualified to coerce the rest of us to live our lives as directed. Invariably, that “direction” involves governments creating more regulations that add additional burdens to the lives of everyday people for little or no benefit. From “green energy” to DEI to the butchering of confused teenagers, these members of the WEF’s globalist cabal care far more about virtue signaling than about actually solving actual problems because, of course, ordinary people’s problems never affect them.

The notion of “rules for thee but not for me” is nowhere plainer than the annual migration of private jets that descend on Davos as Klaus Schwab demands we eat bugs and embrace the “sharing economy.” These paragons of green virtue expend more CO2 in one trip than a family of four does over a year, but it’s OK because they’re saving the world. The fact that these ideas are all based on lies and result in the evisceration of individual freedom while accruing more control for the elites is of no consequence to our modern-day nobility.

The fact that they spit on the free exchange of ideas, limited government, and free markets that are at the core of American prosperity, including theirs, is also of no consequence. In their minds, because they created companies that help people search for friends or buy tchotchkes, making them richer than virtually everyone who’s ever lived, that should be enough proof that they’ve been chosen by God to lead us. Understand? Good. Amen!

Follow Vince on Twitter at ImperfectUSA

Update: An earlier edition of this essay inadvertently wrote Citadel in place of Vanguard. That error has since been corrected.