You know the saying surrounding the learning of history and the dangers of the lack thereof?
It’s not cynical enough.
It’s always thinking “this time, my knowledge and lack of scruples will supersede the human condition!” with the regressive, self-deluded authoritarian mind.
The tragedy of the “doomed to repeat it” and “doesn’t repeat, but it rhymes” aphorisms both is always going to be a function of linear time, not the wit of the self-styled Masters of the times.
Sucks to live on human timescales during these times tho, I think every pen since antiquity agrees.