[argentier]

The Cicero-Giuliani comparison is hilarious, and not bad at all now that I think about it.

Re SCU and the Conspiracy: that the SCU was first used against the Gracchi tells you something about its political motivations. The Senate was always a bastion of the Roman plutocracy. Also the SCU has been retconned, somewhat, by Cicero's partisans. It was invented late, during a bitter class war, and certainly doesn't count as one of the ancient traditions of the Roman republic.

Most Roman historians were knights: most classical historians were gentlemen. This profoundly shapes our view of Roman history.