Here is the syllogism, which you have already met in one form or another somewhere: in a conversation with friends and relatives, in a video about policy on YouTube , in the signature for the topical picture, in the Facebook post, in the comments on it, in the publicist column, in the story on the state television channel, in the president’s speech. It looks approximately like this: A crowd of protesters on the street portends a revolution. The revolution, as history teaches us, ends poorly.