1) How does one end up at a predominantly "pessimistic" reading of history in the sense of Geuss, where it isn´t obvious that all that history shows is utterly appalling ?
2) Isn´t it too coarse to describe every attempt at legitimacy as a part of a mere power game ? Even if winning as such is an inherent part of the political process, one would be hard pressed, in my view, to view the whole entirely reductively, even if the agenda some politicians propose is misconceived by them in the first place.