In the past, as in the present, the greedy succeed through audacity.

That's what I found myself thinking as I rewatched "The Name of the Rose," a mystery set in 1327. Based on a historically accurate book by Umberto Eco, the movie follows William of Baskerville, a Franciscan monk, as he investigates a series of murders in an Italian monastery.

At one of the tensest parts of the film, amid hunger, deprivation and death, a papal delegacy arrives to engage in a theological debate. The topic: Did Jesus own the clothes he wore?

As ridiculous as it might seem, the movie soon makes clear the subtext, with a character outright saying that the question isn't whether Jesus was poor. The question, and a much more relevant one at that, is: Should the church be poor?

There were real implications for that question, and in answering it, the powerful had something to gain.

Once again, history is a great teacher. Questions that are being debated — did Jesus own his clothes, should the federal government vote to pay its bills — hide more relevant matters.

Former Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy was ostensibly ousted for his attempt to pass a continuing resolution that would fund the government through mid-November. Donald Trump pushed the MAGA wing of the House into demanding an election-denier to replace McCarthy.

But what was the debate truly about? Do the eight representatives who rejected the speaker think the government should default on its debts? Do they really believe that, despite all evidence to the contrary, and as rejected by every court in which the arguments have been heard, that Trump won the 2020 election?

But, no, those are the wrong questions. It really doesn't matter. The truth is a distraction.

What we should be asking is, who stands to gain?

The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. once said that "the arc of the moral universe" bends toward justice, but an arc is just part of a circle. Its closed shape brings us back to the start.

The greedy still shoulder their way into power, still using any tool at their disposal to do so.

In Iran, on state-sponsored television the other day, a beautiful young woman presents the results of a viewer poll. The audience has been asked whether it was time for the "cancerous tumor" that is the "Zionist regime" of Israel to disappear from the face of the earth. The two choices: "yes" or "definitely."

The poll's question is irrelevant, as pointless as the possible answers. The real question: Who stands to gain?

In Israel, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's Likud party declines this year to eject a party activist caught on camera telling left-wing protesters that he was "proud that 6 million (Ashkenazi Jews) were burned" in the Holocaust. He wished millions more would have died. The Likud court that restored him to the party says the man, who is Jewish, is a "devoted and committed" party member who's just overzealous.

You might ask why a ruling party would tolerate such a member, but again, I say: Wrong question. The right one: Who stands to gain?

In Austria in 1865, a Hungarian doctor died, driven to insanity by the refusal of his fellow physicians to consider the possibility that hand-washing could prevent the transmission of disease. He virtually ended fatalities from childbed fever in his hospital by instituting a policy of hand sterilization, but well-to-do doctors were insulted by the suggestion that they are dirty.

Oh, how depressing.

Well, yes.

But if you want to know why, ask: Who stood to gain?

Because these are ancient stories, my friend, told and retold innumerable times.

The questions, and the answers, never change.

The truth has always been irrelevant.

The motives are incalculably old.

The greedy will always succeed, and they do so because they are audacious. They will sacrifice anything, anyone, and that audacity is a kind of superpower, albeit an evil one.

For the only thing that could ever stop them is a conscience, and it just so happens that's also the one thing they can never gain.

To learn more about Georgia Garvey, visit GeorgiaGarvey.com.