Lately I have listened to a number of podcasts in which Daniel has talked about magick, and in several of the discussions he has made comments about how people in power (e.g., political elites) use magick. I am trying to process that claim and am looking for some help in understanding what that means.

I want to be thoughtful about how I ask this question so I don't ask people to out others who are engaged in magickal practice, so let me cast this broadly as a question about what happens in the upper echelons of Western society--think captains of industry or political leaders, but not asking about specific people.

Daniel gives a very broad interpretation of magick as (I'm paraphrasing) consciousness combined with intent. Some of the examples of "ordinary" acts that can be viewed with a magickal lens include things like putting on a suit to portray a more professional image.

When talking about how people in power use magick, I'm not sure if I should understand that claim in terms of this broad interpretation of magick (e.g., political leaders engage in rituals like the pledge or participate in Masonic lodges with magickal iconography), or as more explicitly magickal behaviors. To put it crudely, are Western elites engaged in magick incidentally, in that they do things that have magickal significance without thinking of what they do in those terms, or are they actually thinking of what they do as casting spells and working formal rituals?

Sure, check out Donald Trump's hand mudras when he's talking - a masterclass in mind control.

Related - there's the book Dark Star Rising which covers OP topic.

Oh, man, Colin, this is the rabbit hole that leads to a tar baby that leads to the sewer system. I did a round of this stuff some years ago and could only get so far, as I have a very weak stomach. I was reading mainly about the occult underpinnings of the Third Reich's ideology and elite culture. i have always been interested in the politics and sociology of spirituality, which requires a strong stomach to begin with, and I had started the train of thought with Theosophy and Crowley, and one thing led to another and next thing i knew i was in over my head in shit. Unfortunately, there is some excellent scholarship on the subject; this is not flakey stuff, necessarily, though flakes abound. Noah recommended Dark Star Rising    Dark Star Rising: Magick and Power in the Age of Trump: Lachman, Gary: 9780143132066: Amazon.com: Books    , which, goddamn him, and you, I just ordered. I can't recommend the specific book that marked my deepest point in the sewer on the Nazi stuff, but  Amazon.com: The Occult Roots of Nazism: Secret Aryan Cults and Their Influence on Nazi Ideology (9781838601850): Goodrick-Clarke, Nicholas: Books looks good, the same territory covered by a legitimate scholar.

Cannot emphasize strongly the need for a very strong stomach, here, and a deep faith. To read history at all is always a very good test of equanimity in action; to read the history of spirituality and religion, a deeper test; and to read the appalling history of this kind of black magick . . .  well, first do no harm, don't let it fuck you up. It's like the diseases in a tropical place: it will make you sick, and if you recover, you'll have some antibodies, so it may make you less sick on your next pass. If it doesn't kill you. Don't let it kill you; in fact, unless you find yourself highly motivated here, I wouldn't even recommend letting it make you sick. Take a pass, if you can. And if you can't, sit next to me, lol.

My mind was similarly sent racing after that interview. There may be some intentional magick out there, but I think there is a TON of it that is as you say, incidental. Like you say, lots of the rituals involved with corporate consumerism like wearing a suit (although that seems to be dissapearing), or using money. There is a very simple magick that seems to come from getting two or three people to agree on an abstract idea. You get millions of people to believe the value of a stock is X and you've cast a spell that gives tech founders power over our entire economy.

I've personally started to examine all of the magic systems embedded in Mormonism. If you want a counter to the black magic you might encounter at the core of Nazism you might want to take a look at Mormonism. Michale Quinn's book on the occult in early Mormonism is on my reading list: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1179665.Early_Mormonism_and_the_Magic_World_View

Just a preliminary observation but Mormonism is suffused with magic focused on purity and protection and the connection between the two. Mormons wear a sacred white undergarment with protective symbols whose power is dependent on the righteousness of the wearer. I don't think it's a big surprise that the two biggest opponents of Trumpism (Mitt Romney and Jeff Flake) in the Republican party have been Mormon. Mormons take morality very seriously and it may be, at least in part, tied to the magick systems that require it. Lots of other things I could point out -- whiteness as a pervasive symbold of purity (I wore a white shirt and tie for two years as missionary), esoteric temple ceremonies, a rigid patriarchal hierarchy that tightly controls the execution of priesthood power, the control and use of symbols (Mormons do not use crosses), and much much more. Lots of shadow sides as well and the founder was very clearly not without flaws, but you have to give him props for designing a brilliant and elaborate magick system that persists to this day and that continues to have a powerful effect on the course of history.

I left LDS Mormonism a few years back, but I am now seriously considering practicing some unauthorized Mormon Magick. I'm still technically an ordained Elder and as long as I've got the morality in order, I see no reason why I shouldn't use the Magick system I inherited to do some good (I might start with something simple like blessing my house). Still need to proceed with caution, but ironically all my experiences with the Dharma have given me greater faith in the power of Mormonism than when I was an active part of it.

Wait... what? But Mormons are so wholesome!

It's wholesome magick! It's part of this complete breakfast.

We could easily break that spell if we all just stopped using the internet so much! 

Cole, dear, vibrations are contagious. 

I think it is essential to understand for yourself and keep your mind on it why the interests toward all that wake up in you in the first place.

What I have discovered over the years is that depending on the level of vibrations that I was unlocking INSIDE in my meditation experiences, different realms of OUTSIDE experiences started to resonate in unison. 

( I would love to realize the level where there is no more inside and outside, but I am still hanging in the duality. 
So I will speak from what I have realized, and hopefully, it will give you some useful, actionable hints )

With the deepening of my meditations, I had different kinds of waves.

• overly strong pull toward sexual experiences
• strong pull toward politics
• powerful pull toward what traditionally called "conspiracy theory" with gravitation toward health and politics. 

But I realized all that as being triggered by the deepening of my meditation experiences. 

I reorganize myself to stick to the objective of development of my meditation practices first. 

This meditation fitness, so to say, in which you discover stronger and stronger energies to wrestle with, is a very useful practice and personally taught me a lot. 

I don't know if Sri Aurobindo and the Adventure of Consciousness ever got in your hands.

It was a fascinating history of the transformation of a person from real political activists into a yogi. 

@Tim Farrington, I love your response!! 

You might want to dig a little deeper into Romney and Flake before you hold them up as paragons of virtue.