“You’ve been played. We all have.” These are words from the TV series, Homeland. In this particular scene, Saul, the president’s aide, presents Senator Sam Paley with evidence on a Russian conspiracy that Paley believed. The evidence is pictures of people’s faces, with the role they were manipulated to play by Russian operatives inscribed underneath. With every descriptive picture that he sees, the pompous Paley becomes increasingly deflated; but what completely shocks him is his picture with the inscription, UI.
When he asks what the letters mean, Saul tells him, “Useful Idiot.” It is at this moment that Paley confronts the realisation that he is the titular useful idiot who has all along been manipulated by Russian operatives to impeach the American president.