Bread and Circuses

"Bread and Circuses" (or bread and games) (from Latin: panem et circenses) is a metaphor for a superficial means of appeasement. It was the basic Roman formula for the well-being of the population, and hence a political strategy unto itself. 

In the case of politics, the phrase is used to describe the creation of public approval, not through exemplary or excellent public service or public policy, but through diversion, distraction, and/or the mere satisfaction of the immediate, shallow requirements of a populace. 

The phrase also implies the erosion or ignorance of civic duty amongst the concerns of the common man (l'homme moyen sensuel).

In modern usage, the phrase has also become an adjective to describe a populace that no longer values civic virtues and the public life. 

Or as famous American author Robert Heinlein said, "Once the monkeys learn they can vote themselves bananas, they'll never climb another tree." 

To many across the political spectrum, left and right, it connotes a supposed triviality and frivolity that characterized the Roman Republic prior to its decline into the autocratic monarchy characteristic of the later Roman Empire's transformation about 44 BCE. [Wikipedia]