It would be easy to get tribally smug about the resignation of state Senate Majority Leader Kelvin Atkinson on the eve of his guilty plea to felony charges stemming from misuse of campaign funds. “See how corrupt all Democrats must be?” the Republican partisan could shout. “That’s why you should only elect Republicans!”

Nevada Democrats have made that argument easier than it should be in the last few years. Former Las Vegas City Councilman Ricki Barlow resigned his seat and was sentenced to prison just last year for stealing $66,000 in campaign funds. Former Assemblyman Morse Arberry stole $120,000 in campaign funds ten years ago, and the prosecutor responsible for seeking justice in his case let him plead to a misdemeanor with a suspended sentence on her way to becoming our senior U.S. senator. Other prominent Democrats, Mark Manendo and Ruben Kihuen, have been caught attempting to use their power to illicitly obtain… other things they value.

But the tribally smug are shortsighted fools, and miss the real point. Tribalism only breeds more tribalism, and attempting to say that a handful of corrupt Democrats reflect on all Democrats is not only a lie, but it also invites laundry lists of any Republican ever who has ever done anything wrong and the accompanying insinuations that everyone on the right is along for the ride. Ironically, it’s easier for true villains to hide among the broadest brush strokes.

So what should we take from it? Atkinson is gone? No more problem, nothing to see here?

Not even close.

***

This is not to say that Nevada Democrats don’t need to do a little soul searching. Clearly, there is an undercurrent within the culture of the current party which tacitly winks at or even encourages a little of the old help-yourself. Part of that, I think, comes of having been in legislative majorities for so long (with few exceptions) that you start to take the public trust for granted. Certainly those in ridiculously safe (electorally speaking) seats can get to feel that way, when we’re so partisan these days that party affiliation will almost always trump a candidate’s personal character.

But some of it goes deeper. I find it almost impossible to believe that not a single other powerful Democrat in the entire state of Nevada had any inkling whatsoever that Atkinson was the subject of a federal criminal investigation, when the case has progressed sufficiently that the former senator is set to formally enter a guilty plea this coming week. The criminal justice system just doesn’t work that fast, and gossip mills (especially political ones) are just too efficient. So who was protecting him? Who thought this wouldn’t get out?

I also cannot help but blame Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto for not prosecuting Morse Arberry more aggressively. Not only was her handling of his case shocking in and of itself (I’ve prosecuted and defended thousands of theft cases over the years – I’m pretty sure I’ve never seen a six-figure thief with a provable case escape without a felony plea), but the signal it sent was predictable. If Arberry had faced appropriate consequences for his crimes, might Atkinson have thought twice? Might her party have been spared this humiliation — and blow to its political agenda?

Lawmakers considering various criminal justice reform proposals may want to keep these sorts of cause-and-effect relationships in mind before doing anything too rash on that policy front.

***

But Republicans are just as human as Democrats at the end of the day, and one could easily imagine the shoe being on the other foot if the GOP felt they had an impregnable lock on parts of our government. Greed is a human failing, one we all share to some extent or another. And it is a rare individual who can completely resist the temptations of power and popularity morphing into a sense of entitlement and invulnerability. Most people I’ve met in public life, regardless of party, keep these darker impulses under control, and are governed by a sense of honor and duty to do right by the people they represent.

But there will always, always be the Atkinsons and the Barlows and the Arberrys and the Manendos and the Kihuens.

If they will misuse money from campaign donors, they will certainly misuse your taxes. If they will abuse their power against female lobbyists and staffers, they’ll abuse their power against you. This truth of human nature is why unbridled socialism has always and will always end in disaster. Under capitalism, the rich get powerful, but under socialism, the powerful always seem to get rich (while the people suffer, of course).

As voters, we can and should be as diligent as possible about the character of the people we put into office. But our greatest protection is limiting the amount of money and power we give them in the first place.

The legislative pace is fast and furious this year, and in almost every case the bills presented give more and more power to lawmakers and government regulators, over more and more aspects of our public lives. Why do that to ourselves?  Most legislators care about what they’re doing, but even the best of them don’t care as much about your lives as you do. Even the most well intentioned has a limited understanding of the majority of the industries they’re attempting to regulate. Sometimes folks confuse “good intentions” with “competence,” and the roads are paved accordingly. Even on the best of days, with the most virtuous of legislators, it is unwise to hand over too much power.

When we remember that the un-virtuous will always, always find a way to wriggle into the halls of power, then the ridiculousness of relinquishing more and more control over every aspect of the lives we lead becomes obvious. The price of choosing our own leaders is that from time to time, we will chose the wrong ones. And believing our political tribe has some monopoly on integrity only blinds us to the corruption closest to us. This fact should be baked in to every policy change we advocate.

In other words, we’ll always have our Atkinsons, no matter what party is in charge. The rest of us should legislate and vote accordingly.

Orrin Johnson has been writing and commenting on Nevada and national politics since 2007. He started with an independent blog, First Principles, and was a regular columnist for the Reno Gazette-Journal from 2015-2016. By day, he is a criminal defense attorney in Reno. Follow him on Twitter @orrinjohnson, or contact him at [email protected].