Among the most pointed of political aphorisms is Lord Acton’s, “Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” The line lingers because it’s wonderfully well-phrased – and because it rings totally true. Even if absolute power is not something that we’ve personally experienced, we know from the most rudimentary reading of history that some people are power-hungry in the extreme. To the point where nothing less than absolute power, which corrupts as indefinitely as absolutely, will suffice.