History and arts are full of examples of how the acquisition of power leads to the corruption of the individual who seeks and obtains power. The Stars Wars movies are an anthology of how one person seeks to obtain power for good reasons (to save the life of the woman he loves) and it turns him into the evil Darth Vader. The Lord of the Rings trilogy is about how the power of the one ring can destroy anyone who wields that power, and that the only way to preserve society is to destroy that power. Indeed, the story of the recent Republican reign in Congress is the story of how the acquisition and maintainence of power led to corruption at a variety of levels. Duke Cunningham and Jack Abramoff were not the worst of the offenders. The worst was those who used their power, and the massive federal budget, to try to ensure their continuance in power. Earmarks, pork in the common parlance, are the source of that corruption. Subtle though it may be, the use of other people’s money to buy support for the maintainence of power is the worst kind of corruption there is, and Republicans, who promised not to engage in that kind of behavior, deserved to lose Congress for their participation in that form of corruption.
In state and local government, corruption can take many forms, but one of its worst forms is the use of eminent domain for economic development. That power is used more often than not to take the land, property, and/or business of those who are powerless or have not paid their "political dues," and give those benefits to the politically connected or wealthy. We expect our Democrat friends to justify that kind of power grab as "good for the community" since that is their standard line for any "social program." They are all about expanding their power at the expense of individual liberty since that is the only way they can keep the power they pursue. When Republicans engage in that kind of behavior, those of us who have labored long for the pursuit of individual liberty start to abandon hope that we can ever recover the free society that so many of our forefathers died to preserve for us.
Recently, the Redevelopment Agencies and the League of California Cities introduced ACA 8, an initiative that purported to overturn the evil of the Kelo case, and protect landowners from eminent domain for economic development. However, according to several prominent land use attorneys, ACA 8 actually granted local government more power to take land for economic development by removing several obstacles to the use of eminent domain for that purpose. The League, the Redevelopment Agencies, and the Business Properties Association, the organization that represents shopping malls (and usually supports property rights) went into full lobbying mode to convince Republicans to support ACA 8 so that cities could continue to steal property from the powerless to sell it to shopping mall developers.
The problem? Some Republicans bought it. In fact, in a recent Assembly Republican Caucus, 
several Republican members announced that they support the use of eminent domain for economic development, and support ACA 8. Just like Anakin Skywalker, these Republicans think that government needs this power to do good. In my time in the legislature, I heard many of Republican friends talk about the good things they did by forcing people to sell their business or property to the city, and turning over to a "better" owner.
I came into the Legislature fighting government, federal, state, and local. I used to watch Republicans that I helped get elected to City Councils promise me they would cut taxes if they got elected, and then raise taxes after they were elected because they were convinced by the bureaucracy that the city "needed" the money. Term Limits has now led many of those city council types into the Legislature, and they are preserving the power of abusive government in their decisions. Yes, local governments are better than state governments, just as state governments are better than the federal government. However, all governments have a tendency and desire to take individual liberty, and local governments have proved just as able to steal liberty as any other form of government. Republicans have a sacred trust with the people to be the party to preserve individual liberty. We won’t obtain power until people trust us to do just that, and we lose power when we breach that trust. Republicans in the Legislature won’t deserve the trust of Californians, and won’t obtain power in the Legislature, until they stand up against all abuses of power, including the abuse of eminent domain, and Republican activists should hold any legislator who chooses to promote that kind of abuse to account for their participation in the theft of individual liberty by the "all -powerful" government they helped to create.