There’s a great quote at the end of Sacha Pfieffer’s Globe piece this morning about thieving trustees who steal from large trusts. Her story focused on Mark Avery, who blew through a $52 million trust in six months and just got jail time for his actions.

Indeed, philanthropy and trusts are riddled with corruption. And the reasons are embodied in this quote:

“There’s absolutely no oversight by the AGs, the IRS is dead in the water and newspapers are bleeding red ink and killing off investigative reporters, so the field is wide open for crooks and scandals.” This frightening observation was made by Pablo Eisenberg of Georgetown University’s Center for Public and Nonprofit Leadership.

Think about the larger implications of no one looking under the covers. Goodbye democracy if we ever really had it. So if you want less government and are willing to let newspaper die, be prepared for rampant corruption. The U.S. will resemble Rome in the late fifth century.