What the Panama Papers have revealed so far isn’t exactly startling: elites have been using power and influence to bend institutions as far back as the record goes. What is startling, for some, proves to be the lack of prominent American names.

There are no heads of state or government like Iceland’s Prime Minister Sigmundur Davíð Gunnlaugsson and Ukraine’s President Petro Poroshenko. There are no close connections to major politicians Bashir al-Assad’s cousins, David Cameron’s father, and Vladimir Putin’s childhood friends.

And this isn’t because American elites are benevolent or because they’re moved by an invisible hand to keep their money in the country; on the contrary, the United States is both a major source of clients for international tax havens and a burgeoning tax haven itself.

Whether it’s because Americans aren’t taken as clients at Mossack Fonseca and go elsewhere or whether it’s because the journalists breaking the story are still following up leads, there are undoubtedly wealthy and powerful Americans evading taxes and hiding wealth at home or overseas.

What should be startling is the context this takes place in; a dual society is emerging where elites are not only allowed but incentivized to violate the rule of law. By virtue of being powerful or wealthy, the rule of law need not apply. The examples of this abound (the NSA surveillance programs, the 2008 crisis, and the Iraq War are some of the most recent) but the thread runs back all the way to—of all people—Nixon.

The core principle of the rule of law is that it does not have any regard for individuals. It treats all persons as equal both in protection and punishment. In the same breath that Ford invoked this principle, he explicitly rejected it by stating it would recognize a political reality where standards expected of the public were violated by elites if they proved too disruptive.

This was a startling shift. The rule of law exists largely to limit the power of elites: to develop institutions that minimize the capacity for exploitation of individuals while expanding the population’s capacity for individual agency.

Previously, rhetoric had always maintained the rule of law as an ideal to be pursued even as reality held otherwise. Basic human rights were denied to African Americans, to women, and other disenfranchised minority groups for centuries in America, e.g. status as human beings, the right to vote, protection from domestic terrorism. All the while, we espoused dedication to those same principles, empowering populations as they organized to slowly progress towards these ideals.

And so, while holding the highest office in the land, Ford legitimized rhetoric which rebuked the rule of law and how it was enforced and expanded; he rebuked the power of an ideal that we can all rally around. Gone was the rationale behind punishing elites, which set off a long list of cases where political elites wantonly committed criminal acts.

This is the sort of rhetoric which lies behind why, if American elites show up in the Panama Papers, they will never see jail time. The rule of law is a nice idea but consider Ford’s remarks just a month earlier as he was sworn in:

The first thing we should ask ourselves is “what was the national nightmare?”. The Watergate scandal of course. But Ford’s framing of the Nixon’s administration criminality makes this behavior seem as if it was a crisis we all shared and we all must collectively forget like a bad dream.

It absolves Nixon, hides his crimes behind neutral language, then makes a quick appeal to our collective identity as a nation without actually addressing the crimes. It legitimizes the idea that our government is one of men—powerful men—and not laws or important principles. It prioritizes “tranquility” for the sake of its most powerful citizens while undermining the means to prevent elites from acting like criminals.

When during the Iran-Contra hearings it became painfully obvious how high the criminal behavior went, the argument was made that the nation could not bear to disrupt the sea of tranquility by holding elites accountable. George H. W. Bush would defend the pardons given to those implicated in Iran-Contra by saying “[They] have already paid a [personal] price… grossly disproporionate to any misdeeds or errors of judgment they may have committed.”

When during the dying of flames in the ruins of Iraq it became painfully clear the extent to which Bush II’s administration lied to the public and violated international law on torture, the argument was made that the nation could not bear to disrupt the sea of tranquility by holding elites accountable.

When during the greatest financial disaster since the Great Depression it became painfully transparent that Wall Street had collectively defrauded the American people, the argument was made that the nation could not bear to disrupt the sea of tranquility by holding elites accountable. Louise Story, a financial reporter for the New York Times, explained that there was “[A} gentlemen’s agreement… it really allows companies to keep their share prices higher and it helps companies continue to do business with the government.” when discussing the deferred prosecution agreements.

The pattern continues through the leaks of William Binney, Thomas Drake, Chelsea Manning, Edward Snowden and other whistleblowers: the nation cannot not bear to disrupt the sea of tranquility by holding elites accountable.

In the words of J. Paul Getty, “If you owe the bank $100 that’s your problem. If you owe the bank $100 million, that’s the bank’s problem.” The principle here is simple: large institutions have an incentive to shield elites from punishment under the rule of law. If you can’t pay that $100 million loan, the bank has a vested interest in keeping you afloat. If you break a law as an elite, institutions have a vested interest in keeping you out of jail: these institutions more or less rely on that sort of protection for themselves.

So when no Wall Street executive has gone to jail for their part in the Great Recession or when leaks documenting potential war crimes send whistleblowers to jail but top brass to the private sector, the message is clear: do as we say, not as we do.

As long as this dubious doctrine is embraced by mainstream commentary, American elites will continue to brandish their Get Out of Jail cards while committing various crimes.

Nothing inside the Panama Papers will change this. Nothing in the Panama Papers can change this.

Only we can change this asking ourselves if such a situation matches with our values concerning the rule of law. Can we claim to be a vibrant democracy founded on the principle of “liberty and justice for all” when there exists two sets of rules: one for elites and one for everyone else?