Below is a hilarious clip of Stephen Colbert mocking the 2010 landmark Supreme Court case Citizens United. It's humorous, but it misses the bigger point.
Let's say that the NFL basically tells its officiating crews that there are rules to regulate the game of football, but that the officials will now have much leeway in calling penalties outside those specified in the rule book if they believe that by doing so they improve any given game. As a consequence of this new discretion on the part of officials, they begin accepting bribes that advantage one team, or one of its members, over the other team (obviously advantaging the team paying the bribe), under the ruse that their penalties were making the game "fairer" or "better."
The officials are getting rich and accusations of impropriety on the part of officiating crews fly. Would any reasonable person argue that the problem of such impropriety by NFL officials is caused by how they receive their bribes? Just change the way bribes are paid and the improprieties and rent-seeking by prospective officials seeking a job officiating in the NFL will stop? Really? Isn't the problem caused by permitting the officials to stray from the strict rules and guidelines they were hired to enforce, including rules that limit their actions on the field?
There is not too much money in politics; there is too much government and politics in money.
