alt Hacker NewsThat's most definitely not the real sum.
People need to look at financial kick backs. There is a certain guy here in central Europe who left politics quite recently, but suddenly has 400 million euros wealth - out of nowhere. And nobody questions how he got that ...
The corruption happens not only via direct lobbyism. One has to look at the whole corruption bribe bubble here.
Funding their reelection, industry "connections" making it easy for you or your relatives to get jobs or make profitable investments, opportunities to get speaking fees after you leave office and similar perfectly legal things are probably much more common than cash bribes.