It's not a conspiracy per se. It's more like a system of incentives that motivate this kind of behaviour. We have made the politicians into celebrities whoring for our votes so that they can get goodies from their sponsors. It's no longer about any actual politics on the top levels, politicians are trying to strike a balance between decisions that would bring them more votes and those that would bring them more benefits.

I am not saying that's true for every one of them, nor that it's everywhere like that. But I feel that this happens frequently enough to cripple the system.

IMO current democracy as a system of incentives supports Idea 1 much better than Idea 2. Weak evidence, but still.