Learn An Entire Semester Of Campaign Finance Law In Less Than 4 Minutes

As American elections become even more outrageously expensive, the advocacy group Public Citizen argues voters deserve to know who is making a financial play for influence in Washington. The think tank is asking President Obama to sign an executive order requiring all federal contractors to disclose their contributions to political candidates and campaigns. Such an order would mean more transparency about how much money politicians get from companies in competition for lucrative government contracts -- a competition that may be decided by the very politicians those companies donate to.

But how did campaign finance law become so shady? And what led to elections becoming a billion-dollar industry? It all goes back to Buckley V. Valeo, "the most important case in campaign finance law" in our nation's history, according to Jessica Levinson, a professor at Loyola Law School. Watch the video above to see Levinson break down 30 hours' worth of her class to HuffPost Live's Josh Zepps in less than four minutes.

See the entire HuffPost Live conversation about dark money and elections here.

Sign up here for Live Today, HuffPost Live’s morning email that will let you know the newsmakers, celebrities and politicians joining us that day and give you the best clips from the day before.