Oops!

Bad things can happen when people confuse genuine ethical concerns with vague concepts of possible appearances of impropriety. Thus, in Colorado, citizens passed a ballot initiative amending the constitution on matters they supposed to be related to ethics. In fact, the new language in the Colorado constitution is so broad that the state's attorney general has opined that it would violate the constitution for a university to give the child of any state government employee, including, for example, a school teacher, a college scholarship. It would also appear to be unconstitutional for a university professor to accept a Nobel Prize.

The technical term for this situation is "mess."