If (Colbert) continues moving toward a presidential campaign, particularly if he, or Comedy Central, keeps spending money exploring and promoting by hyping it on his nightly half-hour news parody show, he could get himself and his network in trouble for violating election laws, including those barring corporate campaign contributions.

Colbert, Vogel adds, seems to be aware that he might be on shaky legal ground:

On his Thursday show, he unveiled a campaign website and even made it clear a top election law firm, Wiley Rein, had advised him on how to avoid running afoul of the prohibition on corporate campaign contributions.

One other thing about Vogel’s story stood out to us. He gave anonymity to "an election lawyer who … did not want to risk incurring Colbert’s wrath."

We asked Vogel about why the lawyer didn’t want to be named. "He’s a guy who represents prominent politicians and I believe he did not want his clients dragged into it," Vogel said.

Is Vogel worried about the "wrath of Colbert" being aimed at him?

"I thought about that," he said, "and it turns out that (Jon) Stewart is off next week and they’re airing reruns. Traditionally, when he has been off, so has Colbert. … I think that probably the potential for being a target of his wrath would subside over the course of the week."

Hmm. We wonder …