Recent F1 championships have been extremely competitive, with several teams in the running for the title. Red Bull have been dominant, but that's not solely down to budget - they have for several years run an almost perfect campaign, down to the last detail. The best driver can't win the world championship without the best team director and the best technical director. Red Bull's success owes as much to Adrian Newey and Christian Horner as it does to Sebastian Vettel. Brawn GP won the 2009 championships without a title sponsor, largely due to the inspired work of Ross Brawn in developing the double diffuser concept.
The F1 rulebook is a complex political compromise that needs to satisfy several parties with competing interests. Bernie wants the most profitable show, the FIA want a sport that best reflects the pinnacle of motorsport and the teams want whatever they think will serve to their advantage. That balance of power is fragile and constantly shifting. The Strategy Group and the Commission have agreed to a budget cap for 2015, which should put most of the grid on equal financial terms.
There is no simple answer to the management of Formula 1, nor any magic bullet to 'fix' the perceived failings of the sport. For every fan that just wants to see a fair fight between the drivers, there is another who wants to see a pure technical competition. For every fan who wants more overtaking and a better show, there is another that hates the contrivances of DRS, tiny rear wings and the dreaded Pirelli tyres. F1 is a sport that reflects all of the complexities and tensions of finance and politics, for better and for worse. It is the biggest, brashest, richest, maddest show on earth, for better and for worse. Try too hard to constrain those forces and you end up with something like A1GP - a sport that in theory panders to the fans, but in doing so loses the magic that makes people care about this gloriously absurd waste of resources that we call motorsport.