THE ALTERNATIVE IS MUCH WORSE THAN THE BLACKMAIL/BRIBERY THEORY:

I don't believe Donald Trump colluded with Russia to hack the Democratic National Committee. I don't think anyone working on Trump's behalf met with anyone working for Vladimir Putin. That allegation--which appeared in clearly erroneous form in the sketchy "dossier" published by BuzzFeed on Tuesday--could turn out to be true. But nothing I've seen so far, dossier included, has convinced me.

But that leaves all of us with a problem: How do we explain the overtly pro-Russian behavior of Trump and his surrogates? If they're not Russian puppets, why do they work so hard to defend Putin and Russia against American investigators and reporters? Why do they divert blame to other countries and victims of the hack? Why, instead of targeting the Russian intelligence agencies that infiltrated us, do they attack the American intelligence agencies that exposed the Russians?

This behavior has been going on for months. In June, Trump openly invited Putin to hack more Democratic emails. Trump's allies excused this as a joke, but Trump kept going. In July, he defended Russia's invasion of Crimea. Even after the election, and after U.S. intelligence agencies had reported that senior Russian officials directed the hack "to interfere with the US election process," Trump ridiculed the intelligence agencies and scoffed: "They have no idea if it's Russia or China or somebody."

Last week's intelligence briefing on the hack was supposed to bring Trump around. "If, after the briefing, he is still unsure," said Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham, "that will shake me to my core about his judgment." But the briefing has changed almost nothing. Trump continues to belittle the intelligence, question Russia's guilt, divert scrutiny, and attack the intelligence community.

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