What if Richard Nixon had gone on national television, looked into the cameras and urged a loyal henchman to break into the Watergate building to steal documents that could damage his opponent?

What if Nixon had followed that admission by publicly praising the criminals who committed the break-in, openly calling them "very smart" while also discussing, at length, why they shouldn't really be punished?

What if Nixon's son had acknowledged publicly that one of the people who broke into Watergate had offered him "high-level," "sensitive" dirt on his dad's opponent, quickly responded "I love it!" and then held a meeting at their campaign headquarters to get it?

Would we think those actions were any less sinister because they were done out in the open?

Americans expect scandals to be conducted in the shadows. Plots hatched in secret backrooms seem far more insidious than conspiracies discussed on television or Twitter. This cognitive bias we tend to have -- where we equate nefarious activity with activities conducted in secrecy -- has caused millions of Americans to wrongly dismiss the seriousness of the Trump-Russia investigation. "Surely, they couldn't have been so stupid to openly admit wrongdoing on television and then tweet about it!" they say.