THE rIGHT HAS NO CONSCIENCE:

I've finished reading the entire Mueller report, and I must confess that even as a longtime, quite open critic of Donald Trump, even I was surprised at the sheer scope, scale, and brazenness of the lies, falsehoods, and misdirections detailed by the Special Counsel's Office. We've become accustomed to Trump making up his own facts on matters great and small, but to see the extent to which his virus infected his entire political operation is sobering. And the idea that anyone is treating this report as "win" for Trump, given the sheer extent of deceptions exposed (among other things), demonstrates that the bar for his conduct has sunk so low that anything other than outright criminality is too often brushed aside as relatively meaningless. [...]

These lies have multiple consequences. First and most obviously, they demonstrate that the president's word simply can't be trusted. Yes, I know that there are readers who will immediately respond that "we already knew that" or that his dishonesty is already "priced in." But don't forget -- as recently as last year, 76 percent of Republicans still believed that Trump told the truth "all or most of the time." I personally know many people who believe that Trump's ability to "tell it like it is" is one of his chief appeals.

Second, the extent of the lying across the Trump team shows that Trump's lies can't be contained to Trump. Even honest people who believe and repeat Trump's words or the words of key members of his team can find themselves deceiving the public. Those who resist Trump's efforts to deceive can find themselves overruled and publicly shamed. It was to Donald Jr.'s credit that his instinct -- after news of the Trump Tower meeting started to leak -- was to be transparent. It is Trump's shame that he forced his own son to put out a misleading statement instead.

Third, the lies help demonstrate why the underlying investigation was so very necessary. When our intelligence agencies are aware of Russian efforts to interfere in the election and tilt it toward Trump, they know Trump officials are in contact with Russians, and they know that Trump officials are lying about those contacts, then it makes cries of "witch hunt" sound hollow indeed -- especially when the actual results of the investigation demonstrate that the special counsel declined to prosecute multiple individuals who had Russian contacts, including members of Trump's own family.

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