The tide is going out and the whole collusion nonsense (which Tom Friedman of the New York Times said was as serious as the Pearl Harbor and 9/11 attacks) is now down to dark murmurings about the president’s son-in-law speaking after the election with the Russian ambassador. Jared Kushner has let it be known that the ambassador called him and that he will be happy to testify under oath to any appropriate congressional committee whenever he is asked.

The rubbish about the president disclosing Israeli intelligence to the Russian ambassador was mocked by the Russians and denied by the Israeli prime minister, even as the anti-Trump leakers within the administration strained the alliance with the United Kingdom by releasing MI5 intelligence about the Manchester suicide bomber while the British were still rounding up suspected accomplices.

Rear guard actions were conducted by Charles Krauthammer, who has kept his head throughout though not a Trump admirer, and others, claiming Trump should have emphasized support of Clause Five of the North Atlantic Treaty. His support of NATO was nonetheless clear and Clause Five is the essence of the alliance, (and as Krauthammer certainly knows, it is tempered by the following clause that says that each alliance member will determine how it wishes to respond to the attack on all). Clause Five has only been invoked once, after the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon in 2001, and that was largely intended to try to restrain the George W. Bush administration from over-reacting against the Muslim world.