The special counsel's report on whether Donald Trump attempted to collude with Russia in the 2016 presidential election concluded in the same way the election did - with a completely different outcome than expected, predicted and hoped for by Democrats and the national news media.
Both were thought to be slam dunks - Hillary Clinton would easily be elected the 45th president and Trump would be found to have colluded with Russia in an effort to get himself elected.
No doubts were brooked. The questions only were how much the winning margin for the first female United States president would be and how bad Robert Mueller's report would be on the now-president.
After Trump was elected and inaugurated, the left put all its cards in the special counsel's report. It would be their revenge, their comeuppance for Trump, their insurance policy for impeachment.
With Mueller's conclusion that there was no Russian collusion and Attorney General William Barr's determination that there is insufficient evidence to prove in court that there was any obstruction of justice, Democrats and the national media stand naked before the American people.
Together, the two had conducted a drumbeat for collusion for two years, some stating emphatically what evidence was there, others suggesting that the pieces when put together had to spell guilt, and others just outright lying, hedging the facts and attempting to create truth out of innuendo.
To allay the bitter partisanship they helped create by fanning the flames for collusion, Democrats and the media should use the moment to apologize to Americans for waging such a war against Trump, should offer an olive branch of peace, and suggest that a popular president, a Republican Senate and a Democratic House should work together on meaningful legislation for the country.
However, most Democrats and national media members already have shown they have absolutely no plans to let up. Indeed, House members already have sworn to continue with investigations covering the same ground Mueller spent the last two years - and $25 million - probing, and Democrats and the media have made releasing the special counsel's report their newest desire, as if they might find in a footnote at the bottom of page 622 a phrase that implicates the president after all.
The problem for them is Trump himself and Republicans have expressed a desire to see the whole report - that which can legally be released - too. Although, assuredly, anything not released will be tabbed as the smoking gun.
For Democrats and the media, though, we believe continuing to beat this dead horse is a grave mistake. Trust in the national media already is very low, and the American people are aware Democrats have spent the first two years of the president's administration attacking him, putting up roadblocks against him and acting as if anything substantive he suggested necessarily had to be put off until the Russia probe was concluded.
Worse, their unfounded charges - hammered on every occasion - also also have served to undermine trust in the country's top law enforcement agencies and in Trump (who already can be his own worst enemy with his tweets and his off-the-cuff statements) generally.
In fact, we'd bet that whatever evidence the special counsel found that does not completely exonerate Trump on obstruction of justice charges came from statements he made in public or in private without thinking, without consulting other officials and without the knowledge of whether his comments might be construed as being illegal. In other words, they were just stream of consciousness thoughts, not illegal acts.
Unfortunately, even if that were the case, it's not likely to stop him from doing something similar in the future.
What's important to know is that Russia very definitely did try to interfere in the election and that neither Trump nor his campaign "or anyone associated with it" conspired or coordinated with Russia in that attempt.
The first of those statements ought to be very concerning to the American people, and the country's top law enforcement officials should be working diligently to be sure it doesn't happen again. The second should be very comforting to the populace, including Democrats and the media - that the president always has been as innocent in the whole sordid mess as he claimed.
He and Russian leader Vladimir Putin did not secretly gin up a way to win the election, he and his team did not hack into the Clinton campaign or Democratic organizations, the infamous Trump Tower meeting with a Russian lawyer was much ado about nothing, and no Trump-directed spies were stealthily moving here and there to elicit information.
However, even with Mueller's definitive conclusion, we're of no illusion this is over. In other words, look for another two, or six years, of partisan pursuit. Sigh.