IT'S MUELLER TIME!

Donald Trump has always been difficult to listen to, but now, following the end of the Mueller investigation, he will be particularly insufferable.

He claims to have been totally vindicated by the report, but that is far from the truth. On the other hand, far from the truth is where Trump operates.

Mueller concluded that Russia attempted to interfere in our 2016 election by two means: a Web-based disinformation campaign; and the hacking of Democratic emails later disseminated by WikiLeaks.

Trump has often denied those attacks, since it puts an asterisk on his victory. But because he and his people didn't directly assist Russia in making those particular attacks, they were exonerated of collusion.

This doesn't mean there wasn't collusion in some other form. Certainly Don Junior attempted to collude with Russian nationals in getting dirt on Hillary, but that operation failed. And the Russians were apparently not involved in either of the two attacks set forth by Mueller. So it doesn't count, even as an attempt.

Other Trump folks had unreported meetings with Russians, and lied about them to the FBI. Indictments and plea deals have already gone out on those crimes. Again, since these meetings were not apparently related to the two official Russian attacks investigated by Mueller, they didn't count as collusion.

As for obstruction of justice, Mueller offers no opinion, throwing the matter to the Attorney General. He does say this conclusion is not an exoneration of Trump. The AG says he will not prosecute, so I guess the president picked the right guy there.

Trump's position is that because he was not found guilty of colluding with the two specific Russian attacks, he should never have been investigated in the first place. But remember, he doesn't consistently agree there WERE any attempts to influence the election. His real relationship with Russia (and Putin in particular) will probably never be fully known (even by Trump). As a result, the question of his guilt vis-a-vis Russia will remain an open question.

But not to Trump. The only thing open about Trump is his mouth, and we're going to be hearing a lot of fine partisan rhetoric coming out of that turbo-charged device.

Trump is already saying the investigation of his activities began very early on, and illegally at that. I imagine he's referring to the "I was tapped by Obama in Trump Tower" deal. It's not clear if he understands what happened there. Foreign nationals were tapped, and when they called Trump or his people, the Americans were inadvertently recorded.

Trump hints that Obama set this whole thing in motion, maybe even encouraging those foreign nationals to call Trump so Obama could listen in. (Which might explain why Trump called the man "sick.")

Again, full information may never be known, but that never stops Trump from declaring total victory. It's what he does.

The firing of FBI Director James Comey triggered the Mueller investigation. It also triggered non-stop attacks by Trump on those two men, impugning their integrity and so forth. But Comey's handing of the Hillary email situation, especially the reopening of the investigation just before the election, helped put Trump in office.

And Mueller may have just handed Trump his reelection.

Irony is alive and well.