What do you expect, when the criminal gets to appoint the judge? Nothing we didn’t already know, but only some of us care, that the Russians picked our president.

WASHINGTON»A federal judge on Thursday sharply criticized Attorney General William Barr’s handling of the report by the special counsel, Robert Mueller, saying that Barr put forward a “distorted” and “misleading” account of its findings and lacked credibility on the topic.

Judge Reggie Walton said Barr could not be trusted and cited “inconsistencies” between his statements about the report when it was secret and its actual contents that turned out to be more damaging to President Donald Trump. Walton said Barr’s “lack of candor” called “into question Attorney General Barr’s credibility and, in turn, the department’s” assurances to the court.

Still, it was striking to see a Republican-appointed federal judge scathingly dissect Barr’s conduct in a formal judicial ruling and declare that the sitting attorney general had so deceived the American people that he could not trust assertions made by a Justice Department under Barr’s control.

Barr omitted that the special counsel had identified multiple contacts between Trump campaign officials and people with ties to the Russian government and that the campaign expected to benefit from Moscow’s interference.