Robert Mueller seemed to be hoping during congressional hearings on Wednesday that SEAL Team 6 would rush in and rescue him from his interrogators.

Neither Democrats nor Republicans got the sound bites they were looking for. Mueller declined even to read from his own report, apparently to avoid providing made-for-television clips, and he sometimes came across as muddled.

Yet the hearings still offered a window into the state of our presidency at a time when our political system is being grievously tested. I was transported back to my days as a teenager on an Oregon farm in the early 1970s, watching hearings about Watergate and President Richard Nixon. We had just bought our first television — black-and-white — so that we could follow the national crisis. While there were many facts and laws in dispute, the backdrop seemed indisputable: Our president was dishonest and had egregiously abused his powers.

There were no huge revelations on Wednesday, but there was a similar sense of a stench in Washington that might have far-reaching consequences. Here was one exchange that might offer a glimpse of the future:

Representative Ken Buck, Republican of Colorado: “Could you charge the president with a crime after he left office?”