More than 20 million Americans tuned in last week to see James Comey testify before the Senate Intelligence Committee. While they watched the former FBI director accuse President Donald Trump of duplicity, House Republicans passed a measure to eliminate or weaken financial reform laws designed to stop Wall Street abuses. While they listened to Comey sound the alarm on Russia's ongoing attempts to destabilize our republic, Senate Republicans moved a step closer to repealing and replacing the Affordable Care Act.

This has led some smart people, even some liberals, to say the Democrats are taking their eyes off the ball. Yes, Comey said the Russians are coming after America, but the most immediate issues right now, they say, are domestic, not foreign. More people care about health care and housing than they do about Republican President Vladimir Putin. If Democrats keep this up, they will once again demonstrate that they are "liberal elites" who don't get ordinary Americans' concerns.

Don't buy it.

Smart political strategy. The Democrats are united in opposition against Obamacare repeal, as they are against Wall Street reform rollbacks. And the Democrats have public opinion on their side. According to a new survey by Public Policy Polling, voters like Obamacare more than the American Health Care Act (Trumpcare), 51 to 34 percent. Among Republicans, only 42 percent favor Trumpcare. Meanwhile, 46 percent of Republicans think the party is trying to protect the president from from the Russia scandal. And for the second straight month, a plurality (47 percent) thinks he should be impeached.

But more fundamentally, most people most of the time don't know much about politics, don't care to know much and don't care that they don't care. Just because they care more about health care than they do about Russia doesn't mean they know more about it. It just means health care isn't as abstract as a foreign threat. It's more real.

Because most people most of the time don't know much about politics, they rely on those they trust to help them vote. (This is something we all do, by the way, even those of us who consider ourselves "high-information voters.") But that trust isn't immutable, even in this era of extreme polarization.

That's where Comey comes in. His testimony gave the Democrats something they could not buy: a wedge to pry Trump from his base. So a focus on Comey and Russia is not another example of "liberal elitism." It is, instead, smart political strategy.

Cartoons on President Trump and Russia View All 91 Images

Salting the wound. Comey called Trump a liar. He said he took detailed notes of nine meetings with the president because he was afraid that Trump would lie about those meetings if Comey was challenged in the future. Comey said the intent of those meetings was clear: His job depended on whether he meant to move forward with the FBI's investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election.

The point is that Comey's testimony may have crippled Trump's credibility. Comey is not a politician. He's a cop. To many Republicans, he's also the man who bucked protocol to inform Congress days before the election that the FBI investigation into Hillary Clinton's use of a private email server had taken a turn.

If he says Trump is liar, the president probably is. Indeed, no Republican challenged Comey, tacitly establishing his claim as fact. That's going to cast a pall over everything Trump wants. And the president's legislative agenda depends on whether his base of support, about 40 percent of the electorate, still trusts him.

According to Public Policy Polling, a Democratic pollster, 49 percent thinks Trump committed obstruction of justice when he fired Comey. Fifty-six percent say Trump is dishonest while 53 percent called him "a liar." Fifty-one percent trust Comey more than Trump, while 39 percent trust Trump more than Comey. Even the media enjoys more trust. Trump loses by 10 points each to CNN, CBS, NBC, the New York Times and the Washington Post.

That's probably why the president is planning to travel outside Washington to promote repealing and replacing Obamacare and investing in infrastructure. According to the Washington Examiner, the president believes his voters "care far more about his economic agenda than the fight with [Comey] or even the Russia investigation."

That's almost certainly wishful thinking, and a sign of Trump's growing insecurity (along with Monday's spectacle of aides and department secretaries lavishing Trump with empty praise).

The Comey testimony hurt. He's trying to heal, but the Democrats see a chance to salt the wound by reminding voters their party has an ambitious economic agenda, including a $1 trillion infrastructure plan based entirely on expenditures. (Trump's plan calls for just $200 billion with the rest coming from private investment.)

The guilty forget to inquire. It's one thing for Trump voters to distrust him. It's another for Trump voters to suspect him. That's where this should be headed. The best outcome of Comey's testimony would be Trump voters finally seeing Trump's interests as in line with Putin's.

During his testimony, Comey said Trump never asked about the specific details of Putin's "active measures" campaign. This was highly unusual for a commander in chief whose first duty is the national defense. But it was also highly revealing. David Simon, a former cops reporter and creator of "The Wire," tweeted over the weekend that the innocent are curious. They want to know what the police know. But "the guilty forget to inquire," he wrote. "They know."