In our initial take on the WaPo report of a "secret" CIA assessment, according to which Russia, without a shred of evidence, helped Trump win the election (it remains unclear just how Putin "hacked" several hundred thousands Rust Belt workers into believing Hillary Clinton would offshore their jobs), we summarized in five point how this was nothing short of a "soft coup" attempt by leaders of the US Intel community and Obama administration to influence the Electoral College vote. To wit:

Announce "consensus" (not unanimous) "conclusion" based in circumstantial evidence now, before the Electoral College vote, then write a report with actual details due by Jan 20.

Put a proven liar in charge of writing the report on Russian hacking.

Fail to mention that not one of the leaked DNC or Podesta emails has been shown to be inauthentic. So the supposed Russian hacking simply revealed truth about Hillary, DNC, and MSM collusion and corruption.

Fail to mention that if hacking was done by or for US government to stop Hillary, blaming the Russians would be the most likely disinformation used by US agencies.

Expect every pro-Hillary lapdog journalist - which is virtually all of them - in America will hyperventilate (Twitter is on fire regarding this story) about this latest fact-free, anti-Trump political stunt for the next nine days.

At that point we just needed for a prominent liberal to pounce on the WaPo's story as grounds for claiming the Trump presidency is illegitimate.

We didn't have long to wait, and as the NYT's resident Keynesian economist, Paul Krugman, tweeted moments ago, "we'll have a president who lost the pop vote by 2.1%, got in thanks to FBI and Putin. And supporters will demand respect. Um, no."

So we'll have a president who lost the pop vote by 2.1%, got in thanks to FBI and Putin. And supporters will demand respect. Um, no. — Paul Krugman (@paulkrugman) December 10, 2016

Also note CIA held findings until after election; FBI splashed its story -- which turned out to be LITERALLY nothing -- 10 days before — Paul Krugman (@paulkrugman) December 10, 2016

The big problem, for me at least, it how to keep the rage on a simmer, rather than boiling over. The path to justice will be long — Paul Krugman (@paulkrugman) December 10, 2016

And so the strawman has been set, which additionally explains the mainstream media's infatuation with the topic of "fake news" over the past month: between Hillary's recent announcement that "fake news" cost her the election, the "fake news" witch hunt (based on an article which, as its author admitted, later was based on flawed "information"), Obama's announcement that he wants a full review of any "hacking" of the US election before Trump's January 20 inauguration, and now the full-blown "CIA-endorsed" Putin connection, suddenly the Trump presidency is looking very precarious.