WELL, that was a new one. Even by his own show-stopping standards, Donald Trump’s live tweeting of a Congressional hearing into alleged Russian meddling in a US presidential campaign was a radical move. This Trotsky of tagging, this Vladimir Ilyich with an iPhone (other international comparisons are available, but these seem apt) was watching FBI director James Comey and National Security Agency (NSA) chief Admiral Michael Rogers give evidence to the House Intelligence Committee when he began commenting on their answers. We knew this because one committee member put the President’s tweets to the witnesses.

One could be forgiven for focusing on the Tweet sideshow for a moment because the enormity of what went on in Washington on Monday was difficult to fully grasp at first. With some notable exceptions, including the McCarthy, Watergate, and Iran-Contra sessions, Congressional hearings tend not to generate much excitement. But this one was pure box office.

Had the FBI chief just confirmed that his agents are investigating allegations of collusion between the Russian government and members of the Trump campaign aimed at winning the White House? He had. And had the NSA director just described as “nonsense and ridiculous” claims by Mr Trump’s spokesman that Britain’s GCHQ had been involved in bugging Trump Tower at the behest of President Obama? Yes he had. Truly, America has passed through the looking glass and into a house of mirrors.

Here is another pinch-me moment. The Trump presidency has not even reached its 100-day mark; the Comey-Rogers hearing took place on what was only its 60th day. But that headlines-generating Congressional hearing aside, is it still possible to see what is happening in the Trump presidency as a shaky beginning to what will turn out to be a conventional first term in office, or does the Russia links inquiry signal something more profound?

One can see what would be in it for the Kremlin to meddle in the US election. President Putin and the Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton made no secret of their mutual loathing. During the campaign she framed her willingness to get tough with the Russian president as a virtue and Donald Trump’s admiration for him as yet another of the Republican candidate’s vices. Life would be tougher for Mr Putin under a Clinton presidency, of that we can be sure. Whether that would be a good thing is another matter. But when considering how Mr Putin might have approached the Clinton “problem”, one is reminded of the meeting he had with Angela Merkel in which he brought his black lab in to greet the famously dog-phobic German Chancellor. He denied any mischief making. Still, one can imagine the President being tickled by agents acting on behalf of the Kremlin (never the Kremlin itself, mind) hacking into Democratic National Committee (DNC) emails just to put the wind up its candidate. Consider it a reminder that anyone can be vulnerable. Especially candidates who use private email servers to conduct public business.

Being up to their polo-necks in meddling in the US elections would certainly chime with Russia’s anarchic way of engaging with the world these days. Too poor, too weak and too paranoid about ceding the power it has, the Kremlin must cut its cloth accordingly. Whether or not the allegations about involvement in the US presidential campaign prove to be true, look at the propaganda gains Russia has already accrued. Far from seeming to be yesterday’s superpower, Russia would have shown itself to be still in the game, still capable of influencing events at the highest level. Even if you are not the big bad cyber-bogeyman of legend, cultivating that image might be seen as a good investment. If nothing else it spurs opponents into spending vast sums on cybersecurity.

Just as the winners in this situation are easy to spot, ditto the losers. Mrs Clinton is the most obvious. It remains arguable what impact the hacking of the DNC, and later, and more importantly, James Comey’s decision to reopen an investigation into her use of a private email server, had on the vote. She might still have won the popular vote but lost the electoral college. But that is old news. What matters now is the impact the new FBI investigation has.

The Trump administration is determined to come out swinging. Moreover, it seems to think the most important thing here is not whether any contacts took place but who leaked details about them. Never mind the message the whole affair sends about your administration and the way it came into being, shoot the messengers. And if the messengers won’t offer themselves up for undeserved punishment, deny, deny, deny that there was every anything amiss in the first place. The latter is the tactic being pursued by Sean Spicer, the White House spokesman whose continuation in the job is yet another example of the Trump administration’s defiance of political physics. His response to confirmation of an FBI inquiry? “You can continue to look for something, but continuing to look for something that doesn’t exist doesn’t matter. Nothing has changed.” Read that and weep, Donald “Known Unknowns” Rumsfeld.

But something has changed. No-one can say how long the FBI investigation will continue, or where it will end up. Could be somewhere, could be nowhere. Might be criminal charges brought, might not. It is the very fact of its existence, however, and at this stage in his presidency, that ought to have the president concerned. As the Nixon and Clinton eras showed, the original scandal is wounding enough, but it is the investigation that is the real killer. The drip, drip of claim and counter-claim. The appearance of a President at bay. Being the butt of (even more) jokes rather than the focus of considered attention. One needs the thickest of skins to survive that kind of onslaught, and of all the possessions owned by Mr Trump, we know that item is not among them. If there is one thing guaranteed to irk him more than claims that he did not truly win the election because he lost the popular vote, it is the suggestion that he did not even win the electoral college fair and square. That someone, as his daddy had done before, had to help him out. Who knows what a person backed into a corner like that would do. Rise above it? We can only hope.