The blowback over Attorney General Loretta Lynch’s private meeting with Bill Clinton was instant, and it came even from Democrats. To be sure, though, when leftists like former Barack Obama adviser David Axelrod complain about the “optics” — by which he means political appearances — they are completely misdirecting about the root problem. The problem isn’t just that people might get the wrong idea. It’s that Hillary Clinton is under FBI investigation for breaking federal law, and Lynch could decide whether she’s indicted. In fact, Bill Clinton himself is under investigation for Clinton Foundation pay-for-play corruption while Hillary was at State. And as David Harsanyi notes, Bill “has already been impeached for lying under oath and obstructing justice.” The believability of the parties involved is effectively zero.

By the way, the only reason anyone knows about the off-the-books, supposedly impromptu “social” meeting is that a local Phoenix news crew happened to see the pair on the airport tarmac. According to one of those reporters, “The FBI there on the tarmac instruct[ed] everybody around, ‘No photos, no pictures, no cell phones.’” Wonder why that might be.

Lynch will reportedly announce today that she is going to remove herself from decision making in the case and, according to The New York Times water-carrying exclusive, “accept whatever recommendation career prosecutors and the F.B.I. director make.” But all she has to do is let it be known — perhaps in another “social” off-the-books conversation with one of those “career prosecutors” at the Justice Department — that Clinton is not to be indicted. Then not only do Democrats get their “cleared” nominee, but Lynch and the whole Justice Department can claim to have gone beyond the call of duty to ensure a legitimate outcome. It’s smoke and mirrors designed to cost Republicans even more political capital. So ironically, the clear appearance of corruption may help Clinton. In a case essential in determining the next president of the United States, that bodes terribly ill for Rule of Law.