I haven’t seen evidence of “coordination.” I will be surprised if it results in findings of collusion and charges you describe. The proof will be in the pudding.
During the campaign, there was the Russian agitprop that showed up on Sputnik, only to be withdrawn shortly afterward (presumably because it was easily proven false). But within hours that same agitprop still shows up in a Trump speech. That was the first and probably biggest of the pre-election evidence of coordination.
You make a good observation that, “Scandal can even happen around events that never actually transpired, or are completely routine events.”
Some of the revelations however unseemly or ethically dubious are not really shocking. Foreign countries try to influence our policy all the time with direct lobbying or through intermediaries, or through people who agree with them. Under a harsh light I think we’d find unclean hands in any administration and especially among hangers on.
Russia trying to influence our policy isn’t shocking at all, nor is the fact that they can get some traction now and again. It’s the end-to-end management of an entire campaign, ownership of a candidate, and the deep, aggressive, and unapologetic complicity of the Americans that’s new.
An argument could be made for a permanent special counsel to keep an eye on these things in every administration.
There is no doubt in my mind at all that a future sane government will revise the existing special counsel laws, as the current ones have now been clearly demonstrated as woefully inadequate. What form that would take is conjecture.
I’ll be surprised if the GOP holds the House. Why are you so…pessimistic?
Your standard accepted rule of thumb for the past few cycles (used by the likes of 538 and RCP) is that Democrats need to win by 8-9 percentage points to break even in the House. Some of the gerrymandering legal cases (such as PA) may reduce that hurdle, but that’s nevertheless a very high hurdle (it turned 2012’s slight Democratic victory at the polls into a crushing defeat in terms of allocated seats). I’m adding to that the impact of aggressive Russian interference, which last time added around 3 points to that hurdle due to Russians targeting close Congressional elections – that’s a little bit of a wildcard, though, because it could be worse due to the Feds not doing anything to stop it, or it could be better because people are more aware this time around. But basically my thinking right now is that Democrats need a complete and utter wipeout – a 12-point victory – to get a 50/50 flip-the-coin shot at the House. And right now they’re polling ahead in the generic ballot, but not even that much ahead, and the races always get closer when you have actual candidates and campaigns going on. An 11-point victory at the polls would be an historic rout under normal circumstances – but unless something changes, I see it as a formula for Republicans holding the House.
The Russia bit is a big wildcard, I admit. It’s also possible the Russians sit this one out or even sabotage the Republicans, in an attempt to sow discord and watch us eat ourselves. But frankly I think Trump is too important of an asset for them to throw away. I think they’ll try just as hard, if not harder, to keep him in place than they did to put him there.
Gerrymandering decisions are another wildcard–a few more states get fair districts and the Democratic hurdle becomes that much smaller. But I’m not thinking that will happen.