The build up last night on MSNBC had my phone ringing off the hook.  Rachel Maddow proclaimed “we’ve got the Trump returns.”  It turned out to be just the 2005 filing. Well, not the 2005 filing, the first two pages.  Worse yet, it turned out to be an entirely predictable tax return for a wealthy businessman with tons of deductibles.  It seemed like the tax version of Al Capone’s safe with Geraldo Rivera.  What was particularly odd is that MSNBC was “all in” — even after seeing that there was little there.  Maddow led with a long list of things we want to know from Trump’s tax return.  But none of those things were in the return.  They lined  up experts who seemed a lot like the “weather center” reporters the night before covering the major snow storm in D.C.   Reporters literally showed a dusting on cars in parking lots and spoke breathlessly about the possible storm that never came.  The tax experts were left in the same curious position — discussing what might have been shown.  As a legal commentator, I bowed out.  It was like being called as a seismologists to discuss an earthquake that never happened.  It is certainly true that Trump and Melania paid is a rate of less than 4 percent on their personal income — $5.3 million. However, they paid an additional $31 million under the alternative minimum tax, or AMT.  They used every loophole and tactic to reduce payments but those loopholes were legal and used by many in his tax bracket.

Having said that, the White House and others went too far in raising allegations of criminal conduct by Maddow and MSNBC in reporting on the story. There was also a return to the mantra of the “dishonest media.”  There was nothing dishonest in publishing the return. It was clearly overplayed but it was not dishonest to cover the leak.

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