CHUCK TODD: “You have been more outspoken than really any former official. And in fact, it may be why many Republican legislators feel comfortable taking the president’s side; they believe your comments have been over the top. Do you regret essentially accusing the president of treason? Do you regret some of the things you have said?”

JOHN BRENNAN: “I called his behavior treasonous, which is to betray one’s trust and aid and abet the enemy, and I stand very much by that claim.”

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That exchange on “Meet the Press” over the weekend underscores how detached our public debate has become from the meaning of treason. It’s not just that John Brennan seems to lack for a clue about the essentials of treason under the Constitution upon which he placed his hand when he was sworn in as President Obama’s director of central intelligence. It’s also that a veteran journalist like Chuck Todd fails to call him on it.

We understand that our long-suffering readers have previously been subjected to the Sun’s take on treason. Yet it these parlous times it seems the point can’t be made often enough. It’s just disingenuous for Mr. Brennan to suggest, as he did on NBC, that treason means to “betray one’s trust and abet the enemy.” The Constitution, to which he was sworn, forbids our courts from crediting that definition of of treason.

It does so in the article of the Constitution — three — that establishes the judicial branch. Section three of the article ordains: “Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort.” When Congress outlawed treason by statute, it added a further restriction, limiting the crime to whoever is “owing allegiance to the United States.” Fair enough.

There is, though, no definition in American law that is consonant with Mr. Brennan’s language. There’s nothing in it about betraying one’s trust or abetting the enemy. To be a traitor one must either “levy war” against the United States or one must “adhere to their enemies.” Plus, too, if adhering is going to be the treasonous act, then the Constitution insists that there must be the giving to our enemies not just “aid” or “comfort” but both aid and comfort.

That’s the plain language of it. Feature the liberality of that formulation, we wrote when the press and politicians (forgive the redundancy) started using the word treason in respect of Bowe Bergdahl. The definition suggests, we noted, that even in war, one can dissent from our government without committing treason. The plain language suggests that one can even adhere to an enemy without committing treason.

Imagine, we’ve written, an American whose family came over from, say, Germany some years before World War I and felt loyalty to the old country. He read the newspaper or sat by the radio and privately rooted for Germany — so long as he didn’t do anything about it. Were he also to give aid and comfort, then it would be treason. Whether or not one adheres to an enemy, one may never levy war against the United States. That is treason.

What Mr. Brennan has been talking about is not within a hundred miles of the definition to which the Constitution confines the meaning of treason. We’re happy to leave to the congress, courts, and president the question of whether Russia can be an enemy absence a declaration of war. It’s certainly an adversary, but that’s not enough for treason. It has to be an enemy. Nor is collusion sufficient. There must be levying war or adhering to an enemy. Once that happens, of course, all bets are off.

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Photo of Mr. Brennan from the Central Intelligence Agency via Wikipedia.