No one enjoys delivering bad news, least of all a lawyer with a hair-trigger client who is prone to fire the messenger.

Thus the dilemma facing the president's counsel, who according to reports must shade the truth and constantly assure the boss that all is quiet on the southern front (thanks, of course, to talk of the magnificent wall).

Given the precarious positions of the current crop of courtiers at Wolf Hall (if this isn't the Secret Service's code name for the Trump White House, it should be.), I will leap into the breach to hammer home to the current occupant six hard truths.

Why me for this thankless task? As an appointee of President Bill Clinton and a staunch supporter of Secretary Hillary Clinton, I am in no danger of being hired by President Trump and, therefore, in no danger of being fired by him.

Truth # 1: Everything Takes Longer Than You Think It Should.

Of all the balderdash flowing to and from the president, the silliest has been that Special Counsel Robert Mueller's investigation was winding down. We were told it would end by Christmas. Or Groundhog Day. Whenever.

Every deadline was artificial and illusory. Aides and attorneys have to keep telling Trump that the end is near in order to keep him from doing something crazy. OK, crazier.

We have no way of knowing how many grand jury subpoenas the special counsel has issued, the terabytes of information yielded by them, the hours it will take to pore over the records, and the additional leads generated by the documents and interviews.

Truth # 2: When you're in a hole, stop digging.

All trial lawyers raised on Perry Mason reruns pray for the day our client will be cleared when someone in the gallery jumps to his feet, shouts “I did it!” and breaks down sobbing.

Most of us will never see that happen, except that we just did and on national TV. Trump confessed to NBC Nightly News Anchor Lester Holt that he fired former FBI Director James Comey over the Russia probe. Exhibit A in why the president should remember only two words when asked to comment on the Mueller investigation: Zip it.

Truth # 3: You are no match for Mueller.

While we're on the subject of Perry Mason, Robert Mueller is no Hamilton Burger, the prosecutor doomed to lose to Mason week after week, rerun after rerun.

The president cannot go toe-to-toe with Mueller, much less mano a mano.

Mueller is sharp, skilled, patient and experienced. In short, the antithesis of Trump, who suffers from at least two fatal flaws for a witness: He appears to have a distorted relationship with facts, and because he thinks he can talk himself out of jams. Even the wiliest witness is far more likely to talk his way into trouble than to talk his way out of it.

No savvy lawyer would allow Trump to meet with Mueller, inside or outside the grand jury room. Trump owns a tower on Fifth Avenue. Good thing. It will make it easier to remember his answer to every question in the grand jury room if he is subpoenaed: take five.

Truth # 4: Stop using the c-word.

Trump shouldn't talk about the investigation at all, but if he ignores that advice, at least quit saying collusion, as in his relentlessly repeated claims of no collusion.

Though the president believes he can browbeat us into submission by repetition, he should learn from Nixon's “I am not a crook” speech. People didn't glean from that assertion a sense of Nixon's innocence. Instead they absorbed exactly two words: Nixon and crook.

Those two words are forever linked in our collective subconscious. Much like Trump and collusion.

Truth # 5: Don't assume the cover-up is worse than the crime.

Since Watergate, it has become a cliché that the cover-up is worse than the crime. Sure, in Watergate the underlying crime was a two-bit break-in of an office with nothing of value.

Here, however, the cover-up may be just another crime and far from the most serious. The root crimes might well be financial in nature. Think money laundering on a massive scale, bank fraud, and conspiracy to commit same.

Truth # 6: You may be flush today but flushed tomorrow.

If Trump is forking over fat fees to big time lawyers but not taking their advice, he should do himself a favor. Hire cheaper lawyers, whose advice he will also ignore.

He is just as likely to wind up in the special counsel's crosshairs, but he will have shelled out less dough to get there.

Paul Coggins is a former United States Attorney for the Northern District of Texas and currently practices white-collar defense and internal investigations in Dallas.