We know that certain of his biggest rhetorical flourishes aren’t happening.

They’re not getting a wall

Muslims will not be banned

11 million undocumented aren’t getting deported

Obamacare not getting repealed

Trade deals not getting renegotiated

Jobs not coming back to the Midwest

Some of it just isn’t happening because economic and legislative reality.  Some of it is because it was never going to get through the establishment Republicans.  They LIKE the trade deals.  And as much noise as they make about Obamacare, no elected official wants to throw nearly 30 million people out of the healthcare pool.

But an even more interesting possibility is that Trump is a cipher who never believed any of his own propaganda, he just said all that stuff to rile up his beloved crowds.  Now that the crowds are used, he doesn’t care about them at all.

Ryan and McConnell see him as a useful idiot who will just sign everything they throw on his desk.   Like Grover Norquist said all they need is a president who can “handle a pen.”

But that goes both ways.  And if you can get in the room with him and flatter him and explain how things work, Trump is malleable.  Obama explained Obamacare to him and his song changed.  If Obama could stay in his ear, or any smart person, they could get him to fix it instead of getting rid of it because it makes fiscal and legislative sense.

We know he’s no ideologue, he’s a phony with no fixed principals except he likes 10s and loves himself.