More broadly, a message requires a purpose, a vision — and Trump has none other than I won. I’m great. America’s great. He says he wants to repeal and replace Obamacare, but with what? He surely couldn’t tell you the particulars of any version of the replacement, and doesn’t seem to care much. All he wants is a bill, any bill, and a signing ceremony. It’s hard to “message” that.

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Trump’s only policy is self-promotion; the only rationale for his presidency is survival. He’s consumed by the Russia scandal because his administration, in addition to suffering from gross incompetence, is consumed not with accomplishing something but with defeating his critics. Trump lacks attachment to any set of ideas, beliefs or policies. To the extent he has advanced any “ideas,” they are either childish platitudes (“win”) or hysterical prejudices (i.e., xenophobia) or lies (e.g., climate change is a hoax, Russia didn’t necessarily hack the Democrats). It turns out it’s hard to come up with a message for a president who cares solely about himself.

Trump’s lack of attachment to any ideology or policy is inherently confusing and inconsistent. One day Trump wants repeal-and-replace; the next, he just wants Obamacare to fail; the next, he wants repeal only. Try messaging that. One day he’s ripping up the North American Free Trade Agreement; the next, he’s raising only minor issues for renegotiation. So did NAFTA cause us to lose millions of jobs? Maybe protectionism is bad after all. And if it isn’t trade deals, what does account for economic malaise? You won’t hear a coherent explanation.

House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) foolishly thought he could get Trump simply to adopt a right-wing program the Freedom Caucus would love. But as soon as an idea or program proves unworkable or unpopular, the president won’t stick with it. (Remember, after the Rose Garden ceremony celebrating House passage of an Obamacare bill, he told senators the bill was “mean.”) He has neither the attention span nor the persistence to, as President Barack Obama did, work for months on end shaping a complex piece of legislation. The notion that the GOP could use Trump to achieve its agenda was flawed from the start, both because its agenda was unpopular (tax cuts for the rich, cuts to Medicaid) and because Trump’s agenda consists only of his own self-promotion and -defense. Trump, many of us warned the GOP, is so unfit for the presidency, so lacking in the requisite character and intellect for the job, that he cannot exert the presidential leadership needed to accomplish big legislative goals. He can only get in the way.