One debate concerns how seriously anti-Trumpers should take him. At one end of the spectrum are people who find Trump an absurd figure but essentially the political equivalent of a professional wrestler—lots of bluster and puffery that is ultimately devoid of content beyond self-protection and self-promotion. By these lights Trump is dangerous in a moment like the corona pandemic because he is in over his head, not because he has lots of menacing plans in his head. At the other end of this spectrum is the belief that he may not be guided by deep ideas in the traditional sense of politics but he is guided by some clear and purposeful instincts—toward elevating executive power (as long as he is the executive), punishing enemies, and weakening traditional constraints of custom and law. This is the thesis of a pre-pandemic cover story in the Atlantic by influential writer George Packer.

The other debate, related, concerns how seriously Trump takes himself. Does he have any ability to detach himself from his own performance, to self-critique and modulate, to occasionally give a knowing wink to the audience to signal that he understands his act as well as they do. Or is he so fully immersed in the performance that he is lost in it—no longer makes a distinction between reality show and reality?

(Incidentally, these debates among Trump foes are matched by ones from Trump supporters. Is he a crude but surprisingly effective politician with whom one can make common cause—the Mitch McConnell position? Or is he possessed of some kind of mystical leadership skills—possibly what former Energy Secretary Rick Perry meant when he said Trump was God’s “chosen one.”)

The debate over how much Trump has weakened constitutional democracy in prepandemic episodes—his effort to nullify the independence of the FBI, for instance, or his consistent defiance of congressional oversight—is an argument without end, one that surely will continue years after Trump leaves office.

But the stylistic question—how much ability Trump has to tailor his brand of politics to fit new circumstances and meet new demands—may well have been settled decisively in this crisis. The answer is no.

If he had the ability to modulate to the moment he would have done so. And at times he has tried to do so. “Acting with compassion and love, we will heal the sick, care for those in need, help our fellow citizens and emerge from this challenge stronger and more unified than ever before,” he said at the end of his Oval Office address earlier this month, in a line that read like it was inserted at the insistence of someone else, like Ivanka Trump or Jared Kushner.

But his pugilistic instincts returned almost instantly, as did his instinct that the most important part of being a winning leader is bluff self-confidence. Rather than seize command in the crisis, Trump is determined to project that bad news is the fault of someone else. "The LameStream Media,” Trump tweeted on Wednesday, “is the dominant force in trying to get me to keep our Country closed as long as possible in the hope that it will be detrimental to my election success.”

There was an old Trump argument summoned to service in a new era. Maybe the most surprising thing we have learned about Trump during the pandemic is that he no longer has much capacity to surprise.

