This week, we saw Trump in his "statesman" role traveling to Mexico, only to return to his howling at the moon rage persona by that same evening. I've never seen a political figure, or any figure, so blatantly shift policy positions simply to generate applause. There really is no there there with this guy. A walking bumper sticker but with no stick 'em. While pretty much every politician pivots or adds nuance or tones down rhetoric, Trump is unique in how obvious it is. There's no crafty cleverness, just abrupt, to-hell-with-whatever-I-said-yesterday playing to whatever room he's in. I'm curious as to why his most ardent supporters trust that he will indeed stay true to the things he's saying on the campaign trail. On issue after issue, he's taken so many varying positions that it's really impossible to know what he actually believes. Maybe he simply doesn't have any strong core beliefs, and is willing to run his presidency based on popularity polls and "ratings." Prior to Trump, Sarah Palin was ill-prepared, incredibly surface oriented, thin-skinned and egotistical, but she certainly holds definable hard right principles. No matter how much gibberish it takes for her to say what's on her mind, her views are pretty consistent. Trump always seems to be phoning it in, winging it, some sort of political improv act that's all about attention, cameras, cheers and laughs.
I'm seeing a growing consensus, partly from media people who travel with the campaign, that Trump seems to believe whatever the last person who spoke to him believes. And what he says on any given occasion is, to a remarkable degree, dependent on whom he spoke to last. So if Kellyanne Conway says "you need to soften on immigration. Tell them you'll kick the criminals out, but other than that, you're softening," then that's what he says. And then if Jeff Sessions or Stephen Bannon tells him 12 hours later "you need to be hard-line on immigration. That's what got you this far, that's what your base demands," then that's what he says. He really doesn't seem to have any core convictions other than "Trump is great," and is extraordinarily malleable and easy to manipulate, especially through flattery. It should go without saying that that would be an absolutely terrible (possibly catastrophic) quality to have in a President.
Trump believes in ONE THING: ABSOLUTELY NOTHING. He totally panders to whatever audience he is in front of; his only desire is to receive the adoration of the assembled crowd. Total narcissist.
