Obama's right

I just saw a clip on the new of Obama saying regarding Trump something close to this:  "I don't think he's ideological, really.  He's more of a pragmatist, which can be a good thing.  It depends on the people he surrounds himself with.  Am I worried about his administration - of course I am."

Yes, it's Obama being generous, and assessing Trump right.  I mean it's abundantly clear, the number of times Trump contradicts himself, that he has no well thought out ideological positions.  He tells the audience what he thinks they need to hear in order to advance his own self interest. 

To take a skerrick of "looking on the bright side" on Trump*, there is a case to be made that a Cruz presidency would have been more dangerous, because you can't imagine him ever changing a position based on pragmatism winning over ideology.  He would be absolutely impervious to contrary advice.

The crucial thing with Trump, though, is that with the appointment of Bannon as adviser, and a likely cabal of ideologically driven AGW deniers/lukewarmers and economic Laffer-ites around him, there is virtually no reason to believe he will get sound advice.

* although this may end up being as fruitless an exercise as asking whether Mussolini, if he were German, would have made a better leader for pre-war Germany than Hitler.