In addition to using the presidency to pursue his twin goals of enriching himself and his close family while staying in power, Trump has emerged as a kind of gadfly in chief. His Twitter feed and public appearances frequently include criticisms of other elected officials, observations about how bad various problems are, crackpot theories about who is to blame and speculation about what might happen in the future. In this regard, Trump sounds much more like an outsider, albeit a cranky, angry one with a tenuous relationship with reality, rather than a president who has the ability to address these problems. In an odd way, Trump has responded to being one of the most powerful men in the world, by retreating to a self-imposed powerlessness.