Beltway rock star and corporate lobbyist’s wet dream Paul Ryan is once again showing how little that he can be counted on to be a team player. The establishment’s acclaimed ideas man who as the Speaker of the House is the most powerful Republican in Congress has risen to the top through his ability to work the media and to portray himself as an earnest young man unburdened by personal ambition. He could have been called reluctant Ryan for this acting job in the run-up to his assuming the gavel from the drunken orange weeper John Boehner but the Wisconsin congressman is playing the long game and nothing short of pitching in with his Democrat counterparts to finish off what remains of the American middle class will suffice.

Like the rest of the GOP, the rise of billionaire insurgent Donald Trump has crushed dreams and put many a career on hold. Ryan himself was talked about of being the anointed one for 2016 before the Romney plan of screwing Trump at a brokered convention went up like the proverbial bag of flaming dogshit. Ryan made a big deal of his refusing to support his own party’s presumptive nominee but has backed down somewhat after the ballyhooed Paul Ryan summit two weeks ago. However, instead of getting with the program to spare America from the unmitigaged disaster of the Clinton restoration, Ryan is sulking and balking at jumping aboard the Trump train.

According to Politico “Ryan: Trump could win, but I’m not ‘betting’ on it”:

Paul Ryan loves the word “unity,” but his definition of that term differs sharply from Donald Trump’s vision of a smiling speaker at his side, mouth shut and domesticated — just like Chris Christie.

Ryan, who made peace with Trump earlier this month but remains wait-and-see on the question of whether to endorse the presumptive GOP nominee, sees his 2016 job as ensuring that the party doesn’t become a Cult of Trump — he wants to replace it with ideas.

The sooner Trump gets it, the quicker he’ll jump on the unity bus, a relaxed but adamant Ryan suggested during a 45-minute interview last week for Politico’s “Off Message” podcast.

“When people go to the polls in November, they are not just picking a person … they’re also picking a path,” said Ryan, who spoke repeatedly of unity with the front-runner — while refusing to bet on a Trump victory this fall.

“I think this is a ‘we,’ not just one person,” he added. “I very much believe in a type and style of politics that may not be in vogue today but, I still think, nevertheless, is the right kind of politics.”

It was that core belief, he says, more than any rank political calculation, that led Ryan to say he was “just not ready” to back Trump in a shocker of a CNN interview on May 6. Standing in front of an idyllic waterfall, Ryan said he wanted to see “a standard-bearer that bears our standards” and called on Trump to rein in his worst impulses if he wanted Ryan’s support.

While Ryan’s recalcitrance doesn’t rise to the level of derangement of the Never Trumpers, it still should be troubling. This is especially the case given the nature of the wunderkind’s “ideas” such as turning Medicare over to the insurance industry parasites, giving the gamblers on Wall Street access to everyone’s Social Security money and sealing the deal on the job-murdering Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) aka Obamatrade  not to mention saving the banksters’ bacon in Puerto Rico. Always be wary of men with ideas, Lenin had ideas and such ideas have consequences.

Ryan is currently being challenged in his home state primary but the power of the cheesehead mafia and it’s mighty political machine will easily crush challenger Paul Nehlen allowing the Speaker to win his race in November handily. What Trump needs to do once elected POTUS – an increasingly possibility given the problems with Hillary – is to strip Ryan of any actual power within the Republican party structure outside of his official congressional duties and responsibilities. The man is a treacherous snake and lays in wait – fully coiled and ready to strike.