Can he attract hefty new talent? (And how long can he keep the few gems that he has?) One of the corners this White House has painted itself into is the inability to get sane, successful, proficient Republicans to join the Trump show, either to fill vacant slots or as replacements in the coming wave of departures (which happens after Year 1, regardless of who is president).

Can he engineer a big Hill win? Kelly is experienced in working the Senate from his days as the Marine Corps commandant’s legislative assistant (2004-07), and he ‘s going to find extreme unhappiness with this White House’s approach to policy, messaging, strategy and tactics.

Can he shield POTUS from Mueller? We’re going to have document and interview requests, perhaps pleas of the Fifth by people close to Trump. The special counsel has a rich new vein to exploit with today’s WashPost front-pager (denied by Trump’s legal team): “Flying home from Germany on July 8 aboard Air Force One, Trump personally dictated a statement in which Trump Jr. said that he and the Russian lawyer had ‘primarily discussed a program about the adoption of Russian children.'”