The problem there was although they were stated to be priorities, neither Trump nor the Republican caucuses in Congress or the Senate actually thought either things were a good idea. Those weren’t ideologically motivated objectives, they were publicity motivated positions.

Okay, fair, but the end result is still a two year tenure starting in 2016 where the whole federal government was until Republican control, and almost no progress was made on anything. The big achievement was passing a set of unfunded tax cuts— it's got to be pretty devastating for that to be the high point of a career (Ryan's) built on being a deficit hawk.

Sure, but I suspect that deadlock was more to do with the specifics of the awkward relationship between mainstream Republican representatives and Trump in particular than a systemic problem. Ugh, as someone who considers themselves a natural (moderate) conservative it pains me to say this, but frankly it's just as well.