Great article. 2 points:
I’ve waited 25 years to vote against that bitch.
Hilarious!
Trump is leading a center-right movement up the Nolan Chart towards the America we hold in our heads, not the one we live in.
I don't think this is the case. Trump is no closet idealist. He uses government power arbitrarily as we've seen in the growing trade war and lobbing a few missles into Syria. He's good on deregulation and bad on a bunch of stuff. So I don't think he is guided by any ideal of liberty, he's just a pragmatist in achieving his goals.
Those end goals might be slightly more free than where we are now in some respects, but it's destination isn't the top of the chart.
No he isn't an idealist. But, I think that the natural reaction is this because that's the rhetoric he's using to continue gaining popular support. Most people see themselves as far more libertarian than they actually are.
That can, and will, turn into a shift in political preferences once they see the world getting safer as the Empire is drawn down.