So what was the question that Joe Kernen of CNBC put to Donald Trump that the president didn’t want to talk about? Not that it wasn’t a fabulous interview. Buoyed by the economy and the success of his first year, Mr. Trump was relaxed and on his game. There was one question, though, to which the president was loath to respond: “I don’t like talking about it.” He was referring to Mr. Kernen’s question about the weak dollar. And why doesn’t Mr. Trump want to talk about it? “Because, frankly, nobody should be talking about it.”

Tonya Harding couldn’t have twirled around faster than the president has on this head. Back during the election campaign, he was all for talking about the dollar. He was one of the early candidates to do so (Senator Cruz was the first; it was Secretary Clinton who wanted to put criticism of the Fed off limits). And these columns cheered on both Messrs. Cruz and Trump. In our view it was the signal failure of the George W. Bush and Obama years that the value of the dollar had collapsed, clouding the whole economy.

Mr. Trump made what we — and, among others, Judy Shelton — thought was a cagey critique. He campaigned against currency “manipulation” by the Chinese communists. Ms. Shelton noted that Mr. Trump’s manipulation argument could presage monetary reform, which has been stalled in the saucer of the Senate. Yet on the eve of Davos, Mr. Trump’s treasury secretary was trying to spin the weak dollar as some kind of virtue. The Wall Street Journal marked that beggar-thy-neighbor policy as imitating Argentina.

So where is Mr. Trump on the dollar? In his interview with Mr. Kernen, Mr. Trump offered intriguing hints. He started by suggesting that the dollar should “be what it is.” Then he said: “It should also be based on the strength of the country.” Then he added: “We are doing so well, our country is becoming so economically strong again — and strong in other ways too, by the way — that the dollar is going to get stronger and stronger. And ultimately, I want to see a strong dollar.” And then: “Right now it floats.”

Right now? What in the name of Alexander Hamilton does that mean? Mr. Trump said, “it’s your great reserve currency.” He added: “There can never be anything even close to it.” Anything? Ever? “There never will be,” he said. That strikes us as a bit cocky after a first year in which a dollar Federal Reserve note shed 10% of its value, falling to a 1,334th of an ounce of gold from the 1,200th of an ounce of gold it fetched on the day Mr. Trump swore the constitutional oath. No wonder the wires are chattering about competing reserve currencies.

What we hope will prove to be the meaning of Mr. Trump’s reticence on dollar is that he’s not ready to address it — yet. Our hope is that he sees monetary reform as one leg of an economic policy triad. The first, and in some ways, easiest part of the triad is regulatory reform. Mr. Trump spoke of this repeatedly at Davos as ranking up there with tax reform, another leg of the triad. No doubt, given the realities of Congress, Mr. Trump was right to make regulatory- and tax-reform the first two priorities of his presidency.

Without monetary reform, though, regulatory and tax reform will be will-o-wisps (which Wikipedia defines as “atmospheric ghost light” that is “seen at night especially over … swamps,” making it an apt metaphor given the administration’s ambition to drain the capital). Mr. Trump stood for the presidency on a platform that promised to enact Audit the Fed, a first step in reform, and the establishment of a centennial monetary commission to look at what should be done as the Federal Reserve begins its second century. Mr. Trump’s strong start sets him up to start talking about the dollar.