Of course Trump can't drain the swamp. No one can.

You might remember that when Barack Obama took office he banned anyone who had been a registered lobbyist from working in his administration (though he ended up making some exceptions). Did that change the way Washington worked in any lasting way? Not really. Obama’s administration was remarkably free of scandal, more so than any in decades. But that didn’t make future scandals any less likely.

The deepest problems in the ways Washington works were built over decades and can’t be undone by one president, whether he’s an “outsider” or not. Dwight Eisenhower warned us about the military industrial complex in 1961; over half a century later, it’s stronger and more deeply embedded than ever. Trump jawbones a couple of CEOs about the cost of government contracts and comes away thinking he’s accomplished something; the CEOs, who know the system better than he ever will, understand how wrong he is.

If nothing else, Trump understands how fervent the desire to drain the swamp is — it’s always there and it never abates. Much of the time it just means “My side isn’t getting what it wants;” you didn’t hear Republicans complaining about how Washington works when George W. Bush was starting wars and cutting taxes on the wealthy. But the desire is why every congressional challenger says, “If you elect me, I’m going to change the way they do business in Washington!” Which of course a freshman member of Congress will never do.