The fix is in. Donald Trump will not be the next president of the United States. The votes have yet to be fully cast, let alone counted, but even if the national ballot box is in for a jack-in-the-box surprise, the outcome is set. The U.S. is democratic up to a point, after which more weighty considerations weigh in.
The political system of the world's most powerful country has evolved to produce manageable and malleable candidates, not upstarts, rebels and rank populists. The problem with Trump's presidential bid is that it is hard to picture a man with such gut-punching rhetoric presiding over the Pentagon, the CIA, the State Department, Wall Street, the Supreme Court and other power players integral to America's august establishment.
Deep states do their best work by sleight of hand, installing career politicians in their stead, leaving the real machinations hidden from view. Americans got a glimpse of the deep state rearing its head during the impasse of the presidential election in 2000, in which Bush was proclaimed victorious over Gore, with a nudge from the Supreme Court, even though the "winner" actually lost the popular vote.