“Not my System!”: How the “Not My President!” protests could transform in to a movement to restore American democracy

We all need to start or continue protesting Donald Trump’s presidency. He is a sociopath, a pathological liar, a conman, a racist, a bigot, a misogynist, he doesn’t pay his taxes and he exploits workers. He has insatiable greed and, no doubt, only pursued the presidency to personally benefit himself. He represents everything wrong with American culture.

It is absurd that he is our president-elect. He has absolutely no clue what he is doing. We are at severe risk of him violating our civil liberties or starting yet another war. We must organize vigilantly and prepare to have one of the most effective social and political resistances in American history. It is important that we make connections with activists and start following the groups organizing these protests. The better organized we are now, the more effective we will be to potentially stop the next escalation to war in the middle east or a ban on a religion or who knows what else.

We must be a united resistance over the next 4 years, but I challenge you all to do more than that. We are currently a divided nation, but as the next 4 years’ progress, we should seek to transform our resistance against trump in to a unified, popular national movement to radically transform the political and economic system. Let me tell you how and why I think we can accomplish that at this moment in history.

Most of the conservatives who voted Trump in to office did not do so because they thought he would be good, or because they’re all racist or misogynist. No, most of them selected him because they are so appalled by the corrupt political establishment, of which the Clinton family, of course, belongs to. They felt they had no choice.

Donald Trump, is nothing more than a middle finger to both the republican and democratic political establishments by the republican base. He is a protest, via the election of a totally absurd, idiotic wildcard buffoon. To the credit of the republican base, they’re starting to wake up to the fact that the republican party is corrupt and lying to them and they’re looking for outsiders. They’re initial attempt, unfortunately, was totally insane. The political establishment, both left and right is nothing but a corrupt tool for the rich, 1%, who are our true oppressors. Trump now directly reveals our political system for what it is: Oligarchy; rule by an upper rich elite. This indicates that the republicans are in a populist, reject-the-political-system spirit. A simple glance in to America’s streets and at the success the Bernie Sander’s campaign had shown the same about the progressive youth of the country. In that sense, we’re closer to the same page than we think. The challenge is getting past the false left-right divide the upper-class, their media and their political system use to control us with. This may be easier to do than it sounds with the help of a Trump presidency and a continued resistance protest movement against it.

If this direct, in the street resistance to Trump’s presidency can be maintained long term in some form, perhaps regularly spurred by necessary reactions to terrible Trump policy decisions, then its likely this movement is only a couple years away from being massively popular; as we can expect Trump to quickly slide in to popularity oblivion. People will stop seeing it as a pro-left or pro-Clinton movement and begin to see it for what it truly is: an anti-system movement.

These protests are driven by an undercurrent much bigger than an election outcome. Once again, the fury underneath the surface is, at its core, a disdain for the larger system. The movement should thus move forth ignoring what anyone says about “respecting the vote” and “getting over it”. We can have faith that those who criticize it now will join the cause in time, as it is realized that the expressed actions being carried out and anger being expressed by the protesters in the streets are not directed at anyone’s choice but at the fact that we were given such little of a choice, just like we always are.

#NotMySystem is therefore just as accurate as a tag for the movement to spread as #NotMyPresident. For it is the failed system of money in politics, a gerrymandered House of Representatives, a political system that limits itself to two parties and economic system of corporate oppression that transfers all new wealth to the top 1% that got us a Donald Trump presidency.

So, what significant changes could be demanded by a historically popular uprising against the political and economic establishment?

Here are 5 demands that should be made:

A constitutional amendment banning personal and corporate contributions to political candidates and an equal set amount of public financing for all candidates who acquire more than 5% of public support. An amendment creating a proportional voting system for the House of Representatives, instead of the current gerrymander district system. It works like this: let’s say your state gets to elect 9 representatives, as based on population. The people go to the polls and vote only on political parties. Then each party gets to send a representative for every 1/9th of the vote it gets. This enables and encourages 3rd parties to run and achieve representation. The elimination of the electoral college, favoring the popular vote. The implementation of a 1st, 2nd, 3rd choice voting system for senators and the presidency, where if a person’s 1st choice doesn’t achieve a majority then it goes to their 2nd or 3rd This again encourages a multi-party system. A constitutional amendment or law that requires all publicly traded businesses and companies that have over 1000 employees have half of their board of directors be elected representatives from among the workers themselves. This would overnight transform our economic system from one of corporate oppression to one of collaborative enterprise and shared prosperity. Where profits are immediately reinvested in the company or workers rather than being funneled to an elite upper-class.

We could do this if we unite across the nation over the next 4 years and continue pushing to build a strong movement anti-system movement. At some point, we would potentially hit a critical threshold where the movement is big enough, we could launch a national strike and congress would be forced enact these new laws.