u/InternetBackwash

Since I made a pretty lengthy post a few days ago, I wanted to make this a lot shorter (Didn't really succeed). To Put it bluntly, we are in very confusing, difficult times. I often wake up to a new, distressing headline because of the administration's desire of creating noise for the sake of noise. And with the War in Iran, my anxiousness can often spike randomly and rapidly.

I've talked about this a lot in the past, but due to the nature of the current events in Iran and the last couple of weeks involving Trump getting much more outrageous in his claims, it's important to repeat: Sensationalist headlines and claims are going to be frequent, not due to accuracy, but due to a desire of attention.

From a person claiming that Trump posting a video of Frank Sinatra's "My Way" is a sign of potential escalation, to others claiming reports of a bunker in the ballroom is a sign of Trump getting ready to grab power, To the usual claims of Trump using Nuclear Weapons, there is a lot of claims rapidly making waves with no real basis in reality. In the time of the Internet and attention seeking, people are taking it upon themselves to repeat headlines but obfuscate or change a few words to make the case that "We're so doomed! We're cooked! It's so over!". This isn't due to any belief in this from the ones spreading this, but a desire of getting eyes on the headlines that "No one else is reporting".

And the comments are definitely going to add on to the fearmongering as well. Many of these people spread more conspiracies even more outrageous than the last, for mostly the same reasons: attention and likes. Things seem so bad now that surely these claims are believeable in times like this, right? (I'm also of the mind that just as right wing trolls are very likely to be bots, these doomers are bots made by the same people to make people lose hope and activism).

In times of distress and confusion, it's important to try to spread both reasonable hope, and accurate news. Otherwise, people are going to give up since they already think we've lost. The people spreading this will say they're on your side, or they're just asking questions, but they're wrong. They are as bad as people saying everything's alright and perfectly fine, they just have a different tone of voice. Sometimes people are in the dark, and that's just how it works. Due to the war in Iran, people have taken the chance of making an already stressful situation worse, and spreading a higher amount of misinformation for their own sakes. And it is imperative that we combat this by being as accurate, understanding, and straightforward as we can.

So while the midterms are months away and the general election is a couple of years away, I fell into a series of questions in my head. Mainly around what do we do when a Democratic administration takes over and Trump isn't in power? While it seems simple, indicting the administration, removing the changes made, and limiting executive power whilst recovering the economy and global outlook on America.

But this felt a little simple, while a lot of things couldn't be done in a simple 4 year term afterwards, I had a lot of questions about the future of American Poltics after Trump is no longer a factor. So I wanted to go through at least a few different ideas on issues, ideas, and challenges that are here or will be present in 2028 and beyond. This list is definitely not every point I could bring up but I figured was a good starting point.

1. Dealing with the aftermath of the current administration is likely to be the first steps of the next Presidency. The most crucial element is to not let this go unpunished. America has a tendency to forgive and forget which leads to us being brutally backstabbed in the future. From Reconstruction, to Nazis in WWII, to Jim Crow Laws, to Nixon's Pardon, to even Biden slapping Trump on the wrist, we have let many deeds go unpunished and that has let a lot of evil go on to plan for the future and we can't let it happen again. Trump has said he would pardon his administration before leaving office but that doesn't mean him nor any forgotten buddies of his would be pardoned. No matter what, there can't be any people who can be punished who won't be.
2. The Rise of the Far Right will be very likely in the aftermath of MAGA's collapse. While there will be a lot of infighting, early guesses are to be people like Nick Fuentes, MTG, and Tucker Carlson and those alike would lead the charge of a movement even farther right than Trump. This would be full on white-nationalist Neo-Nazis and it is imperative that we prepare for dealing with them. Not to say that they would win, but they are going to be loud and we need to be too. We have to understand that messaging is important, and things like Israel's genocides are going to be used to spread further antisemitism and attempts to legitimize their movement of bigotry. We are going to have to be loud in defiance of these types as they rise up, even before they gather a sizeable movement.
3. Speaking of Israel, while this is a much larger challenge, we need to be prepared to demand our lawmakers and politicians stand up against them and deliver some much needed silence in response to demands to help bomb countries or delivering money/resources. On top of this, we need to deliver sanctions and heavy punishments for their crimes just as much as we need to do the same for Trump. Even in a potential (albeit uncertain) Newsom administration, this is important.
4. Messaging about Voting/Protecting Voter Rights is especially needed. From trying to push for more progressive voices, to voting in local elections, to calling for affordability, to getting younger people interested in voting there needs to be a larger push for information and help in getting people to voting booths. This could very well also include pushing for making election day a federal holiday with paid leave.
5. Dealing with an Isolated youth, we need to try to push for helping educate younger generations on many important topics they've been losing out on in the age of the internet. From general education in schools (especially red states where schools have been forgotten), to helping keep younger men from right-wing rabbit holes like Andrew Tate or Nick Fuentes, to focus on the importance of mental health, to creating opportunity for community outside of the internet, we need to try to push for helping educate people when the right has a major focus on pushing for disregarding intelligence and pushing for more brain-rotting content.
6. Dealing with Right-Wing Media Sphere. There needs to be heavy investigations into the monopolies of things like Paramount/Warner or Musk's buying of Twitter and how misinformation has grown on said website. On top of this, corporations like Palantir need to be looked at for their surveillance tech and breaking privacy laws.
7. Ending the Second Gilded Age is imperative for recovering our economy and helping the working class. There needs to be a push for higher taxes on the 1% and removing the loopholes so glady used by billionares to avoid taxes. There needs to also be another look at Citizen's United and how lobbying is pushed for congress, including PACs and their buying of politicians. Trump got so far due to these laws assisiting people like him into buying into Politics and helping themselves get richer and it needs to end. NYC can be guide in what we should do in the reverse of this by helping working class people have easier access to jobs, government assistance and aid.

This was a pretty long list, and it is definitely not complete with everything that needs to be done in the future. I know that the future is unknowable which is very scary, but we can start in pushing for this type of movement to be more front and center of our needs, our desires, and our hope for a better future. There is always the concern of a resurgence of this period of a wannabe authoritarian taking office and using this time as a guidebook on how to better succeed at being an authoritarian, but we can also push for us to have a better world through our voices. It isn't easy, but it isn't impossible.