Something that some parliamentary democracies have that we're not too familiar with in the US is a "shadow cabinet": Opposition parties basically play fantasy football government, appoint "shadow ministers" to various institutions, and compare how they would do things with how the official state is doing things. It occurs on a very granular, operational level that goes well beyond general criticisms.

It's a pretty great idea in general, but has specific applications to some of the uglier contingencies we may face if Donald Trump manages to obtain the Presidency (legitimately or otherwise). In fact, it may actually serve as a template for a general-purpose approach to fail-safing a state in danger of tyrannical usurpation.

If you can stomach the scenario long enough to explore it, imagine that Trump "wins" the election - that leaves the American people and the Constitutional government a couple of months or so to prepare contingencies. Left to its own devices, the state and the public both will rationalize that no matter how crazy things are getting, everything is normal - nothing to see here, all is well. Or make up excuses to just avoid the subject.

Politicians in particular are almost always delusional enough to treat a disaster like that as an opportunity to curry favor with a tyrant through collaborationism, seeking personal benefit by lending a regime some measure of legitimacy. It never works: Tyrants do not moderate - they simply take the gift of legitimacy and use it to further enhance their already extreme agenda. So, for every historical and practical reason, that sort of collaborator instinct will have to be discouraged and ostracized.

The problem is that even if you do so, once a tyrant possesses the legitimate government, they justify their rule as a false dilemma between obedience to them and mere chaos. This is where a mirror government comes in - preferably one already in operation as a source of political criticism, and well-articulated enough to quickly compete for actual power should the need arise.

Think of it as a government-in-exile kit: All the pieces are available, the requirements identified, the systems and international relationships established, but you don't have to use it for anything more than criticism unless forced to. The people involved are already politically and/or economically powerful, so they are fully capable of protecting themselves against being targeted by a regime, and can also utilize their networks of relationships as further guarantees.

This would remove a lot of the danger of a tyrannical POTUS. Military officers and law enforcement institutions would not have to choose between obeying orders to commit atrocities against their own people or joining some fractious, chaotic alphabet-soup mob of opposition groups. They would have a persistent, already established alternative authority to resort to if things went batshit.

The trick, of course, is convincing mainstream politicians that the danger being faced justifies behaving in such an unorthodox way. They would be tempted to delude themselves that the danger was exaggerated or temporary, and that they would rather not compromise the power they themselves would like to eventually assume.

Tricky business, political engineering. But the ability of someone like Donald Trump to even be viable indicates we must begin contemplating contingencies like this. At very least it's a good idea anyway to have opposition parties having mirror cabinets, and would offer viable solutions to otherwise apocalyptic scenarios that are no longer far-fetched.