Depending on how one looks at it, the ascendancy of Donald Trump to the office of President could be one of the best things to happen to the United States and beyond in some time.  Call it "Making America Grate Again," or "Mourning in America," but the dynamic nation just to the south of us is experiencing an age of angst and energy that hasn't been seen in more than a generation.A couple of observations from comedian George Carlin come to mind.  "In America, anyone can become president.  That's the problem."  He went on to note, "That's why they call it the American Dream because you have to be asleep to believe it."  Well, the United States is many things at the moment, but nodding off isn't one of them.  The rustling, and wrestling, spirit of the country is casting off its indifference and expressing its pleasure/displeasure every minute of the day.  Though the opinion of what constitutes the "American Dream" varies widely, the country's days of slumber have come to an end.The nation has never been good at standing still.  America's teeming masses have always faced issues that, at times, threatened to split the country wide apart.  Racism, slavery, women's equality, the tragic Civil War, and political opportunism have caused citizens to pull back from the edge of destruction on numerous occasions.  Yet because of its great wealth, ingenuity, occasional timely leadership, and fierce independence, it has somehow gathered itself together to fight another day.But in the modern era, nothing has quite jostled the United States to its core the way Trump's election has.  Only weeks into his tenure, the airwaves and lawyers are alive with the possibilities of a Constitutional crisis.  Immigration has become a touchstone of this conflagration.  Protest marches have stretched across the country and the globe at the same time.   This list could go on, but we get the drift: everything is in flux.Well, maybe not.  While much of the country went Republican, nine million Californians turned the region an even deeper blue, and America's most populous state has sworn to fight Trump's efforts to bypass traditional authority structures every step of the way.  International trade agreements can't be discarded easily.  Whether it's NATO or the handling of Russia's Putin, pushback is coming because no one person or position should be able to sweep away so unilaterally something that took decades to construct.  Donald Trump might yet become the key transformative leader of populism around the world, but if he wants to effect change he'll have to negotiate those agreements enacted previously by elected Democratic and Republican administrations.Democratic institutions, for all their ineffectiveness at the moment, exist to provide safeguards against the abuse of power.  George Orwell's 1984 reminds us why that is: "One does not establish a dictatorship in order to safeguard a revolution; one makes the revolution in order to establish the dictatorship."  Donald Trump has accomplished the first part of that equation; many worry that he might also fulfill the second, and so they are fighting back.  For those who think this a bit severe, a recently unearthed 2013 quote by Trump's chief political architect, Steve Bannon, to writer Ronald Radosh gives pause:  "Lenin wanted to destroy the state, and that's my goal too.  I want to bring everything crashing down, and destroy all of today's establishment."The age of pushback is here, with no one knowing quite how it will play out.  It will come from places like the state of California, and from protest marches.  In an insightful column in the National Post, Andrew Coyne challenges nations to act with a united front in dealing with Donald Trump and not permit themselves to be treated on an individual one-off basis.  He's right, and he challenges Justin Trudeau to consider such a response.  In everything from investments to environmental reform, from global security to foreign aid, a sense of dependability is essential lest things spin out of control.And then there is the response from civil society itself.  It will have to consider what to do with Amit Kalantri's observation: "In a democracy, there will be more complaints but less crisis, in a dictatorship more silence but much more suffering."  That is usually true, but we have now entered an era where the complaints and crisis are marching hand in hand into the future.America is more bustling at present than it has been in years.  Democracy is grating against autocracy and the sparks are flying.  Donald Trump has won his election and has the right to lead.  But should he do so at the expense of hard-earned democratic and constitutional gains, only a united global opposition can hope to prevail over the most powerful office in the world.Glen Pearson was a career professional firefighter and is a former Member of Parliament from southwestern Ontario.  He and his wife adopted three children from South Sudan and reside in London, Ontario.  He has been the co-director of the London Food Bank for 29 years.  He writes regularly for the London Free Press and also shares his views on a blog entitled “The Parallel Parliament“.   Follow him on twitter @GlenPearson.