🔗 Share this article

Twelve months back, the landscape was entirely separate. Before the American presidential vote, considerate citizens could acknowledge America's deep flaws – its unfairness and disparity – but they could still identify it as the US. A free society. A country where legal governance carried weight. A state headed by a honorable and decent leader, despite his older age and growing weakness.

These days, as October 2025 ends, countless Americans scarcely know the land we live in. People alleged as undocumented migrants are collected and forced into vehicles, occasionally denied due process. The East Wing of the White House – is being torn down to build a lavish dance hall. The leader is targeting his adversaries or supposed enemies and insisting federal prosecutors hand over an enormous amount of citizen dollars. Uniformed troops are dispatched across metropolitan centers under fabricated reasons. The Pentagon, rebranded the Department of War, has practically liberated itself of day-to-day journalistic scrutiny during its expenditure of what could amount to nearly $1tn in public funds. Universities, law firms, news companies are buckling under the president’s threats, and billionaires are handled as aristocracy.

“America, just months before its 250-year mark as the globe's top democratic nation, has crossed the brink into autocracy and fascism,” a noted author, commented in August. “Finally, swifter than I thought feasible, it transpired here.”

Every morning starts to new horrors. And it's hard to comprehend – and distressing to accept – just how far gone we have become, and the speed at which it unfolded.

Yet, we understand that the president was properly voted in. Despite his deeply disturbing first term and despite the alerts linked to the understanding of the rightwing blueprint – even after Trump himself stated openly he intended to be a dictator solely at the start – a majority of citizens selected him rather than Kamala Harris.

While alarming as today's circumstances is, it’s even scarier to recognize that we’re only nine months into this administration. Where will an additional three years of this decline find us? And what if the three years transforms into a more extended duration, as there is no one to restrain this ruler from deciding that another term is necessary, perhaps for national security reasons?

Admittedly, all is not lost. There will be congressional elections the coming year that may create a new governmental control, should Democrats regain one or both houses of the legislature. There are public servants who are striving to exert some accountability, like lawmakers currently initiating an inquiry concerning the try to fund seizure from legal authorities.

And a leadership election in the next cycle could begin the path toward restoration precisely as the prior selection put us on this disappointing trajectory.

We see countless citizens marching in urban areas throughout communities, similar to recent last weekend during anti-authority protests.

A former official, wrote recently that “the great sleeping giant of America is awakening”, similar to past following the Red Scare in that decade or during the sixties activism or in the seventies crisis.

In those instances, the unstable nation ultimately corrected itself.

The author states he recognizes the signals of that resurgence and notices it unfolding at present. For proof, he references the widespread marches, the widespread, cross-party resistance against a television host's removal and the largely united refusal by journalists to sign government requirements they report only what is sanctioned.

“The slumbering entity consistently stays asleep before certain corruption grows too toxic, a particular deed so contemptuous toward public welfare, certain violence so disruptive, that the giant has no choice but to awaken.”

It's a positive outlook, and I respect his knowledgeable stance. Possibly he may turn out correct.

Meanwhile, the big questions persist: will the nation ever recover? Can it reclaim its standing in the world and its devotion to the rule of law?

Or should we recognize that the national endeavor functioned for a period, and then – swiftly, totally – ended?

My negative thoughts tells me that the second option is accurate; that everything could be finished. My hopeful heart, nevertheless, tells me that we must try, through all methods possible.

Personally, as an observer of the press, that involves encouraging reporters to live up, more fully, to their mission of overseeing leadership. For different individuals, it may be working on congressional campaigns, or organizing rallies, or developing approaches to protect electoral access.

Not even one year prior, we lived in a very different place. In the future? Or three years from now? The truth is, we are uncertain. The only option is to strive to continue fighting.

What Provides Me Optimism Currently

The contact I experience with students with aspiring reporters, who are both hopeful and realistic, {always