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Twelve months back, the landscape was completely different. Prior to the US presidential election, considerate Americans could acknowledge America's significant faults – its inequities and disparity – but they continued to identify it as the United States. A democracy. A country where constitutional order carried weight. A state guided by a honorable and ethical leader, despite his older age and increasing frailty.

These days, in late October 2025, countless Americans hardly identify the nation we reside in. Persons believed to be unauthorized foreigners are collected and forced into vans, sometimes blocked from fair treatment. The left side of the White House – is undergoing demolition to build a lavish ballroom. The president is targeting his adversaries or supposed enemies and requesting legal authorities surrender an enormous amount of taxpayer money. Armed military personnel are dispatched to US urban areas on false pretexts. The defense headquarters, rebranded the Department of War, has – in effect – rid itself of day-to-day journalistic scrutiny as it spends potentially totaling almost one trillion dollars in public funds. Colleges, attorney offices, journalism organizations are buckling under the president’s threats, and billionaires are regarded as aristocracy.

“The US, shortly prior to its quarter-millennium anniversary as the globe's top democratic nation, has crossed the edge toward dictatorship and totalitarianism,” a noted author, stated recently. “Finally, swifter than I believed likely, it transpired in this country.”

One awakes to new horrors. And it's challenging to understand – and distressing to accept – how severely declined our nation is, and the rapid pace with which it has happened.

Yet, it is known that the president was legitimately chosen. Even after his highly troubling first term and despite the warnings that came with the understanding of Project 2025 – even after Trump himself said publicly he intended to act as an autocrat just on day one – enough Americans selected him rather than Kamala Harris.

Frightening as the present situation are, it's more frightening to recognize that we have only been several months under this leadership. How will another 36 months of this deterioration position us? And if that period turns into an prolonged era, as there is nobody to stop this president from determining that a third term is necessary, maybe for national security reasons?

Admittedly, not everything is hopeless. We will have congressional elections in 2026 which might bring a different governmental control, should Democrats retake the Senate or House of parliament. There are public servants who are attempting to apply a degree of oversight, such as lawmakers who are starting a probe into the attempted money grab from the justice department.

And a leadership election in 2028 could initiate us down the road toward restoration precisely as the prior selection placed us on this disappointing trajectory.

There are numerous residents protesting in urban areas of their cities, as they did recently during anti-authority protests.

A former official, commented this week that “the dormant powerhouse of the US is stirring”, exactly as before post-McCarthyism during the fifties or amid the sixties activism or in the Watergate scandal.

On those occasions, the tilting vessel finally returned to balance.

Reich says he understands the indicators of that resurgence and observes it occurring now. As evidence, he points to the widespread marches, the extensive, bipartisan pushback to a personality's dismissal and the almost universal refusal by journalists to accept military mandates they solely cover approved content.

“The dormant force consistently stays asleep before certain corruption turns extremely harmful, an specific act so disrespectful of societal benefit, some brutality so noisy, that the giant has no choice except to rise.”

It's a hopeful perspective, and I respect Reich’s experienced view. Perhaps he will prove to be right.

Meanwhile, the crucial issues endure: can America regain its footing? Can it retrieve its standing in the world and its commitment to constitutional order?

Or should we recognize that the 250-year-old experiment succeeded temporarily, and then – abruptly, completely – collapsed?

My pessimistic brain indicates that the second option is true; that all may indeed be gone. My hopeful heart, though, tells me that we have to attempt, through all methods we can.

For me, as an observer of the press, that’s about encouraging reporters to adhere, more fully, to their mission of overseeing leadership. For different individuals, it could mean participating in political races, or organizing rallies, or discovering methods to defend electoral access.

Not even one year prior, we lived in a very different place. A year from now? Or three years from now? The truth is, we are uncertain. Our sole course is try to not give up.

What Offers Me Optimism Currently

The contact I encounter in the classroom with new media professionals, that are simultaneously idealistic and realistic, {always