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Twelve months back, the situation was entirely separate. Prior to the US presidential election, considerate Americans could recognize the country's serious imperfections – its injustices and inequality – yet they still could perceive it as the United States. A free society. A country where constitutional order meant something. A nation guided by a dignified and upright leader, despite his elderly years and growing weakness.

These days, in late October 2025, countless Americans scarcely know the land we reside in. Persons alleged as unauthorized foreigners are detained and shoved into transport, occasionally refused legal rights. The eastern section of the presidential residence – is being destroyed for a grotesque dance hall. Donald Trump is targeting his opponents or perceived antagonists and demanding federal prosecutors transfer a massive sum of taxpayer money. Soldiers with weapons are being sent into American cities with deceptive justifications. The Pentagon, relabeled the Department of War, has effectively liberated itself of routine media oversight as it spends potentially totaling nearly $1tn in public funds. Institutions, law firms, journalism organizations are submitting from leader's menaces, and rich magnates are handled as aristocracy.

“The United States, only a few months ahead of its 250-year mark as the globe's top democratic nation, has tipped over the edge into autocracy and fascism,” Garrett Graff, commented this past summer. “In the end, more quickly than I believed likely, it transpired here.”

Every morning starts with fresh terrors. And it's difficult to grasp – and agonizing to acknowledge – just how far gone our nation is, and the rapid pace with which it unfolded.

Yet, we know that the leader was properly voted in. Despite his deeply disturbing previous administration and following the warnings associated with the awareness of the rightwing blueprint – following the president personally declared plainly he would rule as a tyrant solely at the start – enough Americans selected him instead of his Democratic opponent.

Frightening as the current reality is, it’s even scarier to recognize that we are just three-quarters of a year into this presidential term. What will three more years of this decline find us? And suppose that period becomes something even longer, as there is no one to stop this ruler from determining that additional tenure is required, possibly for security concerns?

Granted, there is still hope. We will have legislative votes the coming year that could create a new governmental control, if Democrats regain one or both houses of parliament. There are elected officials who are attempting to apply certain responsibility, for example Democratic congressmen who are starting a probe into the attempted money grab by federal prosecutors.

And a leadership election in 2028 could start our journey to recovery precisely as last year’s election set us on this unfortunate course.

There exist countless citizens marching in public spaces of their cities, similar to recent last weekend at democracy demonstrations.

A former official, commented this week that “the slumbering force of the US is rising”, exactly as before post-McCarthyism during the fifties or during the sixties activism or during the Watergate scandal.

On those occasions, the listing ship eventually was righted.

Reich says he knows the signs of that awakening and notices it unfolding currently. For proof, he cites the large-scale demonstrations, the widespread, cross-party resistance against a personality's dismissal and the almost universal refusal by journalists to accept the defense department’s demands they only publish approved content.

“The slumbering entity consistently stays dormant before some venality turns extremely harmful, a particular deed so contemptuous toward public welfare, some brutality so noisy, that he has no choice other than to stir.”

It’s an optimistic take, and I respect his knowledgeable stance. Perhaps he will prove to be right.

At the same time, the major inquiries remain: is the US able to regain its footing? Can it retrieve its standing in the world and its devotion to legal principles?

Or must we acknowledge that the 250-year-old experiment functioned for a period, and then – swiftly, totally – ended?

My negative thoughts tells me that the latter is true; that everything could be lost. My hopeful heart, however, convinces me that we must try, through all methods possible.

In my case, as an observer of the press, that’s about urging journalists to commit, more completely, to their purpose of overseeing leadership. For different individuals, it could mean participating in election efforts, or organizing rallies, or discovering methods to protect ballot privileges.

Under twelve months back, we existed in a very different place. In the future? Or three years from now? The reality is, we are uncertain. All we can do is to strive to not give up.

What’s Giving Me Optimism Currently

The interaction I experience in the classroom with aspiring reporters, who are both idealistic and grounded, {always