A Tragic Transformation Only 12 Months Has Made in America
Twelve months back, the situation was entirely distinct. Ahead of the national election, considerate Americans could recognize the nation's significant faults – its injustices and inequality – but they could still see it as America. A free society. A land where legal governance carried weight. A nation headed by a dignified and decent leader, even with his elderly years and growing weakness.
These days, as October 2025 ends, numerous citizens barely recognize the country we reside in. People suspected of being unauthorized foreigners are rounded up and pushed into vans, at times denied due process. The left side of the White House – is being destroyed for an obscene event space. The president is harassing his political rivals or perceived antagonists and requesting federal prosecutors hand over a huge total of citizen dollars. Soldiers with weapons are deployed across metropolitan centers on false pretexts. The military command, renamed the Department of War, has effectively freed itself of routine media oversight as it spends possibly reaching nearly $1tn in public funds. Universities, legal practices, news companies are submitting from leader's menaces, and billionaires are regarded as nobility.
“America, just months before its quarter-millennium anniversary as the world’s leading democracy, has crossed the edge into authoritarianism and fascism,” Garrett Graff, commented recently. “In the end, swifter than I thought feasible, it occurred here.”
One awakes to new horrors. And it's challenging to understand – and painful to realize – just how far gone we are, and the speed at which it has happened.
Yet, it is known that the leader was duly elected. Following his deeply disturbing previous administration and despite the cautions linked to the understanding of the rightwing blueprint – despite the leader directly said publicly he planned to be a dictator solely at the start – sufficient voters elected him instead of his Democratic opponent.
As terrifying as the current reality is, it’s even scarier to realize that we’re only several months into this administration. Where will another 36 months of this deterioration leave us? And what if that period turns into a more extended duration, since there is not anyone to stop this leader from determining that additional tenure is essential, perhaps for defense purposes?
Granted, there is still hope. We will have midterm elections next year that may bring a different balance of power, in case Democrats regain either chamber of the legislature. We have elected officials who are trying to apply some accountability, such as Democratic congressmen who are starting a probe concerning the try to money grab from the justice department.
And a leadership election in 2028 could begin our journey to recovery exactly as the previous vote placed us on this disappointing trajectory.
There exist millions of Americans marching in urban areas of their cities, similar to recent in the past days in the No Kings rallies.
Robert Reich, commented this week that “the slumbering force of the US is stirring”, exactly as before following the Red Scare in that decade or amid the Vietnam war protests or during the seventies crisis.
On those occasions, the tilting vessel eventually was righted.
The author states he understands the signals of that awakening and sees it happening currently. As support, he references the widespread marches, the widespread, bipartisan pushback regarding a television host's removal and the near-unanimous defiance by media to agree to the defense department’s demands they only publish authorized information.
“The slumbering entity consistently stays inactive until some venality turns extremely harmful, a particular deed so contemptuous of the common good, certain violence so noisy, that the giant is forced but to awaken.”
It's a hopeful perspective, and I appreciate his knowledgeable stance. Perhaps he will prove to be right.
In the meantime, the crucial issues persist: is the US able to regain its footing? Is it possible to restore its standing in the world and its commitment to legal principles?
Or must we acknowledge that the 250-year-old experiment functioned for a period, and then – abruptly, completely – collapsed?
My pessimistic brain suggests that the latter is true; that everything could be finished. My optimistic spirit, however, tells me that we need to strive, by any means available.
Personally, working in journalism analysis, that means pushing media professionals to commit, more thoroughly, to their purpose of scrutinizing authority. For some people, it might involve engaging with election efforts, or coordinating protests, or developing approaches to safeguard voting rights.
Less than a year ago, we existed in an alternate reality. In the future? Or three years from now? The reality is, we don’t know. The only option is to strive to persevere.
What’s Giving Me Encouragement Today
The engagement I have in the classroom with new media professionals, who are both visionary and practical, {always
