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In late October 2024, the landscape was utterly different. Before the US presidential election, reflective citizens could acknowledge the nation's significant faults – its inequities and inequality – yet they still could see it as the United States. A democratic nation. A land where constitutional order meant something. A state guided by a honorable and decent official, notwithstanding his advanced age and growing weakness.

These days, this autumn, countless Americans scarcely know the country we live in. People suspected of being undocumented migrants are rounded up and pushed into vans, sometimes denied due process. The East Wing of the presidential residence – is being torn down for a grotesque ballroom. The president is harassing his political rivals or supposed enemies and requesting the justice department surrender an enormous amount of public funds. Armed military personnel are dispatched to US urban areas with deceptive justifications. The defense headquarters, renamed the Department of War, has practically rid itself of routine media oversight while it uses possibly reaching almost one trillion dollars in public funds. Universities, legal practices, journalism organizations are buckling under the president’s threats, and billionaires are treated like nobility.

“The US, just months before its 250^th birthday as the world’s leading democracy, has fallen over the brink toward dictatorship and totalitarianism,” an American historian, wrote this past summer. “Ultimately, more quickly than I thought feasible, it transpired in America.”

Each day begins to new horrors. It is difficult to grasp – and agonizing to acknowledge – just how far gone our nation is, and the speed at which it has happened.

However, it is known that Trump was legitimately chosen. Despite his profoundly alarming initial presidency and even after the alerts that came with the knowledge of Project 2025 – despite Trump himself said publicly he intended to be a dictator solely at the start – enough Americans selected him over his Democratic opponent.

Frightening as the current reality may be, it's more daunting to understand that we have only been three-quarters of a year into this administration. How will an additional three years of this deterioration leave us? And suppose that period becomes something even longer, as there is not anyone to limit this president from determining that a third term is necessary, possibly for national security reasons?

Certainly, not everything is hopeless. There will be legislative votes the coming year that could create a new political equilibrium, if Democrats regain the Senate or House of Congress. There exist government representatives who are striving to exert some accountability, for example lawmakers currently initiating an inquiry regarding the effort to fund seizure from the justice department.

And a national vote three years from now could begin the path toward restoration precisely as the prior selection placed us on this unfortunate course.

There exist millions of Americans marching in urban areas throughout communities, as they did in the past days in the No Kings rallies.

A former official, wrote recently that “the dormant powerhouse of America is stirring”, similar to past following the Red Scare in that decade or throughout the sixties activism or during the seventies crisis.

In those instances, the tilting vessel finally returned to balance.

Reich says he understands the signals of that revival and observes it occurring at present. For proof, he points to the widespread marches, the broad, cross-party resistance against a television host's removal and the near-unanimous defiance by media to accept the defense department’s demands they report only approved content.

“The dormant force consistently stays inactive before certain corruption turns extremely harmful, a particular deed so contemptuous of the common good, some brutality so noisy, that the giant has no choice other than to stir.”

It’s an optimistic take, and I respect his knowledgeable stance. Perhaps he will turn out correct.

In the meantime, the big questions endure: is the US able to regain its footing? Can it retrieve its standing in the world and its devotion to constitutional order?

Or must we acknowledge that the 250-year-old experiment worked for a while, and then – abruptly, completely – collapsed?

My pessimistic brain suggests that the final scenario is correct; that everything might be lost. My positive feelings, though, tells me that we must try, by any means we can.

Personally, as a media critic, that means urging journalists to adhere, more completely, to their mission of overseeing leadership. For different individuals, it may be working on election efforts, or coordinating protests, or finding ways to safeguard voting rights.

Not even one year prior, we were in an alternate reality. A year from now? Or after another term? The truth is, we don’t know. Our sole course is try to persevere.

What Offers Me Hope Now

The interaction I experience with students with new media professionals, who are equally hopeful and practical, {always