The Devastating Transformation a Single Year Has Caused in the United States
In late October 2024, the situation was entirely distinct. Prior to the national election, considerate Americans could acknowledge the country's significant faults – its unfairness and disparity – yet they could still see it as the United States. A democracy. A land where constitutional order meant something. A nation guided by a honorable and upright public servant, notwithstanding his older age and growing weakness.
These days, as October 2025 ends, numerous citizens hardly identify the country we live in. Persons believed to be undocumented migrants are rounded up and forced into transport, at times blocked from fair treatment. The left side of the White House – is being torn down for an obscene dance hall. The leader is persecuting his opponents or alleged foes and requesting federal prosecutors surrender a massive sum of public funds. Uniformed troops are dispatched to US urban areas on false pretexts. The Pentagon, relabeled the Defense Ministry, has – in effect – rid itself of routine media oversight while it uses potentially totaling close to a trillion USD from citizen taxes. Institutions, attorney offices, journalism organizations are submitting from leader's menaces, and wealthy elites are regarded as nobility.
“The United States, shortly prior to its 250th birthday as the planet's foremost free society, has crossed the limit toward dictatorship and extremism,” an American historian, commented this past summer. “Finally, swifter than I imagined possible, it did happen in this country.”
Every morning starts to new horrors. And it's challenging to understand – and agonizing to acknowledge – how deeply lost we are, and the rapid pace with which it has happened.
However, it is known that Trump was duly elected. Following his highly troubling first term and despite the alerts associated with the awareness of the rightwing blueprint – even after the leader directly declared plainly he planned to be a dictator solely at the start – a majority of citizens elected him rather than the other candidate.
As terrifying as today's circumstances is, it's more frightening to realize that we’re only three-quarters of a year under this leadership. How will three more years of this downfall position us? And what if that period becomes an prolonged era, as there is nobody to limit this president from opting that a third term is required, perhaps for security concerns?
Granted, there is still hope. There will be congressional elections in 2026 which might bring a different political equilibrium, if Democrats retake either chamber of parliament. There are government representatives who are attempting to apply a degree of oversight, such as representatives who are initiating an inquiry into the attempted money grab by federal prosecutors.
And a leadership election three years from now could begin the path to healing exactly as last year’s election set us on this unfortunate course.
We see numerous residents demonstrating in the streets throughout communities, as they did in the past days at democracy demonstrations.
A former official, commented this week that “the slumbering force of America is rising”, exactly as before after the Communist witch-hunt era in the 1950s or during anti-war demonstrations or in the Watergate scandal.
During those times, the unstable nation eventually was righted.
Reich says he recognizes the signs of that awakening and notices it unfolding now. As evidence, he references the large-scale demonstrations, the extensive, cross-party resistance to a television host's removal and the almost universal rejection by reporters to sign government requirements they solely cover authorized information.
“The dormant force consistently stays asleep until certain corruption grows too toxic, an specific act so disrespectful of societal benefit, certain violence so loud, that he is forced except to rise.”
It’s an optimistic take, and I appreciate his knowledgeable stance. Maybe he’ll prove to be right.
In the meantime, the big questions endure: will the nation ever recover? Is it possible to restore its position globally and its adherence to legal principles?
Or should we recognize that the 250-year-old experiment succeeded temporarily, and then – suddenly, utterly – failed?
My pessimistic brain indicates that the second option is accurate; that all may indeed be finished. My optimistic spirit, nevertheless, advises me that we need to strive, in whatever ways available.
In my case, as a media critic, that’s about encouraging reporters to adhere, more fully, to their mission of scrutinizing authority. For some people, it could mean engaging with election efforts, or organizing rallies, or developing approaches to defend voting rights.
Less than a year ago, we lived in a separate situation. In the future? Or three years from now? The fact is, we don’t know. Our sole course is to strive to not give up.
What’s Giving Me Hope Now
The interaction I have in the classroom with young journalists, who are both idealistic and grounded, {always
