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Twelve months back, the landscape was entirely separate. Before the US presidential election, thoughtful citizens could recognize the nation's serious imperfections – its unfairness and imbalance – yet they could still perceive it as America. A democratic nation. A land where constitutional order meant something. A state headed by a honorable and ethical official, despite his advanced age and growing weakness.

Nowadays, this autumn, numerous citizens hardly identify the nation we live in. People alleged as illegal immigrants are detained and forced into vehicles, at times denied due process. The left side of the presidential residence – is undergoing demolition to build a lavish event space. Donald Trump is persecuting his political rivals or alleged foes and demanding the justice department transfer an enormous amount of citizen dollars. Soldiers with weapons are dispatched into American cities with deceptive justifications. The military command, renamed the War Department, has effectively liberated itself of day-to-day journalistic scrutiny during its expenditure of possibly reaching almost one trillion dollars from citizen taxes. Institutions, law firms, journalism organizations are submitting due to presidential intimidation, and wealthy elites are handled as members of the royal family.

“The United States, just months before its 250-year mark as the planet's foremost free society, has fallen over the limit into authoritarianism and fascism,” Garrett Graff, wrote this past summer. “In the end, swifter than I believed likely, it did happen here.”

Each day begins amid recent atrocities. It is challenging to understand – and painful to realize – how severely declined our nation is, and the speed at which it occurred.

However, we understand that the president was properly voted in. Following his highly troubling previous administration and following the warnings associated with the awareness of the rightwing blueprint – despite the president personally said publicly he intended to act as an autocrat only on the first day – sufficient voters chose him over his Democratic opponent.

Frightening as the current reality are, it’s even scarier to understand that we’re only several months under this leadership. What will an additional three years of this deterioration find us? And if the three years becomes a more extended duration, as there is nobody to stop this president from deciding that another term is essential, maybe for security concerns?

Granted, all is not lost. We will have congressional elections in 2026 that may create a new balance of power, if Democrats regain either chamber of the legislature. There are public servants who are trying to impose a degree of oversight, like lawmakers currently initiating an inquiry concerning the try to money grab by federal prosecutors.

And a presidential election in the next cycle could start us down the road to healing just as the prior selection set us on this regrettable path.

There are countless citizens protesting in urban areas throughout communities, as they did last weekend in the No Kings rallies.

A former official, wrote recently that “the great sleeping giant of the US is stirring”, similar to past after the Communist witch-hunt era during the fifties or throughout the sixties activism or throughout the Watergate scandal.

In those instances, the listing ship finally returned to balance.

Reich says he knows the signs of that revival and notices it unfolding at present. For proof, he cites the large-scale demonstrations, the extensive, bipartisan pushback to a television host's removal and the almost universal rejection by reporters to sign military mandates they only publish authorized information.

“The slumbering entity perpetually exists inactive till some venality becomes so noxious, a particular deed so contemptuous of the common good, specific cruelty so noisy, that he is compelled other than to stir.”

It's a positive outlook, and I respect Reich’s experienced view. Possibly he may prove to be right.

Meanwhile, the major inquiries endure: can America ever recover? Is it possible to restore its position in the world and its adherence to constitutional order?

Or do we need to admit that the 250-year-old experiment functioned for a period, and then – suddenly, utterly – failed?

My cynical mind indicates that the second option is correct; that everything could be lost. My optimistic spirit, though, advises me that we need to strive, by any means available.

In my case, as an observer of the press, that means encouraging reporters to live up, more fully, to their mission of scrutinizing authority. For different individuals, it could mean engaging with election efforts, or organizing rallies, or finding ways to defend voting rights.

Less than a year ago, we lived in an alternate reality. Twelve months later? Or after another term? The reality is, we don’t know. All we can do is to attempt to not give up.

What’s Giving Me Encouragement Today

The engagement I experience in the classroom with aspiring reporters, who are both visionary and realistic, {always