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Twelve months back, the situation was entirely separate. Ahead of the national election, thoughtful residents could recognize America's significant faults – its inequities and inequality – yet they continued to perceive it as the US. A free society. A place where legal governance held significance. A nation guided by a dignified and upright public servant, despite his advanced age and growing weakness.

Nowadays, this autumn, countless Americans scarcely know the country we reside in. People suspected of being illegal immigrants are collected and forced into vehicles, at times refused legal rights. The left side of the presidential residence – is being torn down for an obscene dance hall. The leader is persecuting his opponents or perceived antagonists and insisting the justice department transfer a huge total of taxpayer money. Soldiers with weapons are being sent across metropolitan centers on false pretexts. The defense headquarters, relabeled the Department of War, has effectively freed itself of routine media oversight as it spends potentially totaling close to a trillion USD of taxpayer money. Institutions, legal practices, news companies are buckling due to presidential intimidation, and billionaires are treated like aristocracy.

“The United States, shortly prior to its 250-year mark as the planet's foremost free society, has fallen over the edge into autocracy and extremism,” Garrett Graff, stated in August. “Finally, faster than I believed likely, it did happen in this country.”

One awakes to new horrors. And it's challenging to understand – and agonizing to acknowledge – how deeply lost our nation is, and how quickly it occurred.

However, it is known that the president was duly elected. Following his deeply disturbing initial presidency and despite the cautions associated with the awareness of the conservative plan – despite Trump himself said publicly he planned to be a dictator solely at the start – a majority of citizens elected him instead of his Democratic opponent.

While alarming as today's circumstances is, it’s even scarier to recognize that we are just several months into this presidential term. How will three more years of this deterioration leave us? And if that timeframe becomes a more extended duration, since there is no one to limit this ruler from opting that another term is necessary, perhaps for national security reasons?

Granted, all is not lost. We will have midterm elections the coming year which might create a new governmental control, if Democrats regain either chamber of the legislature. There exist elected officials who are attempting to apply some accountability, such as Democratic congressmen who are launching an investigation concerning the try to fund seizure from legal authorities.

And a national vote in the next cycle could start our journey to healing just as the previous vote placed us on this unfortunate course.

There exist millions of Americans marching in public spaces of their cities, like they performed last weekend in the No Kings rallies.

An ex-cabinet member, stated lately that “the slumbering force of the US is awakening”, just as it did post-McCarthyism in the 1950s or throughout the Vietnam war protests or during the Watergate scandal.

In those instances, the tilting vessel eventually was righted.

The author states he knows the signals of that revival and sees it happening now. For proof, he references the recent massive protests, the widespread, bipartisan pushback against a television host's removal and the largely united refusal by journalists to accept government requirements they only publish approved content.

“The sleeping giant consistently stays dormant till certain corruption turns extremely harmful, a particular deed so offensive of societal benefit, certain violence so noisy, that the giant is forced other than to stir.”

It's a positive outlook, and I appreciate his knowledgeable stance. Perhaps he will turn out correct.

In the meantime, the big questions persist: is the US able to return to normalcy? Can it retrieve its standing in the world and its commitment to constitutional order?

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

My pessimistic brain indicates that the second option is correct; that all may indeed be finished. My optimistic spirit, though, advises me that we have to attempt, through all methods possible.

Personally, working in journalism analysis, that’s about urging journalists to live up, more completely, to their purpose of scrutinizing authority. For different individuals, it could mean engaging with congressional campaigns, or planning demonstrations, or finding ways to defend ballot privileges.

Under twelve months back, we were in a separate situation. A year from now? Or three years from now? The truth is, we are uncertain. All we can do is to strive to not give up.

What Provides Me Hope Now

The engagement I experience in the classroom with new media professionals, who are equally idealistic and grounded, {always