Can America Find Its Voice Again?

Trump has reshaped the presidency into a personal empire where law firms, media, and even restaurant chains bow to him. The question now: will Americans fight back?

Guest article by Michael Cohen

Editorial Credit: Joey Sussman / Shutterstock.com

Donald Trump’s approval may be low, but let’s not fool ourselves. He doesn’t care what the actual approval numbers are. He cares what he believes the numbers are in his delusional mind. And one of the biggest problems I’ve seen, as someone who knows him personally more than anyone, is that he is destroying the presidency and our country by bending it to the fantasy dystopian nightmare that lives in his mind. The presidency itself and our institutions are collapsing. The people are rising up, but the institutions are not. What was once a role constrained by norms, laws, and checks and balances is now a personal empire. The office of the president has morphed into the office of Donald J. Trump; and nearly every institution in America, from law firms to media conglomerates to corner diners, is bending to his will.

Before I go further in this post, it’s why I always say to subscribe to this MeidasTouch Substack and my Substack—this is where the real resistance lives.

The evidence is everywhere. Legal powerhouses that once claimed allegiance to the Constitution now calibrate their every word as if drafting a contract with a mob boss. Networks like ABC and CBS, terrified of losing access or becoming the next target of Trump’s wrath, adjust their coverage accordingly. Even the supposedly apolitical spaces of intelligence agencies and corporate boardrooms, like Intel, now operate with one eye on what the president wants. Hell, even Cracker Barrel, America’s idea of middle-class comfort food, can’t seem to resist the gravitational pull of Trumpism in a sign change.

This isn’t politics as usual. This is a wholesale restructuring of the American presidency. Norms have collapsed. Rules have been rewritten. The president dictates, and the rest of the country follows.

So how did this happen? How did a nation of 330 million people, supposedly built on checks and balances, wind up with a system where the president dictates everything from corporate strategy to the tone of nightly news broadcasts?

Part of the answer is Trump’s brazenness. He doesn’t play by the rules; and because he doesn’t, nobody else does either. When the president ignores subpoenas, insults judges, or calls the press “the enemy of the people,” he doesn’t just erode norms—he obliterates them. He teaches everyone watching that power lies not in law, but in spectacle. And when no one stops him, the spectacle becomes the new law.

But the bigger part of the answer is us. Americans—Republicans, Democrats, independents—we’ve let it happen. We tuned in to the circus, we laughed at the tweets, we shrugged at the corruption. We became numb to the daily outrages until outrage itself stopped meaning anything. We stopped marching. We stopped demanding. We let our elected leaders on the left give us lectures about “preserving democracy” while they secretly ran fundraising numbers for their next campaign. Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries don’t want to rock the boat if rocking the boat threatens their path to Senate Majority Leader or Speaker. The rest of them are more worried about a donor list than about democracy.

And while Democrats talk and organize a quarterly protest, Trump acts. While Democrats fundraise, Trump organizes. While Democrats play checkers, Trump is playing chess on a board he built himself with rules only he knows.

Now, here’s the most important question: is this really what Americans want? A country ruled by one man whose rules don’t actually benefit them? Because make no mistake—they don’t. Trumpism isn’t about the working class, it’s about the Trump class. It’s about enriching the already wealthy, protecting his cronies, and punishing anyone who dares to question him. If you think your paycheck or your health care or your kids’ future is better under a system where the president dictates all—wake the hell up. You’re not even in the equation.

So where are the daily protests? Where’s the outrage that used to fill city streets? Nowhere. Instead, we get hashtags. We get Instagram reels. We get TikTok clips that disappear in 24 hours. Meanwhile, Trump’s machine churns day and night, rewriting the rules of American democracy while we sit back and “like” posts from Rachel Maddow or Jon Stewart.

Here’s the cold reality: we don’t win back America with clever memes. We win with numbers. Hard, unshakable numbers. You don’t beat Trumpism with millions; you beat it with a hundred million. That means Americans—left, right, and center—coming together on platforms like Substack, like MeidasTouch Network, like mine; whatever digital spaces allow real community, to organize and mobilize. Because until the people outnumber the spectacle, the spectacle wins.

And don’t be lulled into false hope about the 2026 midterms. Despite what left-leaning commentators want to sell you—“The blue wave is coming!”—I don’t buy it. Not for a second. Not when apathy runs this deep. Not when Trump is tightening his grip daily. Not when Democratic lawmakers are more interested in their careers than in the Constitution.

We are, in my opinion, in trouble. Not in a metaphorical way. Not in a “both sides are bad” kind of way. In a real, tangible, existential way. Our way of life—imperfect but free, flawed but democratic—has been hijacked. And unless we find a way, right now, to remember that democracy only works when we demand it, Trump will keep winning.

So the choice is ours: do we live in a country dictated by one man, or do we take it back—together—with a hundred million voices that can’t be ignored?

You know what you have to do. And in the words of Nike: Just Do It.

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