AMERICAN ZOMBIES

The Zombies of the American Republic: Asleep While Democracy Dies

I never believed in zombies. Not in movies, not in myths. I also stopped believing in the tooth fairy and Santa Claus long ago. But today, I see zombies everywhere, vacant-eyed, stumbling through the ruins of a republic they no longer recognize or, worse, never understood in the first place.

They are the American people.

It is more than 100 days into Trump’s second rise, not a presidency, but a dictatorship in all but name, and the country is still in a daze. There is no mass uprising. There were no sustained protests. No organized resistance worthy of the moment. Just handwringing, headlines, and helplessness. The population, hypnotized by infotainment and numbed by cynicism, wanders like the half-dead, unwilling or unable to confront what has happened.

America is no longer a functioning democracy. That is not hyperbole; it is fact. The transition began years ago, accelerated by the installation of loyalists, the gutting of government institutions, the war on truth, and the hollowing out of civic morality. The final nail came with Project 2025, a blueprint for authoritarian rule, which Trump’s followers proudly circulated and implemented right under our noses.

We warned everyone in 2024. We wrote about Project 2025. We published, we shouted, we pleaded. The warnings were clear. Trump openly promised to be a dictator “on day one.” It wasn’t a joke, it wasn’t rhetoric, it was prophecy.

And now it’s real.

The oligarchy is no longer forming; it is formed. It has seized the levers of power. The rule of law is being rewritten. The courts are under siege. The bureaucracy is being purged. And the people? Still glued to their screens. Still sleepwalking.

It’s as if the majority believe they’re extras in a reality show that will soon cut to a commercial or that a fortuitous power will swoop in and make things right. But this is not a show. There will be no cavalry. And the longer Americans remain inert, the deeper the dictatorship sets its roots.

We are past the point of saving the old democracy. That chapter is closed. The task is to replace it, imagine, and build a new democratic order: Project 2029.

We’ve outlined its foundation:

• Worker cooperatives that democratize the economy from the ground up.
• Public ownership of essential services like healthcare, energy, and transportation—controlled by the people, not profiteers.
• Democratic workplaces, where labor has absolute power.
• Guaranteed living wages and universal healthcare, not as charity, but as a birthright.
• Electoral reform to restore representative government.
• Constitutional rebalancing, where people govern, not money, not monopolies.

But none of this matters unless we awaken.

The appalling truth is that America is in the grip of a full-blown autocratic regime, and yet the streets are not constantly filled with protesters. The churches still preach meek obedience. The universities continue to debate nuance. The corporations chase profits as if the world isn’t burning.

Zombies do not fight. They do not organize. They do not save themselves.

And unless Americans shake off this walking coma, they will live the rest of their days under a flag that looks the same but stands for nothing.

Democracy is not merely fragile; it is mortal. Ours has died. What remains is whether we will rise from the grave of our own making.

Because if we do not act now, boldly, bravely, and together, we will not just have lost our republic.

We will have deserved its loss.

William James Spriggs