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 In all the craziness surrounding Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s disastrous visit to the White House last week, you are excused for not noticing President Trump’s action against his own Vice President, JD Vance. You see, VP Vance decided that he was going to stand up to President Trump and criticize him for some of his positions. In response, President Trump blocked him from accessing his offices both in the White House and the Eisenhower Executive Office Building.

Depending on where you get your news, you will have seen Elon Musk’s work reducing government spending as either the best or worst thing going on in government these days. If you primarily listen to left-wing sources, you will be bombarded with instances where the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) axed vital government programs and heartlessly fired thousands of government employees.

Last week, President Donald J. Trump unveiled his latest attempt to reduce future illegal immigration. Since 1982, the law of the land has been that children born in the United States are naturalized citizens, regardless of the status of their parents. This law is based on some loose interpretations of the 14^th Amendment, which does state that “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.”

Last week, Mark Zuckerberg announced Facebook would be eliminating its fact-checker program. In a video posted across all Meta platforms, Zuckerberg said they would be moving away from what NBC News called “independent, non-partisan fact checking” in a segment on the January 7 Today show. Instead, Zuckerberg explained they will be implementing a community notes section to posts, similar to what X does, where users can add a note to a post to either add context to explain the background, or disprove it entirely.

Every year around this time, it is only natural for people to look back on the year that was and think ahead about what will make next year different. However, as we reach the midway point of this decade, it’s just as wild to recall where we were at this point just five years ago as we entered the 2020s.

Over the last 15 years, there have been several large-scale social movements prompted by one or two major national news stories, which last for a few years until the movement either fizzles out or suddenly goes up in smoke. After that, the country moves on to the next social movement and the cycle continues.