A prominent journalist looks at the most pivotal year in modern American history — and its irrevocable consequences for today’s society.

The tumultuous events of 1968 burden America to this day. The assassinations of Robert Kennedy and Martin Luther King, Jr., the Tet Offensive in Vietnam, campus riots, and the election of Richard Nixon led to disappointment, division, and self-doubt that bred distrust of the nation’s leaders and institutions. For millions of Americans, the dream that we would at last face up with compassion to our most basic problems at home and abroad was shattered in 1968, and the groundwork was laid for the cynical social and political climate that exists today.