I'm afraid I've also lost my faith in "decent Americans" to save us

Trump's supporters are MOTIVATED. They turn out reliably to vote in primaries, and I'm pretty sure Trumpist-crazies like MTG will continue to win primary elections.

When general elections come around, our fate is often decided by the so-called "independents" who aren't the judicious non-partisans many hope for them to be. Far too many of them are married to that stupid idea that "there's not a dime of difference" between Democrats and Republicans.

They have terrible memories for even recent political history, and vote based on rough general impressions (easily manipulated by propaganda) of the particular candidates personalities, naively believing individual character is the most important quality in a politician, blissfully unaware of how party affiliation controls which party runs the agenda in legislative bodies.

Think of how, although we managed to elect Biden, Republicans picked up seats in the House, and we won the Senate by the narrowest of margins. Why? Many Biden voters either didn't bother to fill in Senate/House votes, which Republican voters were clearly more motivated to do, or stupidly thought that splitting their votes was actually a good idea, for "balance".