I think Anthony is trying to finish me off. :)
Yes, we do need a civil revolution but it will never, ever, ever happen. We Americans do tend to be proud of being that way, but the reasons vary. I have to say I disagree with other folks from other places being complacent when attacked-we're not the only nationality which is a tad ethnocentric, it's just that we do tend to be looked at with some bias across the board so it's a little bit of a knee jerk thing at this point and inevitable. I've lived 'abroad' so know there's an awful lot of anti-American sentiments floating around-not without reason due to the actions of our government but one gets a little tired of taking the knocks for George Dubya, or whomever else has commited whatever idiocy of the moment. I didn't vote for him but boy, do I pay for it when the incredibly broad subject of 'The USA' comes up.More than half of us did not, in point of fact, argue that point as much as one wishes. As a plain old, normal American, I'm proud of a ton of things about it but can't do one thing about the oil companies and their various interests which insist on blowing up the entire Middle East for profit. Pretty sure not all those companies are owned by US interests, too, we just have the biggest interests and armies to go get the job done.
Civil Revolution is another story. It can't happen because we're not a democracy, owned and run by the people as is the great myth. We're an Aligarchy, owned and run by corporations and their interests. Who owns the press and all other forms of communication in the end? Some corporation or collection of them, with vast interests in the content and what 'we' are told, the belief systems of an entire society. It works, too, by and large-we're not so much a nation of dupes or idiots as the duped and credulous. In order for Civil Revolution to have a shot, there has to be unrest to the point of interest, which is disallowed via lack of information. Sure, people know they're not doing well,and things overseas are a mess but not the dynamics behind it- they're told all is well, not to worry, the 'real' enemy is the unseen terrorist, or the poor 'on Welfare', or the shoeless Mexican illegal trying to run across the border, or that single unlucky-enough-to-be-caught ponzie scheme banker now in jail. The real information will quite simply just never appear- the mega corps ( who own everything else ) own the networks, that's all. It's a very basic explanation, to be sure but it's a huge part of the problem and the 'real' one. Any revolution which takes place here will 'just' be when people are so poor and disenfranchised there's rioting in the streets, nothing organized or effective. We almost DID have health care, for an example of the power of the press and how it's deliberately used. Then stories hit us daily of all this misinformation calculated to enrage the population( it did )how socialized medicine was a step towards socialism, you wouldn't get good care ( as opposed to the NONE millions have ), you'd have to wait for appointments and ops, it was unconstitutional ( always a good buzz-word here, noone knows what it means but it's a great flag waving means to rabble rouse ), it would lead us down the road to communism, taxes would be out of sight- these hit the media as a veritable storm. Obama's nice, sensible plan to provide health care to all of us was defeated, we can all go back to being a slave to the insurance companies again, and the press did it's job. The 'real' information never made it- like how you could still just opt-out if you wanted to, noone was forcing anyone, no, you didn't wait, no, you didn't have to give up your doc, no, we are not socialists ( most don't know what that means, either), and Obama had a plan where it would end up self-paying-taxes would not go up. It got killed anyway, due to The Press. It's the single reason Civil Revolution is dead in the water, really-although to finally get to the end of all this, yes, of course we could use one. It just can't happen, that's all.