[pmoriarty]

It's much more complicated than simple indifference. The US has a horrible education system and mass media. Self-interest, anti-intellectualism, paranoia, and xenophobia run rampant. Most people lack basic knowledge of American history, never mind much knowledge of the rest of the world's history.

As a result, even when there is political involvement, it often stems from ignorance and fear, and is easily manipulated by the politicians and the media.

[yuhong]

Also, the NSA is funded by government debt. One of the reasons we got off the gold standard was government spending in the first place.

[dredmorbius]

Whilst true, those are neither distinctly American, nor recent, phenomena.

J.S. Mill on 19th century Britain, via Hans E. Jensen:

First, the universities were given the task of providing an unceasing supply of ideologically correct candidates for vital positions in government, church and business. The state was able to make the faculties of the "'venerable institutions'" of higher education, or rather indoctrination, assume this duty because it controlled appointments and held the purse from which "emoluments" flowed into the coffers of academics. Hence the members of the university "hierarchy" made it their "business, the business for which they . .. [were] paid," to "uphold certain political as well as religious opinions," namely those of the "ruling powers of the state" (Mill 1981: 429: and 1988b: 350). Thus the universities pursued with vigor their assignment to inculcate in their students those political and ideological views that were cherished by the power elite. The graduates of the ancient universities were, therefore, well prepared for employment in, and by, those institutions that were instrumental in perpetuating the existing maldistribution of income. All of this might come to naught, however, if the masses of the underclass should achieve anything approaching success in potential attempts at throwing off their fetters.

The state devised a second educational strategy in order to prevent such a calamity from occurring. According to Mill, the "elementary schools for children of the working classes" were given the task of ensuring that the poor would continue to accept docilely their dismal station in life. It was very easy for the state to force the public schools to assume this role. It did so simply by failing malignantly to allocate sufficient funds for the operations of what Mill identified contemptuously as "places called schools" (Mill 1982: 200; emphasis in original). These places were therefore understaffed. Moreover, the few teachers who were actually employed were completely "unfit for their work."

Hans E. Jensen, "John Stuart Mill's Theories of Wealth and Income Distribution". Review of Social Economy. Pages 491-507. Published online: 05 Nov 2010.

http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00346760110081599

[mc32]

I don't believe this attitude is a US-thing. It's a human thing, regardless of education and background. Singapore, Russia, China, the UK, India, Israel, all have different levels of all the above and I don't see any one of them being an exception in this regard.