Incidentally Swizec, you are speaking to people primarily in the US. They have spent the last 200 years convincing themselves that what you say just isn't so regardless of whether or not it actually is.
Don't worry. Everyone here in Europe (and probably elsewhere too), has been spending the last few thousand years convincing themselves that this just isn't so.
And yet, despite all the overthrown governments, the toppled empires, and flat out revolutions - a leader always emerges. After a few years, the common population is always in pretty much the same boat they were before the revolution.
