It all hinges on whether you're willing to bet that the ranter is wrong about American's lack of knowledge about their history, the history of other nations/movements, etc.

If ranter is correct, then any mental snapshot you have of a "freer" America is extremely fragile and probably transient. Unless of course you want to be the contrarian who argues that awareness of history is somehow not part of "eternal vigilance."

If you want to argue that Americans' lack of historical knowledge is largely a myth and have some references about that, let's have the links. Hell, I'd certainly enjoy a December pick-me-up! :)