I fully concur that the magnitude of the lesson and consequences thereof will indeed be dramatically more severe and far-reaching this time around. However, as a man who has made an effort to be self-sufficient, and realized how truly difficult that is now that we've wedded ourselves so intimately to our technologies, I'm not sure a transition to awareness can be accomplished without a dramatic escalation in the "fear which divides." As Americans fully realize the hardship which awaits them, and try to absorb the loss of the things and myths that their disillusioned value system embraced, I believe that fear and despair will be their primary motivations, and that this will lead to a devolving cycle of violence and selfishness, not a rising toward a grand destiny. My perspective on this is much like my thinking about the Iraq War, in which I said that I surely hope we succeed in winning the hearts and minds of the Iraqi people and move the region toward democracy, but I can't see it happening. And as with Iraq, I rely not on my own understanding for this view, but on the teachings of much greater minds than mine: in Iraq, any Mideast expert (you know, the ones Bush and the neo-cons refused to heed in their economically-motivated invasion) I studied concurred that Saddam was a lesser evil, and that to remove him would be to create chaos and sectarian strife. In America, we have the instruction not only of Orwell, but of many brave whistleblowers like Wendell Berry, Allan Bloom, John Lukacs, Richard Goodwin, Kevin Phillips, Russell Kirk, Christopher Lasch, John Kenneth Galbraith, and Albert Einstein, all of whom were similarly ignored in favor of the baser desires of personal wealth accumulation and comfort, of complacency and entertainment.
So I hope you are right, sir, and that a new day is dawning. But what I see (as a realist, not a pessimist) is a wake-up call which will lead to international disaster, in which those most dependent on wealth, oil, and technology (i.e. Americans) will suffer the most. I confess that some of this education arose from living in England for three years, where I became more aware of Americans' wasteful consumptive gluttony, and also of how the rest of the world viewed my country. If only Americans weren't so busy extolling the virtues of their "greatest country in the world," perhaps they would gain some saving humility from an understanding that there are in fact other humans on the planet, and that they are of equal value.
In sum, I see "humanity rising toward it's destiny" as the fulfillment of God's promises in the New Testament that there would be a great conflagration called Armageddon, and that out of that chaos would arise the only perfect government, the gentle stewardship of our shepherd Jesus Christ, to save us from ourselves. Absent the hope He offers, I think we're all done for.

Yes*, tragic for many, yet the message of Orwell has not been "entirely" ignored. All of this has happened before and will happen again, through the difference is the magnitude of the lesson will be more global, more immediate and far reaching, hence the change will*be a sweeping wave of awareness, of the useless fear which divides and of those who support that division. Any attempt to block that wave will fail as the truth of humanity rises toward it's destiny.

True*Peace

BL*M

Sounds amazingly like the road map described in George Orwell's 1984, a fictional tale become reality in modern America. Orwell relates of the proles that, until they become aware, they cannot become free; but until they become free, they cannot become aware. Orwell's proles are too busy simply trying to survive in a toxic soup and impoverished oppression to have the resources to organize or respond to the source of their oppression. The use of torture by the Party is morally justified in a good vs. evil machination, and the people's attention is constantly shifted abroad toward nebulous and shifting enemies, in a war that never ends.
A reading (or re-reading) of Orwell in these modern American times is an eerie and thought-provoking exercise. It is obvious that Orwell was not directing his warnings against just Nazis or Communists, but against any ideology which obfuscates truth in the pursuit of power. The neo-cons and their Orwellian puppet (Orwell explains that Big Brother doesn't have to be real: his purpose is merely to place a human face on the Party) seem to have taken their game plan from the pages not just of Machiavelli, who taught that any means were justified in the effort to gain and retain power, but also from Orwell. Karl Rove probably has parts of the book memorized, for ease of use in a crunch.
Using Christianity as a deceptive shield for such unchristian conduct is Bush's modus operandi, and would not at all surprise George Orwell, who invested great effort to warn modern man of the pitfalls of modernity -- that we were making machines to be more like men, and men to be more like machines. With alienation comes a loss of our humanity. It's tragic that Orwell's warning was ignored....