I guess from my perspective there are even more dire problems in the US that I'm surprised people accept. But it seems they don't know, or care, or know that they should care.

Perhaps it's the lack of proper authoritarian regime in the US' past that drives this. I believe the temporal proximity of such makes people aware of, and angry against, the many traps that such systems leave in their "law", so you can be imprisoned anytime for anything. EU has a bunch of countries with varying degree of such past.

Most people need to work to support themselves so it's quite inconvenient to single-handedly solve all of the problems in the US. Suggesting people simply don't know or care is very naive.