Chuck,
sorry to hear about your experience. It is perfectly legitimate for you to call the company back and ask them why they decided to pass on you. You do not need to be (and should not be) belligerent about it (since that might put them on the defensive). The only other suggestion I have is to get out of Kansas City (for example, when we hire at my startup, we don't give a shit what your Google history is -- hell, you could apply at Google: they might find your qualifications worthwhile) which I imagine is not an option for you, given your activism there.
Another option: put a different name in your resume: Charles XYZ, where XYZ is close to your name but can pass as a typo. After they hire you, if the name difference comes up, you can always say: oops, I guess typo in my resume. ;-) Larger companies probably have more sophisticated outsourced means of tracing your past, so perhaps use different info for email and snail mail address, and so on.
--ravi