I found a thread that said what to add to the command line (gnome-terminal -e blender), but not where the command line is. Looking under properties, my best guess is something has to be added in the “open with” section, but I don’t think that’s the right answer.
What you mentioned would be one of the solutions, but quite localised,
I prefered changing the launcher from
menu > system > preferences > main menu : navigate to blender and hit properties > change from application to application in a terminal.
I don’t have Blender in my menu, only as a desktop link. Can you tell me how to make that work (launch with console)?
i’m using ubuntu. Click with the right button on the desktop, and add a launcher, in the type of the launcher select ‘application in terminal’ point it to the blender executable, and that’s it 
The question of how to install the latest blender so that appears in the menu seems to come up every 2 weeks or so.
http://blenderartists.org/forum/showthread.php?t=132548
The X console can be found under Applications>Accessories>Terminal.
The standard console can be found by pressing Ctrl Alt F1 (or f2,3,4, etc.)
To return to x windows it’s Ctrl Alt F7.
paulo_gomes - thanks, that’ll do it!
Freen - but I’m not asking how to install it in the menu 
Thanks everyone for your help, especially thanks to Maurice Raybaud, that was exactly what I wanted. The exact solution to my problem, it opens the terminal anytime a blender window opens from anywhere! I need this to properly use BGE. Thank you!