Kiwi,
I am not sure I would have noticed the pattern unless it had been tied to a specific weapons system. Americans have always tied gun ownership to liberty, but this seems somehow different.
It also does not seem to be tied to any one complaint. Just a general feeling of government oppression. That is the part that scares me. It seems like a "Rebel without a Cause" type of thing.
So if I am seeing this correctly, there is a general dissatisfaction with the American government. A portion of the population is beginning to feel that the normal means of dealing with government dissatisfaction - free speech and the vote - are no longer adequate to deal with the problem. To top it off, they are don't seem to be able to articulate what the problem is.
At first I would have thought of it as a straw man argument for ownership. That is what I had thought for some time. But now it seems like people "believe the hype" so to speak.
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