Quote Originally Posted by Stan View Post
I have to say that people in rural America fear the worst of everything, not just firearm ownership.

The core perception of the Obama administration (and to an extent, the Clinton era) is that our rights are dwindling. However, Obama did a better job of riding that fine line without saying anything.

If the general perception where I grew up in rural America is that our rights are slipping away, it could be corn on the cob today and firearms tomorrow, etc, etc. While I could care less about owning an AR15 or AK and it's too easy for me to dismiss those so-called rights to ownership, the remainder of rural America doesn't see it that way and would argue with me that by not giving a Sierra about this issue, will eventually translate into everything under the sun being restricted. These are some serious farmers with no military background !
Stan, the funny thing is that American's, as a group, have more rights (or more correctly, fewer governmental restrictions) than they did fifty years ago. Segregation is one example, marihuana, profanity, along with interracial marriage, birth control, and any number of other "blue laws" that have been relaxed. I am not sure that people today would recognize the America of the 1950's. Now on the flip side of that, and in line with Carl's comments on religion, many of these blue laws had a religious basis. It is not so much that people are becoming less free as it is that the traditional religious based restrictions on society are falling away, perhaps creating a feeling of being lost, without a harbor in the storm of social change. I really can't say. But it could be a contributing factor.