Prosperity and Gun Culture

Among all the Facebook postings I have viewed in the days since the Newtown murders, one of the most astute went something like this: “When the Second Amendment was being written it took three minutes to reload a musket and during that time you could rush the guy and kick the crap out of him.”  Much has changed since the end of the 18th century, but the largest shift is the amount of personal wealth.  And it is fully linked to the emergence of gun culture in North America.