yeah, no. Or rather you have identified on piece of it. America is built upon distrust of centralized authority. (our second amendment was put in place as a way to blunt a federal power from oppressing its own people.) And upon individualist sentiments. No nationalized health care, no welfare handouts, these thoughts are not about guns, but they connect to a shared underlying idea of self reliance.

And Americans are fiercely protective of their abilty to choose for themselves. (to have guns or many other things.

I personally am in favor of more robust laws against powerful guns... I just think you are not really getting a very complete picture of the issue. (I loved @Stephen Paz fast food analogy)