A hunting buddy of mine emailed me from the waiting room of his doctor’s office in Columbus, Ga., a few days after the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School. He was cringing in embarrassment as an old redneck spewed racially divisive rhetoric in front of African-American patients. Then my friend’s embarrassment turned to astonishment as that same redneck (almost certainly a gun owner, given the region and his demographic profile) said, “I never cared much for Obama, but that speech he gave about those little kids—I give him an A for that. He’s gonna try and get more gun control, and I hope he gets it.”