Assault rifle at Obama speech a publicity stunt

for conservative talk radio show Declare Your Independence With Ernest Hancock.
Hancock and "Chris", the black man carrying the assault rifle, knew each other "through their work for presidential hopeful Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas)".

"We know what we're up against," Hancock, also packing heat at the health care rally, told CNN. "We're up against a tyrannical government that will rob the next generation as long as they can get away with it."

Just a couple of guys conducting a radio interview while cradling an AR-15 semi-automatic assault rifle at a health care rally where the President of the United States was speaking.
This is not really about healthcare then, is it?
From the "interview" :

"Is it your advocacy that by having guns here we're probably all safer?" Hancock asked.
Chris "absolutely" agreed. He then went on to explain how he was always armed, even when riding his motorcycle, though not always when he showered: "Sometimes when I take a shower I set it down on the sink."

Only sometimes. Presumably other times not. Banking with an assault rifle must be interesting.

Initial news reports included the information that the Arizona police who monitored the man at the downtown protest "wanted to make sure no one decided to harm him."
Now we hear from Hancock's interview on CNN:

"It was Thursday that I called and talked to Al Ramirez, the representative from the Phoenix police department, and we were discussing -- we've been around this rhetoric that was building up around William Kostric, who did this in New Hampshire."

These stunts at health care rallies, whether with or without the guns, were never about health care.