D-Ray:
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Are you suggesting that the right to bear arms is more important to a democracy than a broadly interpreted protection of free speech?
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Never will I attempt to rank the 1st 10 amendments except that the 10th amendment DOES have a clarifier effect on the "scope" of the other 9.. In fact, the 10th amendment makes it clear that the preceding 9 are a special carve-out zone of freedom and liberty from ANY govt intervention (state, federal, local).
The authors COULD HAVE justified any of the other "rights" with some benefit to the state (such as freedom of the press). In fact, the concept of "a press" has changed just as much as the concept of "arms". While you debate what the founders would have thought about AK-47s, you could propose that they never anticipated the dangerous implications of a "wiki" page or the subversive side-effects of twitter (ask Mubarak about that). So the argument can always be made that in terms of actual solid objects referred to in the original words, there is wiggle room. Except that the amendments are not about the objects, but about the excercise of liberty. And if that excersize changes with the centuries, so be it. We have a standing army, so if you abide by the militia interpretation -- you ARE essentially anti-2nd-amendment since that leaves the whole concept null and void. Simple logic folks. If the dangling proposition (militia) is no longer true, the rest is then irrelevent and unenforceable. Except that the right was granted to virtually every citizen of the time. And it is the exercise of that right of individuals that transcends the military organizational chart. Just like 'freedom of the press' is trancendent of the means or organization of communication.
I'll stay with the corroborating testimony of the guys who wrote the 2nd. Makes it clear enough for the current Supremes to declare it an "individual" right.
My bet is that Ben Franklin would have been a major twitter packer AND assault weapon collector.