Total tangent here.
I don't know enough to know if it's a cause/effect, but the correlation certainly exists. Someone else here may know more details. The guy who got his picture taken on the bridge with his AR didn't get arrested until six months or a year later. He probably thought, "Well, if they were going to arrest me for anything, they would have by now." And he started talking. Did a podcast, long enough to be posted in two parts. The first part included his description of using his scope to glass the .gov positions. He was behind bars before the second part aired.
I've always wondered if he would still have been arrested, had he brought a pair of binoculars and used them to do his glassing instead. Was the piece they needed an admission of pointing a loaded firearm at .gov personnel?
Kinda underlines "armed vs. well-armed," i.e., actually knowing what you're doing.