Re: Retiring at 33, where to invest the money?
Boy you know I typed a long reply to this yesterday and then changed my mind. Oh well. Bear in mind that when I worked as a camp counsellor in my earlier years playing babysitter to overprivileged kids, teaching them to handle guns and the art of marksmanship was one of my areas of specialty, outdone only by my skill with a bow. I've been around firearms most of my life and understand them, their ups and downs, and the affect they have on people.
While its said that most people are liberals in their youth and become more conservative in their older years, I think i'm going the other way.
The chief problem with guns, and with most other things in fact, is that most reasonable and rational people apply their own reasonability and rationality to everyone else, or at least to the majority. This while failing to note that even they themselves act unreasonably and irrationally a large percentage of the time.
A shotgun IS the best home defense tool simply because it requires very little accurate aiming. Stats show that a huge percentage of handgun users empty the gun either without hitting the intruder(s) or inflicting fairly minor injuries. In many other cases the homeowner fails to reach the gun. A better option is to hop out the window or lock the door and call 911 rather than putting yourself in a life threatening situation.
A gun is like any other tool in that it creates an advantaged opportunity in specific circumstances, such as hunting and protection. Unfortunately its a terrific offensive weapon as well. People are brain fed through the media to see shooting someone dead as a common and fairly easy way to resolve a situation. You pull the trigger, bang, they fall silently to the ground, its over.
Giving everyone a handgun to equalize the playing field doesnt sound like a good idea either, because I know for sure most people arent as well measured as I am and I wouldnt trust myself with a handgun. This isnt limited in my mind to guns, but to any "quick kill" tool. I remember a scene from about 10 years ago when a guy cut another guy off in traffic, middle fingers were exchanged and they pulled over for some extracurricular activities. The guy in front produced a small crossbow and according to witnesses "with a smile on his face" he shot the other guy in the chest, killing him. His friends and relatives expressed shock that he would have done this as he was such a "level headed guy".
I wonder what the "founding fathers" would have written into the constitution if they had a preview of weapons that would allow a single man to do more damage in an hour than a regiment in their time could do in a day. As a student of the constitution, it reads to me that their intent was to provide tools for the populace to form a militia in times of need to protect the country or to overthrow a government that is no longer serving their interests.
One isnt needed any longer, and good luck with the other one.
I still like the one comedian who had what seemed to me like a fairly plausible solution. Give everyone a gun but make bullets cost $10,000 each. Guns arent the problem. Cheap bullets are the problem
In my case, theres a baseball bat behind the front door and one tucked between my bed and nightstand. If you value your knees you'll think twice about "dropping by" with ill will in mind...
Oh yeah, this will be after they "meet" my half rottweiller half mastiff dogs.
