I got more than a couple of friends who think the economy — the world economy, no less — is on its way down the toilet. Huge debts, large deficits, the Federal Reserve printing money like it was Charmin — they see a Fiscal Armageddon on the horizon. Depression, unemployment, then the collapse of civilization as we know it. They\u2019re wondering if it\u2019s time to buy a gun. Or an arsenal. They\u2019re wondering if they should buy Chinese currency or a year\u2019s supply of food and water. They\u2019re wondering what to do with their money that will keep them afloat when their neighbors drown.<\/p>\n
I remember one of my dad\u2019s pals, Malcolm, building a bomb shelter in his basement. Great guy, Malcolm, salt of the earth, a family man, just taking care of his family down in Northern Georgia near the foothills of the Appalachian where we lived. He took me down into his basement — I was all of 12 years old — to show me the shelter that would keep his family alive after the communists attacked us with nuclear weapons, an event he saw as inevitable.<\/p>\n
He had water tanks and shelves full of canned goods. He had gas masks and a propane stove. He had flashlights and a ton of batteries. \u201cElectricity\u2019ll be gone. Maybe forever,\u201d he told me. There were bunk beds and a portable toilet. It looked like Motel 6 had mated with a Goodwill. It really didn\u2019t look like a home for months of subterranean living, unless you were gophers.<\/p>\n
In the corner by the door Malcolm had his hunting rifle. \u201cFor food?\u201d I asked, thinking maybe a dinner of radioactive deer might be the way to go. Malcolm picked up the gun and gave me a \u2018serious\u2019 look. \u201cNo, Skeeter,\u201d he said solemnly. \u201cYour dad didn\u2019t plan for what\u2019s coming and \u2026 well, when you all try to come to our shelter, I\u2019d have to stop you. There\u2019s only room for us.\u201d<\/p>\n
Now, I wasn\u2019t the sharpest kid on the block, but I took his meaning pretty quick. \u201cYou mean you\u2019d shoot us, Malcolm?\u201d Malcolm set the rifle back in its spot and nodded. \u201cI have to protect my family first. That\u2019s the way it is.\u201d<\/p>\n
It\u2019s real hard to like a man who tells you he\u2019d kill you, whether you\u2019re 12 or 64. The world after a nuclear war, and probably an economic Armageddon too, would be filled with Malcolms. They see the bleakest future and the darkest side of human nature, I suspect because they find it in themselves. Me, I\u2019m not interested in either. But I\u2019m always glad to know who to avoid, catastrophe or no.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I got more than a couple of friends who think the economy — the world economy, no less — is on its way down the toilet. Huge debts, large deficits, the Federal Reserve printing money like it was Charmin — they see a Fiscal Armageddon on the horizon. Depression, unemployment, then the collapse of civilization […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[6],"tags":[4399,468,6296],"class_list":["post-17476","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-rantings-and-ravings","tag-armaggedon-now","tag-fallout-shelters","tag-worst-case-scenarios"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.skeeterdaddle.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17476","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.skeeterdaddle.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.skeeterdaddle.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.skeeterdaddle.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.skeeterdaddle.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=17476"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.skeeterdaddle.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17476\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17478,"href":"https:\/\/www.skeeterdaddle.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17476\/revisions\/17478"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.skeeterdaddle.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=17476"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.skeeterdaddle.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=17476"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.skeeterdaddle.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=17476"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}