A friend who already has an AR-15 with a red dot sight asked me about getting a shotgun for home defense and I figured I'd share my response here. This was just an e-mail response and wasn't intended to be a complete discussion of the issue, so feel free to add your comments and thoughts.

In the wake of the re-election of history's most anti-American president, and the horrible events in Newtown that followed, we have received hundreds of e-mails and calls. Preppers across the nation are desperately trying to fill gaps in their preparations. Guns (all types, not just AR-15s), ammo, and magazines are in record high demand, and selling for record high prices. As prepared Americans, how should we view buying panics and price gouging, and what should we do about it?

A fairly recent development in small arms technology is the advent of “barrier blind” bullets. Law enforcement agencies and groups within our military weren't satisfied with the performance of current ammunition when fired through intermediate barriers like car doors and windshields, but until the Black Hills 5.56mm 50 grain TSX round, every bullet designed to rectify this problem shared the same fatal flaw.

Developed as a specialty cartridge for use in military SPR sniper rifles, the Mk 262 Mod 1 from Black Hills Ammunition has proven significantly more capable, both in accuracy and terminal performance (damage to target), than previous 5.56mm military ammunition. The increase in accuracy is due mostly to Black Hills Ammunition's outstanding quality and consistency, but the reason for the increased terminal performance is a little more involved.  

Even people who don't prepare at all can usually grasp the idea of preparedness. Somehow they think being prepared to care for their loved ones is “not for them” as if we have the right to shirk this responsibility, but in a general sense, they can be led to understand why we do it. The real confusion comes when we discuss physical security, defense, and weapons.

We've all heard people rave about how Black Hills Ammunition is the best thing since sliced bread, but what makes Black Hills ammo so much better than any other manufacturer's ammo?

Aimpoint currently makes over a dozen models of red dot sights. Each utilizes Aimpoint's ACET technology for outstanding (multiple years) battery life, and industry leading reliability. Picking the sight that's right for you will, of course, depend on your intended use, so let's take a look:

Tom: My hunting rifle isn't accurate enough. I'm going to get a nicer one.

Bob: How accurate does a rifle need to be? My rifle shoots three inch groups at 100 yards. That's more accurate than I am, so I don't need anything better.

Bob doesn't know it, but he has just committed the great fallacy of rifle accuracy. He somehow believes that because he isn't the most skilled shooter, he won't benefit from a more accurate rifle. In fact, nothing could be further from the truth.

After using EOTech sights for several years, I now prefer Aimpoint sights for most applications, so I think I can offer a fairly objective explanation of the pros and cons of each.

The primary applications of firearms for our customers are food gathering (hunting) and defense in a survival or preparedness context, so we'll discuss weapons suited to those goals.

It used to be that we chose our gun based on our intended use and chose the scope as an afterthought.  Optics have come so far in quality and specialization that the scope/sight choice is now critical in determining the capabilities of the weapon with the actual underlying weapon being something of a secondary thought.