Month: February 2007

Letter Re: CERT (Community Emergency Response Team) Training

Jim- I’m just finishing up the nine-lesson [Citizen Corps] CERT (Community Emergency Response Team) training. I highly recommend it. Besides the very good information on dealing with a variety of scenarios, I really like the heavy emphasis on taking care of yourself and your family first. This gets constant reinforcement. So though the training is intended to help you be useful as a first responder, it is even more useful in helping you harden up your home, yourself and your family members. Of course it’s also a very good way to invite your neighbors into a local cohort group: instead …


Letter Re: My M1911 Loyalty Has Been Shaken–I Bought a Beretta

Dear Mr. Rawles, I just finished “Patriots” and enjoyed it very much. I have been reading SurvivalBlog for over a year now. Today I went to my local gun shop to trade off a Springfield 1911 Micro Compact, which never worked worth a hoot, even after a return to the factory. The Micro Compact is not the only 1911 I have ever owned, I have several Colts, full size, Gold Cup, Government Model, et cetera. I wanted something different, and I have always wanted a Beretta M9, ever since seeing the movie “Die Hard“. So with a little haggling I …


Odds ‘n Sods:

For those of you that have a fast Internet connection, watch SAR expert Robert Nielsen’s recent Google Tech Talk lecture video: Wilderness Survival: Building and Using a Wilderness Survival Kit. It will be one hour of your time, well-spent.    o o o Reader P.M. sent me flyer that mentioned the Earth-Box gardening system. P.M. says that he has used these for two years with great success. They can be put on wheeled platform or casters, allowing them to be moved indoors at night when frosts are expected.    o o o Rourke (moderator of the Jericho Discussion Group) mentioned …


Jim’s Quote of the Day

"People commit crimes because they are people—because they are innately selfish and do not care how their behavior affects other people, unless they have been raised to behave otherwise or unless they fear the criminal justice system." – Thomas Sowell, Barbarians Inside the Gates and Other Controversial Essays, p. 21


Note from JWR:

I’ve been asked by several blog readers about quantity pricing on autographed copies of the latest (expanded) edition of my novel “Patriots”. Here you go: 1: $22, Book Rate postage paid in the United States 2: $20 each, Book Rate postage paid in the United States 3 to 5: $19 each, Book Rate postage paid in the United States 6 to 10: $16 each, Book Rate postage paid in the United States 11 to 25: $14 each, Book Rate postage paid in the United States Full cases of 26 copies $325 (just $12.50 each), Book Rate postage paid in the …


Electric Golf Carts as a Retreat ATV Option

Jim, A good friend put a lift kit on an electric golf cart. It will go anywhere a 4-wheeler [all terrain vehicle (ATV)] will go; it is drop dead silent; and will go about 24 mph without alterations. I got to thinking: Why not retrofit a PV charging cell on the golf cart’s roof to trickle charge the batteries. An engineer buddy told me that it was very feasible to accomplish this with the additional thought that a redundant solar charger at ‘base’ would increase the time needed to maintain a full charge. I believe that such a unit would …


Letter Re: Advice on Security for Unattended Retreats

Mr. Rawles: I feel guilty about asking you this in an e-mail, since I should probably pay for consulting time to have you answer the following: I have a vacation/retreat house that is in another state, almost 600 miles from my home on the coast. I agree with your advice (that you’ve repeated gosh how many times) that someone should live at retreat year round. I tried renting it to an acquaintance that needed some “space” for a time following a divorce, but he eventually moved on. Now my retreat is vacant. All of my friends and me–including the two …


Letter Re: Veterinary Antibiotics

Jim, Thank you for responding to my e-mail. As a healthcare professional, many of us are going to have to make some really hard decisions in more difficult times when drugs will no longer be available. If it came down to having someone die or administering an out of date tetracycline, I would be happy to try the tetracycline out of date or not. Tough choices either way. The reason I continue this discussion is due partly to an article I read in The Wall Street Journal, Tuesday, March 28, 2000, page A-16. ‘Many Drugs Prove Potent Long Past Expiration …


Odds ‘n Sods:

A new organization, dedicated to protecting the right to keep and bear edged weapons: http://www.kniferights.org In my opinion knife ownership should have it constitutional protection recognized on an equal footing with gun ownership.    o o o USDA Announces An “Opt Out” Procedure For NAIS    o o o Montana and Maine move to reject the Federal Real ID requirements


Jim’s Quote of the Day

"It is an uphill struggle, but I wish that we could distinguish more carefully between freedom and liberty. These conditions are not the same, though they are certainly related. Freedom is the absence of restraint – a physical circumstance. Liberty, on the other hand, is a political situation denoting the lawful capability of the citizen to defend himself and his near and dear without interference from the state. Note that the Declaration of Independence forcibly and particularly establishes the blessings of liberty upon ourselves and our posterity. I like to carry a pocket copy of the Declaration, plus the Constitution, …


Note from JWR:

I recently spent an afternoon with The Memsahib at a COSTCO store. For our overseas readers: COSTCO is an American membership “warehouse” type grocery store chain that sells everything from canned hams to home computers. By the way, COSTCO is not to be confused with the Chinese shipping company, COSCO, although surely some COSCO goods end up in COSTCO stores. Just not to the same extent that they do at Wal-Mart. (Or, as my brother calls it: “Great Wal-of-China-Mart.”) We were at COSTCO primarily to stock up the Rawles Ranch on paper products, soap and cleaning supplies, and some staple …


The CDC’s New “Five Categories” for Pandemic Severity

Several SurvivalBlog readers mentioned an article that ran recently in the New York Times: U.S. Issues Guidelines in Case of Flu Pandemic. The article begins: “Cities should close schools for up to three months in the event of a severe flu outbreak, ball games and movies should be canceled and working hours staggered so subways and buses are less crowded, the federal government advised today in issuing new pandemic flu guidelines to states and cities. Health officials acknowledged that such measures would hugely disrupt public life, but they argued that these measure would buy the time needed to produce vaccines …


Three Letters Re: Pondering Some Personal Consequences of Global Climate Change

Dear Jim, In response to this: “(See the movie The Day After Tomorrow regarding tipping points). Discoveries of animals flash frozen solid with fresh grass their stomachs points to the possibility of a very fast onset to global climate change.” The Day After Tomorrow was roundly slammed by scientists and went beyond ludicrous, and the “flash frozen” animals are a myth that has never been documented. The recovered frozen mammoths have all been highly putrefied. At present, the evidence of warming is mixed, with glaciers in Europe, South America and Antarctica all increasing [in size]. Even with the current Northern …


Odds ‘n Sods:

Don’t miss the recent economic analysis from ContraryInvestor.com (by way of our friends at Gold-Eagle.com): We’re Swimming In Liquidity, Aren’t We? The charts say it all! We are about to experience the inevitable outcome of the liquidity bubble. Major market corrections are rarely fun. When market imbalances get way out of proportion and then markets do correct, it can get ugly. (For example the deflationary Great Depression of the 1930s, which followed the credit bubble of the 1920s.) Rawles Mantra mode on: Be prepared. Diversify out of the dollar. Get out of debt. Invest in tangibles.    o o o …