Day: August 29, 2007

Letter Re: Purchasing Modern Firearms Without a Paper Trail

My Rawles, I am recently new to your SurvivalBlog web site. I have thoroughly enjoyed trying to catch up and read the thousands of posts. While I have always felt the need to be prepared for any eventuality, I have recently began more intensive preparations up on food, ammo, water and learning every thing (like making soap) that I can. I have grown up around guns and hunting my entire life. Of the four guns that I have, 12 gauge, 16 gauge, .22 [rimfire] rifle and 9 mm pistol, I have only purchased one myself: the 9mm pistol. The other …


Letter Re: Garage and Yard Sales as a Retreat Logistics Source

Dear Mr. Rawles I have read your novel [“Patriots”] (several times) although I do need to get the [latest] expanded edition. And I finally talked my wife into reading it. I loved it–by far my favorite book of all time. Okay onto my two cents. I just thought it might be a good idea to mention to everyone the value of going to your local garage sales. I work third shift and have been able to find quite a few good deals over the past years. This year I really focused on survival needs and I think I did okay. …


Letter Re: Advice on Construction a Hiding Place for Precious Metals

Jim- I’ve got a plain, white, lidded bucket of coins (that’s the way the dealer packed them for me) on the floor of my guest bedroom closet. Above it is an old daypack with vital papers and bugout money. The closet, like most folks’, is full of shoes, coats, caps. I’m counting on [Edgar Allan Poe’s] The Purloined Letter idea. My thinking is that the Bad Guys will go first for the master bedroom–and that’s where I’m well prepared to meet them. On the other hand, if I have to bug out quickly, I will have these things ready to …


Letter Re: Resources for Researching Retreat Locales

Hi Jim, My wife and I will be moving to Montana in the near future. While researching a location for our future home, we found the following links to be especially helpful for state tax and cost-of-living comparisons. Overall Tax Burden by State State Income Tax Rates State Sales Tax Rates Cost of Living Comparison Sincerely, – Jeff H. JWR Replies: Thanks for sending those very useful links. I just added them to my Retreat Areas web page.


Odds ‘n Sods:

DAV mentioned this story that might portend a market change: Russian government takes over gold mining sector   o o o Some analysis from Steve Schifferes of BBC News: Financial crises: Lessons from history. I disagree that government intervention is the best solution. Inevitably “market intervention” ends up being a wealth transfer from one group of citizens to another, to the detriment of the former, and to the benefit of the latter. In the context of the current liquidity crisis, “intervention” will probably be in the form of loan guarantees which will put taxpayers on the hook for hundreds of …