Day: December 11, 2010

Notes from JWR:

The Rawles Gets Your Ready Family Preparedness Course is only rarely offered at a discounted price. While supplies last, the publisher is running a special sale. Don’t miss out on the chance to get a copy for yourself, or to give one as a Christmas gift before it goes out of print. — Today we present another two entries for Round 32 of the SurvivalBlog non-fiction writing contest. The prizes for this round will include: First Prize: A.) A course certificate from onPoint Tactical. This certificate will be for the prize winner’s choice of three-day civilian courses. (Excluding those restricted …


Building a Dryer Lint and Wax Stove, by Brian C.

This easy to make tool has been in my inventory for 30-plus years. It has come in handy while camping as a scout, serving in the Marine Corps and even on the ground in the Gulf Coast as a First Responder after Hurricane Katrina and during Hurricane Rita. Once assembled it is primarily a stove, but a bit of its contents can be cut away and used as a fire starter, and–if the area is properly ventilated–a heating device. That’s right, a single, self contained, water proof unit consisting of just three materials of which many of us have and …


Letter Re: The Shelf Reliance Food Storage Planning Tool

James, I wanted to share some info on food prep. I’m sure you know about Shelf Reliance but I wanted to mention them to you and their great resources. I am trying to start prepping food and found their site a few months back. Yesterday, I went to their site to try and figure out how much of what I will need and what it will cost. They have some good tools and packages in there for general prep and emergencies. They also have some decent medical supplies and kits too. Under the “TOOLS” tab, you can use the THRIVE …


SurvivalBlog’s IP Address — A Modest Insurance Policy

We post SurvivalBlog’s IP address (also referred to as a “dotted quad” or IPv4 address) as a sort of insurance policy. Recent events have proven that a government agency or a malicious hacker can fairly easily seize or hijack a domain name. This has already happened to at least 75 U.S. web sites without due process of law. Their DNS records were changed, essentially erasing them from the “phone books of the Internet.” To insure against this, we are distributing our IPv4 address. This can be pasted or typed into a web browser window in place of “survivalblog.com” What you …


Letter Re: Protection From Falls

Mr. Rawles, I have often thought about the dire situation a fall may bring in a sans medical treatment facility scenario. In the western novel Jubal Sackett, by Louis L’Amour, Jubal finds himself in the wilderness with a broken leg and cursing himself for not being more careful. Though the article references falls from structures, I thought the ability to tie a Swiss seat may help an individual in either an urban or wilderness environment. ITS Tactical puts out a great knot tying series on YouTube, and the Swiss seat may be a quicker and cheaper alternative to purchasing a …


Two Letters Re: OPSEC Issue: Geotagging on Pictures from Smart Phones

Hello Mr. Rawles, I just got a link to a New York Times article about geotagging through Michael Yon’s web site, but with the New York Times date of August 11 2010, you may have seen this already. Regards, Albert U. Jim: I have been using the Exif JPEG header manipulation tool for several years.  A batch file can be written to remove EXIF data from all images in a folder.  I have my wife do this before she uploads her photos to Facebook. Regards, Lee H.


Economics and Investing:

Rahn: Folding the Fed. (Thanks to John for the link.) B.B. recommend this piece: How Far Will The Gold Correction Go? C.D.V. and Roy G. both suggested a piece by Alfred W McCoy: Taking Down America (How America will collapse by 2025) Fed’s QE Ponzi Scheme begins to Backfire Items from The Economatrix: Euro Collapse “Possible” Amid Deepening Divisions Over Bail-out   Still Asleep To The New Economic Reality   UK:  Overdraft Charges Soar to 19%   Gold Likely To Hit $1,600 in 2011 – Credit Suisse  


Odds ‘n Sods:

David in Israel mentioned: Ask the Rabbi: The right to self-defense    o o o Chris M. recommended an article about recognizing psychopaths in our communities.    o o o Another accidental invasive pest import: Stink bug numbers ‘explode’ along East Coast. It will be catastrophic if these get out to the fruit orchards of the west coast.    o o o Michael Panzner reports on Obamaville homeless camps: ‘It’s Ugly Out There’


Jim’s Quote of the Day:

“I began to sense faintly that secrecy is the keystone of all tyranny. Not force, but secrecy … censorship. When any government, or any church for that matter, undertakes to say to its subjects, this you may not read, this you must not see, this you are forbidden to know, the end result is tyranny and oppression, no matter how holy the motives.” – Robert A. Heinlein