Notes from JWR:

The central Philippines have been completely devastated by typhoon Haiyan/Yolanda. I heard from a reader there that even some islands that were a hundred miles away from the path of the center of the storm may be without power for several more weeks. This will surely trigger a major public health crisis. Please pray fervently and give generously. Oh, and I didn’t see this political spin coming, but this news article from Disarmed Old England certainly fits in with the globalist/statist agenda: Typhoon Haiyan: gun culture of the Philippines hinders relief efforts. (Thanks to reader J.B.G. for the link.)




Your Retreat’s Privy, by Stephanie M.

Have you considered an outhouse/privy as part of your preparedness plan? If you could no longer flush your toilet because you were having plumbing problems,   or your commercial water supply was cut off and you didn’t want to use your water stores for flushing, do you have a good backup plan,practical even for long term? Going in a bucket with a toilet seat attached to it in your bathroom is one option, but then you have to keep dumping it somewhere. This doesn’t seem like a good long term plan to me. Now, if you happen to have a …




Letter Re: Advice on Buying Legislatively Resilient Guns

James, As a daily reader of your blog, I’ve read over and over again about how Pre-1899 guns are legal. The Internet is full of such advise dating back a long time. However, I still fail to see how that would add much protection against confiscation. The ATF has seized Airsoft guns and police confiscated muzzleloaders from one home in my area after one resident (who was not the owner of the weapons!) was arrested there. The list goes on from there and contains nothing that shows that law enforcement makes any distinction between antiques and modern guns. I believe …







Letter Re: Remembering Dear Aunt Flow

Dear Editor, I really do appreciate Kali for bring up our Dear Aunt Flow because is something I don’t think a lot of women have thought about. I did want to bring up a concern I have about using tampons and menstrual cups that I don’t think has been brought up yet which is the risk of toxic shock syndrome. From what I remember learning in nursing school it’s basically when bacteria gets introduced into a dark moist place in the body is allowed to grow and gets into the bloodstream  through thin skin and becomes life threatening. I’ve heard …




Economics and Investing:

I noticed that spot silver just took a dip to below $21 per ounce. For those who don’t dollar cost average, this would be a good time to make a purchase. From OSU’s Socratic Club: A couple of good illustrations of the perils of socialism. G.G. suggested: Larry Kotlikoff Asks “Is Hyperinflation Around The Corner? By way of Ol’ Remus (who is now back to regular weekly posts): 36 Times Obama Said You Could Keep Your Health Care Plan Items from The Economatrix: Huge Cracks In US Financial Fortress, Petro-Dollar Final Death Throes U.S. Unfunded Liabilities: The Coming Big Squeeze …




Odds ‘n Sods:

Bruce Z. suggested a free and fairly comprehensive wiki-like source for PDFs of U.S. Army electronics manuals: Radio Nerds. Seeing the RC-292 and “Turkey Thirty” antenna manuals brought back some fond memories. (By the time I left the ASA, we were using the fairly advanced Watkins-Johnson AN/PRD-11 with an H-Adcock antenna.) I was also thrilled to a see page dedicated to my all-time favorite HF receiver, the R-390A. To start, SurvivalBlog readers should all save copies of the TA-1 and TA-312 field telephone manuals.    o o o Filipino policemen feel powerless against the of waves of Tacloban looters.    …




Jim’s Quote of the Day:

"One of the most dangerous errors is that civilization is automatically bound to increase and spread.  The lesson of history is the opposite; civilization is a rarity, attained with difficulty and easily lost.  The normal state of humanity is barbarism, just as the normal surface of the planet is salt water.  Land looms large in our imagination and civilization in history books, only because sea and savagery are to us less interesting." – C.S. Lewis