Year: 2021

Economics & Investing For Preppers

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Here are the latest news items and commentary on current economics news, market trends, stocks, investing opportunities, and the precious metals markets. We also cover hedges, derivatives, and obscura. Most of these items are from the “tangibles heavy” contrarian perspective of SurvivalBlog’s Founder and Senior Editor, JWR. Today, we look at the recent GameStop stock fiasco. (See the Equities section.) Precious Metals: Peter Krauth: Gold Bull Will Run For Years – Here’s Why o  o  o Gold to push above $2,000 as Saxo Bank sees 2021 as the start of broad commodity bull market o  o  o Inflation or deflation? …



Preparedness Notes for Thursday — January 28, 2021

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January 28th is the anniversary of the rescue of General James L. Dozier from his Italian Red Brigades kidnappers. Tangentially, Colonel Jeff Cooper created a shooting drill in honor of the men who freed him– The Dozier Drill. — SurvivalBlog Writing Contest Today we present another entry for Round 92 of the SurvivalBlog non-fiction writing contest. The prizes for this round include: First Prize: The photovoltaic power specialists at Quantum Harvest LLC  are providing a store-wide 10% off coupon. Depending on the model chosen, this could be worth more than $2000. A Gunsite Academy Three Day Course Certificate. This can …


Garden Lessons – Part 2, by Greenthumb in the West

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(Continued from Part 1. This concludes the article.) Grapes are a relatively fast maturing plant as far as fruit production (compared to trees) but even for them the vines that bear fruit grow off of last year’s vines. Unless you are already growing or purchase “primacane” variety berries, most of them are the same way. Asparagus and rhubarb need to be established a year or two before they can be harvested. You have time to deal with that year of start up time now, so take advantage of it. Established fruit trees and plants can produce excessive amounts of fruit. …


The Survivalist’s Odds ‘n Sods

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SurvivalBlog presents another edition of The Survivalist’s Odds ‘n Sods— a collection of news bits and pieces that are relevant to the modern survivalist and prepper from “JWR”. Our goal is to educate our readers, to help them to recognize emerging threats, and to be better prepared for both disasters and negative societal trends. You can’t mitigate a risk if you haven’t first identified a risk. Today, we’ll start with an article about the oxygen shortages at hospitals. Oxygen Scarcity Swells Covid-19’s Death Toll To file under “I told you so”: Oxygen Scarcity Swells Covid-19’s Death Toll. JWR’s Comments: I …



Preparedness Notes for Wednesday — January 27, 2021

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Today is the birthday of singer-songwriter Kate Wolf. (Born 1942, died December 10, 1986.)  Her untimely death at age 44 cut short an amazing career and robbed America of a great songwriting talent. This is also the birthday of the late Helen Chenoweth (born, 1938, died October 2, 2006). She was a controversial Republican congresswoman from Orofino, Idaho. — Note that since we’ve very recently quit the Amazon Associates program, the Recommendations of the Week column may only be appearing on occasional Wednesdays, henceforth. That will all depend on how many books, tools, and other products are suggested to us …


Garden Lessons – Part 1, by Greenthumb in the West

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There is an old saying: “The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is today.” We had this proverb in mind when we bought our retreat property five years ago, and started work on the garden and orchard immediately, even before we started on the house. The past five years have been a steep learning curve of lessons in taking raw land to (semi!)-productive land. We have had the blessing of not needing to rely on our garden for sustenance during this time. I wanted to pass on what we’ve learned and purchased …



Preparedness Notes for Tuesday — January 26, 2021

January 26th, 1945 is the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz by the Soviet Army. Established in 1941 Auschwitz was a complex of three large camps and 40 smaller camps used for slave labor, unethical medical experiments, and monstrous killing grounds where prisoners were gassed and cremated. As the Soviets headed for Auschwitz, the German Gestapo began a murder spree and began destroying the facility in an attempt to hide the evidence of their crimes. When the Soviets arrived, they encountered 648 corpses and more than 7000 starving camp survivors along with storehouses filled with hundreds of thousands of dresses, …


Why I Left Amazon — And How You Can Help Starve The Beast

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(Updated, July, 2023.) I feel clean, leaving the brown-tinged waters of the Amazon behind. Let me begin by explaining that I joined the Amazon Associates program in 2007. At that time, Amazon’s corporate management was already liberal, but their politics didn’t influence the way that Amazon.com was operated to any great extent. And Amazon was not yet a provider of web/cloud computing services. I found Amazon to be a handy place to shop for books, DVDs, and various merchandise. They offered commission-earning links that never expired. By becoming an Amazon Associate, I earned an average of about 7% on any …


SurvivalBlog’s News From The American Redoubt

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This weekly column features news stories and event announcements from around the American Redoubt region. (Idaho, Montana, eastern Oregon, eastern Washington, and Wyoming.) Much of the region is also more commonly known as The Inland Northwest. We also mention companies of interest to preppers and survivalists that are located in the American Redoubt region. Today, we focus on an ancient grizzly bear.   (See the Wyoming section.) Idaho Taking a Stand: Sheriffs, Local Officials, and Rule of Law VS. Covid Dictators.  And here is a report on the same sheriff from the left-wing propagandists at Spokane’s major newspaper: New Kootenai County …



Preparedness Notes for Monday — January 25, 2021

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Today is the birthday of celebrated Scottish poet Robert “Bobby” Burns. He was born on January 25, 1759. — An USB stick update: There has been a technical glitch, because we have so much bonus material and almost 40,000 posts and columns lined up for our waterproof 2005-2015 Special 15th Anniversary Archive USB stick. It looks like it might have to be a 32 GB stick! We should have a pre-order announcement by about February 5th. Thanks for your patience. — Fellow blogger Commander Zero of the great Notes From The Bunker blog posted news that his namesake, Edén Pastora — …


Only One Gun?, by Pat Cascio

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I get a lot of questions asked of me, all the time, but many of them are really one in the same question, just phrased a little differently. Over my lifetime, I’ve been asked, literally hundreds of times: “What is your favorite gun…?” or, “If you could only own one gun, what would it be…?” and other similar questions from those seeking a truth or “the” truth about firearms. And, I can’t give a pat answer to these questions and no one else can, either. I can only reply based on my own experiences, the facts and my finding over …