This weekly Snippets column is a collection of short items: responses to posted articles, practical self-sufficiency items, how-tos, lessons learned, tips and tricks, and news items — both from readers and from SurvivalBlog’s editors. Note that we may select some long e-mails for posting as separate letters.
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Reader C.B. mentioned this, published by the leftist USA Today: Will humans cut down trees that have been alive for thousands of years? New rules say no. JWR’s Comments: Throwing in mention and photos of 2,000-year-old trees is just a sympathy-inducing tactic. Those trees have long been protected. The new rules will effectively limit USFS timber sales to just second-growth trees. In many areas, that means small-diameter pulpwood logs. The Bidenistas want to wreck the economies of most of the western and southern states. This new policy fits in with their overall strategy of marginalizing Republican “Red” states.
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Channel 1: The world’s first AI-generated news channel.
JWR’s Comments: AI-generated tripe is becoming ubiquitous. Some websites and alleged blogs are nothing but AI-regurgitated pablum. And Amazon’s self-publishing platform is now becoming choked with AI-generated schlock books. I now often receive articles submitted for our writing contest with phrasing that is clearly AI-written. In my experience, the telling hallmarks of AI-writtten text are: A repetitious writing style, odd or simplified vocabularies, awkward phrasing, perfect punctuation, no typos, paragraphs of almost identical length, circular logic, and a monotonous recounting of facts. I of course reject these scam articles, but I often wonder about the editors of other blogs and websites who are not as discerning, or that simply don’t care. My fear is that the blogosphere will soon resemble my e-mail inbox — that is: overwhelmed by fakers, scammers, spammers, SEO stuffers, and fraudsters. Rest assured that what you are reading at SurvivalBlog is legitimate. Our old-fashioned blogsite may lack those snazzy animated graphics and embedded videos, but we are genuine journalists, guided by Christian ethics.
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The “Post-Degree” Era Is Here: Study Reveals Top 10 Six Figure Careers That Don’t Rely On College. (A hat tip to H.L. for the link.)
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Mike in Alaska wrote:
“My wife and I just watched a movie called Time Changer and all I can say is this is a very good movie to recommend. In a brief summary, it is about a minister who travels from the 1890s to the 2010 time frame and has a change of heart … yes it’s fiction; but the message of truth is not.”
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Iran threatens to close Mediterranean Sea citing US ‘crimes’ in Gaza.
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Avalanche Lily spotted this video on the growing cyberwarfare threat: She’s Exposing the WEF false flag coming in 2024, Journalist Whitney Webb.
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A television news segment: South Dakota doomsday city built underground — On Balance.
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Reader “Country Girl” wrote:
“I wanted to let you know about the fantastic customer service I received from one of your advertisers. After reading about Siege Belts on SurvivalBlog back in 2021, I bought my husband one of their belts as a gift. I ordered the wrong size and intended to send it back to them for an exchange. Due to some unexpected medical issues, it became a low priority. However, in November 2023, I contacted Siege Belts and explained what happened and they were super nice and took it back and did a quick exchange on it for me to swap it for the correct size–even though it was nearly two years after I bought it. There was no charge, and my husband just received the new belt a few days ago and has been able to wear it for the first time. He loves it! Great product, great customer service! For anyone looking for a belt that does double duty as a useful clothing accessory and can be used for defensive purposes in a situation where you might not be able to carry a more traditional weapon, I would highly recommend trying a Siege Belt!”
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Xi warned Biden during summit that Beijing will reunify Taiwan with China.
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Ray wrote, in response to a recent blog post on Starlink losing a subsidy:
“Just this Fall my area of BF Kentucky benefitted from the .gov program to get high-speed fiber optic internet into more rural areas. My house had some trouble because we didn’t show up in the ‘Census Block’ that was used to determine the eligibility of the various addresses, but through some creative shenanigans from my Kinetics rep, we now have 1000 mbps fiber optic internet. We left HughesNet where they published 25 mbps speed, but delivered well below.
We had signed up to be put on the waiting list for Starlink. Starlink came through as I was having the fiber installed. Their specs were 300 mbps, which was well below the minimum specifications for data speed. Yes, a technicality that can be enforced or not as TPTB decides in the moment. I have no doubt that Elon Musk is being punished, and that all of .gov is now not only politicized but weaponized, but on a technicality, Elon’s offering is high-tech for folks out in the very remote boonies where fiber will probably never go, but it doesn’t meet the published specs.”
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More Bidenista backpedaling: John Kirby Denies Biden Regime Left U.S. Weapons in Afghanistan, Calls Accusations a ‘Fallacy’ and ‘Farce’ (Video).
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St. Funogas wrote:
“I really enjoyed Mr. Zipph’s recent article on nut harvesting. A good reminder that I need to quit procrastinating and do something with my black walnuts other than feeding the squirrels. One of my high school jobs was harvesting pecans with very long poles. The best nutcracker I’ve found by far is a pair of vise grips. You set it just right so the nut cracks without going too far and smashing everything to pieces. It works well with most kinds of nuts once set to the correct position. With uneven nuts like Brazil nuts, you just find the part of the nut that fits the vice grips and give them a squeeze. For me, slowing the eating process way down by cracking my own [sequentially] makes them much more enjoyable as opposed to eating them straight out of the bag. Thanks again Mr. Zipph, for the article.”
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A fairly detailed PBS documentary on the Hamas incursion into Israel: Failure at the Fence.
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Ashley St. Clair on X-Twitter:
“To to be clear Air marshals are being pulled from airports to help at the border with the unprecedented number of migrants coming. While simultaneously pilots from every commercial airline are reporting they have no idea who the h*ll is boarding their planes and migrants are bypassing traditional security screening, using arrest warrants as ID.”
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