Six Letters Re: Myths About Income Inequality

Hello Gentlemen, I am as capitalistic as they come and have spent the entirety of my life as the son of a self-employed concrete contractor, then owning and running several of my own businesses. Some of us though are questioning the huge profits rolling out of some of the Wall St. firms due to the QE policy of the Fed. It seems like the scales are getting out of balance because of this policy, and the distribution of wealth is appeasing Wall Street while the POTUS’s policies and regulations discourage middle income entrepreneurs. The top few percent get government bailouts …


Letter: Railroad Bugout

Hi Jim, Here’s an Interesting video from Cambodia, which triggered a series of thoughts on bugging out. You have used railroad tracks and trains in your books to speed along movement away from roads and people. This video shows how anyone who has tracks near them and need an escape route when the roads are blocked could be so very simple. The parts to put this together should be cheap and, depending on location, readily available just to have in the garage as a back up back up plan. I am sure enough readers can also tweek it in such …


Letter: Silica Gel Packets

Jim, Hoping you could answer a quick question. I put two jars full of silica gel packets in a glass jar and set them in a oven at 200 degrees over night to dry them out. I noticed that a couple of the bags broke open and the silica gels were brown. Does that make them non effective. I thought they were white to start with. Thank you and may God’s blessings be upon you and your family. P.S.- I liked your comment on one of your interviews where you stated your prayer is for God to put you in …


Economics and Investing:

B.B. sent in this video preparing for an Economic crash. On that same note, T. sent in this article on holding physical gold rather than paper gold. 7 setbacks for the middle class – H. L. Walmart is cutting more jobs from Sam’s club. – T. G.G. sent this link on on The Big Reset, part 2. Lloyds Banking Group says it has fixed problems that affected Halifax, Lloyds, Bank of Scotland and TSB customers using ATMs and debit cards. – S.R. Items from The Economatrix: TNX Chart: Specter Of Rising Rates HSBC Bank On Verge Of Collapse: Second Major …


Odds ‘n Sods:

Rifles powered by Linux purchased by US Army – R.L.H. I thought it was cool when I learned that many phones were powered by Linux. o o o D.B. sent in this article on Foraging and Looting. It seems clear to me. Foraging is finding what you need from things that really don’t belong to anyone else. Looting is taking something that clearly belongs to someone else. Foraging is OK (except when it’s hoarding) and looting is bad. See? It’s simple. For more on that principle, one only needs to spend some time in the book of Proverbs. o o …



Notes from HJL:

Today we present another entry for Round 50 of the SurvivalBlog non-fiction writing contest. The $9,700+ worth of prizes for this round include: First Prize: Gunsite Academy Three Day Course Certificate, good for any one, two, or three course (a $1,195 value), A course certificate from onPoint Tactical. This certificate will be for the prize winner’s choice of three-day civilian courses. (Excluding those restricted for military or government teams.) Three day onPoint courses normally cost $795, Two cases of Mountain House freeze dried assorted entrees in #10 cans, courtesy of Ready Made Resources (a $350 value), A $300 gift certificate …


Letter: Hard Tack

Dear Editor, We are all aware of hard tack as a long term storage food supply. A pound of flour can make a large quantity of hard tack, which (correctly made and stored) can last for a decade if not more. I would think that whole wheat flour would improve the nutritional qualities of the hard tack, but there are some online references that state that the fat found more so in whole wheat flour may go rancid with time. It leads you to wonder if there was white flour in Civil War times or in sailing ships? Or if …


Letter: Drought

Dear James, The biggest current threat to the U.S. food supply is the extraordinary drought that has had a relentless grip on the western half of the country. If you check out the U.S. Drought Monitor, you can see that drought conditions currently stretch from California all the way to the heart of Texas. In fact, the worst drought in the history of the state of California is happening right now. And considering the fact that the rest of the nation is extremely dependent on produce grown in California and cattle raised in the western half of the U.S., this …


Economics and Investing:

G.G sent this in: The Taxman Driveth: In the future, Your Car May Rat You Out to the Tax Collector. Santelli Slams Central Bank Policies – P.M. B.B sent in this link about just how badly the American People are messed over by their elected officials. Record One-day Withdrawal of Gold from JP Morgan G.C. sent a link to his video about the HSBC debacle Standing out in the video is this quote: “As this was not a change to the Terms and Conditions of your bank account, we had no need to pre-notify customers of the change,” And the …


Odds ‘n Sods:

A commentator who is better known for his science videos observes: The Problem With Facebook. His cogent arguments are just a few more reasons to avoid Facebook and other social media. – JWR o o o Connecticut doesn’t know how to deal with non-compliance to their anti-2nd amendment laws. So here’s their latest scheme. – MDL o o o Several readers reported this: Newspaper conglomerate considers building massive database of gun owners o o o This is certainly a novel way to deal with landmines – Mike o o o M.K.P sent in a link to this multitool. A bit …




Training for Survival, by Warm Winds

During a survival situation, being able to do a task with a good amount of stamina can get things done much faster. As an example, a recent survival blog entry was about how bikes are very valuable during survival. If one has no stamina, bikes can be pretty useless. Even if one has a limited amount of stamina, biking can be very exhausting and require a very long time to get from place to place. As a personal example, yesterday there was a big snowstorm where I live. My younger brothers and I decided to shovel snow for money. I …


Letter Re: Short Term Conflict Versus Long Term Conflict

Hugh, First of all, welcome to the blog. I was impressed by your credentials and have enjoyed reading your comments these past few days. However, I do have a bone to pick. Gee, no grace period? In the Friday, Jan. 24 issue of SurvivalBlog you said, “If our civilization reaches the point of collapse, the lawlessness will, by necessity, be relatively short lived.” In a devastating collapse, I would expect a couple of waves of large-scale “die-offs” fairly early. I think that this is where your theory comes from. However, to say that lawlessness would be short lived doesn’t take …