Notes from JWR:

Please pray daily, fervently for the fledgling nation of South Sudan. I was alarmed to read yesterday that war has now been declared by Sudan. After seeing how the BHO administration has aligned itself with the Muslim Brotherhood in several recent civil conflicts in North Africa and the Middle East, I expect that South Sudan can’t expect anything more than just disingenuous lip service from the U.S. government. Please pray and do anything you can to help the South Sudanese to survive. Please also pray for our President, that he would become convicted to substantively help South Sudan. — Today …


Prepping the Space Between Your Ears, by Tona

I don’t recall a time in my life when I wasn’t doing at least some planning for “worst case” situations.  That may have come from growing up in an earthquake prone part of the country, and during the cold war when we drilled for nuclear attacks during the school day.  My mother, who was a single parent through much of my life, also modeled planning for “hard times” by storing food, following world and local trends closely, and being careful with money.  I became serious and more intentional in prepping following Katrina, when it confirmed my suspicion that we had …


Letter Re: An Expat’s View of Overseas Relocation and Expatriation

Jim: Periodically I see posts or news articles about USA citizens renouncing their citizenship and moving abroad to greener pastures for tax and other reasons. I have lived and traveled outside the USA for some time now due to my current job.  Every year I have to fill out all the forms stating the bank accounts (and now assets) that I have outside the USA and they are indeed a real pain to fill out and it is a rather onerous process to gather all the information that I need to provide.  Not only do I have to fill out …


Economics and Investing:

The $5 Trillion Man: Debt Has Increased Under Obama by $5,027,761,476,484 eBay Announces New Changes for Coins Listed in Auction. The two changes, in essence, that follow up on their earlier banning of “replica” coins: 1.) Starting May 30th, Sheldon Scale numbers (1 to MS70) can only be mentioned if the coins are PCGS or NGC graded and encapsulated (“slabbed.”). 2.) Any coins valued at $2,500+ must be PCGS or NGC slabbed. (JWR’s comment: Gee, do the coin grading firms make a slab big enough to hold a one kilo gold coin? And what about a 10 kilo silver coin? …


Odds ‘n Sods:

Prepper At Large suggested a free medical Expert System developed by the CD3WD Project, a free but high quality collection of practical How-To Technical Development Information. They bill their mission as: “Helping the Third World to help itself.” The site hosts 4,000 document titles filling a whopping 13 gigabytes.  All are free downloads.    o o o Earth as you’ve never seen it before: The best pictures of our planet taken from the orbiting Space Station. A couple of these photos underscore my comments on the high population density of Europe. (Thanks to R.B.S. for the link.)    o o …



Note from JWR:

Today we present another entry for Round 40 of the SurvivalBlog non-fiction writing contest. The prizes for this round include: First Prize: A.) A gift certificate worth $1,000, courtesy of Spec Ops Brand, B.) 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, and C.) Two cases of Mountain House freeze dried assorted entrees in #10 cans, courtesy of Ready Made Resources. (A $350 value.) D.) a $300 gift certificate from CJL Enterprize, for any …


Understanding Five Types of Electrical Losses in Alternative Power Systems, by Roger A.

“Line Loss” is often mentioned when discussing alternative energy systems, but that is just one of several significant losses. This article will describe five distinct types of losses. In an alternative energy system that incorporates a battery or battery bank, the first electrical loss is within the batteries themselves as they discharge, this is called the Puekert exponent. This loss increases with the aging of the batteries. Look at it this way: If you had a 500 gallon tank of water and you used 200 gallon a day you would have to replace 200 gallons every day or 400 gallons …


Letter Re: Defending Static Positions in a Survival Setting

Good day, Mister Rawles. Thank you, as always, for the good work you do. Regarding J.G.’s article homestead defence, it occurred to me that stand-off situations would become a likely possibility. Reasonably, a group of attackers will launch an assault on your homestead and either succeed or fail to kill/capture you. If they succeed the point is moot, but if they fail, what then? Unless their force is clustered or small you’re unlikely to kill them all. Odds are strong that after half their force (or maybe less) gets ventilated the rest will attempt to retreat. What will they do …


Letter Re: Rules of Engagement and Escalation of Force for the Armed Citizen

Recently Fox News published an article about a Hew Hampshire man being arrested on reckless endangerment for discharging a firearm into the ground as a warning shot to stop a burglar. Reading that article got me thinking about what rules of engagement and escalation of force would look like for civilians. As a former infantry officer and combat veteran of the U.S. Army, I am familiar with the Army’s rules of engagement (ROE) and the use of escalation of force (EOF). Soldiers have a clearly defined set of rules of engagement and escalation of force for different scenarios from peace-time …


Economics and Investing:

After an unexpectedly long delay, here it comes: Stivers’ steel-coin bill gets hearing in House. (2012 may be your last chance to stack up your rolls of nickels with relative ease, at face value.) Reader “AmEx” sent this: Taxmageddon coming? Answer could cost Americans $500 billion The latest in the ever-growing world of derivatives: Could the Next Investment Craze Be Hedging Marriages? Kevin S. sent this: It’s Starting To Look Like This Notorious Book On The End Of Growth Was Right Several readers sent this: 16 Reasons To Move Away From California Items from The Economatrix: More US Cities Set …


Odds ‘n Sods:

After a long interval, Ol’ Remus of The Woodpile Report again addresses the fine art of stacking woodpiles.    o o o Scientists Say Spread of Schmallenberg Virus Is ‘Warning To Europe’. (Thanks to Gregg P. for the link.)    o o o Chris M. sent this amazing tale of long-term caching: Twenty Spitfire aircraft buried in Burma during war to be returned to UK.    o o o I just heard that Levon Helm passed away. He was a man who will be missed. By coincidence, just a couple of days ago I heard a cover of the song …


Jim’s Quote of the Day:

“O LORD, though our iniquities testify against us, do thou [it] for thy name’s sake: for our backslidings are many; we have sinned against thee. O the hope of Israel, the saviour thereof in time of trouble, why shouldest thou be as a stranger in the land, and as a wayfaring man [that] turneth aside to tarry for a night? Why shouldest thou be as a man astonied, as a mighty man [that] cannot save? yet thou, O LORD, [art] in the midst of us, and we are called by thy name; leave us not.” – Jeremiah 14:7-9 (KJV)


Note from JWR:

Today we present another entry for Round 40 of the SurvivalBlog non-fiction writing contest. The prizes for this round include: First Prize: A.) A gift certificate worth $1,000, courtesy of Spec Ops Brand, B.) 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, and C.) Two cases of Mountain House freeze dried assorted entrees in #10 cans, courtesy of Ready Made Resources. (A $350 value.) D.) a $300 gift certificate from CJL Enterprize, for any …


Defending Static Positions in a Survival Setting, by J.G.

You’re a prepper.  You have stores of food and water, supplies, commo gear, and everything you could conceivably need in order to survive the Apocalypse.  Unfortunately, that also means that you’re a target.  Eventually everyone in the neighborhood will figure out that you and yours are maintaining your weight while everyone else in society is starving, and your neighbors will cease to behave in a neighborly way.  To say “Oh well, I guess I should have prepared” is not the human way.  They will attempt to take your provisions by force.  This is one of the primary reasons that I …