JWR’s Recommendations of the Week

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Here are JWR’s Recommendations of the Week for various media and tools of interest to SurvivalBlog readers. This week the focus is on learning about sewing machine belt replacement. (See the Vlogs and Instructional Videos section.)

Books:

Great Book of Woodworking Projects: 50 Projects for Indoor Improvements and Outdoor Living from the Experts at American Woodworker

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Pacific Northwest Foraging: 120 Wild and Flavorful Edibles from Alaska Blueberries to Wild Hazelnuts (Note: The same publisher has companion books on foraging in the Northeast, Midwest, and Southeast.)

Movies:

The Cocoanuts. The zany comedy of the Marx Brothers is hard to describe. You will either love it or hate it. I’m one those who love it.

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AGI Glock Pistols Armorer’s Course

 

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The Editors’ Quote of the Day:

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“I developed a problem with authority. Any time that authority was what I interpreted as being unjust, I stood up to it, and that became my personality.” – The Late Singer-Songwriter Tom Petty

Preparedness Notes for Tuesday – January 30, 2018

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January 30th is the birthday of historian Barbara Tuchman (born 1912, died February 6, 1989). She wrote some of the most engaging history books JWR ever read.

January 30th is also the anniversary of the 1945 Great Raid on Cabanatuan Prison Camp where US Army Rangers and Filipino Guerrillas liberated Allied prisoners. See Rescue At Los Baños, by historian and bestselling author Bruce Henderson.

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I recommend that SurvivalBlog readers take a look at the YouTube channel run by an earthquake tracker, who posts under the name Dutchsinse. In the past, most of the folks who have tried predicting earthquake locations have had about the same accuracy as a dartboard. But we’ve been watching Dutchsinse since last summer, and his predictions seem to be at least 70% accurate. On most days, he does a 24-hour livestream and jumps in with reports every evening around 10PM Central time. And on Sunday evenings he does a weekly forecast. He tracks the success of his predictions with a spreadsheet. He accurately predicted the Magnitude 7.9 earthquake in the Aleutians region, last week. Presently, he is predicting a Magnitude 6.0+ earthquake in Iran this week. Preppers living in earthquake-prone areas should definitely take a look! – JWR

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What To Do and Not Do When a Pandemic Starts- Part 1, by Scientist69

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The Basics (Science is Awesome)

What is the basic difference between an epidemic and a pandemic? In an epidemic, an infectious disease spreads quickly between people; however, this will be relatively confined to a geographic area, country, or even a continent. The Ebola epidemic in West Africa is an example. On the other hand, a pandemic means that this infectious disease spreads quickly to other continents, basically causing disease globally, most likely resulting in high fatality rates.

Examples of infections that can potentially cause a pandemic are the bird flu (avian influenza), SARS or MERS like infections that are caused by viruses in the coronavirus family, and of course Ebola and similar so-called hemorrhagic viruses.

Viruses More Likely to Cause a Pandemic

Why are these viruses more likely to cause a pandemic?

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SurvivalBlog’s News From The American Redoubt

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Here is SurvivalBlog’s News From The American Redoubt. This weekly column features news stories and event announcements from around the American Redoubt region. We also mention companies of interest to preppers that are located in the region. The emphasis this week is on pro-gun Wyoming.

Region-Wide

In recent data from The Tax Foundation, most of the American Redoubt States rank well, as usual: 2018 State Business Tax Climate Index

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Likewise, in safety rankings, most of the American Redoubt States rank very well: 2017’s Safest States in America. Note that Montana and Wyoming were dinged for road safety in part because they have so many long stretches of highway with 80-mile per hour speed limits, some severe winter weather at the higher elevations, and so many deer and elk collisions. Otherwise, they’d be near the top of the list.


Idaho

Wolf Trapper Certification Classes Scheduled in Coeur d’Alene

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Some video shot west of Coeur d’Alene: Air 4: Post Falls Dam. (Thanks to D.B. for the link.)

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Reader T.Z. sent news about a company headquartered in Ketchum, Idaho: Clothing Company Founder Finds Out it’s Not a Great Idea to Call His Fox Viewing Customers ‘Idiots’. JWR’s Comment: Something tells me that this company won’t be “getting rich off” many SurvivalBlog readers.

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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 “HJL”. Mexican violence continues to escalate and now the Federal government has decided to get involved again. Must be election time.

Eating Freeze Dried Food

The latest from Commander Zero: Real world eating of decades old freeze-dried food. This is a collection of posts where various bloggers have opened and eaten older freeze dried foods and reported on it. If you have old freeze dried foods in your pantry that you are wondering about, you might want to check this out.

Venezuela

The Associated Press has an article (sent in by reader B.H.) that continues the update on how desperate Venezuelans are getting. Drivers of trucks are getting held at gunpoint while hordes of people loot the food they may be carrying to processing plants or distribution points. These truck drivers are only making the equivalent of $100/month and it is now one of the most dangerous jobs there is. Inflation has the price of foods doubling every few weeks and the government is showing its usual stupidity by blaming supermarkets and ordering them to lower their prices. Let’s blame the symptom for the illness.

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The Editors’ Quote of the Day:

“The Jacksonians were libertarians, plain and simple. Their program and ideology were libertarian; they strongly favored free enterprise and free markets, but they just as strongly opposed special subsidies and monopoly privileges conveyed by government to business or to any other group.” – Murray Rothbard

Ruger PC9, 9mm Carbine, by Pat Cascio

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The all-new and improved Ruger PC9, 9mm carbine is under review. And this may just be the hottest selling firearm on the market right now.

When Ruger Originally Came Out With PC9

Some years back, Ruger www.ruger.com came out with a PC9, 9mm carbine. However, the one draw back was that it only took magazines from Ruger handguns. While not necessarily a bad thing, many shooters wanted more; they wanted a compact little carbine that would take magazines from other gun makers. Still, the original PC9 was a hot-seller, and after it was discontinued demand was crazy. Used models were selling for more than a thousand dollars, believe it or not.

Demand for PC9

As I write this, in the middle of January, 2018, Ruger can’t begin to keep up with demand for the PC9, not even close. My local gun shop that I haunt has 20 of these firearms on order. However, the distributor has no idea when they will have the guns in stock and ready to ship. Yet, daily customers come in asking if they have a PC9. I will go out on a limb here and predict that, if Ruger can keep up with supply and demand, they will sell a million PC9 carbines this year!

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Economics & Investing For Preppers

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Here are the latest items and commentary on current economics news, market trends, stocks, investing opportunities, and the precious metals markets. We also cover hedges, derivatives, and obscura. And it bears mention that most of these items are from the “tangibles heavy” contrarian perspective of JWR. (SurvivalBlog’s Founder and Senior Editor.) Today’s focus is on some recent predictions from economist Peter Schiff.

Precious Metals:

The Precious Metals Week in Review — January 26, 2018

 

Forex:

Next, at Forex Crunch: EUR/USD Forecast Jan. 29 – Feb. 2 2018

 

Commodities:

Moving on to this as Seeking Alpha: Commodities Recap For The Week Of Jan. 26, 2018

 

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The Left’s Vindictive Databases: For Blaming, Shaming, Defaming, and SWATting

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A key tactic of The Left is to demonize their political opponents. They have become increasingly sophisticated at this since the turn of the 21st Century. Most recently they have assembled voluminous databases on “Right Wing”, “Alt-Right” , and “Hate Groups.” But by lumping together legitimate conservative political activists (such as Tea Party groups) and right to life groups in the same lists as racists, bigots, the KKK, and assorted anti-Semites, they have besmirched the reputations of nearly everyone who opposes the socialist agenda. Some of the latest generations of databases can safely be called Vindictive Databases.

A new article in Wired magazine describes the level of database automation that The Left are now employing: Meet Antifa’s Secret Weapon Against Far-Right Extremists. This article reveals a large database called Whack-a-mole. This tool automatically mines data from Facebook, based on keywords like “patriot” and “anti-Obama” without applying human analysis. Therefore, a considerable percentage of the 400,000 “far right extremists” flagged by this system are surely false positives. And even more alarmingly, the key creator of Whack-a-mole publicly admitted that she has shared some of the database information with the Antifa radicals.

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Letter Re: What Is It That Will Really Help You Survive TEOTWAWKI?

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Hugh,

I wanted to let folks know how deep this goes.

The writer is very prescient in identifying the threat(s). In March, I lost my job. I had worked at this corporation for 19 years, but did not survive the political culture. In early November, I lost the love of my life to a devastating disease.

While I have large stockpiles of beans, bullets, and band-aids – enough to provide for my own family plus many others for a long time – these were two things that I didn’t see coming, and was totally unprepared for.

I’m struggling to deal with the unexpected and life-altering losses. Mentally and spiritually I was blindsided. I’m recovering, but it’s very difficult, and these events exposed a hollowness in my heart that I didn’t even know existed. While I had prepared for every natural and political threat (or so I thought), I wasn’t spiritually or mentally prepared for these events.

Depression? Yes. Survivor’s guilt? Yes. Being overwhelmed with the rush of financial and legal details that have to be dealt with? Oh yeah.

So the author’s advice about preparing yourself mentally and spiritually is spot on. I’m trying to move on with my life, while ensuring that our children are provided for and as a family we transition to the next chapter of our lives successfully. Hopefully, things will work out well. – J.P.