The Survivalist’s Odds ‘n Sods:

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”. The world’s public schools are at it yet again.

A Surprising Poll

Like many others, I have always assumed that conservative strongholds like Texas have suffered from the migration of leftist/progressive loonies from California or the east coast. The thinking was that these people moving in from the coasts were bringing their liberal values with them as they sought employment opportunities. It was quite surprising to me to learn that that assumption may very well be wrong. I was listening to Ben Shapiro when he profiled a recent poll that measured if a person had been born in Texas or not and if they voted for Cruz or O’Rourke in this election. It would appear that the people moving into Texas are fleeing the liberal/progressive coasts and are actually skewing the results in favor of conservatism. It is the young, new voters that are most liberal. I suspect that has alot to do with the indoctrination centers we call public school. The interesting part of the video starts at about 14:00.

Scotland Public Schools

Scotland is one of the latest countries to openly subvert Christian values through the public schools. According to this article send in by DSV, schools in Scotland will soon be required to teach students LGBT history to prevent “homophobia and transphobia” and to encourage exploration of their own gender identity. The move comes after lawmakers accepted the full recommendations of a working group led by the Time for Inclusive Education (TIE) campaign. There will be no exemptions or opt-outs to the policy. As we’ve said before, get your kids out of these indoctrination centers while you can.

Brexit

Mike Williamson, SurvivalBlog’s Editor at Large, sent in this interesting article on one British woman’s perspective of Brexit. She has a box of goods which consist of her favorite brands of foods that are made in the EU. She fears that after the Brexit finishes, she will not be able to buy those foods anymore and so she is stocking up on them. Looking in the box, I see things like cans of Pepsi and other common items. It seems silly to those of us that are outside of the EU. As Mike states:

Well, gee, what did the UK do before it was part of the EU? How do the US and Japan trade with Europe without being part of the EU? How does Norway manage? They could be stockpiling useful stuff against natural disasters and the breakdown of civil society, but she’d rather worry about French marmalade. I wouldn’t, for two reasons. A: it’s French. B: it’s marmalade.

Mercator Misconceptions

Reader P. sent in this great article from Visual Capitalist. We’ve all grown up with world maps that use the Mercator perspective to show a 3D globe in a 2D representation. This type of map gained acceptance because navigation lines were all straight as they would be on a globe. However, the map introduces perspective distortions that are greater the further you get from the equator. Since most of the world that we are familiar with lies north of the equator, those countries appear larger than they really are – sometimes significantly larger. In particular, Canada, Russia and especially Greenland are inflated. Canada and Russia appear to take up about 25% of the Earth’s surface when in reality, they only occupy a mere 5%. Kudos to Google for changing to a spherical projection on Google Earth. Perhaps this is one of the reasons Flat Earther’s seem so convinced in their willful ignorance.

Why the AR-15/M4

Its a common question. AR-15 or the AK? Reid Henrichs gives his perspective of why he likes the AR-15/M4. Among the features he likes are the modularity and versatility of the weapon. It can be used for room clearing as well as shooting out past 600 yards and it is an easy rifle to shoot. Of particular interest is the indoor capabilities of the rifle. The .223 cartridge does not penetrate walls as efficiently as the heavier .30 caliber rifles do, making if far less likely that you will over-penetrate your target and shoot your neighbor by accident. In fact, according to Henrichs, FBI testing suggests that penetration in structures is actually less than pistols and shotguns, yet still very effective on human targets. For all you AK fans, Henrichs promises to do a video on the AK too.

A Hard Dose of Reality

After the Borderline Bar and Grill shooting in Thousand Oaks California, the only gun shop is seeing a steady stream of new customers willing to exercise their Second Amendment right and purchase a firearm. The shooting is a tragedy and it should be noted that there were multiple off-duty police officers who could have intervened has they been armed. Any citizen who had a firearm could have prevented or at least mitigated this horrific shooting. This is just one more example where anti-gun laws proved to be totally ineffective in stopping the perpetrator from accessing firearms. Instead, all they did was create a victim-rich shooting gallery for the bad guy who only stopped once he had shot himself.

o o o

Please send your news tips to HJL. (Either via e-mail of via our Contact form.) These are often especially relevant, because they come from folks who watch news that is important to them. Due to their diligence and focus, we benefit from fresh “on target” news. We often “get the scoop” on news that is most likely ignored (or reported late) by mainstream American news outlets. Thanks!




17 Comments

  1. The US and Japan ´ve verified trade Agreements with the EU, goverment officials check the products of the other states regularly if they meet the standards.
    There are Personnel, rules, Agreements etc. in place to check Imports, Exports, tariffs, customs. smuggle and so on.

    Britain and the EU don´t ´ve These Agreements, Britain don´t´ve the personnel in place it seems.

  2. Past 600 yards with a .223/5.56? Let’s gather up the next 25 people coming into the local gun shop who own such a caliber, regardless of weapon type and take ’em to the range! Unless the selected target is very large, the hits at that range will be few and far between. I’ve been shooting AR-15s and another single shot .223 for decades and am more than a fair shot. Anything beyond 300 – 350 is difficult, especially with any crosswind.

    1. I know a young man in the Army who told me of the Army’s recent shift to more open field conventional combat training as opposed to urban combat training. He said he went to a school specifically designed to make them more proficient with M4’s at 600 yards. They shot several thousand rounds to acquire the skills. At the end they were expected to get 2 hits out of 6 on mansized targets at 600 yards.

  3. I have been surprised by the number of people who attribute politicsl change to migration of Americans from one place to another. Particularly in the case of a swing to the left, it has little to do with citizens moving around. The reason could be construed as s flasshing red light right in front of one’s face, and most do not get it. When is the last time you had to stop for a school bus? These indoctrination centers crank out class after class annually, of new socialist voters. Yeah, there are some “conservatives” who survive the brainwashing, but as I have stated for years now, freedom will die in America because of the schools. And it is coming to pass. You watch the kids and the schools, and the increase of socialist voters will be no more a mystery. The question is how to stop the process.

    1. You are absolutely correct. The only way to change this is America must undergo a economic or social collapse OR a world war. We have forgotten what Made America Great and in fact life is so good here we think THAT is the norm and will always be true. As long as politicians can get elected by promising free stuff that is exactly what they will do. When the free stuff runs out for 10 years or so, then and only then will most of the indolent and stupid understand that it is an unsustainable left wing wet dream.

    2. That is a possible reason why Lenin, Stalin and Mao exterminated the intelligentsia in their crackdowns – to stop the spread of democratic ideas at the source. It’s a horrible thing but it was ruthlessly effective. Looking at former Soviet-bloc countries now, the people have no idea how to begin being a democracy and it will take generations for the old guard to die off and new young minds to spread democracy.

  4. In the 70’s Alaska voted to move their capitol from Juneau to a location closer to the [population center. Land was acquired, work was started and the politicians quietly behind the scenes stalled and procrastinated until it was forgotten. The same thing will happen to Brexit. The politicians are making big Euros on the EU and they aren’t going to let citizens stop them

    Regarding trade and being able to buy specific goods; There is no good reason why actually having Brexit go in effect would stop trade. It would only be done to punish. Living in the U.S. I can pretty much buy anything that is made in the EU. There would be no logical reason why British citizens couldn’t do the same post Brexit.

  5. Since the Synagogue Massacre, we have had ANOTHER senseless mass shooting. And the commie/liberal/globalists are crying about GUN CONTROL again.
    No amount of new gun laws will stop this. WHAT IS NEEDED IS SWIFT TRIALS AND EXECUTION OF CRIMINALS FOR ALL CASES OF MURDER AND RAPE.
    For the past 65 years or longer, the SUPREME COURT has been insuring that there are NO TIMELY TRIALS AND SENTENCES FOR CRIMINALS- ESPECIALLY MURDERERS.
    IF MURDERERS KNEW THAT THEY WOULD FACE SWIFT JUSTICE, then they would THINK TWICE BEFORE BRAZENLY KILLING INNOCENT CITIZENS. NOTHING ELSE WILL WORK. There are maybe 400 MILLION guns in this country. No one can take them away. WHAT IS NEEDED IS SWIFT ARREST, TRIAL, AND EXECUTION FOR ALL MURDERERS AND RAPISTS.

    1. re:
      Swift executions? Swift justice?

      Based on my observations of only a few hundred isolated [sarc] examples, those mohammedans seem intent on self-execution. So you and them are in agreement.

      The government agents coming along safely long after the incident? And scribbling their reports? Then heroically arresting the stooge(s)? Front page headlines about the trial and sentencing? Heart-warming yet melancholy interviews with tragic survivors?

      Not interested.

  6. For land navigation you can’t beat the Universal Transverse Mercator projection. Having said that, the Mercator projection isn’t usable above or below the 80 degree mark North or South.

    I used to start the explanation of UTM to my ROTC students by handing them a basketball and a sheet of paper and asking them to transfer the surface of the ball to the paper.

  7. .223 cal/5.56mm. The Army moved to the 5.56mm from the 7.62mm to get a lighter rifle and ammunition in an jungle environment where you couldn’t see 50 yards (Vietnam). The original M16 had sufficient barrel length to achieve some degree of accuracy at 460 meters (50/50 chance) but the shorter M4 barrel has difficulty at that range. And the 55 gr bullet doesn’t pack much of a wallop at that range.

    The 150 gr 7.62 NATO round is still effective at longer distances, although not as effective as the slightly heavier .30-06 round.

    As the Army moves away from a near-full time focus on counterinsurgency and back towards conventional warfare, they will need to consider a full sized battle rifle again to obtain higher probability of kill at longer ranges than the typical city street fight.

    I tend to like the Springfield Armory M1A version of the M14. YMMV

  8. The Brexit lady is a victim, YES victim, of the non stop leftist programming coming at her that says ‘It’s the end of mankind if we Brexit’ Do what I did, throw your TV in the trash.

    Thanks for the Valor Ridge Video

    1. I am with Fred. We haven’t had a TV in this house for years. Watched the World Series at a bar or friend’s house (which is more fun for the company). These days, my questions is: “WHen would find time to watch TV”?

      Carry on.

  9. Re: Nov 10, the Marine Corps birthday. I can still remember being given enormous amounts of food and 20 (!) instead of 12 minutes to eat it. This was three days after taking my oath. 1968. Semper Fi.

    Carry on.

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