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 “JWR”. Today, we focus on the contemporary revival of Typhus in the United States.
Typhus and TB are Spreading
We’ll start of with this in The Atlantic, suggested by readers G.P. and J.C.: Medieval Diseases Are Infecting California’s Homeless: Typhus, tuberculosis, and other illnesses are spreading quickly through camps and shelters. Here is a passage:
More About Facial Recognition
The US Government Will Be Scanning Your Face At 20 Top Airports, Documents Show
.22 Rimfire Price is Down
One bit of good news: .22 rimfire cartridges, after suffering a severe drought for several years (with insanely high prices) are back in good supply in most wholesale and retail channels. I recommend stocking up now while the selection is good, and prices are low. A neighbor mentioned that Natchez Shooters Supplies presently has some Remington .22 cartridges available for as little as 3 cents per round. When you consider that some dealers were commanding 14 cents a round for .22 LR back during the dark days, the current price is very attractive. Buy low and stack it deep!
The Collapse of Western Civilization
Here is the latest from Paul Joseph Watson: The Collapse of Western Civilization. Watson says: “Almost every factor that precedes the collapse of great civilizations has been met by the west.” This video is 12 minutes that is worth watching.
Some Water Storage Tips
Water Storage For The Home And The Homestead. (Thanks to H.L. for the link.)
Portland State’s Cow Bell Censorship
Blog reader Richard T. forwarded this: I Am The Speaker Who Was Disrupted and Abused At Portland State University – Here Is My Story. JWR’s Comments: I’ve mentioned Michael Stirckland before in the SurvivalBlog. He was convicted of multiple felonies for merely defensively drawing a handgun when a crowd of thugs was bearing down on him. That was a travesty of justice. Just because someone is exercising their First Amendment rights does not mean that they must surrender their Second Amendment rights. In fact, they are self-reinforcing.
Understanding The Castle Doctrine and Preclusion
Survivalblog’s Editor At Large Michael Z. Williamson forwarded the link to this important piece; “Preclusion”- The legal concept you must understand. Here is a snippet: “So what information does a victim use to determine if he has a “reasonable belief” that he will be seriously hurt or killed? Most self defense trainers and legal scholars use a three-prong test: Ability, Opportunity, and Jeopardy.”
Wise Foods Loses Class Action Lawsuit
The Wise Foods Company has reportedly lost a class action lawsuit. The plaintiffs in Miller v. Wise Foods alleged: “…that Wise misrepresented how long its Long-Term Food Kits would last and how many people they would feed.” A web page from the plaintiffs’ attorneys offers some details on the settlement.
Flooded Lead-Acid Battery Advice
Mike H. wrote to recommend this article at OffGridHam: Flooded Batteries For Off Grid Radio, Revisited. This article is not just for ham radio operators! It is also apropos far anyone with a backup battery bank that includes lead-acid batteries. And the safety tips included also apply to automotive batteries.
Details Emerge on Citrix Hack
G.P. provided this link: Iranian-backed hackers ransacked Citrix, swiped 6TB+ of emails, docs, secrets, claims cyber-biz.
Venezuela Blackout’s Inevitable Consequences
And at Zero Hedge: Looters Pillage Venezuela Supermarkets As Crippling Blackout Hits Day Five. (A hat tip to H.L. for the link.) And a few even more severe consequences, as reported by Forbes: Venezuela Is Quickly Becoming “Uninhabitable”. The current situation in Venezuela illustrates just how Tango Uniform a society can become, and how the power grids truly are the linchpins of modern civilization.
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You can send your news tips to JWR. (Either via e-mail of via our Contact form.) Thanks!
Re: water storage…Couldn’t agree more. It is my #1 storage item. Some things I have discovered…Like everyone I bought cases of water and stored it. After a couple years I noticed most brands, even the most popular, began to “shrink”. Only one brand stayed perfect…Sams Club…bottles were as good and tightly sealed as the day they were purchased. As far as alternate storage I go thru a lot of V8 juice and keep the 1/2 gallon bottles for additional water storage. Reason is simple. The containers are PET and unless I am mistaken are impervious. Throughly bleach clean and disinfect before filling them and chlorine treat the water after filling. Been working great for over 10 years now. Even the oldest are as good new.
Facial Recognition – here in the scandanavian state of nj, when renewing one’s drivers license or obtaining a new one, the driver is not allowed to smile or wear his/her prescription glasses. Why you ask? Your picture gets digitally saved for future facial recognition – another attack on our privacy. You dont like it? Driving is considered a “priviledge” in nj, no photo? no license for you!
Same for Colorado.
This is a requirement of REAL ID, now in all 50 states. This will make face recognition easier at the airports, since you cannot fly without your REAL ID after October 2020. (Supposedly you can still fly with additional documents, if your DL isn’t REAL ID compliant, but it’s been tough to find out what those docs are.) However … there are a handful of states that allow you to opt out of the photo for religious reasons (Wisconsin) or have your photo and info removed from the database (New Hampshire, home of the Free State Project). There are others, but you have to provide proof of your religious affiliation with forms and someone else decides if you get the waiver. The biometric requirement has already been challenged in the courts, and citizens have lost to judges who claim the government has a stronger compelling interest in forcing you to do the biometric photo. Not surprisingly, it was 9/11 that created that change. (The exception are employers, who have lost lawsuits to employees who refused to use biometric time clocks for religious reasons. Now legal and Human Resources experts recommend that employers accommodate.)
The additional document is a U.S. Passport. Here in CA, we’re now getting our renewal forms in the mail (just got mine). We have the option of applying for the REAL ID, or a standard CA State Driver License. The only difference is that the REAL ID will be required next year to access Federal properties or jurisdictions such as airports or military bases. However, the TSA has stated that a U.S. Passport will suffice as acceptable identification in lieu. They both require the same application, proof of identity, and fees, and they’re essentially acting as the same thing.
Achtung! Papers, please.
But note the irony that we – as American citizens – will now need a passport(!) to fly within our own country. Remember when such predictions twenty years ago were pooh-poohed as tin foil hat absurdities, and now they’re accepted by the sheeple as normal and necessary?
Same in Oregon.
Typhus and TB are Spreading
This is a feature of massive and unchecked immigration. The people who are pushing legal and illegal immigration knew this and yet they persisted. Why? Answer that question and you will know why we are committing national suicide.
Thanks for the tip about .22 ammo.
Re. .22 ammo. JWR’s ‘Patriots’ offered many lessons. One key takeaway for me was, after food, .22 ammo is next best barter item. It is cheap, compact, extremely long shelf life if stored properly, and just 1 brick yields 10 great barter units. It’s probably the most-common round, yet being rimfire it is essentially not reloadable.
Look up Sharpshooter 22LR reloader. I don’t own one but it it interesting.
That’s why I said ‘essentially’. I suppose one could make their own 22LR re-loader.
I just ran the idea by my wife (a real marksman who has my 6 and my heart). She replied, “You are going to do what? For 3 cents a round? What if something happens to you? Buy the darn factory bricks and PLENTY of them for the whole family. And don’t forget the grandkids.”
@Montana,
I began stacking ammo back in 2012 when Obummer was re-elected, and when the .22LR was disappearing off the shelves (here in CA it was completely gone for three years). An extra box or two here and there, and after a while the inventory begins to add up. And why do we do this, fellow preppers? Consider what’s about to happen here in the DPRK four months from now beginning July 1…full background checks and registration (yes, the rumors are true, and I personally read the text of the law on the CADOJ website to verify), and Gov. Newsom has requested a ‘parts’ bill that will do the same to magazines, barrels, uppers, trigger groups, etc.
So I wholeheartedly agree with JWR’s repeated suggestions to buy ammo, AR lowers, extra parts, mags, while you can, because you never know what will happen in the future. To a non-gun person, the total inventory of my ammo would be outrageous, but it represents only three years of uninterrupted training.
Oh, while I’m thinking of it…Walmart has begun the process of fully removing ammo from their stores in CA. Of the three stores within easy driving distance from me, one was part of the 40 locations affected within the state in 2018 (as told to me by a manager), and many more will be converted in 2019 after the ammo registration law takes effect in July. So now I only have two Walmarts with ammo at low prices, with the future uncertain.
Buy it while you can. A GOP win in 2020 is preferred, but not guaranteed.
Go to Las Vegas and import your ammo in! It’s the only solution. To avoid that harassing communist checkpoint that is six miles over the Nevada border in the People’s Republic of California (PROC), take Highway 95 to Nipton road.
Fire a few test rounds off at the only Interstate checkpoint in the entire country. They’ll tear it down soon enough!
peace out!
I was intrigued by your comment and just checked the map…it looks like there is indeed a checkpoint. It must be new? I went back and forth regularly from SoCal to Vegas for over twenty years, but haven’t been that way for perhaps four years now. The only one I’ve ever encountered is the one further south down the 15 near Barstow (the one that only asks if you have any imported fruit, and that nearly always lets everyone through without stopping). Is the new checkpoint asking specific questions?
Barter ammunition? Strongly disagree.
BisonPrepper James M Dakin makes a good point:
Trade stuff you grow or build… intra-tribally.
Inter-tribally, never trade manufactured goods during this collapse. Never.
What would you trade your gardening tools for? A few meals of venison?
What would you trade your ammunition for? A few meals of potatoes and corn?
What would you trade your freedom for? Blankets from an infested FEMA camp? Clothes from a corpse?
Trading outside your tribe exposes you to the ‘VibrantUrban homeless diseases’ of TB and Hepatitis. Typhus. Lice. Is every refugee a walking epidemic? How do we know, how do we explain our generosity to our family as we weaken and die?
This information will be on the next exam.
LargeMarge, we grew and built stuff for 50 years. What will you and your spouse barter when you are in your late 70s? The exams questions may not change with age but trust me, your answers will.
Speaking of Shigellosis. Just up the road a piece is a beautiful swimming hole, cool, clear, Berkshire water and even an old steel railroad bridge to jump off of. People have been enjoying it for years. In the past 5 years the ,not so local, locals from the inner city discovered the spot. There was a big shigellosis outbreak due to trash and used diapers strewn about. Why do people S@@@ where they eat? Broken glass also where the kids swim. Now the site is posted and the police will throw you out if they come by. I won’t even walk my dogs down there anymore. It is a true shame.
How Not To Open Carry
(YouTube Video)
Active Self Protection
Published on Mar 17, 2019
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XWvnuT9q9t0
Duration – 5:33
Wholeheartedly agree with JWR on the .22 ammo, and would encourage the stockpiling of as much as you can afford of .22 as well as all the other calibers you use, along with reloading supplies if you are into reloading. Store it well and carefully and it has an extremely long life. As in ammo used during WWll are constantly turning up and still functional. With the present day political situation it will NOT be getting better any time soon. ALL our rights & liberties guaranteed under our Constitution are at extreme risk. I don’t believe they will get any better until after the games have begun and our Constitutional Republic restored.
As for storing water, wherever you are, from whatever your water source, it is a necessity. Even from a well. Mine has gone dry. With last year being a very dry summer and dry fall, with 3 to 4 ft. of snow still on the ground and little melting taking place, there is no runoff seeping in to replenish the aquifer. If you have the wherewithal to install a buried tank, do so, the larger the better. 1500 gal at even an extravagant 12 gal a day will give you 125 days of water. Living on boats in the past, at 205 gal capacity, when sparingly used, salt water showers with fresh wipe down, and basic sanitation needs, that 205 gal lasted 101 days. Surprising how little you use when aware of it’s limited availability…. Plan accordingly.
Just a silly thought here: Why does a software giant like Citrix need to be told by the FBI that they’ve been hacked? Because the FBI was already hacking Citrix?
Why is the “ruling class” trying to kill us all off? Why would they knowingly bring in people, through mostly no fault of their own, that have terrible diseases that have been virtually wiped out in the USA decades ago? The “ruling class” hates citizenship, and they hate the American people. Why else would they make an unbridled effort to make citizenship meaningless? Do you question this statement? Explain why the neo-conservative/neo-liberal cabal that actually runs Washington DC are all for open-borders, cheap labor (we make too much money don’t you know), full government-paid (make that taxpayer funded) benefits for non citizens, and the degradation of the citizenship rights of the AMERICAN people.
Who is the “ruling class”? The very rich elites, the elected political class, the unelected bureaucratic class, and the leadership of the military class, at all levels of government, Federal, State, County, and local, that’s the “ruling class” in a nutshell. Listen to what they say, then compare that to what they actually do. If their actions don’t match their words, then the words are a lie.
Why do they hate us so much? Because they fear us. The more they fear us the more they hate us. It doesn’t matter the color of your skin, your ethnic background, your religion, it just matters that you are a citizen with rights to protect. They hate you because you are you, period. Don’t think so? Why don’t they actually enforce the gun control laws that are already on the books? If the laws already written were enforced, most of the mass shootings of the last 25 years would not have happened. Why was “Big Pharma” given immunity from legal liability for the harm their vaccines do to all too many of us? For that matter, why do we, as tax payers, have to pay for the liability claims made against the failures of these vaccines? Shouldn’t those claims be paid by the vaccine manufactures? Shouldn’t they be liable? They’re not, we are! Why punish people who take responsible actions for their own self defense? Why has the political and the elite classes made lobbying a viable income stream for politicians? Isn’t that just legalized bribery?
Sorry for the rant. On a lighter note, thanks for the heads up on the .22 ammo. Needed additional inventory of my own. I think I’m half way to my inventory goal.
Why? I’ll tell you why. We no longer make stuff here in the USA as we used to. No need for a working middle class – they got rid of the factories/jobs. All they have to do now is invest/control multinational corporations and farm out the work to asia and mexico. Dont worry though, they keep us busy as we hit the “like” button and post our pics on line.
You may have heard Ben Shapiro’s take on the college entrance scam. He tells about a speech Elena Kagan (then Dean of Harvard’s law school, now a Supreme court justice) gave to new Law School students. In essence she told them that they could now relax, they had “made it” to the upper class ruling elite. She told them all about how many Harvard graduates are in congress, the courts, business, etc.
She basically was boasting about how the smart connected people ruled over the deplorables. This Elite fills the ranks of the Deep State, the Administrative State, the legal profession, Wall Street, the media, etc.
Incidentally, I would recommend reading Kagan’s wiki page… not only does it brilliantly illustrate the kind of connections these people have , it also shows the interconnected influence they have (Clintons, Obama, Cass Sunstein, gays in the military, late term abortions, etc, etc.)
In its most basic form, this self styled Elite believes that they are much smarter than you, and this gives them the right and necessity to rule over you stupid people. God has no authority, the Constitution has no authority, common law and common sense has no authority. Only THEY have authority, because they make the laws, they control the media, they run Wall street.
Why are they “killing us”? Because “you have to break a few eggs to make an omelette.” The random individual is expendable. Its more important to pack the voting booth now with the third world. Once they achieve a permanent majority, they might fix illegal immigration later.
Why do Republicans go along with this stuff? You have to disabuse yourself of the idea that there are two political parties fighting for opposite ideologies. There is just one party, The Government Party. They work for their own power and enrichment. They all look down on you as smelly, stupid deplorables.
Non Sequitur – Loading up on 22lr is a good idea. However, I have friends that are getting interested in PSA’s KS-47 chambered in 7.62×39 expressly because the russian ammo is so cheap. Its a nice rifle, but I’m not sure I agree with this reasoning. They prefer the AR platform because its familiar, and it uses AK mags which is convenient. I personally prefer the 7.62×39 round and the AK design, but I wouldn’t plan on the ammo always being available or cheap just because its cheap now (things can change).
Professor,
You and NJ Tax Pro greatly help to make my point. We are already in the middle of a violent civil war. There hasn’t been a whole lot of direct combat, yet.
We Americans are a troublesome and basically independent lot. I know it doesn’t seem that way collectively, but individually we are. So why do they want to kill us? To quote G.W. Bush, “they hate us for our freedoms”.
I always double check ammo sales against ammoseek.com. Did a brief check and Remington .22 can be had for 2.7 cents a round. Of course you have to factor in shipping costs between vendors. I’ll look for the best deal when I get time today.
Walmart carries the same ammo Natchez is selling for $14.58 per brick. I pick up a brick once a week when I stop in for other things.
Look into Iron Edison batteries if you don’t want to replace your batteries every few years, you can easy restore them yourself with powdered chemicals you mix into water and they could potentially last over a hundred years. They also don’t have memory issues like all other batteries do. The only maintenance needed is distilled water once a month for so. They’re pricey compared to others, but one one or two here and there as you can, you will never have to buy again. I plan on buying some for a small solar setup for my ham radio gear at the house, they are definitely portable friendly though, for that I will OH8STN’s LifePo4 battery packs (look it up on YouTube he has a detailed how to guide with a buy list), they won’t last forever but they will list years and are lighter and provide more power than other battery types.