oil economy lies 5

OIL ECONOMY LIES 5

Lie #4

The US has a free market, Yankee ingenuity and other one of a kind traits.

At what point do lies and propaganda go from team spirit, tribal identity and cohesion building to hubris, delusion and insolence?  All tribes believe they are God’s chosen people and that all outsiders are scumbags and pukes and not worthy of being pissed on if afire.  This is human nature and is a mandatory survival mechanism.  Man is territorial and vicious about it and if he wasn’t we wouldn’t be here today talking about it.  Dirty Long Hair Hippies had a huge energy surplus society to enable them to sit around in smoking dope ( not that there is anything wrong with smoking pot.  It is organic and makes you mellow rather than crazy or violent.  The derisive tone is directed at the Total Life Waste of its habitual user ) and talking out of their ass about, dude, can’t we all, like, you know, get along.  No, jag off, we can’t.  The hatred directed against you was due to the fact that we are violent, take no shame in it, tribal and you just form your own alien group, and to rub salt in the wound you are using the old tribes resources!  Most hippies went to college to stay out of Vietnam but they sure didn’t learn a damn thing while there.

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And there was your apex of our economic activity along with the opening of the cultural wars.  It was all downhill from there.  Society has been disintegrating since that time.  Groups lose cohesion when they turn against each other in times of resource shrinkage.  Most groups use the tribal structure as a means of surviving times of troubles, which would include when you see said resource contraction.  But the American tribe was never a cohesive body.  It wasn’t a tribe conquering territory and then forcing the defeated into their tribe and making them conform to the mores and norms.  No, it was an immigrating force practicing genocide and only the WASP members were eligible to partake in the loot.  All others were never fully assimilated.  And the dominant culture was never about surviving hardship but about being a resource parasite.  The posers and wannabe’s and apprentices were sent West to fight the indigenous holdouts and the holders of civilizations light followed afterwards to reap the lions share of the reward.  Money alone was a good class divider ( the myth of the lack of class divisions in America was for the benefit of the poor.  The rich have never been under any illusion that they were not superior in every way and a tribe onto themselves ).

*

Yankee Ingenuity is another myth which allows us to think that we arrive with nothing and through awesome brain power and perseverance and sheer cussidness build castles in the sky from nothing.  It is the “we alone can pull ourselves up from our bootstraps” fable.  And it is complete bullcrap.  At its base it is an apologists delusion that we aren’t living off the fat of the land with no effort.  It is a fat lazy persons self justification for not getting off the sofa.  And at the same time it is a fire under the ass of the poor to work harder with no thought of revolt, slaving towards the ever retreating illusive goal of sharing the wealth with the wealthy.  The wealthy who got it all for nothing and now don’t want to share.  Not that you can blame them.  Look at the rich in America as you would a lottery winner.  They put no effort into winning but once they did they know the reward is all theirs, and any new found fair weather friend coming around to borrow any is a parasite.  You think the rich care whether you die or not, as long as they stay rich?  Remember, you are not of their tribe.

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Meanwhile, as the country fractures even further apart, although you didn’t think that was possible, new tribes are being formed for the sole purpose of looting.  They are not tribes of cohesion, formed to survive, but bands of thieves temporarily bonding for treasure and then dispersing.  The forerunning which comes to mind is women’s rights advocates who formed to agitate for better pay, better positions and lots and lots of alimony and child support.  This came at no expense to the rich, as it was the peons wages which was being shuffled around.  And as an added bonus, the underclass turned against itself ( and the fact that Girl Power gals were practically running the military was also irrelevant.  The rich always controlled the wealth here, and when resources started contracting they started in on stripping the House America of its copper wiring and other valuables.  The military proves incapable, they move on to a more hospitable clime ), and a house divided can’t focus on the evil landlord.

*

America has never been a cohesive tribe.  It was an upper class living off the resources and an under class being fed lies and hype struggling for a tiny sliver of those resources.  You will never be rich, or even comfortable ( all the assets are being mined as we speak, and they are NOT virgin resources but the ones supporting the workers ), and you shouldn’t delude yourself as such.

Oh, yes, even more articles follow in this series.

END

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oil economy lies 4

OIL ECONOMY LIES 4

Lie #3: The US dollar is the currency other flee to.

It is something that is written so often it brings to mind Nazi propaganda ( if you repeat a lie often enough… ).  The dollar is a safe haven.  The dollar is fundamentally sound.  The dollar is always preferred over other currencies.  The dollar rebounded today after foreign stock market crashes.  Back before Peak Oil, or the housing bubble bust or Lehman Brothers, back when you could actually realistically pretend the economy was still on life support rather than a corpse being injected with more formaldehyde to stave off decomposition, I read a small piece stating that all the worlds gold and all the worlds reported oil reserves ( which, remember, are usually inflated numbers ) combined together at current prices were worth less than the current US national debt.  If one can agree that you can’t really recognize a store of wealth as desirable as those two, gold being real money since the start of national governments and the Agricultural Age, and oil being the energy source that is responsible for all economic growth but more importantly all our products helping us survive such as fertilizers for crops and heat for our homes in winter, than can’t we agree that those two stores of wealth are the only indicators there are?  And that if that is the case then our debt is larger than all the wealth left on the globe.  And then it follows that any economy with more debt than can ever be repaid is sick and will not last. 

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But that isn’t the worse past.  Our debt has been paid ( the interest on our debt, NEVER the principle ) and increased not by any economic activity as we don’t manufacture or create as much as skim and steal from others, but by that magic Petro-Dollar.  I’m sure you are all pretty tired of hearing about that by now, but it is imperative to your survival to understand that while the Derivatives Bubble Of A Quadrillion Dollars is a very scary near future problem ( perhaps even starting as I write this and only viewed in hindsight, it only takes a few re-insurers failing to make good on paying off loses measured in the less than one percentile that will give us 2008 Redux ), scary enough that it will cause a global Depression immediately and impair trade and stability, from the point of view of the man on the street nothing is going to be more devastating than the world waking up one morning and deciding that the US can pack sand and they don’t want our worthless Greenbacks anymore ( just remember, a Greenback was a Lincoln wartime currency unbacked by gold and the term originally derisive ).  We’ve been subsidizing our debt and inflation by exporting it for 45 years now, while at the same time we’ve increased the oil we need to import to survive.  We only pump five million barrels a day ( not including the soon to be shut down fracking oil ) and use up to twenty and that math does not add up.  The death of the Petro-Dollar is the death of imports, including all that oil. 

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In short, the Dollar is only a company chit for future oil production, which was the only thing making it attractive to foreigners ( and here, by Dollar, I mean Treasury Bills.  They are the trading currency for oil, not the actual dollar paper currency ).  Once those chits become counterfeit, once the buyers or producers of oil decide they want another way to trade oil, the dollar is instantly worthless and not fit for TP ( remember that unplayable debt? ).  And as we speak, more and more countries are safely bypassing the dollar for oil trading.  Iran just announced as such, one in a long line.  Russia just opened an Oil Exchange using their own currency.  China and Russia have bypassed the dollar for future trade agreements.  Less than two decades ago, Iraq tried to decouple from the dollar and we invaded them.  Libya tried to talk up a gold currency and we did the same ( although I believe that was secondary and there was more than meets the eye there ).  Now, we can’t say “boo” when others announce goodbye to the dollar ( one wonders if the Iranians either have nukes or if there are Russians in country to guarantee their safety, to assure this, or if we simple are that powerless now ).  It is already happening, the barn door is opened and the horses are stampeding.  Forget the global stock market meltdown, this is far more serious.  There is absolutely no guarantee that we have years of this before the world as a whole rejects the petrodollar.  It could happen any time.  Gird your loins, yo!

Series continues next week.

END

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oil economy lies 3

OIL ECONOMY LIES 3

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Note: responsible minion: the honey shipment(s) arrived ( lg and sm bottle ).  Before you read this I'll have dined on whole wheat toast and your honey and enjoyed immensely.  Many thanks!
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Lie #2:

The US is the worlds largest economy.

As Mark Twain said, there are lies, damn lies and statistics.  Our economy looks bad enough, but if you disbelieve all government statistics the thing is actually a zombie.  Unemployment is really at Great Depression levels and would be worse if Obammy’s Health Hump didn’t turn a lot of jobs into part time positions.  The only thing the floppy lip Kenyan ever did right, bailing out the banks through the insurance industry and made more jobs available by turning them all into 28 hours a week instead of 40.  Of course, yes, he only did the correct thing by his handlers/electors by enriching them ( indirectly with the employment.  A half starving employee with one foot in bankruptcy court is easier to cower and control.  Does anyone even know what Union Benefits are anymore?  Do you still buy the Rush Limbaugh School Of Trickle Down Benefits?  Where the rich get richer and the poor get the benefit of being able to keep their menial job, if they are lucky, and only until the end of next quarter when layoffs are needed to boost the CEO’s bonus ). 

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And if you can’t believe the unemployment statistics, why should you believe anything else they say?  Hell, they inflated energy reserves, pretended that you are going to get your Social Security, poisoned a couple of generations of soldiers with depleted uranium and tacked on about 18 TRILLION in unreported dollars to your future inflation bill bailing out foreign banks ( this is in addition to the reported national debt ).  Everything the FedGov says ( as well as, more often than not, their lackey state governments ) is worse than a damn lie.  Don’t believe anything they say.  The GDP is at least a third government spending rather than real economic activity.  What activity remains is debt driven, rather than demand driven.  Most of our manufacturing is low quality high cost military hardware.  Even the pride of our service economy, Hollywood, has retreated to safe profitable pap that is about as low in quality as you can get ( and yes, of course there are exceptions.  Some really great shows and movies do come along periodically.  Yet, even those, if compared to generations past, can come up wanting.  Overall, a quality decline ).  Our economy did good on cheap oil from Alaska in the 80’s, from the former Soviet Union in the 90’s, faltered on the Tech Wreck but was saved by interest rate reduction, ratcheted up with the Housing Bubble and crashed on Peak Cheap Oil.  Since then, bonds were the new bubble, derivatives doubled down on un-sustainability and is currently looking for the death of the petro-dollar or something similar to wipe them off the face of the earth.

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You can’t gut a manufacturing economy and replace it with debt driven consumerism driven by cheap oil, and quadruple the national debt AND expect it to last too long after resource depletion begins in earnest.  Our economy is simply façade and Potemkin Village heads and shoulders above even our paper tiger military.  Even if the military had more than a snowflakes change in Hell of surviving a serious opponent, they couldn’t recover and recoup without a much stronger economy than what we currently possess.  We all know our economy blows chunks, but keep pretending it is still 1965.  That we can still send a man to the moon, still fund both guns and butter, still export to the world and still have a middle class.  With our military, you can pretend our politicians betrayed us in Vietnam and Somalia and with the economy you can pretend to be a writer for Forbes magazine and only see profit by hook or by crook as the marker for success as an economy, but both shallow superficial views blatantly ignore fundamentals. 

Next lie tomorrow.  END

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oil economy lies 2

OIL ECONOMY LIES 2

Lie #1 The US is the worlds only military superpower, part two.

I won’t take up much of anyone’s time beating the issues of Girl Power myths to death.  Females do many things better than males, but soldiering is not one of them ( and soldiering isn’t even the same as being a warrior ).  We can agree on that, I think.  We can agree that high tech is a great Force Multiplier, but that it forms its own vulnerability issues ( already we are seeing signs of Russian tech superiority with our naval ships and that should frighten the crap out of everyone that understands the US rules world trade through its navy.  And this is BEFORE any other factors effect our reliance on tech.  We are getting our asses handed to us and that should be telling you how even higher tech is no longer our strength ).  And certainly we can agree that we are extremely vulnerable economically.  When you have a short decrease in the increase in the budget, and everyone gets stupid doing things like “borrowing” money from the civil servants retirement, and you are at a point where the yearly deficit is bigger than the total national debt when we of not too advanced years were starting out as young adults, and when the only economic growth was Bubble Fracking Industry magic and quantitative easing, I think we can all agree that sooner rather than later, This Sucker’s Going Down!

*

Culturally dysfunctional, organizationally impaired, reliance on the wrong weapons systems, the inability to afford what we have based on a crashing economy.  What else hampers our supposedly world class military?  As touched on earlier with the two hour verses one year airplane, not only is nothing easily replaceable, we cover this up by practicing the false economics of shrinking force size.  As already covered, a 95% force reduction, with the remaining 20-25% female.  A navy with ships in the thousands down to 250 ( +/-).   Divisions numbering around 75 down to 15.  We pretend to save money and replace quantity with quality but we spend more every year, hamper our weapons of dubious quality with poor doctrine and try to rule more of the world with less.  We are in worse shape than Britain in WWII ( and have as much success against opponents as the Italians did back then ).  They were broke after WWI but managed to still fight another world war prior to losing their colonies.  We still retain nominal control over ours but have nobody stronger to help us retain our possessions-our colonies will be lost overnight and we will not be able to force them back or even defend against any potential aggressors ( who attack our overseas areas, not the homeland.  See below ).  The military is under too many negative constraints, all of which will converge at the same time to handicap us at the exact wrong time.  This is what a paper tiger gets you. 

*

I listed this lie as number one, as it is our biggest block to recognizing reality.  We can easily defend ourselves.  Even after decades of downsizing and allowing maintenance to be deferred, we still have a good enough nuclear shield.  Although not a guarantee, I still believe the odds are good nobody is stupid enough to use the nuke card.  Even terrorists have vulnerable retaliation points like Mecca.  But nukes will not be what holds our oil countries submitting to our protection racket in our corner.  Just like you can’t get boots on the ground cultural savvy intelligence by satellite, you can’t bribe with nukes rather than money or hold ground against insurgents with nukes.  After a certain point, nukes are irrelevant for all but guarding the castle walls.  We’ve allowed our military to whither in substance even as a shiny glittery façade was painted on at great cost.  We’ll learn this harsh reality soon enough.

Continued tomorrow with lie #2.

END

Please support Bison by buying through the Amazon ad graphics at the top of the page.  IF YOU DON’T SEE THE AD, DISABLE AD BLOCK ( go to the Ad Blocker while on my page and scroll down the menu to “disable this site” ). You can purchase anything, not just the linked item. Enter Amazon through my item link and then go to whatever other item you desire. As long as you don’t leave Amazon until after the order is placed, I get credit for your purchase.  For those that can’t get the ads because they are blocked by your software, just PayPal me occasionally or buy me something from my Amazon Wish List once a year. Or, buy the monthly magazine.  Pay your author-no one works for free.  I’m nice enough to publish for mere Book Money, so do your part.*** 
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oil economy lies

OIL ECONOMY LIES

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Note: favored minion, the RV 12v LED light arrived in the mail.  Looks pretty sweet!  Thanks you.
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Ah, the lies we tell ourselves. 

1) The US is the worlds only military superpower.

2) The US is the worlds largest economy.

3) The US dollar is the currency other flee to.

4) The US has a free market, Yankee ingenuity and other one of a kind traits.

5) Fracking Oil has made the US energy independent.

6) Even if Peak Oil is 100% correct, we still have half of our global oil left.

7) The US has easily weathered severe economic depressions before and can do so again.

8) The transition from oil to other energy sources will be rough but successful in the long run.  We got knowledge, yo!

9) The US, even in civil war and Depression, has always been law abiding and relatively peaceful with representative government.

10) The US is the land of plentiful resources and can recover from whatever calamity befalls us.

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1) The US is the worlds only military superpower.  While it is true that the US spends far more than most other large powers combined, this is certainly not indicative of strength.  The US has shrunk its military personnel by 95% ( taking into account population growth to reflect the percentage of population in uniform ) since WWII.  And not only has the number of uniform wearers shrunken, now in many cases those are female.  Unless we are fighting the Netherlands, they will be pitted against males, not other females ( interesting Fun Filled Fact- the first female combat death in the Gulf War was due to an overburdened MP on urban patrol losing her balance, falling off a pier and sinking to the bottom of a harbor ).  Females share neither the upper body strength nor the natural aggressiveness of males, on the average.   Regardless of how wonderful females are at non combative roles ( and there are very, VERY many that needed standards to be reduced to accept them ), unless you can guarantee your support personnel won’t be put in harms way ( which, obviously, the newest Iraq war proved you can’t ) you are asking for some pretty serious trouble by making a major component of your military female.  Even the Israelis, surrounded by hostiles, put their females in very limited military positions.  Far more limited than our forces.  And this doesn’t even get into the cultural damage female equal rights have done to the remaining male military personnel. 

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In WWII a military airplane took two hours to construct.  It now takes, astonishingly, in some cases a full year.  Nor can you claim higher tech makes up for the difference.  If like fights like, and you must replace losses, you can’t afford long production times.  Ask the Nazi’s how well higher tech fared against masses of primitive butt simple tech.  For the most part, the only factor significantly contributing to the length of time and the number of times they were so successful was their superior training and organization.  I don’t believe you can claim the US is anywhere close to that achievement.  We are a politically correct 1920’s corporate organization masquerading as a military and only nuclear deterrent and the financial control of the globe and most of its oil has kept us in business with a military that is mostly defense industry profit and not much in the way of a fighting force ( the only way we win against inferior opponents is when we bomb their infrastructure to rubble, and then we only win against the conventional army that has no air force ).  You can’t claim to have a grasp on simple tactics or strategy when you still, stripped of all its flash and glitter and microchips, practice meat grinder cannon fodder fighting.

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Section 1 continues tomorrow

END

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GUEST ARTICLE
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Note: this is the second post of today.  Scroll down for the first regular article.
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                                   BUY GRAIN NOW

I know that you have been beating the “BUY WHEAT NOW” drum for a while however we are in the perfect storm for low prices this year.  There is a short term glut of oil internationally that will be over by 2017/2018.  The oil from fracking will slow to a trickle soon and the big money will be slow to get back into that market after this oil fall.  Oil prices have everything to do with low grain from the fuel to produce it to getting it to the consumer (Rail and Trucking).  It also impacts the prices in making fertilize and other chemicals used in farming.

The following report is for corn but as corn goes so goes wheat.  Whether you think a total collapse is in the future or just that grains might go up 3 or 4 times the price of today, this is the year to stockpile and it might be the last time we see prices this low.

Keep in mind that the outlook does not take into consideration major weather problems or Black Swan events.  NOW is the time to buy.  Also remember as you read this that I’m NOT selling anything, I’m just giving information and opinions as I see them. 

Grain price outlook

USDA Forecast for “Next Crop” MY 2016/17: In their early release Agricultural Projections to 2025 the USDA provided an initial forecast of U.S. corn supply-demand and prices for the “next crop” 2016/17 marketing year beginning September 1, 2016.   The USDA projected 2016 U.S. corn plantings of 90.500 million acres (ma) – up 2.501 ma from 2015.  Forecast 2016 harvested acres of 82.700 ma would be up 1.951 ma vs 2015.  With projected yields of 168.1 bu/ac, 2016 U.S. corn production is projected to be 13.900 billion bushels (bb) – 2^nd highest on record behind 14.216 bb in 2014. With forecast MY 2016/17 total use of 13.935 bb (record high), and an adjusted projection of ending stocks of 1.832 bb (13.15% S/U), U.S. corn prices are projected by the USDA to be $3.60 /bu – unchanged from the $3.60 /bu midpoint estimate for “new crop” MY 2015/16.

plastic bottles

PLASTIC BOTTLES

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Note: this is the first of two posts today.
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Note: please forgive me, I didn't intend to ignore your generousity but I haven't been getting e-mail notifications when I receive a PayPal donation ( which I normally do ).  For the last 30 days:
A.B. $30
G.B. $12
P.B. $50
S.M. $10
I love you all, and many thanks!
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I think that plastic bottles and other items are, for almost all of us exempting perhaps a few Birkenstock wearing tree hugging female armpit hair braiding Californians, so common in our lives and so taken for granted that they are almost as water to fish.  I’m not bemoaning their presence, nor shall I jump upon a soapbox and screech at our imminent demise as a species from our pollution and point a shaking finger at a Pacific ocean layer of garbage-mostly plastic-the size of Texas or whatever.  I mean, Hello!, don’t bats and birds crap all over the floor of their house?  That fertilizer sure helped out our booming population for a hundred years prior to Kraut atmospheric nitrogen extraction.  Not all pollution is as beneficial, I’m only saying fouling ones nest isn’t just a human problem.  We’ve degrading our planet from Day One.  It isn’t just modern capitalists nor is plastic the first mass polluter.  We are pretty much pigs wallowing in our own filth.  I’m more of an optimist when it comes to plastics.  Sure, we are wasting an ungodly amount, and a lot is pure waste for a profit.  Getting a plastic toy which will break soon out of an insanely thick plastic shell which protects the item from sticky fingers, as well as from quality control tests, and provides on shelf advertising, is pretty much the poster boy of polluting wastefulness and greed run amok.  But plastic sheeting keeps me dry underground and plastic keeps our food sanitary and prolongs its life.  Plastic isn’t all bad, but mostly good even if a lot of the products should be labeled Earth Raper. 

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I’m also a big fan of plastic bottles.  I trash picked from works garbage all the Minute Maid brand one gallon juice bottles for my water hauling.  They were good for months and months of use, even with abrasion from the baskets on my bike they rode in.  They withstand freezing and thawing continuously as storage water out at my B-POD.  Rather than have one tank for water storage I like the dozens and dozens of half and full gallons.  My eggs aren’t all in one basket and they were free and they are portable.  Since I’ve been on my Water Therapy this last year ( a half once water per pound of body weight is recommended so I drink 100 ounces a day ), which I can’t recommend highly enough as it reduces the coffee I crave and  eliminates painful and frequent nighttime urination which can only be helping my middle age prostate,  I’ve been saving all the twenty ounce Gatorade bottles I get from work ( I use ten ounces of Gatorade a day to flavor a bottle of water I drink at work, the rest of my water is just water.  I tried very small amounts of diet drinks for flavoring more of my water but I quickly felt the adverse health effects of that ) both to use in my drinking water and keeping tract of how much I drink, but the surplus gets filled and stored.  It might not be much having an extra gallon stored once a month, but I save extremely thick plastic bottles and pay nothing for them.

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We all have to be careful to not store too much “junk”.  I could never get away with stocking my empty vitamin pill bottles, no matter how nice of a bottle they were.  I can get away with the water bottles as they are downstairs in the basement out of the way ( half the structure is sunk down to a concrete slab and the other half dirt floor crawl space.  I put the objectionable items like filled water bottles and buckets of rice in the crawlspace to keep the walk-in part nice and organized.  Guys, women want their home to be pretty.  Help them out to get some cooperation ).  I drink, maybe, a bottle of soda every three months.  When I quit smoking I could go through a 2-liter everyday, if not more.  Luckily I don’t like the crap much anymore.  More water jugs there, even if they do accumulate slowly.  Some of my junk bottles I have to hide.  I really got a lot of ribbing for my cleaning, de-labeling and saving a ketchup bottle.  Hey, the thing was really thick plastic.  Once we make our own bulk liquid soap that will be the perfect dish washing soap dispenser.  It disappeared behind the cleaning supplies under the kitchen sink and so was acceptable for keeping.  Not all plastic is created equal.  Stock the best stuff and stock it deep.  Ceramic takes energy to fire.  Plastic is a much more efficient container, while they stay available.

END

Please support Bison by buying through the Amazon ad graphics at the top of the page.  IF YOU DON’T SEE THE AD, DISABLE AD BLOCK ( go to the Ad Blocker while on my page and scroll down the menu to “disable this site” ). You can purchase anything, not just the linked item. Enter Amazon through my item link and then go to whatever other item you desire. As long as you don’t leave Amazon until after the order is placed, I get credit for your purchase.  For those that can’t get the ads because they are blocked by your software, just PayPal me occasionally or buy me something from my Amazon Wish List once a year. Or, buy the monthly magazine.  Pay your author-no one works for free.  I’m nice enough to publish for mere Book Money, so do your part.*** 
*Contact Information*  Links To Other Blogs *  Land In Elko*  Lord Bison* my bio & biblio*   my web site is www.bisonprepper.com
*Link To All My Published Books
* By the by, all my writing is copyrighted. For the obtuse out there

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GUEST ARTICLE
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Note: this is article 3 of 3 today
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[ a minions experience with airless bike tubes ]

Just got off the phone with my bike shop, confirming they were "nu-tek" or "nu-teck" he couldn't remember how to spell it, and I've found both online.

I had them order and put them on. All together it was about 200$ I had them do it due to the idea that they are insanely hard to mount for the inexperienced.

The installer confirmed the hours of difficulty with mounting. Also they had not had anyone want something like that for at least 10 years, so they had no real experience either. 

I got out their door and tried to ride the bike in the parking lot. It was highly resistive to pedaling and bumpy. I went right back in the shop. They said that that's just how they work. I asked them to drive it and they said they would while I went to lunch. When I returned they said they couldn't go more than a few hundred feet. Their call to the manufacturer resulted in a reply that basically said they were defective from the factory.

The tires were not one circular piece of foam, rather several.. I'd guess 10.. curved foam pieces, each similar in shape to a banana. These pieces were fitted and secured into what looked like a normal bike tire. The bumpy feel was, in my opinion, each piece compressing in it's center and not compressing on their ends.

The bike shop agreed to remove and refund my costs. I ended up with normal tires with tubes. And have had no problems since. It rides and pedals beautifully now

This was on a 1986 Dahon stowaway fold-a-bike 5 speed with 20 x 1.75 tires.

guest article

GUEST ARTICLE
This is post 2 of 3 today.
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Re-Using Canning Jar Lids in an TEOTWAWKI Scenario

by Idaho Homesteader

The current USDA standards do NOT recommend re-using metal canning jar lids.  While we still can enjoy the advantages of our modern society, I strongly advise that you follow this counsel. I see no reason to risk you or your families safety just to save a few cents.  No, the USDA recommendations are not a conspiracy to get you to buy more lids, there really is a reason behind it.

When a home-canned jar has not sealed properly, there is a strong possibility that bacteria and/or mold has spoiled your food.  You might not be able to see or smell the change. One of the ways to tell if a jar is properly sealed is by looking at the lid.  The center of the lid should be concave (i.e the center should be sucked down.) Most of the time when you open the jar, the center pops back up.  MOST of the time, but not ALL of the time.  I have seen this happen first hand with a jar of green beans that I canned up.  I saw that the lid was down in the center but there was mold growing in the jar.  I was able to lift the lid right off without a can opener.  It wasn't sealed at all, but the lid was concave. It happens. 

There can also be issues with the rubbery sealing compound.  When a good seal happens, it can leave an indentation in the sealing compound.  If deep enough, it can go all the way down to the metal.  I have also noticed that fat from canning meat can degrade the rubber. I've had some jars canned with beef where the rubber got all gooey. The rubber can also be affected by the heat from the canning process.  Also, newer lids seem to have less rubbery compound than older lids. I am still using lids that I inherited from my uncle that are from the 1970's. They are a LOT stouter than today's lids -- thicker metal and more rubber.

So these are the reasons why you should use new canning jar lids.  Yeah, I know your cousin's room mate's grandmother reused her lids all the time without killing any of her children.  But remember, better safe than sorry if you have that luxury.  

However, the world isn't perfect and you may find yourself in a survival situation where the "best choice" is not an option.  So here are some hints on how to reuse your metal canning lids while being as safe as you can. Use this advice at your own risk.  Again, I do not recommend reusing canning jar lids unless you are in a true life or death situation.

First off, take your time opening a jar of home-canned food.  Do the contents look okay?  Clear liquid, not cloudy? Do you see any mold growing?  Is the lid popped up or down in the center?  With a very gentle push of your fingers does the lid come off, showing that it was not really sealed? Once open, does the food smell okay?

Now when you open the lid, make sure you ask everyone to be quiet.  You should hear a little bit of air being sucked in when you pry it off.  That sound tells you that there was a vacuum and a good seal.  If you are thinking of reusing the jar lid, make sure you are gentle when prying off the lid or else you will warp or even possibly tear the lip.

Now I would triage your lid for reuse:

#1  I can over 50 gallons of Apple Cider every year.  I pour the hot cider (180*) into hot jars, pop a lid on and screw down the ring and call it good -- no water bath.  Not USDA recommended but it's what I do.  When I open the jars, the lids are in almost perfect condition.  I would reuse these in a survival situation.

#2  I water bath my jams and jellies for 10 minutes.  Upon opening the jars, there may be a slight indent in the sealing compound.  I would reuse these lids.

#3  Fruit and tomatoes are water bath canned.  I would look to see if the acid in the fruit has discolored or eaten away the bottom of the lid.  Also, how deep is the indention on the sealing compound.  If it's getting kind of deep, I would reuse it for cider (because what's the worse that would happen -- your cider will turn into wine or vinegar.  A pretty low risk for food poisoning.)  If the indention is minimal to medium, I would reuse it again for fruit or jams and maybe vegetables.)

#4  Vegetables that are pressure canned.  I would examine the sealing compound and see if it is still firm to the touch and not soft.  How deep is the indent?  If they look good, I would use these for cider, jams, fruit and possibly for vegetables again.  Though, using them again in a pressure canner would be my last choice.  I would have to be pretty desperate.

#5  Meats and fish canned in a pressure canner.  I would NOT use these lids again.  I have seen major degradation of the sealing compound because of fat.  If the lids did look good, I would use it as a jar lid for dried items  -- something you needed a lid for but not a 100% airtight seal.  I would not use it for canning where a perfect seal is required to keep the food safe.

Other thoughts:

Tattler lids are a plastic lid with a separate rubber gasket that are made to be reused.  They are somewhat expensive but they do run sales periodically.  I have bought a few cases but have not had the chance to use them yet.  The rubber gaskets can be used 10 to 20 times.  The plastic lids are supposedly good forever.

Canning jar lids are cheap -- Cheaper than bullets.  If you have ammo, there is no excuse why you should not set aside some money for jar lids.  Plus, they would make a great barter item.

I have lids from the 1970's that I am using.  They are still good and I have a minimal failure rate. I see no problem in buying extra cases and storing them for long term. Granted, my lids have been stored in a climate controlled house.  If you are storing lids in a hot shed or attic, the rubber compound might degrade.  Also, the metal lids can rust.  Do not store them in a damp shed or root cellar. Use common sense.

I have read several pioneer accounts where a family would put up 1,000 jars a year - a 1,000 jars!!!  If you are thinking of a multi-year survival situation, then a few thousand jar lids would not be too many. Buy a few packages every time you go to the store and it'll begin to add up.

Idaho Homesteader

why WBS matter 2 of 2

WHY WBS MATTERS 2
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Note: this is post 1 of 3 today.
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The winning side always writes the history books.  So the Revolutionary War was about freedom and independence and human rights.  Except the Constitution took power away from the states, nullified the previous agreement by a gathering of rich humpers, and pushed the lands of settlement into Indian territory.  For Blacks and Indigs, there was no sharing the fabled Free And Independent country.  And for anyone who had fought to help free us from British colonialism, if they then objected to the same high tax rates as before, Ol’ Wooden Teeth led the entire federal army into their farm region and viciously dissuaded any dissent.  For the War Between the States, the re-writing has been systematic, deep and unrelenting.  If you rely on your history from public schools and PBS, everything you know about the conflict, except for a few dates and the colors of the uniforms, is a flat out lie.  Why?  What is so bad that the feds can’t just fess up and present a Give A Crap attitude, just like they did with Indian Massacres and with napalming Little Brown People?

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What do you think the governments job is?  To protect you and your money?  To present you with opportunities?  To provide a safety net?  No.  The governments job is to provide a protection racket, and to protect those that enrich and empower those running the government.  A protection racket as in, pay me and you are protected from me sending you to a jail where you have a pretty much 50/50 chance of getting AIDS or another fatal disease, if you don’t get shived first.  Cruel and unusual punishment, sure, but what Amendment hasn’t the FedGov crapped on?  And protect and enrich the bankers who provide it credit to continue growing ( corporations are just the red headed stepchildren of the Feds and the central bank, reliant on one for credit and the other for “protection”.  All “corporations are evil and rule us and control the government” bullcrap is just blatant propaganda and misdirection from our true controllers ).  As was discussed elsewhere, a private bank providing credit to a central government is the cheapest and longest lasting method of growing and maintaining an empire. 

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But you certainly can’t tell your peasants any of this, because the cheapest and easiest form of social control is to make your slaves think they are free.  Anyone is free to connect these easy dots but most of the herd is content to queue up to the corn derivatives trough and constantly eat as they gaze upon large screen sports entertainment.  As long as the trough stays full, and the pretty flicking images keep them in a REM sleep brain state, the golden handcuffs are ignored and anyone who points out the shackles is vilified and burned at the stake.  All this isn’t even new, but nearly fifty years old as the protesters of the Sixties made this common knowledge.  No wonder those dirty hippies were so loathed and ignored.  Okay, to be fair, they didn’t get everything right.  But they sure knew about breaking free of their conditioning.  Yet, as more and more economic calamity befell us as a nation, the farther and farther most of the population retreated from reality.  It got easier and easier to control the masses.  It isn’t even necessary anymore to massacre students or religious leaders.  Just keep the bread and circuses flowing, and circuses aren’t just gladiator spectacles but also feel good propaganda and conditioning.  

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Let them think their vote matters.  Let them think they still live in a Republic.  Let them think the tyrants and dictators freed oppressed people instead of oppressing them.  Let them think the states still respond to its citizens rather than the FedGov.  Let them think that democracy always returns, even after a brief regrettable suspension of civil liberties.  Let them think It Is All About Them.  Baffle them with bullcrap.  Make them happy to be eating the crap sundae that is their lives.  Let them think that civil servant pensions and Social Security and Food Stamps are an entitlement and a right rather than a backdoor payment to the bankers and the corporations paying the bankers and not least a bribe to let them continue being controlled.  Let them think teachers care about a young children’s mind and aren’t in fact the conduit for early training for control.  Let them think firefighters are there to serve the public rather than taxpayer paid agents used for protecting private insurance companies ( who are central bankers bitches ) profits.  Let them think the police protect and serve them rather than the moneyed interests.  Let them think the FedGov didn’t colonize the states and has been exploiting them since.  Let them think the federal army is a force keeping the serfs free rather than an instrument that will be turned on the citizens immediately upon discovery of dissent.

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Don’t let them think that your king hates all you serfs and slaves and would rather kill you all than look at you.  Good subjects, good.  Go back to sleep.

END

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wny WBS matters 1 of 2

WHY WBS MATTERS

Do you know why it is so important for Washington D.C. to keep spoon feeding the masses the pap that passes for history regarding the War Between the States?  It certainly wasn’t a Civil War because the Confederates had no desire to overthrow the existing government.  They merely wanted to be left alone to do their own thing.  Now, granted, doing their own thing was slavery, and that crap simply ain’t cool.  But let’s remember that slavery was legal under the Constitution, the law of the land.  Lincoln, a lawyer on par with Obammy ( ie, someone who somehow passes the bar but then goes from being a scumbag lawyer to a complete douche bag politician.  You may be asking what the difference is.  A scumbag is a condom and a douche bag is for cleaning hot, dark and stinky body interiors.  You would think a douche isn’t as bad as it doesn’t hold body fluids, but under the intricate rules of insult and derision, that is not the case.  I don’t know why.  Perhaps because a douche is used for cleaning the anal cavity which is then violated by another male.  A condom can be used for less nasty things ), would under any ordinary circumstances you could think of, be able to comprehend that fact.  I guess not.  He evidently had no conception that we had the First Amendment.  Or, he did but simply didn’t care.  Lincoln was bought and paid for by the Industrialists Blue Bloods Yankee East Coast Humpers and when they wanted more money ( federal subsides for the railroads ) or wanted to safeguard what they had ( going to war with the secessionists ) then good old Abe was their butt boy ( just as Obammy is today ).

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The War Between the States was about money.  It always is ( we got involved in WWI to safeguard the private Federal Reserve Banks loans to Europe and we got involved in WWII to steal the world from the British after we used the Soviets and the Nazi’s to destroy each other.  If you notice the political control after that war, all the powers that colonized the worlds oil, except Russia, came under our thumb in one form or another ).  In 1861 the Southern states reacted to Lincoln being elected by preempting his negative ( to them ) policies and seceding.  Their plan was to introduce a tariff on imported goods substantially lower than the North’s, which obviously would cost the Powers The Be substantial amounts of money.  The South had in effect been in a colonized situation, selling cheap agricultural goods for dear industrial goods as imports flowed through the North ( they paid most of the nations taxes in effect, with diminishing political input ).  Not to mention, the federal government relied on most of its revenue from import tariffs.  In one swoop, the South threatened all the Northern moneyed interests.

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Can you guess why that went over like a turd in the punch bowl?  At the cost of a bunch of underemployed immigrants, the Northern wealthy got a bunch of profit from war production and got to keep control of the money faucet.  What was not to like?  The schmucks dying for “an indivisible Union” got maimed and killed.  In fact, some didn’t even want to be there, but when riots broke out in NYC over a new draft law ( one imagines the hordes of cannon fodder were dangerously thinning ), the citizens a bit miffed over needing to die for the Negro’s ( for political capital dissuading Europe from supporting the Confederacy, “indivisible Union” was switched over to “ending slavery” as a war advertising slogan ) and were promptly given a taste of grapeshot.  The protests died down sufficiently to continue Lincoln’s dictatorship.  And just as an aside, who do you really think was behind killing Lincoln?  Southern sympathizers?  Are you following the money?  Lincoln wanted a return to normalcy after the war.  He was a prick, but his only goal was to profit his handlers.  He didn’t care if he destroyed the Republic to do it ( and so it came to be ).  He did their bidding and retained the South as colonies.  But he wasn’t going to enslave the conquered territories, as they had honorably surrendered.  The same pricks that directed Lincoln discarded him when they were done with him, both to cover their tracks and to have a free hand instituting Reconstruction.  Of course I could be wrong on that, but my cynical side is whispering such seditious thoughts into my ear right now.

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I think that is enough for one day.  We haven’t even touched on the articles original purpose.  More tomorrow, not to worry.

END

Please support Bison by buying through the Amazon ad graphics at the top of the page.  IF YOU DON’T SEE THE AD, DISABLE AD BLOCK ( go to the Ad Blocker while on my page and scroll down the menu to “disable this site” ). You can purchase anything, not just the linked item. Enter Amazon through my item link and then go to whatever other item you desire. As long as you don’t leave Amazon until after the order is placed, I get credit for your purchase.  For those that can’t get the ads because they are blocked by your software, just PayPal me occasionally or buy me something from my Amazon Wish List once a year. Or, buy the monthly magazine.  Pay your author-no one works for free.  I’m nice enough to publish for mere Book Money, so do your part.

*  My monthly newsletter: search at Amazon under Kindle “Malthusian Survivalist Newsletter”.  * 
*Contact Information*  Links To Other Blogs *  Land In Elko*  Lord Bison* my bio & biblio*   my web site is www.bisonprepper.com
*Link To All My Published Books
* By the by, all my writing is copyrighted. For the obtuse out there