POST PREPPING 3
While I normally poo-pah
the BackWoodsHome Magazine mode of prepping ( for the simple fact that a
mortgage to grow your own food is a losing strategy as the banker won’t accept
broccoli for your payment. Read a little
history, it won’t kill you if you just ignore dates and most names. The Great Depression was chockablock full of
Sheriff’s auctions for family farms ), I really enjoy the musings of the Green
Mountain Dude ( for humps sake-the link is over at my web site ). He is, mostly, an Apocalypse Farmer. But unlike the idiots on twenty acres with
thirty years debt, he went to go farm junk land and is debt free. I value his insight into the apocalypse ( we
disagree on Gore Warming, and being extroverted, but these are minor quibbles
).
*
I trust you’ve read
everything he has published. He doesn’t
write often. Unlike myself he sees
little need to contaminate the ether daily with mental diarrhea. You can easily catch up on his writings. He is big on devolving now to match the near
future economy ( Greer did also, but was a bit pretentious and a LOT delusional
with his Super Happy Slow Collapse-that did tend to color his conclusions
). His are the clearest thoughts on an
economic collapse end game I’ve encountered ( being poor tends to yank your
head out of your ass ). Heavily
influenced by how Latin America is living, he also realizes with the cultural black
hole in America we won’t successfully transition as they have done.
*
I’ll take exactly one
paragraph to encapsulate the problem.
Your car. Yes, it is preferable
to rely on a car loan than a mortgage.
Come the collapse you just stop driving, while still having a legal
squat to build your hovel. But you MUST
plan now for the lack of a motor vehicle.
It is so baked into the cake, unless you believe Glen “I was an
insufferable alcoholic and now I’m an insufferable born again Jesus freak so
why are you listening to me?” Beck and are a Fracking Fag. I can forgive anyone for being trapped in the
Oil Paradigm. Our entire society was
constructed that way. I’m far less
forgiving if you assume the Oil Age refuses to inconvenience you by ending
ahead of your schedule.
*
But let’s return to the US
emulating Latin America. At least in one
aspect. Prior to the actual imperial and
civilization collapse, after the economic collapse but before the die-off, we
must adapt to an imploding economy with its concurrent government benefit
erasures. Everyone will fight it, of
course. From females unable to get the
courts to enforce child support to corporate CEO’s losing their gravy train
billion dollar projects the government funded.
From defense contractors losing out on trillion dollar boondoggles and
laying off their engineers to Social Security recipients unable to live to age
95 off of free medicine and pills. From
state pension funds no longer able to get 1% loans to Extend And Pretend any
longer to civil servant Unions finally closing up shop, all state welfare is
going to be cut back to the point hyperinflation makes them painless for the
government to continue ( or, just cut, period ).
*
But the one thing they
most likely won’t ever stop until the bitter end is subsidized food. I don’t imagine Food Stamps will continue, as
the bureaucratic cost of rising inflated prices being matched with benefits
will be too much, but perhaps a morphing into a WIC program for all. A means tested commodity package for everyone
every month picked up at the grocery store ( subsidizing the stores to remain
open is cheaper than building commodity distribution centers or staffing them
). Just like in Latin America where it
is common to be able to buy artificially low cost staples such as corn and
beans and cooking oil, there will most likely be a food program so that nobody
starves. It is the cheapest way to
forestall revolution.
*
And eventually, that is
going to pretty much be all that the government offers. No more cushy contractor jobs, no more
housing or diaper freebies. No more
Obammy phones, but also no more military and sewage worker pensions. Just like our own history and that of Britain,
the sons of the rich become military officers.
They don’t join for the salary but just to be housed and fed in the
style above the peasants. Once the cost
per soldier drops drastically after our imperial entanglements cease, the draft
has to see a return as the military also starts to emulate Latin America and
uses its military to police the nation ( as we used to on the frontier in Injun
Country ). A much cheaper version of law
enforcement and defense.
*
The economy is going to
contract severely without the petrodollar subsidy. The government must follow suite. Just as huge swaths of England today have a
total budget less than one of Americas “sex lives of snail” bogus research
grants, our spending will fall to now unimaginable low numbers. The path will be convoluted but the
destination is pretty clear. You can
actually run a national government on very little money, sans welfare, and
still provide the very basics to the poor.
In time, your only benefit from the government will be that monthly bag
of flour and other assorted edibles. And
the fact that the army will send in troops after the communist guerrillas,
which may or may not be a benefit.
*
This isn’t just a Rush
Limbaugh approved comeuppance for uppity ghetto dwellers on welfare. The majority of us are actually dependent on
the government for a check. It is free
money to them, just more debt never to be repaid except through hyperinflation,
and in the end the bankers and assorted scumbag ilk get that money from us to
fund more mansions in the Hampton’s, hookers and blow. We are speaking of dismantling most of the
functioning economy by withdrawing government spending, no better than northern
European welfare states. Tomorrow, let’s
finish up and look at your average peasants lifestyle in this situation.
END ( today's related link https://amzn.to/2s9QI8J )
* By the by, all my writing is copyrighted. For the obtuse out there
>> a mortgage to grow your own food is a losing strategy
ReplyDeleteThere are a lot of intellectual people out there living their own private Hollywood fantasy inside their head, happily forgetting the fact that food grows on land.
Your amateurish attempts at growing potatoes will kill you, I've been training with the best and let's say this is a realm reserved to the pros. The final test is coming, you'd better be up to the task.
Hey how cool, I never tried it myself, you can claim everything that way ! I don't need to provide proof or arguments or whatever, what a relief.
;)
Back to the topic, it depends on how your debt situation looks like, but going into debt to purchase land or preps is counterproductive. The amount of money the bank asks as a down payment is sufficient to purchase more food (and energy to cook it) than that land could have provided you with, without having to spend any time on it. Jim has explored so many ways to buy food the cheap way it deserves its onw post with links to the different articles... ...
That said, there is a learning curve on growing food. It's a good thing to try if you're so inclined, several friends have started their own veggie patch and are learning patiently.
But there is a learning curve to EVERYTHING, so it's a matter of perspective and priority. In my village in Germany there were some people who spent two hours per day in their garden and did fuck all the rest of the time. It was their thing, other people did other stuff.
Article with links! What do you think I am, organized? :) No, seriously, I have little idea what I've written in the last month, let alone all these years. Dammit, Jim, I'm a writer not an editor ( Star Trek reference ).
DeleteYou are right on Dark Green Mountain blog.
ReplyDeleteAnd he doesn't give any slack to tacti-frauds crowing about their coming exploits come doomsday.
Food production, soil building, nutrient cycling (sanitation), staying out of the debt master's clutches.
I'm not psychic, but I also am pretty dann sure it will be more about these issues of daily life and not so much about dispensing 300 yard headshots.
Of course, even if farming is more important than head shots, you still need a FLIR scope!
DeleteAnon 8:43 his experience is going to be invaluable to those around him.
DeleteThe way I see it, rural places have their own dynamics. But people there don't like land left unattended and they generally don't like people who don't think and work the way they do.
Already in peacetime they try to pry acres one from the other. From my ancestry I have a few scattered hectares left in Germany and sometimes I swear the people there are behaving like children : "No Ave loves me more than you you will never have that field he will sell it to me".
The way I see it is as following :
Option A : whatever happens, you leave for the countryside and become a farmer or a peasant, full time. Why not. I heard many of them are comitting suicide for the last decades...
Option B : there is still a form of government over the peasants, and you're better off renting land to them than cultivating it yourself. If you have no land, it could be a form of investment, but not a good one. You would be better served in investing in tools for a trade of some kind (unlike the Middle Ages, we have a glut of "clerics" (cubicle dwellers, of which 70% are useless because too specialized or dumb), but too few craftsmen / repairmen ).
Option C : there is no effective rule over the land, and being a foreigner the locals will take everything from you (down to your life if need be, or if you kill one of them in self-defense). You *may* be left with a pitiful something if you join one of the large families there.
Junk lands are different in that they're almost infertile, but shepherds are going to be a nuisance - or you can make a deal (flesh, wool, work hours, something like that).
Not sure you'd want to coexist with farmers if you graze animals. Too close and you get water wars ( well, here in the West ). Junk land is for economic collapse, then for hiding during the die-off, THEN you can move to a better grazing and watered are still far away from farmers.
DeleteI remember a comments thread from some site or other.
DeleteLong story short. A wealthy man living on the coast owned land in some rural US location & his plan was to retreat to that land. He was told that he wouldn't be welcome there.
Wealthy Man - "But it's mine. I own it"
Locals - "You don't belong there"
Wealthy Man "But it's mine. I own it"
Locals - "You show up once in a blue moon. the game belongs to us"
Wealthy Man "But it's mine. I own it"
The whole thread was instructional. The Wealthy man thought because he owned it under todays laws that come TEOTWAWKI it would still be his and that the locals, who have been there for generations, would welcome him as one of their own.
Wealthy Man got really angry. But those telling him reality weren't mean about it. They kept on saying "move to the area, become a local or at the very least people should know your name & face"
Common rich dude attitude, that they are morally superior because God wanted them to be rich. How can you conceive of a world where money doesn't put you on top?
DeleteI got a lot out of reading the back and forth. The Rich Guy just didn't get it.
DeleteI guess *should* things go south there are going to be a lot of people that won't be able to adapt, or fail to adapt soon enough or adapt to soon (as an example if you start shooting to soon you're toast, if you start to late you're toast).
That reminds me of a quote on a militia-esque type blog I read many moons ago. It said How do you know it's time to start shooting? Run outside and if nobody else is shooting then run back inside because it's not time.
Spot-on example Dingo. The Wealthy Man here is a Stupid Rich guy.
DeleteA less stupid Rich Guy would have appointed one or several guys to take care of that land somehow, and make sure there is some form of payment or compensation (even if symbolic). In turn the Clever Rich guy reinvests locally for PR. There is always a project that needs extra funding, or a need for leverage on higher administrative levels. This is how you gain influence, which is human's prime currency.
The locals are not stupid, they will not love him for that, it's just that the Clever Rich guy shows he knows something about community relations and plays his part. Nobody loves anybody in these parts, especially not foreign rich guys, but if he plays his part right he will have a say in the future.
(Also, to a degree, it applies to clever guys as a whole. In any orgnaisation there are not enough clever people anyway).
He would also show up much more often to keep his communications channels up to date. All this doesn't cost really much, it's a form of maintenance cost.
What the Stupid Rich guy does is neglect. It's like the Northeast blackout of 1965, when it was revealed that some companies HAD prepared : they bought emergency generators, that were still in their crates...
(It wouldn't surprise me if the generator issue had been tackled by Stupid Rich people).
Dingo-run outside and see if anyone shoots at you. Funny as hell. Of course, humor does condense down wisdom and make it memorable.
DeleteAve-Stupid rich guys in a blackout kind of are like a lot of us with our prepper equipment. Keep it pretty in the box. Don't use it now or you won't be able to use it when you need it. Even small things. Come on-really? You're telling me that you open every single pack of batteries and test one? Do you open every pack of socks and see if one pair fits and wears adequately? Ten generations of manufacturing economy has conditioned us to a certain level of trust and certainty. Granted, a generator isn't exactly ready to go right out of the box, but I think it is from a shared certainty. Well, it could have just been from greed. An open machine needs running, cleaning, inspecting. A box needs a visual glance and a check list.
I stopped reading that BackWoodsHome Magazine, after reading that article by that man-hating feminist that built her own log cabin, aided by her mangina boytoy (these young guys today must be a really pathetic pack of desperate pussies). At least half of the article was devoted to what an evil patriarchal shit her ex-husband was, and how horrible the days of yore were for man-haters such as herself. Someone posed the question of “were her breasts real”? Which of course caused a civil war in the comments section. She should have been flattered, since at her age, it probably took a titanium wonder bra, and a pair of floor jacks, to keep those suckers off the ground :D
ReplyDeletePermies is another one that attracts these types. I’m sure that you can glean some good information from these publications, but I stay away from such sites when they start to get political. It was painful enough for me to have to give up Field And Stream (A good manly magazine when I was a kid, but another one that went down the road to political correctness).
Of course, in the SJW's and Permies defense, we preppers get quite political ourselves. I submitted material to BWH in the early 90's. They said survivalism was too controversial. Now they publish feminist screeds ( the founders daughter took over, right? ). Loompanics was the only one who ever published me, so besides them I'm glad I went self-publishing.
DeleteI wasn’t aware of you back in the Loompanics days, or I would have ordered your publications, as I used to get that catalog going back to the 80’s.
DeleteI didn’t start following this site until your earlier blog years. I started off at the super survivalist guru’s site. I was already starting to find that version of survivalism to be unpalatable, when someone over there in the comments section talked shit about that “Bison dude”. And the rest is history :D
Any advertising is good advertising :) The 'zine was started in '92. The Gun Fag Manifesto mentioned me, bless his heart, but my exposure was pretty negligible ( at the peak, 100 subscribers ). A e-mail newsletter for awhile, and a blog about the same time Loompanics finally kicked it. I ordered from them heavily in the 80's, before kids.
DeleteHmmm... I suspect you are right that the government will somehow still be providing staples up until the end of government rule (lack of food will be the spark to blow up the government). BUT why would they not just make everyone get snap cards to pay for their food, automatically paying 'enough' to those that are poor to buy the food, and making the rest of us put our own money on the cards - the infrastructure already exists and is used, and would prevent 'discrimination' against snap card users. Sort of a 'mark of the beast', but without marking the flesh just running out plastic cards to everyone- and since we are all already trained to use them we are all good. And since the electronic funds will be on the cards the government can easily manipulate the electronic records to their benefit until the whole thing breaks down.
ReplyDeleteBut while it is going on a way to store the overage from the EBT/Snap cards while unemployed will be a big advantage. Now is the time to get the canning jars, buckets, Mylar bags and O2 absobers stocked up.
I see the end of Food Stamps and the return of Government Cheese. Like when Jimmy Carter became president and the government then started giving away so much peanut butter, Commodities are a way of giving away true surplus ( in the case of Jimmy, pure profit items ). Food Stamps don't discriminate between scarce or surplus foods. Now, WIC, the program of protein to pregos and kids, is a commodity specific food program. The infrastructure is there for that. In my future example, you get ten pounds of flour, and ten pounds of chicken. No dollar amount ( because of inflation ) and no wasting on soda and such like they do today. No buying too expensive of food so you run out too quick. And the gov can change the items you get to concentrate on surplus items. It could still be "Food Stamps", but run more like WIC. But going from money to commodities like it used to be.
DeleteI remember those big blocks of cheese and the big cans of peanut butter. My alcoholic uncle used to get those all the time, and then gave it all away (he hardly ever ate anything, preferring his “high carb liquid fast” to all other diets). Time will come when this stuff will seem like gourmet food.
DeleteBudK had a free shipping promo recently, so I ordered their heirloom survival seed packet, in the long term, hermetically sealed bags. The trick will be to not only learn gardening, but to do so on desert junk land. I’m thinking that Kurt Saxon’s tire garden, or some kind of heavily mulched raised beds, will be the answer here. Obviously it will have to be small scale, and requiring one to stick to the easy to grow, high nutrient vegetables (Think turnips here; the greens of which are a super food in and of themselves).
Save those 2-liter bottles for drip irrigation.
DeleteI am getting too old and have been too urbanized to become a farmer/herdsman.(not born into it or have yuppie income coming in to focus on asparagus crops) Getting remote land is a good cushion for post collapse refuge. I think many a minion as such may just hide in plain sight amongst the herd but be stocked and prepped as best as possible on limited income or physical abilities. There will be old coots in town that are just enough resourceful and able to nibble around the edges of society even in chaotic collapse conditions. Not ideal, but we can't all be in the wilderness stroking ar-15s playing "wolverines".
ReplyDeleteI think Red Dawn ( original ) is on Amazon Prime.
DeleteIt has to be the original Red Dawn or nothing.
DeleteSpeaking of which why are movies so bad now? I have, and I kid you not, 150 Dollaroos worth of vouchers but there is literally nothing I want to see. I missed out on Death Wish (Bruce Willis version) and Winchester because they were yanked from the cinemas so quick.
Anon 4:23 I agree, "surviving" does not equal "winning". It's more like "not losing", and there are many possibilities for that.
DeleteDingo: the reviews on Death Wish were mixed. I think a lot of them are politically motivated. I'm seeing it regardless, but I'll get it at RedBox for under $2. Modern movies are fine. Or they're not. I think there are just far more than historically normal that are not. And it isn't lack of money. Those $200 million turds are everywhere. It confuses me too because clearly very good movies are being made. Folks know how to make good ones. How hard is it to devote an extra twenty minutes to character story instead of extra CGI explosions? The only thing I can figure out is that the better ones come from less corporate control/thinking and the worse ones are from companies that are robotic corporate entities with no flexability. I'm sure that isn't even the whole answer, but it would explain Disney, Star Wars and the PC pushing that drives away their core viewer.
DeleteHave fencing or green house/hoops/cold frame enclosures for garden. Deer and rabbits will eat it clean in one night, and yer screwed. A yard dog will help keep em away but it needs to be fed as well, and makes unwanted noise. Probably have hungry neighbors poaching too then you have to expend ammunition or get all sore muscles from clubbing and burying operations.
ReplyDeleteLoosen the soil on the edge with rototiller ( probably in advance? ), bury body, plant tree.
DeleteFeel free to not post this
ReplyDeleteFound another Vault-Co fan with a theory
Interesting
Posted on May 29, 2018 by Anonymous Conservative
An article on Tommy Robinson and British Politician Pedophilia got linked on Reddit and was getting popular, and somebody went into my host and changed the permissions on just the blog/Index.html file this morning to 0 to kill access to the site, in a way I would not see from the back end this morning.
That subject appears a sore point. It could be what did Vault-Co in, and obviously Robinson is under attack because of that specifically.
More evidence of Q’s validity?
Q or no Q: meh.
Delete“Modern movies are fine. Or they're not.”
ReplyDeleteIt’s really hard to find anything these days that isn’t politically correct, which is why I almost never watch modern productions. Everything produced now has to have a magical minority, an empowered fem, a turd burglar, and in many cases, an example of all 3. That Survivalist movie was one of the few modern productions that spared you the PC BS (it realistically portrayed what the real role of women will once again be, not the kick ass, Bruce Lee with tits, hollyweird versions).
I heard something the other day regarding the Star Wars franchise, and apparently it’s not doing too well (surprise surprise, right?). Some of the smaller independent production companies will probably surpass freakywood in the relatively near future. Though with each passing generation, the country just becomes more and more liberal, and I don’t see this changing until real hard times are upon us. Liberal, SJW crap, is only something that exists in wealthy countries (When folks are worried about where their next meal is coming from, or whether or not they will have a roof over their head the following month, they have better things to worry about then how some evil white dude is victimizing someone).
Another recurring theme that you’re seeing a lot of these days is a reboot of a vintage show, and then a formerly male character does a “gender bender” (think battlestar galactica) and becomes a female, or a different race all together. Take the new lost in space series for example. In this reboot, Maureen is now a brilliant feminist physicist that has all the answers that the bumbling men don’t have. And Judy Robinson? Well, guess what? She’s black now (Remember that gorgeous blond in the original?). So she’s no longer John Robinson’s daughter, but the daughter of Maureen’s former beau. The younger generations watching this crap don’t notice or care about these things, but I see fully the agenda that’s in place and refuse to support it on any level.
DeleteI guess I wasn’t quite through venting yet :D
If anyone understands the need to vent, it's me! Now, as far as supporting it, I do understand. For me personally, it is enough to support it as little as possible. And yes, I understand I'm part of the problem. I just look at it as this is Kabuki Theatre on the deck of the Titanic. We're still going down, yo. If I avert my eyes, it will still be "the show must go on". Look at Star Wars. Theatre revenue down sharply, especially in their cash cow market China, and fans voting with their wallets has NOT changed the PC agenda of the films. Just as one example. Sure, the pro football Wallet Vote worked there. With two conflicting examples it is hard to say if the Vote matters or not.
Delete“And yes, I understand I'm part of the problem”
DeleteNah, it’s cool Jim, I’m not judging anyone here. For me personally, I just can’t get into any of this newer stuff. Perhaps I’m particularly sensitive to it, but it seems like it’s really in your face these days, and I hardly even watch tv at all.
The time will come when I will likely just cut out all forms of media (with the exception of the old time radio and classic tv shows/films) and dramatically reduce my digital footprint as well. The only reason that I don’t do this completely, is because I do follow a few sites such as this one, and also handle my bills and bank account online.
I hate digital, even as it pays my grocery money. I imagine the former farmers going to the factory thought similarly.
Delete