The Police, Preps and More Preps

Apparently, I'm not alone in the deep concerns I shared in "More Nannyism Comin' Your Way".   One of the big dogs - Karl Denninger over at Market Ticker had some similar feelings in his post from yesterday -

Finally, you [police departments] need to start respecting the unalienable rights of the citizens in this state and nation. This means cutting the crap with the so-called "permits" to exercise unalienable rights.


All of them.


We'll stand with you - we want to - but respect is a two-way street and it has to be earned. We, the peaceful citizens of this state and nation, are willing to work with you. But you have to both work with us and respect our rights.


That's the deal, and if you don't like it that's fine - we don't have to help you.

He noted the "us vs. them" mentality that seems to be infecting many police departments.  I hope that changes, as when TSHTF, the LEOs will want us law abiding citizens on their side.  You'd think.
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I love Mondays.  I work out of my home office getting caught up on paperwork, and calling people that have signed up for gun my classes (I require a personal interview with all students prior to the class).

Anyways, I also will typically put away some long-term food storage, usually via canning.   Mostly meat, but occasionally something else.

This week I just did some simple beans.  Two pounds of dry pintos (soaked over night), a cup of diced onions, cup of diced celery, maybe a teaspoon of salt and half that of black pepper.  A couple of bay leaves for good measure.

Cover with water and bring to a boil for 20-30 minutes.

I then added about a cup of chopped, uncooked ham into the bottom of each quart jar, and covered it with beans and boiling liquid to a half inch of the top.  90 minutes at 10 pounds pressure, and viola! 5 quarts of the best damned beans you've ever eaten.  Seriously.

One of the jars didn't seal, so they were part of dinner last night.  Along with two loaves of homemade bread that were made with NO recipe.  I noted here or somewhere else that making different kinds of bread by memory is one of the items on my Skills Development checklist.

I'm getting there!
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I recently downloaded, The Art of War, onto my Nook reader (I really love this thing).  Absolutely great book on developing strategic plans.

My intent is to absorb as much of this as possible, and apply it to my precious metals business.

We've got two competitors in our town, and a half-dozen or so in the general area.  Our business is growing, so far, beyond every benchmark we had established, but we all want to crush the guys in town (for a number of very good reasons I'm not going to go into).

One of the "pearls of wisdom" from early on in the book -

Hence the saying:  If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles.  If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat.  If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle.

I'm in the information gathering phase right now.

I'd guess that the strategic lessons could be applied elsewhere as well...
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Speaking of precious metals:  Is anyone who owns gold or silver freaking out over the latest drops in spot prices?

Not me.

The only way I'd be worried would be if I thought the dollar wasn't going to be demolished by the Federal Reserve and the US government policies.

They're not going to change, so I'm not worried.  Long-term trends, baby.  Long-term trends...
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Tunisia, Egypt and Lebanon are coming apart at the seams.

Russia takes a serious terrorist attack, killing 30+ at their largest airport in Moscow.

A bus was blown up in the Philippines (ya didn't hear about that one, did ya?).

Not surprisingly, the Government Scribes (the Main Stream Press) have wasted no time starting the propaganda campaign to give the TSA, et al, reason to further infringe on our rights.

I absolutely guarantee more invasive screening and other draconian laws are coming your way.

It will be very difficult to prevent all such attacks, Kean says. "We have a lot of places in this country where crowds gather," he says.

Well, we'll just have to put a stop to that, now, won't we?!  No more large gatherings, all in the name of security.

Sounds reasonable, no?
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Tip:  Do what you can to stay away from large crowds if you can possibly avoid them.  For a while, at least.  Lots of tension in the air.

People are so sensitized to the fear of a bombing that if a large firecracker were to go off at, say, a sporting event or the mall, I'd be more worried about being trampled to death than anything else.
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And when was the last time you went to the gun range?  Yeah, that's what I thought.

Get thee to the range, and practice your non-traditional stances and grips.  Weak-side and one-handed shooting.

Don't expect the bad guys to stand still while you carefully line up your sights.  Practice draw-and-shoot drills so that as soon as the gun is fully extended, you can pull the trigger, and you'll at least hit center-of-mass to slow the bastard down.

Shotgunners, when was the last time you shot your preferred home defense load?  From your weak side?  Get on it.

With all firearms, be sure you're leaning into the shot so your body is absorbing as much of the recoil as possible.  This will let you get subsequent shots on target much more quickly.  Important, especially if there are more than one bad guys "visiting".

For you non-lethal weapon folks, when was the last time you swapped out your pepper spray and changed the batteries in your stun gun?

OF COURSE you know to not throw away the old pepper spray, but to use it as a training tool to reinforce in your mind just how far the spray goes, and what kind of finger-hold you need to fire the thing, right?

Right?

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