Free Republic

Welcome to the New Year. The usual platitudes for early January include wishes for greater success, greater health and all-around greater prospects. But we all know our nation faces some bleak times. Our constitutional rights are at an all-time low, and our national debt is at an all-time high. The government is spying on its citizens like never before, and anyone who thinks endless spending (such as “QE Infinity”) is the way to handle our economic issues is a blind fool. In short, while I won’t go so far as to make any dire predictions for what 2014 will bring...

Today I have an update for you on my hydroponics adventures. The system has been up and running all season (April 20 - November 1) so there is a lot of information to be shared. The system currently includes 12 beds - 4 outdoors and 8 in a greenhouse - for a total surface area of 56 sq.ft (~ 5.5 m2). An in-depth description of the system was published last year on Survivalblog. I made only 1 substantial change since then and that is in the way the polyethylene drain pipes are connected to the beds. The connections need to...

In just the last twelve months Congressional members and top level administrators at the Department of Homeland Security have warned of threats to the national power grid so serious that should they occur life in America as we have come to know it would change almost instantly. Former DHS head Janet Napolitano, in a letter to her successor, advised that “a massive and serious cyber attack” on the US Homeland is imminent and that a “natural disaster — the likes of which the nation has never seen — is also likely on its way.” This was followed up by a...

Right (good, truth, God…) is on my side, I (we) will prevail, win, survive… Forget it. Nobody cares for reasons and what is right and what is wrong when SHTF. If you think that you have an advantage just because you are good man you are so wrong. The first thing that completely breaks apart is the concept of good will win or “fairness.” We only have these ideas because of living so far removed from nature. Nature is brutal and good dead man is still a dead man. You’re gonna find yourself in situations when you wonder why this...

This past weekend a country with one of the highest living standards in the world saw rioting in the streets! According to Credit Suisse, Singapore ranks 8th in the world in terms of personal wealth. Since the year 2000, Singaporeans’ wealth has more than doubled. It is clear that this is a very prosperous city state that is the gem of Asia. I know that when I have looked for offshore gold storage in the past, Singapore comes up as one of the top areas along with Hong Kong, Zuric, Perth, and Toronto. However, on Sunday a riot was sparked...

If you were going to pick a rifle caliber for a long term SHTF situation, what would that caliber be? For some reason I woke up this morning thinking about my 7mm express / 280 Remington, and how the panic buying in the first half of 2013 caused a shortage in ammunition supplies. When I got my Remington model 700 chambered in 280, I wanted something that was around the 270 or 30-06, and that would also work on heavier game such as elk and moose. In all honesty I put too much thought into picking the 280 Remington. While...

"Unless you're fighting zombies, skip the crossbow." While many preppers are busy stockpiling hordes of rifles, shotguns, and handguns plus cases of ammunition for a looming doomsday scenario, others are thinking more broadly about other weapons options. Thanks to the success of AMC’s The Walking Dead, one of the options that has become popular with preppers is the crossbow. On TWD, one of the main characters (Norman Reedus’s Daryl Dixon) uses a crossbow with quite an astonishing amount of lethal success. But is this even remotely realistic? Let’s take a look at this bolt (arrow) shooting implement to see its...

I don’t sweat the big things, I’m sure there are a million articles on them already and you have read them all, but I hope there are a few little things here that will give you food for though, and that might just save your life some day.

She’s about to become one of the most influential financial leaders in the world, but a classmate who sat in front of Janet Yellen at Brooklyn’s Ft. Hamilton HS says he was “shocked” at her career path.

You have your 1,000 pounds of wheat. Your 500 gallons of water and enough ammo to make Chuck Norris jealous but the question remains, are you truly prepared? Just because you’ve been prepping for twenty years doesn’t mean you haven’t made some mistakes along the way. It’s not enough to just have your emergency food storage, you have to be able to store it, eat it and even move it if things really get crazy.

NOMURA: It's The End Of The End Of The World Joe Weisenthal Nov. 27, 2013, 5:47 AM Japanese investment bank Nomura is out with a big global economic outlook for 2014. The title is "The End Of The End Of The World." The theme is that as 2013 comes to a close, the age of crisis is well and truly over. There are still lingering issues of course, but the really huge themes that have dominated the past several years are gone, and concerns over systemic risk will no longer be high on investors minds. Strategist Michael Kurtz and Co....

Banks Warn Fed They May Have To Start Charging Depositors Tyler Durden 11/24/2013 15:24 -0500 The Fed's Catch 22 just got catchier. While most attention in the recently released FOMC minutes fell on the return of the taper as a possibility even as soon as December (making the November payrolls report the most important ever, ever, until the next one at least), a less discussed issue was the Fed's comment that it would consider lowering the Interest on Excess Reserves to zero as a means to offset the implied tightening that would result from the reduction in the monthly flow...

Desperation triggered anarchy in communities flattened by Typhoon Haiyan as survivors of one of the most violent storms ever to hit land struggled to find food, clean water and medicine Wednesday ....[snip].... ANC Television said security forces exchanged fire with armed men amid widespread looting of shops and warehouses for food, water and other supplies

Zombie aficionados debate whether the living dead should be fast- or slow-moving. But there's no denying that the Zombie Apocalypse Stock Portfolio — companies that should do well in a zombie outbreak — has been lightning-fast. The zombie portfolio of seven stocks — SolarCity (SCTY), Generac (GNRC), Sturm Ruger (RGR), Smith & Wesson (SWHC), Cabela's (CAB), GNC (GNC) and Pall Corp. (PLL) — has soared by 230% since "The Walking Dead" premiered on Oct. 31, 2010. That compares to 50% for the S&P 500 index. So far this year, the Zombie Apocalypse Stock Portfolio has jumped 63% vs. the S&P...

That terrible storm which hit the Philippines must have affected a lot of expats as well as the natives. Some of those expats are Freepers. Has anyone got an update so we know if they are all safe? We even had at least one Prepper living there, hope he bugged out safely. Prayers go out to all of them.

Scientists Warn of Extreme Risk We’ve long said that the greatest short-term threat to humanity is from the fuel pools at Fukushima. The Japanese nuclear agency recently green-lighted the removal of the spent fuel rods from Fukushima reactor 4′s spent fuel pool. The operation is scheduled to begin this month. The head of the U.S. Department of Energy correctly notes: "The success of the cleanup also has global significance. So we all have a direct interest in seeing that the next steps are taken well, efficiently and safely."

For some investors, it feels a lot more like 1999 than 2013. Third-quarter earnings have not been spectacular. The U.S. isn't expected to grow at anything close to breakneck speed next year. And there are few industries experiencing huge profit expansions. Despite all that, a number of high-profile—mostly technology—stocks are soaring. The heady advances are making shareholders of these companies big money, but they're also raising serious questions among some analysts about whether the unusual trading is a troublesome sign for the overall market. Last week, the Dow Jones Industrial Average set a record on Tuesday, but closed up just...

Rodney Dial is crafting hefty waterproof containers that can store all his preps safely underwater where no one can reach them.

WASHINGTON — Inflation is widely reviled as a kind of tax on modern life, but as Federal Reserve policy makers prepare to meet this week, there is growing concern inside and outside the Fed that inflation is not rising fast enough. Some economists say more inflation is just what the American economy needs to escape from a half-decade of sluggish growth and high unemployment. The Fed has worked for decades to suppress inflation, but economists, including Janet Yellen, President Obama’s nominee to lead the Fed starting next year, have long argued that a little inflation is particularly valuable when the...

EXCLUSIVE: Terry McAuliffe has promised voters he is committed to transparency, but in the final days of a Virginia governor’s race he leads, the Democrat has steadfastly refused to explain a complicated financial arrangement involving several family trusts and a union-owned insurance and investment company. For the arrangement... Read more: http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/oct/24/mcauliffe-silent-on-union-connected-loan/#ixzz2ijYL0ikj Follow us: @washtimes on Twitter