When The S*** Hits the Fan

Apple TV iOS / tvOS Slideshow bug – 4th Gen Apple TV

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On any larger (50+) album, if you choose to play a slideshow with it, at some point the slides will skip from being in order to a random spot earlier. In some cases, the slideshow will continue, in others it will play a few earlier slides and quit. This has been reported to Apple since TV OS 9.0, as you can see in 9.2 it is still there. (It occurs in three different Photos libraries on three different Macintosh machines, all running the current (at that time) OS X, iTunes and Photos versions and has persisted through all versions since the Apple TV 4th generation was released.)
This video demonstrates it. It has the numbers 1-10, capital letters A-Z, and lower case letters a-z. It is in a new photo library with only one album, but the same occurs in larger photo libraries with 1000s of photos and 50+ albums. It doesn’t seem to be impacted by the time between slides or the transitions (e.g. Classic, Ken Burns etc).

Here is a 2 minute video showing the problem:

And one of several Apple Support forum discussions:
https://discussions.apple.com/message/29961343

Occurs in Apple tvOS / iOS 9.0 – 9.2 (March 21, 2016 current)

 

Update: The May 13, 2016 Apple TV/tvOS update seems to have fixed the bug based on a quick test.  Let’s hope so!

We Throw so Much #Plastic into the #Ocean That Now We’re Literally Eating It

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Claire Bernish
March 21, 2016

(ANTIMEDIA) Recent reports of a phenomenal quantity of plastic inundating the world’s oceans are alarming enough — but another aspect of the problem should snap everyone to attention: humans ultimately consume that plastic.

According to Plastic Oceans, this pollution and its effects are “an environmental catastrophe of our own making.” Indeed, humans produce in excess of 300 million tons of plastic each year — “equivalent to the combined weight of all adult humans on earth” — and nearly “half of this we use just once [and] then throw it away.”

Further, the perceived conveniences of tossing items into the garbage is pure illusion.

“There is no ‘away’ because plastic is so permanent and so indestructible,” said Sir David Attenborough, according to Plastic Oceans. “When you cast it into the ocean … it does not go away.”

For the benefits plastic originally appeared to offer, the untold number of products now made of or contained in plastic has created an environmental and health nightmare arguably unlike any other.

In 2015, the BBC reported eight million tons of plastic — enough to cover “an area 34 times the size of New York’s Manhattan Island to ankle depth” — finds its way to the planet’s oceans every year. Such a quantification of our plastic waste was finally possible thanks to a study published in Science Magazine and presented at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS).

“The quantity entering the ocean is equal to about five plastic grocery bags full of plastic for every foot of coastline in the world,” Dr. Jenna Jambeck, study lead author from the University of Georgia, told the BBC. Study researchers caution the findings and quantifications are a middle ground, as plastic — despite its indestructible traits — can still break down into smaller pieces and particles.

A more recent study by the World Economic Forum estimated the world’s oceans will contain more plastic than fish by 2050 — in part because a “staggering” 32 percent of plastic packaging “escapes collections systems.” Even so, only 5 percent of plastics are effectively recycled — making the WEF’s prediction for the use of plastic to double in the next 20 years even more dire.

Truthout noted recent “estimates indicate that upwards of 8 million tons of plastic are added to the planet’s oceans every year, the equivalent of a dumptruck full of plastic every minute. That is enough plastic to have led one scientist to estimate that people who consume average amounts of seafood are ingesting approximately 11,000 particles of plastic every year.”

Unless we turn to alternative and less toxic means for producing plastics — such as hemp — our failures in recycling will, indeed, come back to haunt us. As phytoplankton populations drop and overfishing remains an issue, marine plastic pollution simply compounds a massive catastrophe.

This article (We Throw so Much Plastic into the Ocean That Now We’re Literally Eating It) is free and open source. You have permission to republish this article under a Creative Commons license with attribution to Claire Bernish and theAntiMedia.org. Anti-Media Radio airs weeknights at 11pm Eastern/8pm Pacific. If you spot a typo, email edits@theantimedia.org.

#Wikileaks Drops #Hillary Email Bomb That Could End Her Campaign but FB Censored It

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Michaela Whitton
March 20, 2016

(ANTIMEDIA) United Kingdom — On Wednesday, a major archive containing over 30,000 of Hillary Clinton’s emails were released. Though the State Department began releasing the emails in May last year — after a Freedom of Information Act request — it is the first time the messages have been made easily available in a searchable format, courtesy of WikiLeaks. Before the launch, the FBI was investigating the Democratic candidate’s use of a private server during her tenure as Secretary of State. The archive contains over 7,000 emails written by Clinton herself.

The scary, albeit fascinating exposé on who’s in bed with whom in the halls of global power has expanded to include Facebook, according to WikiLeaks. The organization has accused the social networking site of censorship, saying Facebook is blocking users’ access to the latest Clinton dispatch.

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As a result of the outing, Twitter users are calling Clinton wicked, a thug, and a hypocrite. The released emails uncovered that the presidential frontrunner was instrumental in spreading chaos and extremism in Libya. They also revealed that she pushed for oil privatization in Mexico and forwarded emails claiming a Sunni-Shiite war would be good for Israel and the West.

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For those who are fascinated but don’t have the time or inclination to sift through more than 30,000 documents, here is a snapshot of what Clinton’s emails revealed:

This article (Facebook, WikiLeaks and Clinton’s Warmongering Emails) is free and open source. You have permission to republish this article under a Creative Commons license with attribution to Michaela Whitton and theAntiMedia.org. Anti-Media Radio airs weeknights at 11pm Eastern/8pm Pacific. If you spot a typo, email edits@theantimedia.org.

Venture Capitalist Says Investors Are Terrified Of Market Volatility And Weak Economy: “They Are Scared And Don’t Know What To Do”

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With stocks having rebounded following a major down-swing earlier this year, it’s all smooth sailing going forward if you believe the mainstream financial pundits and renowned economists who continue to encourage the general public about the unfettered strength and stability of the U.S. economy. But according to well known venture capitalist and resource sector investor Carlo Civelli, last week’s Fed action, or rather, inaction, suggests that exactly the opposite is the case.

It goes to show that the economy is not as strong… or the markets were too volatile even for Yellen to stomach.

In his latest interview with Crush The Street Civelli explains why the stock market is the only game in town for many investors, why people are being forced into negative yield investments, how stabilizing stocks markets doesn’t necessarily translate to a healthy economy, and where to position yourself today to avoid the wealth destruction to come:


(Watch at Youtube)

It was just a few months ago when the Federal Reserve was so proud of their work that they took to raising interest rates and announcing that no more monetary action would be necessary. And, though most of the investment world would like to believe that the best and brightest central bankers on the planet have everything under control, it turns out, as Civelli notes, those who are manipulating the global economy, financial markets and monetary policy actually have no clue as to the consequences of their actions:

Nobody, not even the central banks, knows how this is going to end. They keep on pumping money…  

Volatility in financial markets has left an air of uncertainty across the globe. So much so, says Civelli, that many of the investors he talks to on a regular basis are just as concerned about the unknown as the Fed, with many either sitting in large cash positions, making risky stock market bets in an effort to generate some yield on their investments, or willing to pay governments to keep their money “safe”:

The central bank of Switzerland, for example, has a negative interest rate of 0.75%, so you’re paying the bank 75 basis points to keep your money there… and therefore people even go to the extreme of buying a Swiss government bond with a negative yield of, say 35 points, which makes them still up 40 points… it’s getting ridiculous.

…

What else do we do with the cash? Everybody I talk to holds unprecedented cash positions, is scared and doesn’t know what to do…

So the only way out right now is to play the stock market.

And then, as we can see in January and February.. if something that was not in the cards happens, the markets go wild.

The unpredictability of central bank and government action has left many anxious and confused.

But despite the challenges being faced by most investors, there are still opportunities available. Civelli, who is focused on acquiring assets while they’re cheap through his latest project Callinex Mines, remains positive that precious metals will weather the storm of unprecedented monetary intervention from central banks and the consequences that will follow:

The consensus, obviously in a situation like this, would be that gold has to go up.

For investment reports, interviews, and market analysis visit Crush The Street.

Click here to learn more about Carlo Civelli’s latest investments and projects.

#Netflix’ House of Cards Is Much More Realistic than We’d Like to Admit

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Jake Anderson
March 19, 2016

(ANTIMEDIA) — ***MAJOR SPOILERS AHEAD

Netflix original series, House of Cards, has never shied away from controversial storylines. The narrative has followed Frank Underwood’s rise to power from Congressional whip to Vice President to President. His meteoric ascent to power was always trailed by a dark shadow, though — one that perhaps mirrors the real life brutality, scandal, and corruption that accompanies the machinations of most high-level politicians.

House of Cards is particularly ruthless in this regard. Frank Underwood has personally killed two people. One, a journalist with whom he has been having an affair. She learns too much, and during a discreet subway station meeting, Frank takes advantage of a well-timed metro train to push the young woman into its oncoming path. Another Underwood victim is a ruined, alcoholic candidate for governor of Pennsylvania (who had become politically toxic for the Democrats). Late one evening, he passes out in his car, and Frank, who has driven him home, leaves the gas running and closes the garage door.

Frank, of course, has addressed the camera and been open about his Machiavellian philosophy of power. “For those climbing to the top of the food chain there can be no mercy,” Frank once said. At one point, he also stated, “I’d push [the Russian president] down the stairs and light his broken body on fire just to watch it burn if it wouldn’t start a world war.”

Season 4 of House of Cards picked back up in the middle of the savage Democratic primary, where  Underwood is pitted against an ethical judicial reformist, Heather Dunbar, who promises to restore dignity to the White House. Unfortunately, her brief inconsequential meeting with journalist-turned ex-felon Lucas Goodwin, who pleads with her to listen to his evidence of the president’s crimes, spells her end. After Goodwin attempts to assassinate Underwood, rendering him on the brink of death, Dunbar’s dalliance with Goodwin is a nail in her political coffin.

Season 3 also ended with Claire Underwood leaving the president, though she returns to him as the season progresses. While Underwood is the frontrunner on the Democratic side, he trails in the general election polls to a Kennedy-esque Republican by the name of Will Conway. After his recovery from the near fatal gunshot wound to the liver, Frank and Claire come up with an unprecedented plan for her to be his Vice President. This effectively reunites the two and makes them a formidable opponent against Conway, who is a war hero. He is also the user of a mysterious data analytics company deploying a proprietary data mining surveillance tool to gather voter information.

Underwood begins his own surveillance program, obfuscating its paper trail with a military strike that would necessitate surveillance. Here we start to see the full measure of Frank Underwood’s manipulative warmongering — Wag the Dog mixed with some black ops. Underwood, who is a moderate Democrat toeing the line with conservative policies (he proposed ending social security, as well as doubling down on foreign interventionist strategies), appears very much as a Clinton-like centrist ideologue who uses the military for nebulous political gains and geopolitical chess moves.

The real manifestation of this comes in the last few episodes of Season 4 of House of Cards. Underwood negotiates with ICO — a radical Islamic terrorist group clearly modeled after ISIS — for the release of a family held captive. The mother and daughter are released, and the Underwoods allow the kidnappers to speak with their imprisoned leader. When that goes awry, a federal raid turns up nothing, and a news story draws attention to his previous crimes, Frank begins to panic.

Claire, overwhelmed by emerging scandals from their past that threaten to dismantle their political dynasty, devises a sinister but calculated plan.

“I’m done trying to win over people’s hearts,” Claire says to a dejected Frank, insinuating the Underwoods should start a war to help win the election. “We can work with fear.”

The fear instilled in the public from terrorist attacks like ICO’s often serves as fodder for foreign intervention, and in the season finale, Claire realizes it can also serve as a distraction from their corruption.

This is more than a reflection of the times: this is political reality. Americans live in a militaristic empire that thrives on using fear as leverage to coerce the population into thinking war is a necessity. In reality, it is a boon for defense contractors… and the politicians who facilitate this wealth. Distractions abound as those in power execute hidden agendas in Washington D.C.

During an address to the nation in which Frank notifies the public he will not negotiate with terrorists — leaving the father of the family in the hands of the domestic extremists who kidnapped him — Underwood declares a merciless war on ICO. It is presumably declared without congressional approval. “We must move beyond reason, we must respond with force,” he says. “It will be a war more total than anything we have waged thus far in the fight against extremism.”

After the terrorists share video of them slitting the kidnapped father’s throat, the Underwoods share a moment together. Frank casts his characteristic gaze into the camera, readying to speak. Only this time, Claire is looking at us, too.

“We don’t submit to terror,” the president says. “We make the terror.”

House of Cards Season 4 ends.

This article (Netflix’ House of Cards Is Much More Realistic than We’d Like to Admit) is free and open source. You have permission to republish this article under a Creative Commons license with attribution to Jake Anderson and theAntiMedia.org. Anti-Media Radio airs weeknights at 11pm Eastern/8pm Pacific. If you spot a typo, email edits@theantimedia.org.

Rape Prevention With the Push of A Button

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Michaela Whitton
March 18, 2016

(ANTIMEDIA)  A groundbreaking device was launched this week to make sure everyone can access help in an emergency, regardless of where they are. A team of engineers and developers have created Revolar — a tiny, wearable device that sends immediate alerts to contacts if the user feels threatened or unsafe.

Hoping to address the culture of fear women and other vulnerable groups face on a daily basis — Revolar means to fly again in Spanish. The gadget is the brainchild of CEO Jacqueline Ros, whose teenage sister was a victim of sexual assault. In the aftermath of the rape, Ros found herself wishing her younger sibling had been able to push a button to ask for help, so she set about creating one.

Using the tragedy to try to ensure the same doesn’t happen to others, Ros and her team launched a successful Kickstarter campaign. In addition, the developers took part in the Techstars Boulder 2015 accelerator program, made the Top 25 for Sir Richard Branson’s Extreme Tech Challenge, and more recently, closed a $3 million financing deal with The Foundry Group. After Ros raised a whopping $3.5 million, the wearable device, designed to clip onto your clothing or keychain, began shipping on March 15. It is due to be on the shelves in shops in April.

Marketed as the “world’s smartest personal safety device,” the slimline, 2-inch long gadget enables users to send differentiated alerts by the simple press of a button. Two presses sends a yellow warning alert while three times signals a red alert. Built-in GPS means contacts immediately receive a text revealing the user’s exact location.

For those who feel they need an extra layer of protection, Revolar can be ordered at revolar.com. A video showing the device in action can be found here.

This article (Rape Prevention With the Push of A Button) is free and open source. You have permission to republish this article under a Creative Commons license with attribution to Michaela Whitton and theAntiMedia.org. Anti-Media Radio airs weeknights at 11pm Eastern/8pm Pacific. If you spot a typo, email edits@theantimedia.org.

Shock Report: #Oil Oversupply Exaggerated: Millions of Barrels Go Missing: “Oil Market Could Tighten Substantially”

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You may remember that just two months ago the International Energy Agency warned the oil market could “drown in oversupply” in 2016. The outlook for oil, which had tumbled 75% since 2012 and hit a low of $28 per barrel by mid January, was looking bleak with some analysts suggesting that sub-$20 oil was a real possibility.

The official numbers were compelling – the world was awash in oil with scores of tankers brimming with black gold reportedly sitting in limbo with nowhere to go. Oil storage was at capacity. OPEC warned that oil wouldn’t return to triple digits for two decades.

The entire North American oil sector had collapsed. Tens of thousands of jobs disappeared almost overnight. And with prices so low, many producers and exploration companies who had taken out large financing packages started missing payments. The energy debt bubble had burst.

But what if the oversupply that was threatening to topple mid east governments and unravel the global economy was a complete fabrication?

What if it the numbers upon which the entire narrative was predicated were nothing but fantasy?

It turns out that this may well be the case, according to Fortune:

The IEA was unable to account for 800,000 barrels of crude per day last year–the highest level of missing crude in 17 years.

The missing crude could simply be a figment of statistics, showing up in the agency’s data due to flawed accounting.

…

If the oversupply has been exaggerated and those barrels don’t exist, market analysts say that the oil market could tighten substantially. Crude prices have wallowed at their lowest point in more than a decade over the course of a nearly-two-year crash marked by concern about oversupply.

Seriously, you can’t make this stuff up.

Long story short: no one actually knows where these missing barrels are or if they even existed to begin with, suggesting that someone, somewhere Kashkaried the numbers.

This means that millions of barrels of oil that were reportedly filling up storage depots around the world may have never actually existed in physical form, which would in turn imply that said oversupply threatening to catalyze World War III and wipe out the North American energy sector for the next several decades has been fabricated.

Most ironic, of course, is that if the International Energy Agency’s latest official report is correct we are about to witness a massive global supply crunch, the consequence of which could be an unprecedented price swing in the opposite direction.

Survival Hacks: With These 17 Tricks, You Can Improvise Through Any Crisis

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One part of prepping is gathering and storing lots of useful gear and supplies.

Another part is honing your skills so that you could likely manage without any of those supplies – if you had to.

This video will start you out with some tips on how to whip up some useful devices out of practically nothing.

Tips in this video:

1. Use an aluminum soda can, cut open, to reflect and magnify the light of a candle

2. Use a piece of cloth and two containers to purify dirty water by transferring through the cloth. Then boil.

3. Instantly light a fire without lighter fluid. Place charcoal briquets in the spaces of an empty egg carton, and just light the egg carton for a quick lunch out and about.

4. Use or burn rosemary, basil or other common herbs to repel mosquitoes and irritating insects

5. Create an instant solar oven by cutting open a box, lining the top and inside with foil. Just add sun, and your food can be warmed in just a short time.

6. When the compass gets lost in your gear, you can point towards north by static charging a sewing needle by rubbing it on clothing. Place the charged needle on a leaf floating in water, and you’ll find orientation by connecting man, metal and nature.

7. Combine cooking oil with a paper-towel wick in a spare can, and create an emergency candle… more expensive the more virgin and imported it is.

By starting to think this way, you can conceive of and notice hundreds of other ways to modify, improvise and “hack” your way through survival – anywhere, anytime.

Here are even more life hacks that could help in a crisis.

Perhaps even cooler are the “life hacks” presented by the CrazyRussianHacker:

His hacks include:

– Making a candle out of an orange peel, which provides container and wick, and vegetable oil (as above)

– Creating fire with an aluminum-coated gum wrapper connected to the opposite terminal ends of a AA battery (way cool)

– Make a makeshift harpoon-like weapon out of a wooden BBQ skewer, a balloon, and a stabilizing bottle top

– Open a can the Russian way: using just a knife and some strategic angles

– Pick a padlock with an aluminum scrap from a soda can

– Modify an aluminum can into an alcohol-fueled gas stove

– Use aluminum foil to create a battery-dud to complete the circuit when you only have one battery to power a flashlight that requires two.

– Power small devices with the miniature cells inside a AA battery by peeling it open, carefully

– Reconfigure paper clips into wire electrodes to connect batteries to a light bulb and create a flashlight.

Seriously, this guy is the Russian MacGyver!

Train your mind to re-envision the common items around you. Many of them can serve your survival needs and create comfort at times when there is little else around to work with.

There are infinite possibilities, and you are only limited by your cleverness once you understand the basic principles involved.

Read more:

Prepper’s Blueprint: All the Tips You Need to Survive Any Disaster – Must Have

These Clever 100-Year-Old Life Hacks Can Still Make Your Life Easier Today

Can’t-Do Generation: “Expect Everything to Just Work,” and Throw Out What They Can’t Fix

How To Get a Family of Four Prepped for The Coming Collapse – In The Quickest and Easiest Way Possible…

“The 2nd Amendment Will Be Under Siege Before The Election” – New Supreme Court Nominee Supports Whatever Big Government Wants

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As with most of Obama’s actions, his nomination of Merrick B. Garland as the replacement for recently-deceased Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia is hardly unpredictable.  This article will outline Garland’s background.  Obama will “fast-track” this appointment, as if evidenced by Orrin Hatch already “jumping on the bandwagon” and agreeing with Obama’s choice.  Right out of the chute, here comes one “RINO” in the rodeo to “rope” in another liberal democrat to follow the herd of Obama-appointees.  First Sotomayor, then Kagan, and the third rodeo clown appears to be Garland.  Here’s the “punch line” for the clowns:

Garland will be fast-tracked in, and the 2nd Amendment under siege before the election.

So, this man grew up in Chicago, Illinois, attended Harvard, then subsequently Garland went to Harvard Law School for his JD.  He served under Judge Henry J. Friendly of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit (Friendly attended Harvard Law School), and then under William J. Brennan, a leading liberal Supreme Court Justice appointed by Eisenhower.  Brennan, let it be noted, also received his JD from Harvard Law School, and was a giant liberal who opposed the death penalty and was a staunch supporter of abortion and Roe vs. Wade.

Just to give you an idea of Brennan’s mindset (as he was a mentor to Garland), guess what little gem he helped to set into the crown of our broken American society?  He wrote the rulings for Texas v. Johnson, and United States v. Eichman.  These rulings enabled the Court to uphold that desecration of the American Flag is protected under the First Amendment.

In 1993, Garland worked for the Department of Justice under another Clinton appointee, Deputy Attorney General Jamie Gorelick, Garland’s mentor there who personally asked for him to serve as her principal deputy. Gorelick, let it be noted, also attended Harvard Law School, picking up her JD there. Gorelick later became Vice Chairman for Fannie Mae, and during her tenure from 1997-2003, Fannie Mae underwent a $10 billion accounting scandal.

Garland was later appointed under Clinton in 1995 to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.  He didn’t start until 1997, however, because his initial appointment was turned down, to consider whether or not the court needed him as a judge.  Clinton’s reelection in ’96 enabled him to slip through in ’97.  Now Obama is fast-tracking Garland into the Supreme Court.  Obama, let it be noted, also attended Harvard Law School.

But wait…there’s more.  Back when Parker vs. District of Columbia (submitted 2003, the basis for Heller vs. D.C. ruling in 2008) came about, part of D.C.’s restrictive gun law was struck down as unconstitutional under the 2nd Amendment. The mayor at that time for D.C., Adrian Fenty and a squad of his liberal assistants brought a petition in April 2007 to the circuit court of D.C. to hear the case en banc, meaning with all of the justices on the appeals court voting.  That petition was struck down and denied on May 8, 2007, at a vote of 6-4.  Guess who was one of the dissenting 4 voters?  Yep, you guessed it…Judge Merrick Garland!

This guy supports whatever big government wants.  With him in the vacant SCOTUS seat, it will just be a matter of time before the 2nd Amendment comes under attack.  We have seen what happened when Obamacare was voted in under the color of law with Roberts leading the way.  Now it won’t even need a (pseudo)conservative to break the deadlock.  Now Roberts can appear to be the “dissenter” …while Ginsburg, Sotomayor, Kagan, Kennedy, and (soon) Garland…vote to negate or cripple the 2nd Amendment.

Jeremiah Johnson is the Nom de plume of a retired Green Beret of the United States Army Special Forces (Airborne).  Mr. Johnson is also a Gunsmith, a Certified Master Herbalist, a Montana Master Food Preserver, and a graduate of the U.S. Army’s SERE school (Survival Evasion Resistance Escape).  He lives in a cabin in the mountains of Western Montana with his wife and three cats. You can follow Jeremiah’s regular writings at SHTFplan.com.

This article may be republished or excerpted with proper attribution to the author and a link to www.SHTFplan.com.

Also Read:

Obama Pushes For Widespread Surveillance State: “At This Rate We’ll All Be In Cages… Either Electronic Or Literal”

How To Survive Occupied America: “Red Dawn Just Started… And You’re In It”

Forced Economic Free Fall the Precursor to Collapse: “The World Is About To Enter A Global Depression Unlike Anything Seen Before”

Jeremiah Johnson’s Green Beret Survival Guides

‘Thunderstorm Spiral’: Pentagon Trains for Underground War/Disaster In Densely-Populated MegaCities

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As populations grow into cities across the globe, and increasing majority of people will live in urban areas – places which quickly become very desperate and vulnerable during a major crisis.

Every prepper knows the dangers of being stuck in a major metropolitan city in the event of a major hurricane, a grid down scenario or civil unrest and societal collapse.

In such a situation, as every prepper knows, food, water and other vital resources will quickly become scarce or unavailable. The gridlock of survivors trying to get out, or get their hands on assets.

Increasingly, the Pentagon is looking at the likelihood – perhaps the inevitability – of war/conflict inside of a destabilized or decimated megacity urban center like New York.

According to the Daily Mail:

The Pentagon is calling for help from technological innovators to take on the future of warfare.

In the program titled ‘Thunderstorm Spiral,’ the US government solicits demonstrations to tackle the challenges of megacities and underground environments, which will become increasingly prevalent as populations continue to grow.

[…]

A megacity is defined as a city with more than 10 million residents. To put this in perspective, there are currently over 8 million people living in New York City.

As these numbers continue to grow within defined areas, infrastructure will have to adapt, pushing megacities toward the development of subterranean – or underground – environments.

In 2014, there were 23 megacities with ‘vast subterranean structures’; in 2025, it’s expected this number will reach 37.

To meet these needs, the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Emerging Capability and Prototyping, Rapid Reaction Technology Office (RRTO) Technology Demonstration Program is sponsoring the request for information (RFI) issued by the Pentagon.

‘As the world’s population grows, the probability of the U.S. needing to conduct combat and humanitarian assistance / disaster relief (HA/DR) operations within a megacity (defined as a city with more than 10 million residents) also grows,’ the solicitation states.

[…]

The ‘desired capabilities’ in focus of the program include GPS techniques for underground and dense urban environments along with intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance sensors for use in tunnels.

As major American, Asian and European cities grow with extreme rapidity, urban planners have been expanding large underground facilities. Increasingly, it is not just subway systems, but shopping malls, parking lots, utilities and perhaps even residential units that are being built underground.

While this may be practical to facilitate crowded above-ground conditions, it brings new dangers for populations who could be trapped underneath in the event of a bombing, terrorist attack or major natural disaster.

Inadequate design to accommodate flooding and allow evacuation for people underground is perhaps the biggest threat facing these quickly expanding facilities.

The United Nations University has studied many of the disaster scenarios that could occur in underground spaces, noting the rapid growth of underground facilities in mega-urban areas across the world:

The rapid and extensive underground expansion of mega-cities – for subways, malls, parking and public utilities – takes place often with too little knowledge of associated risks and too few plans to minimize the effects of a natural disaster, United Nations University experts warn.

With growing land pressures in cities (which contain about 50% of all people today, seen rising to 65% by 2030), creating new space underground becomes increasingly attractive. In many places, however, studies of potential natural disaster risks are often neglected, says Srikantha Herath, UNU Senior Academic Programme Officer.

While many underground shelters can withstand earthquakes and other disruptions, flooding stands as one of the biggest and untested underground disasters cities may face in the near future:

Modeling a variety of catastrophic events is essential for building contingencies into underground infrastructure designs, including evacuations and the emergency containment and transport of flood waters, for example.”

Via underground interconnections, water can travel considerable distances away from the flood source. However, there are often no subsurface maps; underground space is usually mapped in relation to a building overhead.

Strategic relocation expert Joel Skousen and other prepping experts have warned against allowing yourself to be trapped in a major city – particularly on the East Coast – where evacuation may be nigh impossible. Being trapped underground in such a megacity only adds another layer of disaster to that recipe.

If you have your own underground structure, make sure that its design has accounted for flooding, because the possibilities are all too real.

Read More:

The Safest Areas in America: An Expanded Western Relocation Zone

Strategic Relocation: Where To Go When It Hits the Fan (Full Movie)

How This Man Converted “Underground Shelter Using a 20 Ft. Shipping Container”

Elite Hiding in Bunkers to Escape War with China: “Intended Survivors Are Moving Underground”

China’s 7,000 Year Old Strategy Hints That A Massive Move Is Coming : “Largest Gold Rally Of Our Lifetime… It Will Go Ballistic”

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Up until January, the majority of people assumed that governments and central banks had everything under control. Zero-Interest and Negative-Interest rate policies coupled with unprecedented monetary printing appeared to have stabilized the economy and financial markets. But then something broke. Stock exchanges crashed following the New Year and investors the world over went into panic mode. They sold pretty much everything, including oil and the oft touted Internet 2.0 behemoths that were, in some cases, selling at 500 times their earnings. It was a rush for the exits.

But as we’ve noted repeatedly in recent years, when financial panic, confusion and uncertainty take hold, the smart money will rapidly moves into wealth preservation assets of last resort. And, this is exactly what we saw over the last two months. Though broader stock markets were crashing, precious metals and the companies that mine them exploded to the upside. Exchange traded funds that track gold were up double digit percentages and in some cases stock prices nearly doubled.

With more economic machinations from the powers that be sure to come and a currency crisis looming, what we recently saw with gold and silver is just a small preview of how precious metals will behave during serious and sustained market disruptions. Some analysts have suggested that the next stock market crash will be deeper and more violent than what we saw in 2008. And as Future Money Trends notes in their latest video below, that could mean massive moves for gold:

We believe the gold price will go absolutely ballistic… with a repricing of a level of $10,000 per ounce or higher as predicted by former CIA adviser Jim Rickards.


(Watch At Youtube)

And how does one position themselves to take advantage of this crisis asset of last resort?

Holding the physical asset in the form of bullion is, of course, highly recommended.

But for those with investment accounts like 401(k)’s or IRA’s, consider following China’s lead:

For 7,000 years man has mined gold deposits, making it possibly one of the most reliable businesses in human history… and one of the smartest because owning a gold mine allows you to keep producing the gold after your initial investment…

Think about it, for all of human history gold is so precious, so rare, that if you took all the Egyptians mined… the Romans… and everything since… we would only have three Olympic sized swimming pools full of gold.

The headlines for gold these last few years have all focused on physical gold accumulation by China, Russia and Eastern central banks… but what they have missed is a 7,000 year old strategy that China is doubling down on… According to data compiled by Bloomberg, in 2013 asset purchases by Honk Kong and mainland miners increased by $2.2 billion. China is buying gold mines at a record.

…By August of this year Chinese influence will have infiltrated the biggest financial institutions in the world with China only revealing their physical bullion above ground while saying nothing about their mine acquisitions. This explains their long-term strategy to implement some form of gold-backed currency.

The world may well be on its way to the largest gold rally of our lifetime. 

When it comes to positioning oneself for crisis, gold and silver have stood the test of time for thousands of years. There will no doubt be ups and downs going forward, but the trend is clear.

For more videos, interviews, news and commentary visit Future Money Trends.

Click here to learn how you can follow China’s strategy of accumulating mining assets ahead of the next bull market.

Self-Driving Cars Programmed to Sacrifice As They Hit the Road: “Someone Is Going to Die”

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Screen shot 2016-03-16 at 7.12.40 AM

Self-driving cars are poised to take over U.S. roads and destroy American jobs… and they will also kill people, even if by accident.

Right now, they’re makers are in the process of convincing Congress that they can handle their own regulations – even as they continue working out the kinks.

The U.S. Senate subcommittee for Commerce, Science and Transportation heared testimony from Duke University roboticist Missy Cummings, who admitted that fatalities and accidents are inevitable as self-driving cars attempt to integrate with a busy and complex society.

The London Guardian reports:

The robot car revolution hit a speed bump on Tuesday as senators and tech experts sounded stern warnings about the potentially fatal risks of self-driving cars.“There is no question that someone is going to die in this technology,” said Duke University roboticist Missy Cummings in testimony before the US Senate committee on commerce, science and transportation. “The question is when and what can we do to minimize that.”

Automotive executives and lawmakers sniped at each other over whether universal standards were necessary for self-driving cars….

Senators Ed Markey and Richard Blumenthal, who have cosponsored legislation that proposes minimum testing standards for automated drivers… “The credibility of this technology is exceedingly fragile if people can’t trust standards – not necessarily for you, but for all the other actors that may come into this space at this point.”

These “standards” reflect the programming that will make sometimes fatal choices in the mix of situations that may involve innocent by-standers and no-win situations.

In these cases, is there a “moral” gradient that computers and people can see eye-to-eye on?

If the self-driving car is designed to avoid children at all costs, does that mean it could be programmed to kill (or sacrifice) you if/when you are caught inside of a car headed for disaster, or on the opposite side of the road as the child? There are no clear answers.

The standards are already becoming morally complex. Google X’s Chris Urmson, the company’s director of self-driving cars, said the company was trying to work through some difficult problems. Where to turn – toward the child playing in the road or over the side of the overpass?

Google has come up with its own Laws of Robotics for cars: “We try to say, ‘Let’s try hardest to avoid vulnerable road users, and beyond that try hardest to avoid other vehicles, and then beyond that try to avoid things that that don’t move in the world,’ and then to be transparent with the user that that’s the way it works,” Urmson said.

But the “morality” of the decision-making structure of the computer’s processes, and the inevitability of chaos for at least some individuals is only part of the story.

Autonomous vehicles will, ironically, also be quite vulnerable to hacking – as Internet-connected devices in the car can be manipulated and used to takeover the commands and data of really any of the newer “smart” cars on the road. The problem will be even bigger as self-driving cars become a bigger part of our life.

“We know that many of the sensors on self-driving cars are not reliable in good weather, in urban canyons, or places where the map databases are out of date,” said Cummings. “We know gesture recognition is a serious problem, especially in real world settings. We know humans will get in the back seat while they think their cars are on ‘autopilot’. We know people will try to hack into these systems.”

“[W]e know that people, including bicyclists, pedestrians and other drivers, could and will attempt to game self-driving cars, in effect trying to elicit or prevent various behaviors in attempts to get ahead of the cars or simply to have fun,” she said.

Back in 2013, a couple of white hat hackers demonstrated how vulnerable a number of newer cars are to hacking. The possibilities are down right frightening – everything from the stereo and windshield wipers to the brakes can be hacked and remotely controlled – or shut off when you need them most. Just imagine what is possible in 2016.

What happens when these self-driving cars of the future disagree with the human passenger about the priorities, or what is allowed in a critical situation – like escaping a car jacking assault or avoiding a cop in pursuit?

Screen shot 2016-03-16 at 7.03.10 AM

It isn’t hard to see how trusting technology on the roads is going to complicate the future, and restrict our human ability to make decisions about important factors on the road. Let’s just hope somebody programs these intelligent machines with some common sense.

Read more:

7 Jobs That Are Going to Survive the Next Economic Crash

“Government Wants to Control Your Car” and Prevent You From Tinkering Under the Hood

How Smart Devices Could Take Out Power Grid: Hack “Air Conditioners, Turn On/Off Repeatedly”

Cyber Attack May Be To Blame For Deadly Amtrak Crash ‘Throttling Speed’

Infrastructure Cyber Attack: “We Don’t Know How Many Utilities Are Compromised”

Obama Pushes For Widespread Surveillance State: “At This Rate We’ll All Be In Cages… Either Electronic Or Literal”

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prison2prison1

On Friday, March 11, Obama was in Austin, TX attempting to make his case for an allowance of a “back door” for government to enter into mobile devices.  His plea is predicated on the government’s “need” to gain information for use against “war on terror” suspects, and also to find evidence to prosecute those attempting to bypass tax laws.  Obama used the phrase “we” to refer to those making the decision to utilize such back door venues.  The pronoun does not refer to “we the people,” but instead a nebulous “we” such as the TV series “the Outer Limits.”  His “we” wants to control the vertical, the horizontal, and everything in between.

Obama said the following at the South by Southwest Festival on Friday:

“The question we now have to ask is: If technologically it is possible to make an impenetrable device or system where the encryption is so strong that there is no key, there’s no door at all, then how do we apprehend the child pornographer, how do we solve or disrupt a terrorist plot?  What mechanisms do we have available to even do simple things like tax enforcement because if in fact you can’t crack that at all, government can’t get in, then everybody is walking around with a Swiss bank account in their pocket.”

He uses “we” as if it applies to us, the American people.  That paragraph is very interesting.  Of course, none of it applies to him or any of the communists on his staff, present or former.  Where’s the “back door” request for Hillary Clinton’s e-mail accounts?  Where are the demands for all the data from the servers?  How about Hillary’s cell phones?  How about Obama’s cell phone records and e-mail account?  Yes, Obama, how do we solve or disrupt a terrorist plot such as the Fast and Furious operation that placed weapons into the hands of terrorists who killed a U.S. Border Patrol Agent?

It is a simple equation: the laws are made by them for us to obey.

Such is a truism we are forced to deal with as daily these criminals hide behind the badge of the color of law and inflict their illegal edicts onto those who have no legal remedy or financial wherewithal to defend themselves.  The end state has not happened in the U.S. but it is predictable, because it has happened with other societies.  History repeats itself.  It happened in the Soviet Union, as chronicled in the work “The Gulag Archipelago.”  It happened with the formation of Red China.  It happened in Nazi Germany.  It is happening here.

They didn’t build a $50 billion data recording and storage facility in Ogden, Utah for nothing.  The emphasis on technological development is much the same as in “1984” by Orwell.  Improvements in technology do nothing to alleviate any of the burdens of poverty, overcrowding, food shortages, disease, or any of the things afflicting mankind.  The focus of technology is on developing new methods of surveillance, of data recording, and intrusion into people’s private lives.  All of this is anent control and dominion, plain and simple.

Obama asks for “…mechanisms… to even do simple things like tax enforcement…” in such a nonchalant manner.

Oh, what about how James Clapper declared Iran the foremost supporter of terrorism, and Obama was the one who enabled the Iranians to obtain $12 billion in taxpayer funds to continue funding terrorist operations?  What “mechanism” do the American people have to prevent such things?  Impeachment?  Elections?  Yeah, we see how well all of that has been working.

Obama still has almost a year left to continue gutting and destroying the country. If elections even occur, what will change?  In the meantime, the Bill of Rights continues to be under assault and shredded.  At this rate we’ll all be in cages…either electronic or literal, as the U.S. turns into the Hotel California.  We’ll be prisoners here of our own device who can check out any time we like…but can never leave.

Jeremiah Johnson is the Nom de plume of a retired Green Beret of the United States Army Special Forces (Airborne).  Mr. Johnson is also a Gunsmith, a Certified Master Herbalist, a Montana Master Food Preserver, and a graduate of the U.S. Army’s SERE school (Survival Evasion Resistance Escape).  He lives in a cabin in the mountains of Western Montana with his wife and three cats. You can follow Jeremiah’s regular writings at SHTFplan.com.

This article may be republished or excerpted with proper attribution to the author and a link to www.SHTFplan.com.

Also Read:

How To Survive Occupied America: “Red Dawn Just Started… And You’re In It”

Forced Economic Free Fall the Precursor to Collapse: “The World Is About To Enter A Global Depression Unlike Anything Seen Before”

The Trigger: If This Ever Happens You Know You’re Days Away From Nuclear War

Jeremiah Johnson’s Green Beret Survival Guides

How to Dress to Avoid Suspicion, Blend In During a Crisis: “Be a Grey Man”

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Survival is all about blending in.

If you stand out, you could become like the unhammered nail, begging for unwanted attention.

Whether you are carrying concealed or attempting to negotiate your way through a post-apocalyptic SHTF scenario, take notice that you don’t appear “militaristic” or tactical, as it will work against you.

Mark Twain long ago observes that “clothes make the man” – and the last man you want to be in an emergency scenario is a conspiracy theorist, an obvious doomsday prepper or an overzealous gun-toting idiot who beams controversy and strange looks wherever he goes.

Camouflauge fatigues, “fishing” vests and militia-gear will all work against your efforts, and put an exclamation mark over you while interacting with whatever remains of society, and potentially put a spotlight on your prepping efforts, your stores or retreats, and deflate your hard work to survive.

The last thing you want to do is look like someone who wants a fight, someone who could be stolen from or someone who could become a target or mark.

TheOl1911 explains his philosophy on finding common and even “trendy” clothing with muted colors and enough style to pass the “sniff test” that also offers advantages for concealed carry and tactical preparedness. There’s no one right answer here – but there are certainly wrong ones.

Author Jeremiah Johnson recommends in his Green Beret’s Guide:

Cargo pants.  These are preferred because of what you can stash in them.  You can hold an infinite combination of gear in them…a polar-tech cap and a balaclava, a “drive-on” (do) rag – the o.g. Army cravat.  You can carry shooting gloves (leather for all-weather) and ear plugs (radians do tell!).  With all of these things in the cargoes, there is still plenty of room for the main function:  when you change your mags or speed loaders, you can shove the empties in your cargo pockets.

Loosely fitting clothing will break up the outline of your body.  Also, remember all of the caps and do-rags I mentioned before?  A quick disguise is where you find it; need I say more.  An old Russian saying: “Do not be a white crow among black crows or you’ll be pecked to death!”  Make sure that you blend in as best as you can.  Earth tones in your dress if you have to dee-dee into the woods.  Balance your tones with the discretion of common sense.  Do not try to be a walking Realtree monster right next to downtown city hall.

Blend in and be inconspicuous; be the “gray” man in the crowd.

Police and most trained marksmen know the techniques to spot someone carrying concealed, and otherwise looking shifty. Tell-tale signs of behavior, including subconsciously checking pockets, and changes in the gait, shifting weight to one side, or uneven clothing (from the weight of the weapon in a pocket) are all give away to the professionals. You’d do best to know them, too, so you can spot others, and avoid giving yourself away.

Be aware of how your behavior can give you away, and dress to blend in with the local population. The styles will change depending upon what part of the country you live in, and whether or not you live in or near a city, or out in the countryside.

Psychology of Survival- Gray Man Concept

Instead, you should have the “uniform” of average clothing and accessories for your area, so that no one  would notice you in a crowd, and few would remember you after the fact based upon your demeanor and any “give away” actions.

Read more:

The Prepper’s Blueprint: The ESSENTIAL Guide For Any Disaster

Civil Unrest: You’re Pretty Much on Your Own If You Are Caught In a Riot or Other Violent Demonstration

A Green Beret’s Guide To Planning Your Personal Posture: “First Things First: Always Be Armed”

How Can You Tell If Someone is Hiding a Gun?

This Stun Gun Looks Like an iPhone, Delivers 3 Million Volts of Electricity

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Michaela Whitton
March 14, 2016

(ANTIMEDIA) United Kingdom — When members of the public became concerned that stun guns disguised as iPhones were readily available online to be imported into the U.K, they contacted national advocacy service Whistleblower.co.uk. The group contacted the Sunday Mirror, which launched an investigation into the devices that look and feel like iPhones, yet are capable of delivering over 3 million volts of electricity.

Available online in a variety of disguises, such as phones, torches, and key fobs, the stun guns can be bought and delivered for free in a few days with a couple of clicks. With the look and feel of a cell phone, the high-voltage weapons can be bought for as little as £13.00 ($22) and feature two electrodes at one end for zapping victims.

Claiming the availability of the stun guns could “fuel gang warfare on the streets,” the Sunday Mirror report uses predictably sensationalist language throughout. What it fails to mention is that the majority of buyers are purchasing the items for self defense. Just one sentence devoted to what a tragic indictment it is on today’s society that people are forced to carry high voltage devices on their key fobs — in defence against violent aggressors — wouldn’t have gone amiss but, after all, this was the Mirror.

What it does point to is how easy it is to get hold of the stun guns for malicious purposes, highlights the fact that they are classed as firearms in Britain, and that possession is illegal. While the site selling them is based in the U.S., possession in the U.K. can carry a prison sentence of up to ten years.

The investigation claims to have uncovered a series of prosecutions throughout the U.K. involving criminals importing the stun guns, referring to them throughout as “deadly weapons.” While intended to be non-lethal, there have been many deaths reported following police use of tasers in Britain, prompting Amnesty International to express concern that stun guns are “potentially lethal” weapons.

It says hundreds of the devices are slipping under the radar of the U.K. authorities only to be found in the possession of the likes of Nathan Matthews — the demented killer of Becky Watts — who was found with two stun guns disguised as torches. It also points to a naive holiday maker who was jailed for five years last month — after buying a stun gun designed as an iPhone as a present for a relative and bringing it into to Britain — unaware it was classified as an illegal firearm.

Meanwhile, a quick scan of the reviews for the iStun model from buyers in the U.S. reveal that not only does the device work, but that they are more than happy with their purchase.

“Used it on a drunk parking lot bully who was intimidating my wife, I got out and asked him to lay off, he said hey old man, who is gonna stop me,? you? he grabbed my coat and pushed my back, that is the line for me I stuck it in his rib cage and bully went down like a sack of potatoes he was still making threats as I zapped him again, called the cops and they took him away for threatening an elderly person.”

“This little diddy provides you with confidence to go dark places at night, hangout with shady people, or just yell offensive remarks at random strangers.
When confronted, just say you will ‘give them your iPhone’ as an apology. Then you give em the ol’ 3,800,000 volts and continue on your way.”

Alongside the pros, there are always the cons:

“It looks like an iPhone! My mom called me after I had this bad boy for about 2 days. Naturally I answered the phone. I woke up 2.5 hours later on the ground crying to the smell of burnt hair. Turns out I answered my stun gun! That was an iMistake I only made once. The only long term damage done was to my pride. Good news is, I know it works well.”

Stun GunStun Gun

This article (This Stun Gun Looks Like an iPhone, Delivers 3 Million Volts of Electricity) is free and open source. You have permission to republish this article under a Creative Commons license with attribution to Michaela Whitton and theAntiMedia.org. Anti-Media Radio airs weeknights at 11pm Eastern/8pm Pacific. If you spot a typo, email edits@theantimedia.org.

Ex-CIA Official Says Obama Doesn’t Follow Through on Promises Out of Fear of CIA

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Claire Bernish
March 14, 2016

(ANTIMEDIA) AcTVism Munich recently interviewed former CIA analyst-turned-activist, Ray McGovern, whose steadfast anti-torture stance led him to return his Intelligence Commendation Medal in 2006 — when the CIA sought official inclusion of torture in its methodology.

AcTVism’s Zain Raza asked McGovern to describe what led to his decision to return the medal.

“It was a time when the director of the CIA was openly pleading for an exception to legislation being drafted by Senator John McCain, prohibiting U.S. government officials from torturing people,” McGovern explained, noting he was aware torture had been practiced during CIA operations in Latin America. “But this was the first time the CIA was openly advocating for permission to be able to torture … and that seemed to me so abhorrent that I wanted to disassociate myself from the CIA for the first time since 1963 — because I didn’t want to be associated in any way, however remotely, with an agency engaged in torture.”

McGovern also described Europe’s role in the torture campaign and his opinion on whether President Obama had followed through on campaign promises to hold officials accountable for their actions.

“The role of our ‘allies,’ in my view, is a scandal. Fifty-three other countries cooperated in the kidnapping — extraordinary rendition — of suspected terrorists to black sites, where they were administered ‘enhanced interrogation techniques … which, by the way, is a direct, literal translation of verschärfte Vernehmung, right out of the Gestapo manual. I have the manual, and the sad thing is that many of the techniques are exactly the same — with a few ‘enhancements’ by the U.S. since World War II. So the role of our European allies and others has just, really, disappointed me greatly.

“Now, why President Obama … decided not to hold the torturers accountable is another very sad story,” McGovern continued, saying the president “is afraid” of the CIA. “I never thought I would hear myself saying that the President of the United States is afraid of the CIA, but he is. He’s afraid of the NSA, as well.”

McGovern says this is evident because National Intelligence Director James Clapper, who lied under oath in a Senate hearing, and Director of the CIA John Brennan, who hacked computers involved in the Senate committee overseeing him, both remain on the job to this day.

“You know, it’s hard to say this,” he continued, “but I suspect that Obama is afraid either of blackmail potential or even worse; and he has referred to the killing of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. … saying, ‘Don’t you remember what happened to Dr. King?’”

Discussing the NSA’s overreach and domestic spying, as well as general tacit acceptance of surveillance by people in both the U.S. and Germany, McGovern warned against passivity. He strongly emphasized the need to protect against the gradual ebbing of liberties and human rights, comparing such programs to those of the Gestapo.

“This is terribly, terribly dangerous territory,” McGovern said. “And the passiveness, you know, the apathy, that’s not responsible citizenship. When I’m asked why am I an activist, I say, ‘well, that’s the rent that I pay for living on this planet,’ okay? … To the degree we pretend to be a democracy, we have a corresponding duty to be activists enough to prevent our human rights from being infringed upon.”

McGovern also discussed Edward Snowden, whom he met in Russia, and dispelled some myths and rumors surrounding the whistleblower many call a hero.

AcTVism Munich’s interview can be seen in full below, or at the link here. The independent media site has previously conducted interviews with Glenn Greenwald, Noam Chomsky, and many others, which are available in multiple languages. AcTVism Much relies heavily on crowdsourcing to fund such endeavors, which you can help by donating here.

This article (Ex-CIA Official Says Obama Doesn’t Follow Through on Promises Out of Fear of CIA) is free and open source. You have permission to republish this article under a Creative Commons license with attribution to Claire Bernish and theAntiMedia.org. Anti-Media Radio airs weeknights at 11pm Eastern/8pm Pacific. If you spot a typo, email edits@theantimedia.org.

California Legislature Votes to Ban Some Adults From Buying Cigarettes

by

Josh Mur
March 11, 2016

(ANTIMEDIA) At the age of 18, young American adults are granted the legal right to sign a contract, purchase a firearm, marry, enlist in the military, sit on a jury, and vote. These rights bear a fresh batch of life-changing choices to youth that the law views them capable of making.

California lawmakers, on the other hand, appear to perceive 18-year-olds capable of no such thing. A list of new anti-tobacco bills was passed by the state Assembly on Thursday, among it, a bill that pushes the legal age to purchase cigarettes and other tobacco products from 18 to 21 throughout California. The motion passed with a 46 to 26 vote. Governor Jerry Brown has yet to sign off on them.

In addition to raising the smoking age, the new bills seek to put further restrictions on e-cigarettes and vaporizers. If these new laws are put into effect, California will become the second state after Hawaii  to raise the smoking age. However, a handful of cities ─ San Francisco and New York being the largest ─ have adopted the same new regulation.

As stated earlier, 18-year-olds in America are granted a set of rights, as they are perceived to be ─ or at least capable of being ─ responsible adults worthy of making very serious and/or life-changing decisions. So let’s ask the obvious question here:

How is one seen as competent and responsible enough to join the ranks of the military to risk their lives for the agenda of corrupt power elites, sign a legal contract that could bind them to harmful terms and conditions, choose the person they want to spend the rest of their life with, have a voice in what laws are passed, and who our political leaders are, and sit on a jury with the fate of a peer in the hands of their judgement, but somehow not seen as sufficiently “adult” enough to buy a pack of cigarettes or enjoy a cold beer?

Having gained the support of nearly all of the Democratic party, the bill was largely opposed by Republican lawmakers.

“I don’t smoke. I don’t encourage my children to,” said Assemblyman Donald Wagner, R-Irvine. “But they’re adults, and it’s our job to treat our citizens as adults, not to nanny them.”

Those in support of the bill argue that raising the smoking age to 21 will significantly reduce smoking, as an approximate 95% of  smokers pick up the habit before age 21. In addition, an analysis published in March 2015 suggests raising the smoking age to 21 could possibly reduce smoking by about 12% within a decade, along with saving around 273,000 lives from lung cancer and premature deaths.

While good intentions may be found underneath these bills, it does not change the fact that they directly stifle the freedom of the American adult. One should not have a say in a presidential election if they cannot be seen as capable of choosing whether or not to smoke cigarettes. One should not have the option to carry an assault rifle and risk their life for government policy if one is not considered responsible enough to have a drink.

It would appear such basic principles are much more difficult to grasp than they seem.

This article (California Legislature Votes to Ban Some Adults From Buying Cigarettes) is an opinion editorial (OP-ED). The opinions expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily represent the views of Anti-Media. This article is free and open source. You have permission to republish this article under a Creative Commons license with attribution to Josh Mur and theAntiMedia.org. Anti-Media Radio airs weeknights at 11 pm Eastern/8 pm Pacific. If you spot a typo, please email the error and name of the article to edits@theantimedia.org.

Don’t Blow Your Cash On These Overrated #Survival Items: “There Really Isn’t A Good Reason For It”

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mre-wikimedia

This article was written by Joshua Krause and originally published at The Daily Sheeple.

Editor’s Comment: Not only are there lots of prepping items that are overpriced and expensive, but you may not even need it. There is quite possibly a better strategy that is usually learned only through experience and thoughtful planning– and recognizing what not to do after things go wrong.

With that in mind, the newbie prepper, as well as the veteran, should remember that blending in, lying low and adopting the “grey man” strategy may serve you better than hot-headed stockpiling of military surplus gear, and overpriced survival toys. Pace yourself, and invest in the equipment that will truly serve you in times of need, and avoid drawing too much attention to your efforts.

Five Alternatives to the Most Overrated Survival Items

by Joshua Krause

If you’re new to the prepping scene, you should probably know right off the bat that you’re about to waste a lot of money. I’m so sorry to break it to you, but it’s true. We’ve all done it. It’s practically a right of passage by now.

You’ve just become aware of how fragile our society really is, and all the horrifying ways the shit can hit the fan, and you think you have to rush out and buy a bunch of supplies and gear to survive the inevitable looting spree. There’s something you should know first though. If there is one thing that is practically guaranteed to part an otherwise smart person from their money, it is fear.

So stop, take a deep breath, and realize that in all likelihood the world is not going to end tomorrow. There may not be any serious crises for months or years. I know this (as do many other preppers) because I couldn’t possibly count the number of times I’ve heard someone I would consider reputable, sound the alarm on a possible threat.

Don’t get me wrong I’m glad they do, because it’s good that we have people who are dedicated to looking for these threats, but you should know that most of them never come to fruition. If anything, they are usually signs that our society is in a slow decline towards oblivion, rather than an explosive last hurrah. There’s still danger ahead, but when it’s all said and done, there may never be a single day that will go down in history as the day the world ended.

So now that I’ve assuaged your fears, hopefully you’re gripping your wallet a little tighter than you were before. That state of mind you’re experiencing, the one that isn’t an anxiety riddled mess, is the correct state of mind you should be in for prepping. It’s time to take a critical look at that list of supplies and gear you’re thinking of purchasing, and be prepared to cross a few items off, because some of them are highly overrated.

Canned Food and MRE’s

I don’t want to completely bash canned food. It certainly has its merits. In most cases it will last a very long time, longer than the expiration date in fact, but most canned foods aren’t very healthy. The whole canning process tends to degrade the nutritional value of the food, and most cans are laced with toxic preservatives and BPA. They’re also heavy and somewhat awkward to store. If you want to can your own food, that’s a worthy endeavor for other reasons, but to go to the store and max out your credit card on canned food is a terrible idea.

After realizing the folly of cans many preppers turn to MRE’s, but they also come with their own set of problems. For me personally, I find them to be utterly disgusting and unhealthy. They usually taste great when you’ve been hiking all day and you’re starving, but in that condition anything can taste good. I remember the first time I tried an MRE. I thought, “wow, this tastes familiar.” After looking over the ingredients, I realized that I was basically eating the same stuff that is served at McDonald’s and 7/11.

What Should You Get Instead?

mountain house

Freeze dried food. Mountain House brand is the most popular, but there are several other good brands out there. It’s arguably healthier than most packaged food, and has a shelf life of 10 years or so. It’s small and lightweight, and to me at least, has an excellent flavor. The only downside is that it’s not perfectly edible out of the package. You have to add water (preferably hot), but I consider that a fair trade-off compared to the downsides of the other options. If you live in an area that would have a severe lack of water after the collapse, then maybe canned food is for you. Otherwise, freeze dried is the way to go.

Generator

This is a tough one, because I have to admit that generators can be useful for many short-term disasters. If you need to keep the lights on for a couple of days it’s a viable option, but generators may be completely useless during any long-term disaster. In that case, they become a logistical nightmare. Since it’s safe to assume that there will be gas shortages during any major disaster, do you really want to store enough gasoline to last you six months? And keep in mind that gas has a limited shelf life, and generators are usually really noisy.

Another thing to consider is energy efficiency. The majority of the electricity you use in your home goes toward appliances that provide heat. But the process of turning the combustion from your generator into electricity, and then back into heat, is incredibly inefficient. We don’t normally think about this because the power grid provides electricity at such a low-cost, (relative to a generator) so it’s not a big deal.

What Should You Get Instead?

propane stove

If you live in a rural area, you might be able source wood from your environment. Otherwise, You should probably use propane for all your heating needs. There are portable stoves, lanterns, and space heaters that all run on propane. You can buy those tiny Coleman tanks for your stove, or you can buy an adapter to connect it to a larger tank. Most of the lanterns have to take the Coleman tanks, but many of the space heaters are designed for the 20lb tanks as well. It’s a pretty versatile option, and best of all, propane has a much longer shelf life than gasoline. If you have to stock up on fuel, this is definitely the superior option.

The rest of your energy needs will probably go to electronics, which will be minuscule compared to your heating needs. For that, I would take a thin and flexible 100 watt solar panel over a generator any day.

Camelbak Canteens

I’m an avid backpacker, so I think I have more experience with this than any other item on this list. For such a simple task, there is a wide variety of ways to carry water. Nowadays the most popular way is with any kind of soft, flexible canteen. They’re lightweight, easy to store, and since you can squeeze the air out of them the water doesn’t slosh around and make a lot of noise.

Over the past 10 years it seems that the Camelback and the Platypus canteens have come to dominate the market. But frankly, I’ve never been a big fan of those drink tube apparatuses, due to their maintenance needs. You have to keep the tube and the drink valve very clean if you don’t want to get any mold. It doesn’t take a whole lot of effort, but personally, I don’t want to put any more work than I have to into my canteen, and I don’t see the Camelbak giving me a huge advantage in any way.

What Should You Get Instead?

canteen

For a while I tried using bota bags, but honestly I don’t think they make them like they used to. Maybe I’m just unlucky, but I’ve tried using three different bota bags over the years, and none of them worked very well (they always leak).

If you want a really simple soft-shelled water carrier, I’d recommend the military issue bladder canteen. It holds two quarts, and has all the advantages you’d come to expect from a flexible canteen, but without any of the fuss.

Camouflage

I’d have to say, the most overrated item a prepper could buy is military camouflage. There really isn’t a good reason for it unless you live way out in the sticks, in which case you probably don’t need a military pattern. A good hunting camouflage pattern should be sufficient. And since only 18 percent of the US population lives in a rural area, it’s safe to say that camouflage isn’t really that important for most preppers. If anything, that would just make you stand out in an urban or suburban area.

Even camouflage that is specifically designed for an urban area is a bad idea. Even if it helps to conceal you in a tactical situation, it will still make you stand out in literally every other situation.

What Should You Get Instead?

dickies shirt

Instead of camouflage, just get something that is durable, comfortable, and is dyed in solid, muted earth tones. I’m sure there’s more than one opinion on what that entails, but in this case I’m referring to brown, tan, olive drab, and gray, or at least something similar.

These colors have the advantage of being versatile. You can wear them on city streets or in suburban parks without standing out, but on the off-chance that you wind up in a rural area later on, you won’t be too obvious there either. Basically, it’s not the best you can use for any single environment, but it’s the best you can use in most environments without looking like a stereotypical survivalist.

Your best bet would probably be something made by Dickies. They make great civilian looking clothes that are just as durable as their military counterparts, and it’s not hard to find Dickies shirts and jeans that come in earth tone colors. Wrangler and Carhartt brands are also great choices.

Ballistic Plates

This one has a lot of the same problems as wearing camouflage. It’s pretty much impossible to wear these bullet proof plates without it being painfully obvious. They’re so big and heavy, that every soldier who wears them looks like some kind of sci-fi mashup with a Roman legionnaire.

That’s not to say it’s stupid. It’s probably just unnecessary. These plates are made for stopping rifle rounds, and considering the fact that only 2-3 percent of murders are committed with rifles, it’s safe to say that ballistic plates are overkill for civilians.

Keep in mind that the violent criminals you might face after the SHTF aren’t that different than the ones you might run into now. There will probably be an increase in murders committed by rifles since there would be no cops to stop people from carrying them openly, but I suspects that pistols, shotguns, bats, and knives will still be the most common murder weapons.

What Should You Get Instead?

kevlar vest

If you even need ballistic protection to begin with, which I don’t think most people will, just an ordinary kevlar vest will do. At most you won’t need anything that is rated above level IIIa, which should stop pretty much all handgun rounds, and some shotgun rounds. They’re also lighter, breathe better in hot weather, and some are designed to be concealable. There’s no need to overdo it with a hulking rig of ballistic plates.

Now I’m sure a lot of folks will disagree parts of this list, but does it sound reasonable to you? If not, then for the benefit of anyone reading this who is new to prepping, let’s hear your opinion in the comments. And if you have any overrated boondoggles from your early prepping days that you’d rather forget, now is a good time to get it off your chest!

Trend Forecaster Gerald Celente Warns: Prepare For The Panic Of 2016: “History Will Remember This”

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geraldcelente-2016

Earlier this week hedge fund manager Marin Katusa explained that up until the recent stock market hit all the easy money flowing into the energy sector was being exuberantly spent on hookers, blow and fancy toys. Now, as oil prices hover under $40 per barrel, Katusa said more pain is likely coming and oil, along with other asset classes, are going to go “lower for longer.”

In a recent interview with Future Money Trends, trend forecaster Gerald Celente echos Katusa’s concerns. Having accurately predicted the Crash of 2008 nine months ahead of the bottom falling out on a global scale, Celente says another panic is coming this year.

But if you thought 2008 was bad, says Celente, this crash will be so severe it’ll be one for the history books:

…51% of the people in the United States that are employed are earning under $30,000 a year… Less than half the population is considered middle-class in America… the gap between the rich and the poor is as bad as it was at the worst times of the Gilded Age going back over a hundred years.

So, what happens when the Panic of 2016 happens?

The Panic of ’08 helped wipe out the middle class… this is going to eliminate it to a large degree, because they’re deep in debt…

Watch Gerald Celente discuss his trend forecasts for everything from politics and the economy to wealth preservation strategies and entrepreneurship in times of crisis:

Now, what this is going to do… it’s going to knock out the top… and the top survived the other crash because the top are the ones that are totally leveraged out… there’s no more savings anymore… there’s no more savings anymore… it’s only markets because of zero interest rate policy.

The markets have been artificially juiced up… so when this thing comes down it takes the top down… the last time it pulled out the bottom… so this is going to be a top-down crash.

And there’s not going to be anything to pump it back up because they’ve blown all their ammunition…

Visit Future Money Trends for news, strategies for protecting your wealth and more interviews like the one posted here.

#UN Begged to Intervene After #Refugees Sew Mouths Shut

by

Michaela Whitton
March 10, 2016

(ANTIMEDIA) Calais, France — Desperate volunteers in a Calais refugee camp have issued an urgent plea to the U.N. to recognise the plight of a group of Iranians who sewed their mouths shut a week ago. The extreme protest — joined in solidarity by a British volunteer — was initiated to draw attention to the atrocities being carried out by the French government.

The latest shocking tale to unfold from the Calais camp — known as The Jungle — began on March 1st to raise awareness of the human rights violations taking place. Homeless, jobless, and now hopeless, eight Iranian men aged between 17 and 46 sewed each other’s lips shut in the extreme form of protest against the forced evictions of the southern side of the squalid camp. Their bold move has been supported by British volunteer, Tom Radcliffe, who has joined in solidarity.

The decision by the French authorities to dismantle the camp has had significant implications for the 3,500 refugees living there, over three hundred of whom are unaccompanied minors. Legally, the authorities can only evict people if they are able to offer alternative accommodation, but France has grossly underestimated the numbers.

A few residents have moved into shipping containers and centres throughout France, while others have shifted to the northern part of the camp, which volunteers predict will be next to be cleared. Organisations on the ground believe there will be more temporary encampments as refugees continue to be hounded by the police. Volunteers report people camping in fields, churches, under bridges, and in abandoned buildings with no sanitation, water, access to aid, or other facilities.

Despite a ruling that the dismantling of The Jungle was to be humane, video footage from a volunteer showed residents running from clouds of tear gas. Eyewitnesses said the camp was lined with riot police and claim residents were given an hour’s notice to leave, many without alternative accommodation to move into. In general, most refugees in Calais have strong ties to the U.K., and many have family they are waiting to be reunited with. Others lived in Britain previously.

Since beginning the hunger strike, the men’s condition is deteriorating rapidly according to The Worldwide Tribe:

“These men were already weak from their traumatic journey across Europe. Many of the refugees in the camp are suffering from illness and infection, malnutrition and post traumatic stress syndrome. Although they are determined and focused, they are now gradually growing weaker by the day. They say they are prepared to die for this cause. It won’t be long before they do.”

In a desperate plea to the Office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, a petition drawing attention to their plight has gathered thousands of signatures overnight. Demanding the United Nations assess the camp conditions and witness the human rights breaches taking place on European soil, it calls for a stop to the demolition of the camp until adequate alternatives are put in place. You can sign it here.

This article (UN Begged to Intervene After Refugees Sew Mouths Shut) is free and open source. You have permission to republish this article under a Creative Commons license with attribution to Michaela Whitton and theAntiMedia.org. Anti-Media Radio airs weeknights at 11pm Eastern/8pm Pacific. If you spot a typo, email edits@theantimedia.org.

Drought-Stricken L.A. Admits to Using Weather Modification “To Produce More Rain”

by

cali-drought-1

The weather patterns have become cruel and extreme.

For California, it has meant outright desperation as water reserves disappear and needs for cities and farms have created a standing crisis.

Water and rainfall remain consequential to life as we know it. Mankind is no longer leaving it up to just praying for rain and waiting for a miracle.

Now, a company in the Los Angeles area has admitted that it was hired to seed the clouds and make it rain:

Via Daily Mail:

El Niño has brought some much needed rain to California in recent months, but a Los Angeles storm earlier this week may owe some credit to unnatural modifications.

For the first time since 2002, the Department of Public Works has turned to cloud seeding, using generators to shoot silver iodide into the clouds to produce more rain.

The county estimates that this produces roughly 15 percent more rainfall…

Cloud seeding is a weather modification process that aims to increase the amount of rain in a particular area.

According to the L.A. Times, this method has been used in the county to boost the amount of rain produced by clouds since the 1950s, taking a hiatus during heavy rains or periods of potential flooding from wildfire devastation.

And so, rain has increased in California by something like 15%, and L.A. is happy to get all the water it can.

But cloud seeding is not without its consequences – it could keep it from raining in the area downwind, or have other potentially disastrous effects:

The company says the method has no significant environmental effects, as the amount of the seeding materials used are very small in relation to the affected area.

[But…]

It could have unintended consequences, including a change in precipitation or other environmental impact downwind of the target area, though such effects have not yet been demonstrated.

An earlier cloud seeding contract from 2009 was terminated in L.A. after the Station Fire, which destroyed about 250 square miles of the Angeles National Forest, L.A. Times writes.

Technology and money can make it happen, and there is reason to think much more is going on than just seeding clouds to bump the rainfall.

When it comes to blame for the drought and the environment in general, many are quick to point to the hyped-effects of global warming and climate change, which are supposedly attributed to the every day activity of people in mass.

But few are daring enough to look up at the sky and question the weather manipulation programs that have become common place and which are being carried out covertly on behalf of a shadowy agenda to control the weather, and the economic cloud that surrounds it.

Researcher Peter A. Kirby explains how a secret project on the scale of the Manhattan Project may have been incubated under government research projects to engineer the weather:

After so many years of watching airplanes produce the lines in the sky, largely without knowing of what this Project consists or why, we have recently gained an understanding. Evidence suggests that today’s chemtrail spraying operations consist of airplanes saturating our atmosphere with nano-sized particles influenced by electromagnetic energy for the purpose of weather modification.

U.S. patent #4,686,605 “Method and Apparatus for Altering a Region in the Earth’s Atmosphere, Ionosphere and/or Magnetosphere” shows how stratospheric and tropospheric aerosols can be manipulated using electromagnetic energy in order to modify the weather. The ground-based antennas (known as ionospheric heaters) needed to produce the appropriate electromagnetic energy exist. For a detailed discussion, please see the author’s previous article “Smoking Gun: The HAARP and Chemtrails Connection.”

The 1996 U.S. military document “Weather as a Force Multiplier: Owning the Weather in 2025” outlines a program using aerosols sprayed from airplanes which are then manipulated with electromagnetic energy in order to modify the weather.

[…]

Controlling Earth’s weather would necessarily require a gigantic scientific effort. Oddly enough, when one looks for a National effort in weather modification, one finds a lot. Specifically, if one looks, one can find a history of weather control programs involving electromagnetic energy and atmospheric particles; all in a coherent chronological order.

It is stunning to learn that there are means for manipulating aerosols with electromagnetic energy in effort to change weather patterns. But there are many scientific papers on the topic, and experiments to boot.

Many of these agencies are likely compartmentalized and don’t understand how they fit in to the larger project… but the truth is that most don’t want to know – along with the rest of the general public.

They don’t look up at the sky for the same reason they drag to work, and live an empty life. Most are too conditioned by fear to face the truth, whatever it proves to be.

For now, it is enough to point out that California is admittedly altering the weather in the hopes of catching up on its lost water.

But what are the true causes of the drought in the first place, and what other aspects of weather are being changed for the benefit of a few, and the detriment of entire populations?

Read more:

Drought Withering Away Any Chance of Recovery

NASA Warns California Drought Could Threaten U.S. Food Supply: “There will be some definite changes”

Water Wars Loom Over California As Farmers Lose Thousands of Jobs: “Wrestling Match Over Who Gets the Water”

`The Self-Reliance Weekly Report: Acts of Nature, Farm Fresh Eggs, and DIYs

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March 10, 2016

The Self-Reliance Weekly Report discusses acts of nature, along with a healthy helping of information about eggs from the backyard and, of course, unique and frugal DIYs from across the web.

Despite the epic drought in California, the state also has a long history of devastating floods. We have received record amounts of rain recently, and many of us are dealing with just that. 

Sometimes we don’t spend enough time thinking about the weather and how it affects our efforts to be self-reliant. Too much rain and your plants and livestock are at risk, too little rain and your plants and livestock are at risk. Add to this the fury of Mother Nature when she unleashes high winds and tornadoes, and any sensible person begins to realize that we can prep all we want, but we are still at the mercy of the weather.

The Self-Reliance Weekly Report is a collection of strategies, made up of the articles, books, DIYs, and products that I found useful on my own little prepper’s homestead.

Prepping

Tis the Season…for Tornadoes

Anyone who lives in an area prone to tornadoes knows that the season for them is fast approaching (and here already in some places). While some believe that you can’t really prep for a massively destructive act of nature, there are a few things you can do. For example, you can learn the signs of an impending tornado (and even volunteer as a storm spotter to provide valuable information for others), you can make a plan with your family, and you can stock your storm shelter in the event that you must hunker down there to wait out a threat.

The Disaster Isn’t Over When the Storm Passes

After a massive windstorm like a tornado, there are many threats: drinking water may be compromised, live power lines may be down, structures may be compromised, and people will be shell-shocked. Do you know how to take charge in a situation like this? It’s very important to get ahold of yourself and function effectively as quickly as possible. If your home has been destroyed, you will need to take steps right away to replace important documents. This is an essential step to making insurance claims and rebuilding.

Other Favorite Prepper Articles This Week

How to Brew Coffee without Power (Ummm…yes, please. You’ve gotta have numerous ways to make that vital elixir!)

How to Cook for Survival in a Power Outage Emergency (from the author of an incredibly thorough new book, Prepare Your Family for Survival)

Old-Fashioned Skills

Homesteading

Eggstravaganza: How to Preserve Eggs When They  Are Abundant

I have eggs running out my ears right now. Anyone else?  If you’re in the same boat, here are 4 time-tested ways to preserve them, plus some bonus methods from the 19th century. As well, here is a very detailed primer on preserving eggs with water glass. If you’re wondering whether your eggs are still fresh, this article explains how to test them. Of course, you can always use them up. This handy book has 70 simple and delicious egg recipes.

The Benefits of Farm Fresh Eggs

Did you ever wonder what the real difference is between store-bought eggs and ones from the farm?  It’s bigger than you might think.  Want more info about farm fresh eggs?  Here’s a list of Frequently Asked Questions that I learned quite a lot from.

Are You On the Fence About Growing a Garden?

If you aren’t sure about enlisting part of your yard for raising food, here are 5 reasons why you should consider it. If your excuse is that you’re new to gardening, then there’s no time like the present. Here are some tips to get you going. Many people have a dream that “one day” in an emergency, they’ll simply plop the seeds from their emergency seed bank into the ground and boom – the family is fed. But it’s not that easy. Take it from me – you need to practice well before you intend to be dependent upon the food that you raise. If you take the plunge (and you should!) Tthis is a great reference to keep on hand. It will answer nearly every question that a gardener might have and offer simple, inexpensive solutions.

DIY

Farm Blog

Our move is rapidly approaching, and my house is full of boxes.  There’s nothing like packing it all up to make you realize how much stuff you actually have.  (Answer: LOTS!)

Of course, a move wouldn’t be complete without a couple of monkey wrenches. And for us, that monkey wrench is mud. For years, California has been in the midst of a historic drought, and we are thrilled that there seems to be light at the end of that tunnel with the rainiest year since the drought began.

But since our property has been dug up to deal with the septic issues, the dirt wasn’t packed down afterward and it’s a giant mud puddle. My daughter was coming in from the barn the other evening and stepped into what looked like just a puddle but instead, was mud that sucked her in up to her knees. After assuring myself she wasn’t in life-threatening peril, I took a quick photo (shared with her permission). I had to rescue her by yanking her legs right out of her boots.

Mud Collage

Next week is moving week, and then I’ll have lots of photos from my new home in the mountains to share with you guys!

Give Us Your Self-Reliance Weekly Report!

What’s going on at your farm or urban homestead right now?  How’s the weather in your area? Please share your updates in the comments below!

Schiff: Obama Caught “Peddling Fiction” to Hide Pre-Election Recession

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obama_phone_fema

Despite the extent to which the officials in the White House, and the talking heads in the media and on Wall Street deny that the economy is faltering, it is this very issue that is driving voter outrage in the direction of Trump and Bernie.

It’s the jobs, stupid!

And since Obama can’t fix it, he’s lying about it to maintain appearances.

Because so many have become so ill-adjusted to the unforgiving job market, there is great talk about why our national policy is directed towards destroying employment, income, savings and the American dream in general.

After 8 years, it is a problem that Obama may have inherited, but will now have to own.

Peter Schiff claims that:

In his seventh, and final, State of the Union address this January, President Obama, clearly looking to bolster his legacy as the president who vanquished the Great Recession, boldly asserted that “Anyone claiming that America’s economy is in decline is peddling fiction.”  Unfortunately for the President, more and more Americans seem to believe (with an adequate basis for proof) that the fiction is emanating from the White House.

It’s hard to imagine how anyone can really assert with a straight face that the economy is currently “strong.”

[…]

Companies have been incentivized to cut their full-time work force… The view from the street looks quite different, as workers prefer one good job to several bad ones. This is why rallies for Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders are so well-attended. The underemployed are fed up with platitudes from the elites and they flock to these outsider candidates, who seem to understand their pain.

Never mind these two as individuals, but what they represent as symbols. Americans are completely fed up with establishment – and they aren’t ready to accept being pushed back in for another round.

I don’t expect that the President will ever officially acknowledge that the economy has weakened, let alone relapsed into recession. He has walked out too far on his rhetorical branch to walk it back. As a lame duck, he really has no incentive to do so.

The Obama White House has been hiding an economic holocaust during his two terms. Symbolically elected to dispose of the mess created by George W. Bush’s administration and the economic collapse that was engulfing people already drowning in debt.

Instead, he has cheered on the illusion that “recovery” is near, while the bankers have accumulated more wealth than ever, and are waiting for the next wave of the crash to come down on the population.

Meanwhile, critics have accused Yellen – publicly very silent about policy decisions – of timing the blow of the recession.

The recession itself is presumably inevitable, but the announcement and reaction to it could change the major issues of the election cycle, and potentially swing even more votes into those camps who are running as anti-establishment. Trump has previously accused the Fed of waiting to raise rates in order to avoid embarrassing Obama:

But Janet Yellen is in a very difficult spot. If she continues to ignore the growing signs of recession, she runs the risk of letting one develop prior to the election. This would favor the Republican challenger, whether that is Donald Trump or Ted Cruz, neither of whom would be inclined to reappoint her as Fed Chairwoman if elected. Allowing the Greenspan bubble to bust on Bush’s watch sealed John McCain’s fate, allowing Obama to ride a wave of voter outrage into the White House in 2008. Yellen does not want Trump to catch a similar wave in 2016.

As a result, I expect the Fed to soften its rhetoric in the very near future.

As Schiff himself has pointed out many times before, the entire situation is made worse by the prolonged and belabored attempt at cushioning the impact. For better times to be had by all, the Fed out to stop propping up a market of speculators driving a bubble in real estate and other over-priced assets.

Since that isn’t going to happen, pay attention to the handling of the “political football” as Obama & co. try to pretend that job growth is happening and stability is here to stay.

Read more:

Trump Accuses Fed of Not Raising Rates Because Obama “Doesn’t Want a Bubble Burst” Until He Leaves

Ron Paul: Unless the Fed is Stopped, America Will “Soon Experience Major Economic Crisis”

NYT Jokes About Trump Assassination: “Good News I’ve Figured Out How Trump Campaign Ends”

You Won’t Believe How They Rigged Ohio Against Trump: “Intentionally Confusing Ballot”

by

trump-ohio-ballot

This article was written by Piper McGowan and originally published at The Dai

ly Sheeple.

Editor’s Comment:  The GOP has a history of manipulating the primary, but this time they are going all out to destroy Trump. Is it any wonder that Ohio’s ballot – which will be cast next week – is so confusing that Trump may lose votes just as a result of the ballot’s design?

It is the home state of Governor John Kasich – a lackluster candidate who, nonetheless, was expected to win Ohio, and keep the delegates for the establishment side. But according to the polls, Trump is beating Kasich in Ohio AND Rubio in Florida – and they are big delegate, winner take all states. However, Kasich is close enough in his homestate, that a bit of meddling could change things. If Trump wins both, the GOP insiders have even less of a chance to trip up The Donald.

But if the Ohio GOP ballot leaves as many people scratching their heads as the newscaster in the video below, anything could happen in Ohio. Polls will not translate into votes if the machines are designed to deceive.

You Won’t Believe What They Did to the Ohio Ballot to Stop Trump

by Piper McGowan

We all know the elite are on the warpath against Donald Trump, with everyone from pundits, to major world leaders, to the Pope speaking out against him. Newt Gingrich recently said it’s because Trump isn’t part of the secret societies and hasn’t taken the initiation rites.

Regardless, Trump has received a groundswell of support from the average conservative American, winning state primaries left and right. Ohio’s primary is coming up on March 15, and it’s a big one because it’s a “winner takes all” state.

Well now it’s being alleged that Ohio’s GOP has intentionally set up a confusing ballot in a bid to try to make sure Donald Trump does not win.

The Dem ballot has one place for voters to mark their choice for president. Period.

The Republican ballot in Ohio this year apparently has two, leaving a lot more questions than answers about whether or not voters will understand how it works.

Take a look, (via the Conservative Treehouse):

ohio-vote

Is the ballot intentionally confusing by design?

Given the previous discussions on State Party shenanigans, and the intent of state republican party leadership to hold complete influence over their delegate’s decision-making, many believe the answer is “probably”.

Look at that ballot. It definitely raises a lot of questions… that aren’t answered on the ballot.

Do the majority of voters know the difference between “Delegates-at-Large” and “District Delegates”? Does a person need to choose their candidate twice, or are they only supposed to chose once? Which is right? What if they pick a different candidate in each box, do they cancel each other out? What if they pick someone in the first box and not the second, or vice versa?

Why the confusing GOP ballot, Ohio?

Leaking Beachfront Nuclear Reactor Near Miami Threatening Florida Everglades

by

Claire Bernish
March 9, 2016

(ANTIMEDIA) Biscayne Bay, FL — According to a study released by Miami-Dade County Mayor Carlos Gimenez on Monday, the waters of Biscayne Bay measured 215 times the level of radioactive tritium as is found in normal ocean water.

Tritium is a radioactive isotope traceable to nuclear plant cooling tower operations. In this case, the leak appears to be emanating from the aging canals in the Turkey Point Nuclear Generating Station located nearby.

“This is one of several things we were very worried about,” said South Miami Mayor and biological sciences professor, Philip Stoddard, as the Miami New Times reported. “You would have to work hard to find a worse place to put a nuclear plant, right between two national parks and subject to hurricanes and storm surge.”

Biscayne Bay harbors one of the largest coral reefs on the planet and is situated near the Everglades. Hot, salty water from the canals appears to be flowing back into both national parks, which has caused concern among environmentalists and others from the time Turkey Point planned to expand its reactors in 2013.

“They argued the canals were a closed system, but that’s not how water works in South Florida,” Stoddard remarked.

“How much damage is that cooling canal system causing the bay is a question to be answered,” Everglades Law Center Attorney Julie Dick told the Miami Herald prior to reviewing the report. “There are a lot more unknowns than knowns and it just shows how much more attention we need to be paying to that cooling canal system.”

Tritium, a hydrogen isotope, is considered a precursor indication of leaks from nuclear plants, as it ‘travels’ or spreads faster than, and often precedes, other radioactive agents.

“While the tritium levels far fall below levels experts consider dangerous, the telltale tracer provided the critical link that high levels of ammonia and phosphorus in sections of bay bottom — pollution that is more damaging to marine life — likely came from the canals,” the Herald explained. Samples for the county monitoring study were gathered during December and January — and the tritium levels seem to show Florida Power & Light in violation of both local water laws and federal operating permits.

 FPL, which operates Turkey Point, will likely receive another violation due to the leak — the county issued a citation in October for tainted groundwater — to force FPL to bring the plant into compliance, the Herald reported Tuesday.

After news of the report made headlines, critics, including environmentalists, nearby rock miners, and Rep. Jose Javier Rodriguez, came forward in full force calling for the Environmental Protection Agency to intervene in the matter.

“For years our state regulators have failed to take seriously the threat to our public safety, to our drinking water, and to our environment posed by FP&L’s actions at Turkey Point,” Rodriguez asserted, according to the New Times.“Evidence revealed this week of radioactive material in Biscayne Bay is the last straw and I join those calling on the U.S. EPA to step in and do what our state regulators have so far refused to do — protect the public.”

The leak also serves as possible confirmation for environmentalists who have suspected radioactive leaks from Turkey Point as the cause of algae blooms appearing in the bay for years.

“Biscayne Bay has not traditionally had algae blooms,” explained executive director for Miami Waterkeeper Rachel Silverstein, reported the Herald. “That’s from pollution. From sewers, septic tanks and now we know, cooling canals.”

Indeed, though FPL claims it continues to protect the health of the bay, as the Herald noted, Turkey Point has created issues for the waterways since the facility began producing more energy three years ago. “When you look at the big picture,” FPL environmental director, Matt Raffenberg, insisted, the canals “are not impacting Biscayne Bay.”

At a meeting on Tuesday, county commissioners discussed the imperative need to bring FPL and Turkey point into compliance with the law.

“We’ve had stop gap measures we’ve approved,” Gimenez said. “So far they’ve not proved to be the solution.”

Referencing the last time FPL was forced to implement changes following a lawsuit in the 1970s, he added, “It’s time we enter the 21st century.”

FPL’s continued problems with Turkey Point might have finally crossed the legal line by violating the federal Clean Water Act.

“There’s a certain validation to critics in seeing this result in the study,” Stoddard said. “But more important, it’s now crossed the threshold of federal law here.”

This article (Leaking Beachfront Nuclear Reactor Near Miami Threatening Florida Everglades) is free and open source. You have permission to republish this article under a Creative Commons license with attribution to Claire Bernish and theAntiMedia.org. Anti-Media Radio airs weeknights at 11pm Eastern/8pm Pacific. Image credit: Mr. Usaji. If you spot a typo, email edits@theantimedia.org.