When large-scale weather threatens large-scale consequences

 

I'm sure most of us have read news reports about the imminent return of the climate phenomenon known as El Nino, possibly in the form of a so-called "super" El Nino, far stronger than "normal" events of this kind.  There have been all sorts of alarmist forecasts about drought, flooding, and everything in between.  However, the big story may be the effect of this climate phenomenon on global commerce and industry, regardless of whether it's rainy or sunny.  TT Club, a "provider of mutual insurance and related risk management services to the international transport and logistics industry", examines the implications.

El Niño events are part of a naturally occurring climate cycle, but “super” events are characterised by exceptionally high sea surface temperature anomalies, which are far less frequent and significantly more disruptive. Current forecasts are suggesting that a very strong event is increasingly likely, with some indicating increases well above historical norms. The result is not a single point of failure, but rather a synchronised, multi-regional disruption that has potential to affect the interconnected global supply chain.

. . .

Perhaps the most concerning aspect of the current outlook is the convergence of climate and geopolitical risk factors. When overlaid with El Niño-induced climate shocks, the potential for cascading effects increases significantly.

For example: 

• Reduced fertiliser availability may exacerbate the impact of drought on crop yields
• Higher fuel costs may increase the cost of transporting goods
• Trade route disruptions may amplify delays caused by weather-related events
• This interconnected risk landscape highlights the need to view El Niño not as a standalone hazard, but as part of a broader system of interdependent risks.

. . .

The critical point for global businesses is that exposure is rarely limited to the location of the physical hazard. Organisations may face indirect impacts through suppliers, commodity markets, logistics networks, energy systems, insurance costs and customer demand.

Key global vulnerabilities include: 

• Food and commodity price inflation driven by crop losses or supply uncertainty
• Disruption to agricultural, industrial and consumer-goods supply chains
• Transport delays, port disruption and reduced reliability across maritime and inland logistics routes
• Energy market volatility linked to higher demand, reduced hydropower output and infrastructure stress
• Increased insurance, financing and working-capital pressures as businesses respond to greater uncertainty

For internationally exposed organisations, these second-order and third-order effects may prove just as significant as direct physical risks. The practical implication is that El Niño should be assessed not only by geography, but by dependency: where goods are sourced, how they are transported, which inputs are most constrained and where alternative capacity exists.

There's more at the link.

That's an often underestimated factor in many plans:  military, political, business, disaster, whatever.  A factor that is described in geographical terms - like El Nino, often termed the "southern oscillation" of weather patterns - can have effects far outside that geographical area.  I'm sure most US businesses on the East Coast aren't planning for any major disruption due to weather that might affect the West Coast of this country, but that's very short-sighted.  What about Europe, or Asia?  I'm sure many nations on those continents are dismissing El Nino as "someone else's problem", but if, as the article suggests, we define it by dependency on economic activity in the area where it occurs, that dependency reaches into every corner of global markets, both imports and exports.

Even on a small scale, in terms of personal planning for the next year or two, this bears thinking about.  For example:

• Is my employer (and hence my job) likely to be affected by El Nino, positively or negatively?  Could it determine whether or not I have a job at all this time next year?
• What about our household emergency planning?  Are we assuming that certain staple foods and basic necessities will always be both available and affordable, or might the advent of El Nino-related weather patterns affect that?
• Are we planning to travel anywhere over the next year or two?  Will airline flights be affected by El Nino?  Will they become more or less affordable?  What alternatives are there?

Just a few areas where we might all do well to consider what's going on in our atmosphere and our oceans at present.

Peter

Verily, the mind doth boggle...

 

I've been something of a "prepper" for many years, but until last night it had never even crossed my mind to consider this.

The city of Annapolis, Maryland, has released an emergency preparedness guide tailored to the LGBTQ+ community, arguing that members of the community are more likely to be affected by natural disasters.

The Annapolis Office of Emergency Management, led by Kevin Simmons, published a graphic this week outlining its emergency preparedness recommendations for LGBTQ+ residents. The office states that disasters “present unique challenges for the LGBTQ+ community,” claiming that “After a disaster, LGBTQ+ people are almost twice as likely as the overall population to be displaced - and far more likely to face food insecurity, unsanitary conditions, and isolation during recovery.”

Under the recommendation to stay connected, the guide advises residents to establish a support network that can be contacted during emergencies and to identify “safe spaces” where resources may be available. For medical preparedness, the guide recommends speaking with healthcare providers to get an “emergency supply of retroviral and/or hormonal medications.”

The guide’s list of recommended supplies to gather includes standard emergency items as well as things such as “syringes” and “gender-affirming clothing.” It also lists “chest binders,” “wigs,” and “packers,” which are used by trans-identifying biological women to make it appear as though they have a bulge in their pants. 

“Extreme heat can be challenging for those who rely on gender-affirming clothing,” the guide warned at the bottom. “Stay hydrated and take frequent breaks from chest binders on hot days.”

There's more at the link.

For the life of me, I can't see how LGBTQ+ concerns for preparedness are in any way, shape or form different from everyone else's concerns for the same thing.  Water doesn't ask for your sexual orientation before you drink it:  food, before you eat it:  and a blanket, before you sleep in it.  This appears to be a thoroughly artificial attempt to drag the politically correct cause du jour into an essentially practical field that has nothing whatsoever to do with gender.

I can, however, assure you that if, in a crisis, people come to me demanding that I give them a bottle of lesbian-safe water, or gay-safe guacamole, or bisexual beans, or ... well, you get the idea ... I'm likely to be very rude to them, and anything but sympathetic.

Ye Gods and little fishes . . .

Peter

Tab clearing

 

I've come across several very interesting stories and reports over the past week or two, but haven't had time or space to give each one the attention it deserves.  In this blog post, I'll list them all, and provide a brief synopsis.  I highly recommend clicking over to the ones that interest you and reading them in full.

1.  Tragedy in the Maldives.

DiveMedic offers several blog posts that analyze the deaths of several divers in a deep-sea cave in the Maldive Islands in the Indian Ocean.  He's a very highly qualified and experienced diver himself, so his words carry a great deal of weight.  Follow each link to his reports, in chronological order:

Dive Accident

Compounding Tragedy

Risks

The Next Chapter

2.  Credit card fraud at the gas pump.

Wall Street Apes warns us that by physically blocking the pump from shutting off after you pump gas, thieves can go to the pump after you drive away and pump gas for themselves on your account.  Their report includes a video clip illustrating how it's done.

3.  Shortage of lube oil?

Tamara at View From The Porch notes that lubrication oils are likely to become a lot less readily available following the Iran war.  She reproduces a warning letter from AutoZone to its managers outlining what they can expect and how the company will try to deal with it.  Very important reading, IMHO.

4.  Our medicine supply is a national security issue.

RealClearWire warns that our top-heavy reliance on China for almost all our critical medications and/or the raw materials that go into them has become a genuine national security issue.  It notes that "More than 131 million people—nearly two-thirds of all U.S. adults—use prescription medications."

I've written about this issue before.  If you rely on prescription medications, I highly recommend that you build up a stockpile of at least six months' worth of each of them - if possible, a full year of each.  If their local doctor and/or pharmacy won't help with that, many Americans buy them from pharmacies outside our borders.  That's technically illegal, of course, and therefore I can't legally advise you to do it:  but what alternatives are there?  Some drive across the Mexican border, where pharmacies will help without turning a hair.  Some who can't do that use mail-order pharmacies in countries like India.  There are several of them.  Whatever you do, don't just sit back and say "Oh, well, there's nothing I can do about it."  That won't help keep you alive if the crunch comes.  All it will take is a Chinese bureaucratic edict blocking all medicine-related exports to the USA, and we'll be in a world of hurt within weeks.

5.  Lessons learned from Argentina's collapse.

The author warns that "many American preppers prepare for the wrong kind of collapse".  He describes how, when Argentina's economy blew up, the result was that "Society did not disappear. It simply became dangerous, unstable, and deeply unpredictable".  He offers practical suggestions to deal with increased crime and violence, and points out that reliance on weapons and ammunition is less important than more mundane factors.

6.  Military snipers are being put out of a job by drones.

An interesting assessment of how military snipers are being displaced in importance by drone warfare.  Snipers are becoming assistants to the drone operators, finding them targets, helping them focus on them, and supporting them as the higher-technology drone delivers far more damage, far more accurately than a bullet could.  Future battlefields may see far fewer snipers than in the past.

7.  But is it art?

To be read with tongue firmly in cheek:

Museum officials at the Louvre announced Friday that a portable latrine recovered from a forward operating base outside Fallujah, Iraq, has been placed on permanent display in the antiquities wing alongside works by da Vinci and Delacroix, with curators citing the interior wall art as some of the most raw and unfiltered human expression documented in the post-9/11 era.

The piece, a standard-issue plastic latrine manufactured in 2002 and last serviced at no documented point in its operational life, contains on its interior walls an estimated 340 individual works including pencil drawings, marker illustrations, carved inscriptions, and what the Louvre’s authentication team described in their formal report as a surprisingly consistent motif repeated across all four walls, the door, and part of the ceiling.

. . .

The Louvre’s acquisition statement, released Thursday, describes the wall art as an anonymous folk tradition rooted in the vernacular of the American enlisted experience, comparing the recurring phallic imagery to fertility symbols found in Paleolithic cave systems and noting that the sheer volume and anatomical commitment of the work suggests multiple contributing artists across a sustained period of time.

“These are not casual marks,” the statement reads. “These are declarations.”

The rest is just as funny.  Enjoy!

That's all for today.  I hope you enjoyed the variety.  If you did, let me know, and I'll probably try to do more such omnibus posts in future.

Peter

"Pie in the sky" prepping - or, getting real about our chances

 

I'm a relative lightweight in the "prepping" world.  I have emergency food, water and other supplies to keep my wife and myself alive for a few months in a disaster situation, and (hopefully) enough to share with friends for at least the short term;  but that's based on "bugging in", staying in our home and not venturing far unless and until it's safe to do so.  We don't have a "bug out" location, or remotely stored supplies, or anything like that - it's simply unaffordable for us.

Nevertheless, I'm often surprised to hear from people who are very much in our situation that they have these grand plans to "bug out" to the sticks, establish a survival homestead from scratch, grow their own food, herd a few cows, steal a travel trailer from somewhere as a place to live, and so on.  Frankly, I think they have no idea at all of just how much effort will be involved in making that plan work.

Eaton Rapids Joe has put up a couple of recent blog posts in which he lays out precisely what skills and resources are needed (and vitally important) if one is to homestead successfully.  In the first article, "A man has to know his limitations", he looks at all the skills needed to successfully homestead (some required all the time, others for specific situations).  In the second, "Why 'Russian' Dachas all look alike", he examines what successful country farms have in the way of facilities and equipment, and also what they don't have (because it's either way too expensive, or too resource-heavy, or unnecessary).  Both articles, and both of the lists he provides, are well worth reading.  If, after reading them, anyone still thinks it'll be easy to set up an emergency homestead . . . well, you're probably going to learn the hard way how wrong you are!

Another aspect of the problem is that too many people stock up on "second-best" gear, food and equipment for emergency use, because it's cheaper and they can afford more of it.  Commander Zero discusses this approach with respect to firearms:

... if you need to resort to your hideaway stash becase you can’t get to your primary gear, then its safe to assume that your life has just taken a turn for the spectacularly ungood, agreed? So, in that time of (literally) existential crisis doesn’t it seem to make sense that you would want the best gear you can have?

It does, indeed, make sense.  That's a lesson I learned the hard way in Africa over many years.  If you know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that Mother Nature is a stone cold bitch who's out to kill you, wouldn't you want the best gear you can get in your emergency stash, to help you withstand her advances?  Quality can save your life.  Economy can kill you.  That applies to all our emergency preps, not just firearms.

(On a related subject, Commander Zero recently bought some land in the back country of Montana, and is beginning to set it up as a private retreat.  He recently blogged about his first weekend excursion to begin preparing it for use.  So many things went wrong that one can almost feel his pain, but he's not afraid to discuss all the mistakes he made, and what he's learned from the experience that he'll apply in future visits.  A very useful discussion, and a very useful reality check for the rest of us.)

Preparation isn't just physical.  One's outlook on everyday living - and what it costs - is a foundational element.  SNAFU links to a social media comment from a teacher who's complaining that she can't come out on $7,500 net income per month - while spending over $1,500 on a vehicle payment, and over $3,000 on rent!  Some commenters at his site question whether the original post is truthful, because the payments seem extraordinarily high, but he makes the very valid point that "Financial Education needs to be a REQUIRED course in school (along with NOT chasing luxury items to impress people that don't give a damn)".

On that subject, here's some brutally frank (and very truthful) advice from the TV series House Of Cards.  Kevin Spacey plays Frank Underwood, a highly immoral yet realistic politician.

Yes, that is brutal advice:  but in this world of easy-fulfilment dreams, hire purchase, leasing, and all the other debt instruments out there, it remains true.  If you're in debt, you're a financial slave to those who own your debt, and most of them will be utterly ruthless in coming after you to get what they're owed.  Being prepared for emergencies is as much about financial preparation as any other type of preparedness:  and one of the first and most fundamental steps in financial preparation is to get out of debt as far as possible.  As Spacey's character says, "The moment you get in debt, you're enslaving yourself until you buy back your freedom with interest."  Believe it.  It's true.

(Sometimes, of course, we can't afford not to go into debt.  We had to replace my wife's car in early 2022, because her old one had been driven into the ground until it was no longer viable.  The impact of COVID-19 had led to a drastic shortage of all types of vehicles, partly due to the reduction in dealer inventory, partly due to the shortage of used vehicles thanks to President Obama's "Cash For Clunkers" scheme, which scrapped tens of thousands of otherwise worthwhile cars.  We ended up buying a new car, and paying above the manufacturer's MSRP, because nothing else worthwhile was available to us:  and, to finance that very expensive purchase, we took out a loan.  It was a loan neither of us wanted, but under the circumstances, it was necessary.  Under such circumstances, one does what one must.  We bought an entry-level model without all the luxury features, and that helped lower the price and keep payments down.)

All of the above articles are food for thought.

Peter

The real problem of "living up to your income"

 

I know plenty of people who are using almost everything they earn to support their lifestyle.  Some do it because they earn so little, they can't afford to do anything else with it!  Others do so because they want much more than they actually need, and they earn a salary high enough to afford wants as well as needs, so they spend all their "excess" money on those luxuries.

That's where the trap comes in for everybody, but particularly for higher-earning individuals and families.  They're committed to repaying hire-purchase accounts, credit card bills, leases, and what have you.  They've used their surplus income to "bring forward" consumption that they'd otherwise have had to put off until they managed to save enough to buy it.  Instead of saving money, they borrow money in order to spend even more.  Psychology Today examines this behavior.

For decades, America has operated on a simple yet precarious principle: Borrow from tomorrow to pay for today. This mindset, deeply embedded in our economic systems and individual behaviors, has created a teetering tower of debt that threatens to collapse under its own weight. As a nation, we've normalized living beyond our means—from federal deficit spending to consumer credit card debt—with seemingly little consideration for the inevitable reckoning.

. . .

The national debt has grown exponentially rather than linearly, suggesting that each generation has become more comfortable leveraging the future than its predecessor.

. . .

Historical evidence suggests that debt-fueled economies eventually face correction. The 2008 financial crisis provided a preview of what happens when leveraged systems begin to unravel. Yet instead of fundamentally restructuring our approach, we responded with even more borrowing and financial engineering.

There's more at the link.

The problem is that such spending habits last only as long as there's money to spend.  I'm seeing more and more cases where income is suddenly cut off (as in being fired, or made redundant) or greatly reduced (getting a new job, but having to accept a much lower wage or salary than you made in the old job).  Having weighed oneself down with debt and spending patterns based on a higher income, suddenly one is faced with creditors demanding repayment, vehicles being repossessed, and all the other burdens of an over-leveraged household.  Kids whine when they're told they can't have all they're used to, spouses blame each other for the sudden hole in their finances, and in some cases families break down altogether under the strain.

Karl Denninger sums up the problem.

The real problem for ordinary people in the economy is that anything that is unsustainable over a sufficient amount of time will blow up in your face.  But when will it blow up?  That's a more-difficult problem.  For example we know that housing is largely locked up in a large part of the country -- indeed, most of it.  In those places where it sort-of-isn't there are other serious problems including property tax and insurance concerns that might as well have it locked up from a standpoint of actual affordability.  Add to this that many formerly thought of as "safe" professions which earn a nice wage, including computer science and medical, are rapidly being destroyed in terms of forward earnings capacity by both AI and foreign worker imports.  There are plenty of stories already of people living quite high on the hog having accumulated a lifestyle with mandatory monthly spend commensurate with $250,000 wages suddenly being laid off and finding no replacement for that wage at even half what they formerly made.  If you've managed to get yourself into a leveraged position with a forward requirement for such earnings and they disappear you're in very serious trouble indeed.

Again, more at the link.

Just this week (so far) I've heard from friends and acquaintances fighting that very issue.  Examples:

• A family has been reduced from three cars to one, because they couldn't afford the lease payments, insurance, etc. for the two very nice vehicles used by father and mother.  The remaining old beater had been given to their teenage son, but he's had to give it back to the family.  Neither he nor they are very happy about that.
• Two families are urgently seeking low-cost rental accommodation because their nice big McMansion-style houses are being repossessed.  They're finding it almost impossible to locate anything as nice as what they had, and even lesser houses are more expensive to rent than they had anticipated.  It's gotten to the point of screaming fights with their kids because they're going to have to share two rooms, one for the boys and one for the girls, rather than each have their own space.
• Two families have had to give up their pets to shelters for (hopefully) adoption.  It's been a real trauma, particularly for the children, as they can't be sure their pets will go to loving homes where they'll be properly cared for.
• I know too many people who are using one credit card to pay off another each month, never reducing what they owe.

With those problems fresh in mind, you can bet that my wife and I are checking on our monthly expenses to make sure we can fit into a reasonable budget, and keep our heads above water if any sort of financial emergency hits.  Recent medical bills would have made that very problematic, except that you, dear readers, came to our rescue last year, to our deep and abiding gratitude.  Even so, it's up to us to use what we have wisely, and not waste it.  We also made a decision early in our marriage to get out of debt as far as possible (following Dave Ramsay's advice), and pay cash for routine expenses wherever possible, and pay off our credit cards and other accounts in full every month rather than accumulate a balance, and save money in an emergency fund.  Those decisions have been a Godsend for us, sparing us more than a little worry.

I guess more and more of us are going to be facing this conundrum as prices increase and jobs become harder to find.  It's a good time for all of us to take stock of where we are, what we're spending, and how we might cope if similar problems rear their ugly heads in our lives.  If you have helpful suggestions that might help others to do that, please share them in Comments.

Peter

The Iran war and the global economy

 

The Iran war isn't (yet) having a major impact on the US economy.  Gas prices are up, but not out of control, and since we're self-sufficient in most sources of energy, we're in relatively good shape despite the interruption to oil supplies from the Persian Gulf.  However, many other countries are not so fortunate.  A few examples:

• Fishermen in Ireland are grounding their boats because they can’t afford diesel, thanks to rising prices.
• The Philippines has declared a national emergency over the supply of fuel.  Current estimates are that the country has only enough gasoline for the next 53.14 days; diesel, 45.82 days; kerosene, 97.93 days; jet fuel, 38.62 days; fuel oil, 61.49 days; and liquified petroleum gas, 23.51 days.
• Australian gas stations are running out of gasoline and/or diesel.  "As of mid-March, Australia held roughly 38 days' worth of petrol, 30 days of diesel and 30 days of jet fuel."

One might ask why America should be worried about other countries' fuel problems.  The reason is simple:  because their economies are inextricably tied in with ours.  If our trade partners experience serious economic problems, they'll inevitably affect us too in the long run.  CNBC points out:

Energy and commodities market expert John Kilduff of Again Capital ... said “the numbers are just too big ... This is a 10 to 12 million barrel per day deficit. … really just insurmountable. There’s no policy measure that can be taken. There’s no lever that can be pulled to offset this,” he said.

That is why he thinks the timeframe to be focused on is that post-April 1 date. “If there’s no resolution, if there’s no plan, if there’s no sort of even hopefulness that we can get the Strait reopened, with amassing troops or doing whatever the military has to do to do that,” that is when this becomes an energy crisis, Kilduff said. “By mid-year, you will see shortages in places like India, Japan, and South Korea. They will start to rein in industrial production. They’re going to have to conserve to keep the lights on, literally,” he said. If the military and government do not have good answers by April 1, “The crunch is coming.”

There's more at the link.

Speaking of death and dying, John Donne famously wrote:

Therefore, send not to know
For whom the bell tolls,
It tolls for thee.

When the economic bell is tolling, as it is right now, we'll do well to remember that warning.  We, as individuals, can't do anything about the world situation, but we can do something about our own preparations for hard times and our own resources.  The old proverb says, "Look after the pennies, and the dollars will look after themselves."  In the same way, if we look after the practical preparations we can make from day to day, the longer term will tend to resolve itself, and we'll be better off when it does.

Peter

Looks like more difficult times bearing down on us

 

I'm not panic-mongering and declaring that we're facing TEOTWAWKI, but the impact of the Iranian war on the world economy is steadily getting worse, and it's going to affect us in the USA as well.  We'll be far better off than most countries due to being a net energy exporter, but problems for our major trading partners inevitably end up being our problems as well.

Click on the following headlines to read more information about each point.

Economist who predicted 2008 crash warns something much worse could be coming

"We have returned to a period of risk, one rife with the sort of pressures that have led to major financial crises.

"This time, the risks are spread across industries, markets, and nations: artificial intelligence, the roughly $2 trillion private credit industry, stock markets, Taiwan, and now Iran."

While each of these issues are enough to cause chaos on their own, combined they suggest that another financial crash is inevitable and the ongoing war in Iran is seemingly at the heart of it all.

Russia Halts Ammonium Nitrate Exports As Global Fertilizer Crisis Set To Worsen

Export disruptions of the critical crop nutrient can hit import-dependent buyers hard, especially in markets such as Brazil, Canada, India, Peru, and Ukraine.

Russia's temporary export comes at the worst possible timing as the Northern Hemisphere planting season begins in some regions. 

The risk now is that, as the Middle East conflict enters its fourth week, a global energy shock is also spreading to fertlizer markets and may only suggest a delayed food price shock later this year. 

Hundreds Of Gas Stations Run Dry In Australia As Hormuz Shock Exposes Energy Security Failures

Australia's weird obsession with "green energy," compounded by a lack of urgency regarding proper energy security, has now collided with the worst energy crisis the world has ever seen.

A country heavily dependent on imported refined petroleum products, many of which transit the Strait of Hormuz, has reached the fourth week of the U.S.-Iran war, but with a full-blown fuel supply shock now underway, and hundreds of gas stations across the country running dry.

Energy Minister Chris Bowen ... warned that fuel supplies were at about 38 days for gasoline. He said only 30 days of diesel and jet fuel remained.

The Rapidly-Gathering Economic Storm

Karl Denninger looks at problems with AI, housing, energy, food, fraud and many other current issues.  He concludes:  "Is Iran the triggering event?  I have no idea.  It might be."  Go read his whole article.  It's food for thought.

Finally, a perspective from England that may be of interest to US preppers as well.

I laughed at bulk-buyers during Covid, but this time I think the preppers are right

I am not what you’d call a natural prepper. Even during the Covid lockdowns, when others piled supermarket trolleys high with giant packs of loo roll, I felt the UK’s shoppers were losing their collective grey matter. But as the war with Iran continues and the Strait of Hormuz remains closed to the ships of the US, Israel and their Western allies, I find myself changing tack.

This time round, I’m with the doomsters. You don’t have to be Nostradamus to foresee that we will all feel the impact from the global supply chain of crude oil, liquefied natural gas, fertilisers, sulphur and helium being suddenly, severely restricted.

Today’s Bright Young Things may soon wake to their very own Great Slump. Before sitting down to write, I saw an American professor of medicine post the following message on X, highlighting just one little-discussed aspect of the problem: “I hope no one needs an MRI this year. The world’s largest producer of liquefied helium is in Qatar and is shut off.” He had just been told that his own institution’s yearly supply will be halved, at best.

That last paragraph is a wake-up call.  How many MRI's are performed every day in the USA?  What would those needing them (and the doctors who call for them) do if half of them could not be performed?  Could this be a life-or-death situation for the patients needing them?  I suspect it might.

As I said above, I'm not one to cry "Wolf!", and I don't want to spread alarm and despondency:  but forewarned is forearmed.  If we need something that may soon be in short supply, now might be a very good time to get it, and beat the rush.

Peter

Very useful information on long-term emergency food storage

 

Commander Zero, whom we've met in these pages on several occasions, recently wrote an article asking his readers for feedback on cold weather food storage.  His exact question was:  "If you were going to store foods in a location that was going to be subject to freeze/thaw cycles, what foods would be best choices?"

Many of his readers responded - 44 of them, as I write these words.  They've provided a great deal of information that's useful for anyone considering food storage, even if not in a cold-weather environment.  I highly recommend clicking over to his place to read his question and explanation, and their responses.

Peter

The UPS air disaster as experienced on the ground

 

Midwest Safety has released a 40-minute video compilation of bodycam footage from emergency responders who rushed to the scene of the UPS air crash in Louisville in November last year.  It's harrowing footage, showing the chaos as responders tried to come to grips with a situation far larger and far worse than they could have envisaged.  I highly recommend watching it to learn what happened, figure out how it could have been done better, and to ask yourself, "What would I do in that situation?"

A tip o' the hat to Zendo Deb at 357 Magnum for posting the video.

Having been involved with civil defense and disaster response on two continents over many years, I can promise you:  that Louisville crash is the stuff nightmares are made of for any and all emergency responders.  It's going to be a case study for years, probably decades to come.

May almighty God have mercy on the souls of all who died there.

Peter

More useful information about your home in extreme cold

 

Karl Denninger has written extensively about the effect of extreme cold on your home's plumbing, heating problems, and related issues.  His article is too long to excerpt here, so click over to his place and read it for yourself.  Very interesting and useful information.

Stay warm, friends.

Peter

Helpful advice for the Second Coming of the winter storm next weekend

 

For those in the path of the latest deep freeze:

Given the likely temperatures, one might advise the wearing of underwear irrespective of the wind speed - but that's probably un-Scottish of me, or something like that.

Peter

Lessons learned from the snowstorm - reader questions answered

 

As we gently "melt out" from the snow and ice of the past few days, a number of readers e-mailed me to describe problems they'd encountered, and to ask about aspects of emergency preparation in such weather.  Of particular importance to them was solutions that will work in extreme cold, when the power's out for an indeterminate period.

Let's start with light.  The simplest, easiest and cheapest way to light your home for a few hours, or days, or even weeks, are the pull-up camping lanterns available under various brand names (but probably all made in the same Chinese factory).  This is the cheapest 4-pack on Amazon at the time of writing:

They run on 3 AA batteries, which give several hours' bright light.  They're very lightweight, too, and one can use the handle to hang them from any convenient hook or branch, or stand them on a firm surface.  To use them, just pull the top up (or partway up if you want less light).  I've used them for years.  Some may not work very long, because they're Chinesium, and quality is an afterthought for many such products;  but at the price, it's hard to complain.  I keep half a dozen handy for emergency use.  You should also keep a few flashlights on hand to carry around as needed.  Candles, tea-lights, etc. are useful if you have a safe place to burn them, but they do add to the fire danger, and you leave them unattended at your own risk.

What about generators?  Very useful, but also very noisy, and thirsty for fuel if power remains out for several days.  They also have to run outdoors, for safety reasons (carbon monoxide from their exhaust will kill you deader than dead if you run them indoors).  I have a smallish, lower-cost model, which I'll use mostly to charge up my battery power banks if and when necessary.  It doesn't produce enough power to run all our electrical appliances.  (If you can afford it, you can by all means consider a whole-house generator and a dedicated fuel tank to run it for a week or more, but they're usually very expensive.)

Another problem with generators is theft.  They're in high demand during weather emergencies.  There are those who travel around in such conditions, listening for the sound of generators or evidence of their presence such as lights at night, and then steal them from wherever you've put them.  It happened to a friend of mine not far from here a couple of years ago, not 48 hours after he bought the unit.  The thieves waited until the small hours of the morning, when the generator wasn't in use, then cut the chain he'd used to fasten it to a pillar and carried it off.  He was not a happy camper, to put it mildly!

If you rely on a fuelled generator, make sure you have one powerful enough to run all the appliances you want to use:  then calculate its fuel consumption under load (not just idling).  A lot of manufacturers won't give you that information in their sales brochure, so you might have to dig around to find it, or establish it by trial and error.  Once you know what it is, store enough gasoline or propane to run the generator for however long you might need it.  That adds up very quickly, by the way:  for a large generator, you may need up to 10-15 gallons per day.  Smaller ones are rather more economical.  (Don't forget oil:  if you have a new generator, you'll normally be expected to change its lubricant after 20-30 hours of operation, and at regular intervals thereafter.  Spark plugs of the right size, plus spare air and oil filters, are also worth keeping in stock.  A trickle charger to keep the generator battery topped up isn't a bad idea, either.)

Finally, run the generator regularly to make sure it's in good working order.  Some recommend every month;  others, every quarter.  If it won't start when you desperately need it, you aren't going to be very happy (and even less so when your family finds out)!

My preferred solution for electric power is to use one or more electric power banks, which are sometimes referred to as power generators or solar generators.  They usually offer a more expensive solution than generators (at least, at today's prices), but they're also much more convenient, can be carried to wherever you need them, can be easily recharged by even a small generator, and don't smell of exhaust fumes or drip fuel and oil on your floor!  There are many models, some of which you'll find at the link above, but I'd divide them into three size categories based on likely use.

The first are small power banks up to 1KW (kilowatt - 1,000 watts) in power and a similar storage capacity in KWh (kilowatt-hours - the energy used to produce one kilowatt of power for one hour).  These can't run anything very big in power draw, but for lightweight use (portable lights with LED bulbs, charging cellphones or tablets, game consoles, etc.) they can be very convenient.  I know some families who keep a couple on hand to let their kids use them while Mom and Dad use a larger power bank for larger power needs (e.g. TV, DVD player, computer, etc.)  Small units are also useful to power low-draw appliances such as a CPAP machine or oxygen generating device, which are often important for home health care.  Check the appliance's power draw and make sure the battery bank you buy has adequate power and storage capacity to cope with its needs.

The next category is what I'll call medium power banks, 1.5-4KW in power and a similar storage capacity in KWh.  These are general-purpose workhorses, usually portable, and with enough stored energy to be useful for several hours before needing to be recharged.  My personal favorite at present is the Bluetti Elite 400, for two reasons:  one, its capacities are 2.6KW power and 3.84KWh storage capacity, which meet most of our needs, and two, it's on wheels with an extendable handle.  Being a larger, heavier unit (about 85 pounds), and because my wife and I both have health issues restricting us from lifting heavy loads, the Elite 400 is much easier for us to move around the house if necessary.  There are, of course, many competitors to the Bluetti.  Shop around and see which you prefer.  Also, don't forget extension cords so you can plug in your fridge, freezer(s), etc. to the power bank, no matter where it is.

Finally, there are whole-house battery banks, some from providers such as Bluetti, some permanent installations such as the Tesla Powerwall.  Such banks are much larger than portable units, and many require professional installation, usually along with solar power panels to keep them charged when grid power is shut off for any reason.  They're an excellent solution, but very expensive;  the least you can expect to pay for all components (batteries, solar panels, wiring, plus installation) is usually $25,000 or more.  On the other hand, they tend to work very well, and give owners peace of mind.  (For example, you can read Divemedic's blog posts on his Florida installation at this link, from most recent to oldest.)

I find battery banks' convenience and ease of use to be head and shoulders above any other low- to medium-cost solution.  We have the equivalent of about 14KWh stored across a few units, charged and ready to go, which should be enough to get us through two to three days before we have to run a generator to recharge them.  With judicious use and not wasting power, I think we could go several weeks without electricity from the grid, if we had to.

What about heat?  If the HVAC system goes out, we're reduced to what we can power using our battery banks and/or generator.  In both cases, in extreme temperatures, we'd move into one or two rooms and heat or cool only them.  For heating indoors, a fireplace is a very desirable option, and/or a wood-burning stove:  if you don't have one, but can fit one to your home at an affordable price, I highly recommend it.  Otherwise, I use and recommend the Mr. Buddy propane indoor-safe heaters, which utilize the familiar green Coleman fuel cylinders and can be fitted with an adapter to run them off conventional propane cylinders.  (With any fire or propane heater, remember the danger from carbon monoxide, and take appropriate precautions!)

There are electric options if you don't like fire or other fuel.  Given a suitable size of power bank, you can buy low-power electric heaters from 400W up to about 900W.  A medium-size power bank can run a 400-500W heater all night long.  They're not very hot, but will warm a 10x10 foot bedroom, which will do nicely in freezing weather.  Larger rooms, not so much - but then, in an emergency, one has to compensate by adjusting one's lifestyle.  If you have an electric blanket, a medium-size power bank will also run that all night long, making things very snug.

What if it's summer, and you want to keep things cool?  Air-conditioning units are power hogs, to put it mildly.  Even the smallest window or stand-alone unit will drain an average power bank in a couple of hours.  I'd suggest using fans instead of air-conditioners, and venting the hot air inside through windows and doors as the day cools down.  Only a whole-house power backup system will allow you to run your HVAC as usual, even without incoming power from the grid.

Cooking?  Use camping gear such as butane or propane stoves.  They're simple, relatively cheap, and work on almost any surface.  You won't (I hope!) burn them long enough to pose a carbon monoxide hazard:  if that worries you, use them on a table in your garage.  I'd suggest having two burners, because a single burner might limit what dishes you can cook (and get extra fuel cartridges for them).  The good old Coleman 2-burner camping stove has been around for decades, and still works well, but it's a lot more expensive than it used to be.  Buying two single-burner butane stoves can often be much cheaper.  Make sure to clean the stove(s) and cooking utensils thoroughly;  sanitary cooking conditions are important for your family's health.

I won't speak to needs such as food, clothing, warm blankets, etc.  We've addressed those subjects several times in the past, and many Web sites have done likewise.  You pays your money and you takes your choice.  However, there are a few things you'll do well to remember.

1. If your kids need to be entertained, have a stock of board games, coloring books and crayons, etc. on hand.  Game consoles, etc. are not useful if you can't switch them on!  TV's can be a problem because of their power consumption.  If you want to use one, get an extra power bank for the purpose.
2. Batteries, batteries, BATTERIES!!!  Make a note of what size of battery (AAA, AA, C-cell, D-cell, 9V, etc.) your toys and small appliances need, and then stock up on them (and rotate your stocks frequently, so you always have fresh supplies when you need them).  I keep at least 50 AAA and 50 AA cells on hand, and I try to buy only small battery appliances that use that size.  I have a dozen C- and D-cells, and 9V as well, just in case.  For a larger family, I'd say 100 of each important size is not unreasonable.
3. If it's going to freeze, get your emergency supplies into the house and out of the worst cold before the storm hits, if possible.  It's no fun to have a week's water in reserve, in case your taps and/or pipes freeze up - only to find that your reserve water containers are also frozen!
4. Have plenty of paper plates and bowls, and plastic drinking cups, available.  That way, you won't have to waste water and time washing up dishes.  You can simply throw it all away.
5. For your vehicles, have windscreen de-icing fluid, ice scrapers, show brushes, etc. on hand, and use them regularly so you can drive if you have to.  It may be better not to, but if you have to get a family member to a doctor or hospital quickly, or evacuate to a hotel if your home becomes uninhabitable for some reason, you want to be able to move quickly.
6. Keep in touch with friends and family nearby.  Make sure everybody's OK.  You could save lives that way.

That's a quick pass through most of the questions I was asked.  If you have something I haven't addressed, please ask it in Comments:  and readers, please feel free to answer such questions, or contribute ideas from your own experience.  We can all learn from each other.

Stay safe out there!

Peter

A quick storm update from northern Texas

 

So far, so good.  The major roads in our area are skating rinks, and a light sleet is falling (more like ice dust at present).  We're told that snow will arrive later today, extending through the evening.  The birds are thick in the branches of our backyard tree, and complaining bitterly that their water dish is frozen and their food is buried under a layer of ice.  Our cats want us to let them indoors, so they can "assist them by warming them up by chasing them".  Er . . . no!

We have an abundance of food and warm layers to wear.  If the power goes out, we have a camping cookstove and plenty of fuel for it, a few decent-size power banks, a couple of kerosene heaters and fuel for them (not to be used in the house, but they'll keep the garage from freezing), a generator, and plenty of gasoline for it.  I think we're as prepared as we can be on a limited budget.

Most of our group of co-conspirators partners in crime friends appear to be doing OK.  Our usual Saturday supper together isn't happening this weekend, because most of us would end up in the ditch or hitting something expensive if we tried to drive.  We'll make up for it next week.

I hope all is well with you, dear readers.  Let us know in Comments how you're faring.

Peter

Batten down the hatches!

 

It looks like the first Snowmageddon and Icemageddon of the year are about to hit us (well, maybe the second Icemageddon, if you count the first as being what ICE is up to in Minnesota, Maine and elsewhere).  The stores around here are pretty much sold out of anything that looks like ice scrapers, snow brushes, windshield de-icing fluid, and so on.  Firewood is at a premium, propane gas cylinders are being refilled until the suppliers run out, and appliances using propane, white fuel or kerosene are in short supply.

I haven't had to buy much, as we're pretty well supplied most of the time.  I just have to bring into the house enough firewood for a couple of days, a propane cookstove and small heater in case the power goes out, and charge up our battery power banks, which should give us two days or so of portable electric power if needed.  Our generator decided not to start when I tested it, so I picked up the necessary bits and pieces to service it tomorrow.  It shouldn't be too hard to get it going.

It does look as if this is going to be a very big, very widespread storm.  Those of you in the path of the heaviest predicted ice and snow, which looks to be from southern Oklahoma and north-eastern Texas through to Washington D.C. and surrounding area, please be careful.  Ice beneath heavy snow is a really nasty thing to encounter - particularly when the snow turns to slush, but the ice beneath is still frozen.  Skid city!

(One of my favorite memories of my time in Louisiana was the New Year of 2000 - or was it 2001?  At any rate, I had to drive from Winnfield to Monroe to attend a medical examination for my green card (permanent resident permit), which I couldn't miss because it would knock me out of the process until another could be scheduled.  There was an ice storm the day and night before.  When I got up next morning, the world was white and sparkly, and the roads were pretty frozen.  I had no choice but to drive, so I left two hours early in my rear-wheel-drive pickup and drove the whole way, very gingerly, at about 20-25 mph.  The whole way up, I passed four-wheel-drive pickups in the ditch, one every few hundred yards.  Louisiana state police were in attendance at many of them, and I learned some new words from some of them about rednecks and Cajuns - or worse, Cajun rednecks! - who thought they could drive on ice as they normally did, so long as they did so in four-wheel-drive.  Of course, all that got them was a four-wheel skid!  I made it safely to Monroe, albeit with a few scares and slides, and made it back the same way.  Not fun!)

Anyway, I hope and pray all of you are (and will continue to be) safe and well, and warmly bundled up against the snow and ice.  Power failures are forecast to be widespread, so if this blog doesn't come up for a few days, that'll probably be the reason.  (I may have emergency power at home, but the Internet service will probably be down.)  I'll see you when I see you.

Peter

Shades of 2020... are we seeing George Floyd redux on the left?

 

When it comes to politics, I'm not a great believer in coincidences.  When headlines, proclamations and exhortations pop up like weeds around the same subject, there's always some form of coordination behind them.  If anyone denies that, they're most likely part of the coordination effort.

That's what we're seeing now in connection with ICE's immigration enforcement:  a concerted, organized effort to paint the agency as evil, and its agents as villains and demons, and to use both as levers to attack President Trump.  It's shades of the George Floyd riots all over again.  Consider these headlines (and click on any one to read the article concerned):

• Renee Nicole Good was Minneapolis ‘ICE Watch’ ‘warrior’ who trained to resist feds before shooting
• Crockett warns of nationwide protests over ICE shooting: 'State-sanctioned execution'
• WALZ’S REBELLION: Minnesota Governor ... Threatens to Activate National Guard Against Federal Law Enforcement
• ‘Stoking the Grievance Industry’: Leftist Groups Mobilize After ICE Shooting in Minneapolis
• Chaos!: Democrats Use Minneapolis Shooting to Push Their Anti-Trump 2026 Campaign Theme
• Just how insane did Democrats become on immigration?
• Who Is Helping Low IQ Migrants Defraud American Taxpayers?

Those are just a few examples of the torrent of articles (from both left and right wing authors and sources) about the present political and social situation.

If you can't see parallels between the riots of 2020 and those of 2026, I fear you're living in cloud cuckoo land.  The left, progressive wing of US politics is trying to whip up fear, anxiety and doubt around the issue of illegal aliens and illegal immigration (although they're very careful never to use, or accept the legitimacy of, either of those terms).  They want to make it a standard around which to rally support, and to undermine the policies and actions of the Trump administration. To achieve that end, demonstrations and riots, public violence, even looting and trashing other people's property, are merely tools in their toolbox.  The "restraints" of law, common decency, and ethical and moral behavior are a joke to them.  They use those things against those who believe in them.

In South Africa we used to say that the left wing (meaning, in that country, the anti-apartheid forces during the 1980's) were trying to make the country ungovernable.  To a considerable extent, they succeeded, leading to that country's first-ever democratic elections in 1994.  They used violence, controlled and uncontrolled, as just another method of applying pressure.  It cost us tens of thousands killed, possibly hundreds of thousands - we'll never know - and they still haven't stopped.  Stress kills, even after many years and many miles.  (See, for example, my 2008 article about the death of a good friend.)  I'm convinced that my heart attack in 2009, out of the blue with no warning, was just such a delayed-effect reaction to all those years.

With that experience behind me, I can say with absolute confidence that precisely the same tactics (particularly intimidation and aggression) are being used against conservatives, and against law enforcement officers and agencies (with particular emphasis on the Department of Homeland Security and the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency).  The lyrics are different, but the tune is the same.  The fatalities here are a lot less, too . . . for now.

Folks, remember how disrupted things became in 2020 and 2021?  Expect it to happen again.  If you live in cities (and I sincerely hope many of you heeded my earlier warnings and left big cities behind you), you're going to be right on the spot.  Think it won't affect you?  I have news for you . . . the success of the left depends on you feeling their wrath personally, and being afraid of them, and therefore voting the way they want in order to "make it stop".  They won't leave you alone.

If you're still city-bound (and even if you're not), pay extra attention to the following:

• Make sure your emergency preparations, food and ammo stocks, etc. are as ready as possible.  Expect there to be another run on firearms and ammunition, just like 2020/21, as those who hadn't prepared in time try to do so at short notice.  If your own supplies are a little threadbare, beat the rush and stock up now, while prices are still relatively low.  Service and lubricate your firearms, and load your spare magazines!  There's nothing quite so useless in a defensive emergency as an unloaded magazine... or, perhaps, an empty fire-extinguisher when your house is burning.  (You do have fire-extinguishers - quality ones, of a reasonable size - in your home, don't you?  When did you last check them?)
• Design, prepare and practice emergency drills with your spouse and children, and anyone else who lives with you.  Be ready for an emergency if one arrives unannounced.  Liaise with your neighbors, and arrange with those of them who are realists to help each other if the need arises.  Keep your vehicle(s) serviced and at least half-filled with fuel, ready to leave in a hurry, and have at least 72-hour bug-out bags packed for every member of your household.
• Have spare cash on hand, as much as you can afford.  In an emergency, some vendors are likely to refuse credit cards, and/or the card charging systems might be out of service.  Cash is king!

Finally, if Minneapolis 2020 looks like it's coming to your neighborhood, be somewhere else!  Let insurance pay for repairs and replacement for any damage they do to your home and vehicles.  That's what insurance is for.

Peter

A very timely reminder about emergencies

 

The former Secretary-General of NATO, Lord Robertson of Britain, is not complacent about the danger of war in Europe.  He warns that Britain, and by extension every other country in NATO, needs to better prepare its citizens for what might happen.

Robertson has a torch [flashlight] on his key ring, in case the lights go out, and some spare money, in case the ATMs stop working in London.

“We are under attack,” Robertson, 79, said. He is now a Labour peer and has met Putin nine times.

“He (Putin) is a very different individual to the one that I did business with.”

. . .

“I think we are being tested. They’re going to the edge of what they think is acceptable. They won’t go across that line, at this point,” Robertson said of Russia.

Targeted assassinations, cyberattacks, sabotage and disinformation campaigns are all examples of Moscow’s so-called grey zone activities.

“That’s the way in which you undermine western societies. There is no doubt at all, there is a challenge to the West,” he added.

. . .

“With our adversaries becoming bolder and our critical national infrastructure becoming more fragile and much more on a knife edge, we need to be much much better prepared than we are today,” he said “It won’t be enough to wait to until the lights go out and the hospitals shut and the data centres melt because the air conditioning has gone out and the traffic lights have stopped and the ATMs don’t work anymore.

“At that point, people will expect government to have done something,” he said.

. . .

Robertson was as “ready as I could be”, with torches [flashlights] in every room, a battery-powered radio and a stockpile of food and water.

He said it was also the case in the UK that the public needed to have “resilience” in case there were civil emergencies or financial disasters.

Following Knighton’s speech at the Royal United Services Institute (Rusi) this week, he suggested the government could start to engage the public by issuing booklets to prepare UK citizens for war, such as Sweden’s recent If Crisis or War Comes.

There's more at the link.

All the risks he highlights are likely to occur in the USA as well.  We've already had concrete evidence of the dangers:

• Known terrorists identified and arrested within our borders, some even legally admitted due to lax background checks;
• Foreign students trying to smuggle dangerous bacteriological material into the USA (and don't tell me it's for "research" - if it was, they could legally obtain all they need within the country, without smuggling.  They can only have been planning to position it to do as much damage as possible if and when released);
• Foreign criminal gangs and drug cartels actively setting up cells and groups in almost every major US city, including smuggling weapons, illegal narcotics and other dangerous substances across our borders.

Such people, and/or those they've influenced, could very easily disrupt a city by the simplest of sabotage activities.  I'm not going to go into details, for obvious reasons, but back in the day, I was a sector officer in civil defense for one of South Africa's largest cities.  I know whereof I speak.  The ease with which ordinary, everyday services and utilities could be disrupted was enough to make for sleepless nights, and now that everything's dependent on computer systems and (increasingly) artificial intelligence, they are even more vulnerable.  That's why China, among others, is trying to deliberately infiltrate as many industrial, commercial and control networks as possible - so that it can disrupt them at the flick of a switch if it should become necessary to them.

I'm not a doom, gloom and disaster merchant.  I don't run around crying "Wolf!"  However, the evidence of these dangers is all around us, and I don't have to make up a thing to justify improving our personal and family preparedness for the sorts of problems and disruptions that may occur.  I daresay most American households could not survive serious shortages or systemic breakdowns for as little as a week;  a month is probably out of the question for most of them - yet I (and many others) regard a month as a minimum period to be able to get by without outside assistance.  Attitudes toward preparedness need to change, and change quickly, if we're to be able to withstand the sort of problems raised by Lord Robertson, the Swedish government, and so many others.

A timely reminder indeed.

Peter

Need meat for long-term storage? Here's a very useful option

 

A few readers have contacted me asking what sort of meat they should buy for long-term storage and emergency use.  All the usual answers are well-known, particularly a freezer filled with the meat you normally eat:  but in a long-term emergency situation, you may not have power to run your freezer.  That's where dried and/or canned meat comes in.  (Jerky is basically dried meat, of course, although often over-seasoned.)  I also keep a stock of pemmican, as I wrote a few weeks ago.  What else do I recommend?

Some time ago, author and friend Mike Williamson introduced me to Grabill Country Meats in Indiana.  They're an Amish-run company, producing cans of beef, port, turkey and chicken preserved the Amish way, boiled in the can with water and nothing else at all.  The meat tastes delicious and lasts a very long time, so much so that they don't put a "best by" date on the can.  Last Monday I opened a can of pork chunks that I bought from them twelve years ago, and it looked, smelled and tasted just as good as one bought last year.  Delicious!

They sell 13oz. and 27oz. cans in boxes of twelve only.  I make sure we always have some in our long-term storage, simply because I've never found better-tasting, easier-to-use canned meat.  Their cans may seem expensive, but if you work it out on a cost-per-pound basis (particularly considering the quality of their meat), it's not bad.  The larger cans work out considerably cheaper per pound than the smaller ones, of course.  Shipping costs are a bear, but anything heavy has that problem.

So, if you want to keep a few (or more than a few) cans of "emergency meat" around to feed yourself and your family, Grabill Country Meats has my strong recommendation.  Being canned chunks, it can't be roasted or fried, but it makes great stews and soups.  In emergency, it can be eaten cold out of the can with a spoon.  Good stuff.

Peter

He's not wrong

 

Fellow blogger Divemedic brings a timely warning.

Alarm bells should be ringing with the news that the government sold $694 billion in Treasury securities spread over 9 auctions in only three days. Yeah, our national debt now stands at $38.2 trillion. The most alarming thing about this news is that T-bill yields are rising. The 10-year Treasury yield is now at 4.15%. At that rate, the interest on our debt will be more than $1.5 trillion per year. Since Americans only pay about $2.4 trillion in Federal taxes each year, we are edging closer to the point where our debt will begin to grow like a snowball rolling down a mountain.

The only way to keep the government solvent at that point would be to inflate the currency in order to pay it with lower valued money. At that point, inflation will be higher than interest rates, and it will no longer be financially possible to invest in government bonds. This will in turn cause higher rates, which will also create a need for higher inflation. In other words, hyperinflation is the only way out, but that will cause a complete collapse of the US dollar.

There's more at the link.

I can't disagree with anything he says.  We've spoken often about debt in these pages, whether government, business, or individual.  The inevitable result of too much debt is bankruptcy, in one form or another.  A government can't really go bankrupt in the classical sense of the term, because it has laws (and can pass more) to protect it:  but it will still not be able to afford the routine expenditure we expect from government.  (Even if it tried, savvy businesses would refuse to accept government checks or money orders if they weren't sure they'd be able to cash them.)  If you are reliant on government money to feed, house and clothe your family from month to month, you'd better be making plans for when that money is no longer available, and/or has been so (deliberately) inflated that it will no longer buy you all you need.

I also repeat our earlier warnings to get out of debt if at all possible.  Sometimes this can't be done, due to factors beyond our control:  but certainly don't take on any more debt, unless it's a matter of life or death (e.g. an emergency medical procedure), and don't neglect paying down (and hopefully paying off) debt you already owe.  Don't carry balances on your credit cards - pay them off in full every month.  Don't run accounts at stores - buy for cash, or do without.  Forget "payday loans" or other ultra-short-term loan options (including buy-now-pay-later schemes).  They're only designed to enrich the person or institution making the loan, not the one repaying it.

In particular, prepare now for what might hit us if the dollar does lose much of its remaining value.  Try to have one to three months' worth of food stockpiled and ready for the day you can't afford to buy more.  Try to have an emergency fund of at least one months' expenditure on normal bills, and three to six months if possible - and make sure that includes rent, electricity and other utilities.  There's no point in having food available if you have no electricity to keep it frozen or to cook it!

All these are basic measures, to be taken during good (or at least better) times in order to make it through the bad times.  Take as many of these step as you can afford, and plan ahead (and around) to deal with those you can't afford.

Peter

Yay pemmican!

 

A few years ago I mentioned Steadfast Provisions and their pemmican products.  Earlier this year I boosted their fundraiser, aimed at building a brand-new, much-updated commercial kitchen to produce much larger quantities of pemmican and other products.  I'm very glad to report that the new kitchen is up and running, and their pemmican is better than ever.  If this article sounds like I'm shilling for them, well, I guess I am, because I really like to see small businessmen come up with a good idea and make a living out of it - and I just plain like pemmican anyway!

(In case you didn't know much about pemmican, there's a very informative article about it at their Web site.  Recommended reading.)

The new product is similar to the old, but more finely ground, producing a powdery rather than a granular substance when crushed or folded into other foods.  I find the flavor much improved, too.  Last time I ordered the salted-only pemmican, without seasoning.  It was fine, but very bland, designed more to be added to other foods (e.g. soup or stew), or supplemented with flavorings if eaten alone.  In this way it would taste more like the main dish, but provide added protein.

This time I ordered the seasoned version, and find it's much more palatable to eat on its own, even without adding anything else.  The texture appears much closer to Plains Indian descriptions of it, where it was eaten by the pinch out of a parfleche rawhide bag.  I tried some yesterday flavored as the Indians did, with honey dripped over it - delicious!  One can also add dried or fresh berries for a fruitier, sweeter flavor.

I plan to keep several bricks of this stuff in stock as an emergency supply.  One could exist by eating only pemmican, if one had to, but that would get boring fairly quickly!  I regard it as an excellent "bug-out" food, energy-rich and nutritious, easy to get to while walking or driving.  The new version tastes good enough that I'll probably be eating some as a snack on a regular basis, too.  I don't think one could possibly get foods that are more "keto" than pemmican, so I'll take advantage of that.

I prefer to buy the "brick" package of pemmican, containing 2.2 pounds of concentrated beef.

It may seem expensive, with a price tag of $97 for 2.2 pounds of pemmican, but bear in mind how greatly the "raw" weight of meat has been reduced in the production process.  One of those bricks contains over 10 pounds of raw beef, and given the price of good-quality beef today, that's a bargain in anyone's language.  If you'd like to try something smaller and lower-cost, the company also makes a pemmican bar for $17.  Expect them to be hard to find for a few months as the word spreads about the company's new production and new flavors.

To all my readers who contributed to Steadfast Provisions' fundraiser, thank you very much.  IMHO, it's been worth the wait to get their new premises into production.

Peter

"A timebomb waiting to go off"

 

That's how British economist Jeremy Warner describes the US stock market at present.

According to the UBS Investment Returns Yearbook, US equities today account for more than 60pc of the value of global equities as a whole, up from around 40pc 15 years ago.

Yet in nominal terms, US GDP is just 26pc of the global total, and even less at around 15pc in purchasing parity terms.

The mismatch between equity valuations on the one hand and actual economic heft on the other could scarcely be more striking. It also looks increasingly hard to justify.

. . .

Yet impressive though this phenomenon may be, it is also indicative of something much more worrying: a giant, all-consuming investment bubble at the heart of the global economy.

Almost everyone wants a part of Silicon Valley’s investment boom. In hoovering up an ever-greater proportion of the world’s supply of available capital, it threatens a frenzied and devastating end to America’s 15-year-long bull market.

. . .

If everybody else is getting rich from America’s stock market boom, the temptation to join in becomes almost irresistible.

I’ve been following stock markets for longer than I care to remember, and though we can all claim to have had the occasional success in spotting the turning points, the big lesson is that prediction is a mug’s game. Hardly anyone manages it consistently.

Here goes, anyway. The telltale signs of euphoria and over-exuberance – and therefore of capital misallocation bound eventually to culminate in loss – are today everywhere to be seen.

There's more at the link.

The inexplicable thing, to me at any rate, is that there are so many hair-trigger moments baked into our current economic cake that any one of them could bring down the entire house of cards, virtually overnight.  Think about it:

• Russia launches massive retaliation (economic and possibly military) against NATO states which are supporting Ukraine?
• China invades Taiwan?
• President Trump activates the US armed forces to tackle the drug cartels in Mexico, Venezuela and elsewhere?
• A new Middle East war severs oil supply routes from the Persian Gulf to the Indo-Pacific region and China?
• The Internet is shut down due to many incidents of sabotage, all of which may be suspected as coming from Russia, but which can't be proved as such in the initial stages?

All these things have already happened, or precursors to them have happened, on a smaller scale.  They could ramp up overnight, leading to major disruptions in geopolitics and world economics . . . yet we're all behaving as if they aren't factors of importance at all.

Add to them major internal political disruptions in all the major nations involved (USA, Britain, France, Germany, and so on) where there is no national unity whatsoever on how to deal with the problems facing each country, or all of them together.  Some are calling for "Governments of National Unity", but when there is no national unity, that's a wee bit tricky to achieve.

And through all this, business and commerce carry on blithely earning and spending money as if there's no tomorrow, no interruption possible.  We're living in a house of cards, and utterly ignoring that reality all around us.

Therefore, dear readers, I can only suggest that we focus on the absolute basic needs of our lives and cover as many of those bases as we possibly can.

• Build and maintain a reserve of food and emergency supplies (toilet paper, light bulbs, candles, fuel, essential medications, etc.) to last as long as possible.  My gut feel is that a minimum emergency stash should be able to take care of one's household for thirty days, and three months is even better.  I'm not sure whether six months to a year is as important, because if the crisis (whatever it may be) goes on that long, others will come to our door intent on stealing what we've got, bringing with them a whole new set of problems.
• Know how to defend your home, your loved ones, and your emergency supplies, and have an adequate supply of the tools and equipment needed to do so, and don't hesitate to do so if this becomes necessary.
• Build up a local network of friends and associates who can help each other make it through hard times.  I've been forcibly reminded of this during my current post-surgery recovery period.  Right now my physical condition will almost completely preclude me from defending or working for my family and loved ones.  Do I have other friends I can rely upon to "step into the gap" and do it for me until I'm on my feet again?  I'd better have!

Get as many as possible of these building blocks in place before worrying about what the stock market is doing.  Only when you've achieved that should you worry about things you can't control.

Just my $0.02 worth . . .

Peter