skepticalsurvivalist-blog
A Skeptical Survivalist
Survivalists are subject to negative stereotyping - with good reason. However, we aren't all tin-foil hat wearing, conspiracy theorist Chicken Littles.
My Goal: Provide a skeptical, balanced, and rational environmental scan of current news and commentary about Dramatic Change Events (DCE).
About me: A tolerant, socially liberal, gun owning, food-stocking, information science professional and former native of eastern Kentucky who questions everything, but doesn't ignore the signs that dramatic changes are happening all over the world - every day.
Who cares about speculation on the causes at this point, I'm watching the symptoms.
Topics: Global food crisis, survivalism, emergency preparedness, natural disasters, economic crisis, currency revaluation, inflation, peak oil, climate change, personal security, firearms, civil liberties, privacy, domestic surveillance, and more.
Email Contact : skeptical [dot] survivalist [at] gmail [dot] com
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NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- An oil price spike caused by a confrontation with Iran is now seen as the biggest threat to the U.S. economy.
That's according to nine out of 18 economists surveyed recently by CNNMoney. They say rising oil prices now outweigh the risks posed by the European debt crisis, ongoing gridlock over the budget in Washington and fears of a slowdown in China.
"An Iranian disruption of oil supplies could send oil prices to $200 a barrel," said Lynn Reaser, chief economist at the Fermanian Business & Economic Institute.
"It's something we're really concerned about," said Chris Lafakis, an economist at Moody's Analytics. "A military confrontation could push prices to $180 a barrel, which would precipitate a recession."
The economy, it appears, can handle oil around $100 a barrel and gas prices near $4 a gallon. While these prices are relatively high, consumer spending continues to rise.
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Look, I know this is serious. There are people hurting and dying because of this disease. However, I'd be amiss if I didn't point out the similarities between the Zombie mythos and the symptoms these people exhibit.
Severe seizures, nodding off, lack of appetite, personality changes, having to bind the kids down to keep them from wandering off , aversions to strange food, fire starters...ok, so not all of them fit, but enough to make it fall into that area of the unknown that scares the hell out of us.
It appears to be widespread, affecting large numbers and the manner of transmission is unknown.
...more than 3,000 other children in Northern Uganda, has been struck by the mysterious syndrome that has doctors and scientists puzzled and has shattered lives in this rural community.
Nodding disease gets its name from the strange nodding-like symptoms that children display in the first stages of a seizure. But doctors on the ground and at the U.S.-based Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) say that is the least profound effect.
Severe epilepsy-like seizures grip the children, they struggle to eat, and they become shells of their former selves. It is a progressive and debilitating syndrome that robs children of their future.
The seizures are triggered in strange ways, say community members, such as when unfamiliar food is brought to the children or when the weather changes.
There are other bizarre symptoms. Often the children will wander off by themselves and get lost in the bush. And other children will start fires, according to parents and medics in the field. Others appear confused and traumatized.
Read the full story
Wikipedia says that is has been spreading across numerous African countries for many years
Whatever the case, it truly is a tragedy.
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NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- The national average price for a gallon of gasoline rose for the ninth straight day on Sunday to $3.838. That is now only about 6.7% below the record high of $4.11 from July 2008.
The average price rose by three-tenths of a penny, according to the survey of gas stations conducted for the motorist group AAA. Gas prices are now up more than 17% this year.
The nationwide average was $3.52 a gallon a month ago and $3.76 a gallon on March 9 -- the day that prices started rising again after a few days of slight declines.
Gasoline averages more than $4 a gallon in seven states: Alaska, California, Connecticut, Hawaii, Illinois, New York and Washington. Gas prices are also above $4 a gallon in the District of Columbia, according to AAA. At nearly $4.48 a gallon, Hawaii ranks as the nation's high. Prices are less than a dime away from $4 a gallon in Michigan, Nevada, Oregon and Wisconsin.
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Washington (CNN) -- Most Americans can put away winter coats and umbrellas and break out the short sleeves and sunglasses even though spring doesn't officially begin until next week, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
In a 90-day weather outlook released Thursday, forecasters predict the unseasonably warm temperatures that have blanketed parts of the United States will continue into the summer, and much of the country will remain dry.
In fact, for the first time in four years, no area of the country will face a high risk of major flooding from April through June, due in large measure to a winter without much snow, forecasters said.
"We expect above-normal temperatures in the South and Eastern United States," said Ed O'Lenic, chief of operations at the Climate Prediction Center for NOAA's National Weather Service. He predicts temperatures could be half a degree to a degree and a half above normal in many parts of the country.
Above-normal temperatures are also predicted for the Southwest across Texas and the Gulf Coast, as well as the Atlantic Coast, the Ohio Valley and the Great Lakes region, according to NOAA. Temperatures in the Pacific Northwest and southern Alaska will be below normal.
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Obama outlaws Freedom of Protest (by RTAmerica)
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Drones coming to a space near you
This CNN story covers the rise in personal and commercial applications of drone technology - from real estate, to law enforcement, and search and rescue. You could even build your own if you knew what you were doing. It's a technology like any other - it can be used for good or bad purposes. I'm sure those of you who are gun owners can relate. However, like most new technologies, the laws and regulations concerning such a tool always fall significantly behind the practical usage and application.
In scenarios such as this I wonder how the libertarians would go? It can be used as an infringing tool against our privacy, but federal regulation is to be avoided. Can we have an unregulated free market and yet regulate by whom and how robot eyes are used without reinforcing a big government approach? I'm not a hardcore libertarian because these are the areas where their philosophy verges from mine. I believe there are a number of things it makes sense to regulate at the federal level.
Either way, law enforcement and private companies will be using this more each year and they will be looking at things most of us feel are private. If a Peeping Tom is hovering 200 yards away but zooming in on your window with telescopic lenses, isn't it the same scenario? I'll be curious to see what happens when they start to get shot down.
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Here we go. I thought the US might be holding Israel back, trying to keep gas prices from huge jumps, but here we are, admitting that we'll do whatever it takes....to start another Middle Eastern war.
"The United States will always have Israel's back when it comes to Israel's security," Obama said, repeating a line from the Sunday speech as Netanyahu nodded in agreement.
"I reserve all options and my policy here is not going to be one of containment; my policy is prevention of Iran obtaining nuclear weapons and, as I indicated yesterday in my speech, when I say all options are on the table, I mean it," Obama added.
Netanyahu said he welcomed Obama's "strong speech" on Sunday and noted that Iran considers the United States and Israel to be similar foes.
"For them, you're the great Satan, we're the little Satan," Netanyahu said. "For them, we are you, and you are us. And you know something, Mr. President? At least on this last point, I think they're right. We are you, and you are us. We're together. ... Israel and America stand together."
Why am I picturing Frodo and Sam?
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The price of unleaded gasoline in the U.S. will likely hit a nationwide average of $4 by this summer, said Dan Dicker, oil trader and author of "Oil's Endless Bid." The last time prices topped $4 was 2008 and Dicker said there's a one in three chance that gas could reach $5 a gallon.
If gas prices do head to those lofty levels, that could put a crimp in the economic recovery as consumers will likely cut down on spending if they have to pay more to fill up their cars.
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Homeland Security monitors Social Media for keywords and trends
The Department of Homeland Security has contracted with a private firm to provide aggregated information about trending topics and keywords from social media sites such as Twitter, Facebook, and I would assume site like Tumblr. So, if you've ever wanted to get on a no-fly list, here's your chance.
A "privacy compliance review" issued by DHS last November says that since at least June 2010, its national operations center has been operating a "Social Networking/Media Capability" which involves regular monitoring of "publicly available online forums, blogs, public websites and message boards."
The purpose of the monitoring, says the government document, is to "collect information used in providing situational awareness and establishing a common operating picture." Source - Reuters
Now, they are quick to point out that they are monitoring publicly available content, however, this still means that in the course of exercising your freedom of speech rights, you may still come under scrutiny. And who knows how many relevent keywords will get you added to a list and what the lists will be used for.
This isn't being paranoid - this is being realistic. They listen, watch, and aggregate. They compose profiles and calculate persons of interest. If you fit a profile they may watch you more closely. Maybe even use Patriot Act privileges to dig into your life.
For survivalists and preppers, there is added concern. If you insist on using cash, purchase bulk amounts of food, or express unpopular political points of view, you could already be a person of interest.
You don't know if they are watching YOU, but they are definitely watching the generic EVERYONE.
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I would think this would bode well for the dollar as the reserve currency if the Euro folded. However, I can't help but think that the crushing debt and defaults that would result as Greece, Spain, and Italy fell would throw us ALL into turmoil as a result.
Italian Prime Minister Mario Monti - "And it is very, very important that we all take this with great attention in order to avoid that something that was meant to be the culminating point of the European construction -- namely, the single currency -- turns out to be, through psychological negative effects, a factor of disintegration of Europe."
Europe may not disintegrate tomorrow -- and the Euro could some how squeak by in a two-speed European deal, but the deep divisions between those citizens who are now choking under the prospects of long-term, imposed debt burdens and the loss of sovereignty to German bankers and financiers could have the impact of a 21st century Versailles Treaty that dissolves the ties that have bound together the once fractious region.
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1. Iran is now threatening to strike at any third country in the region that aided Israel in an airstrike on Iran. The aftermath is therefore likely to be further conflict in the region.
2. Oil prices will spike. I imagine you could easily see $150 a barrel or maybe even more. This development could throw the US and Europe back into deep recession.
3. Hizbullah would likely launch rockets, causing at least severe inconvenience to some 1/4 of the Israeli public, which might well have to move house again, and possibly much worse if Hizbullah is able, as they claim, to target toxic gas storage in Haifa or even reactor at Dimona with modified Chinese silkworms. It is not clear that the Israeli public would appreciate all that trouble; they didn’t, in former PM Ehud Olmert’s case (his 2006 Lebanon war was extremely unpopular and his party is no longer in power). A Hizbullah official said on Sunday that Hizbullah would be willing to go to war with Israel if Syria were attacked, so it seems likely the same thing would hold true with regard to Iran.
4. Israel would destroy Lebanon infrastructure in revenge for Hizbullah rocket attacks.
Juan Cole is Richard P. Mitchell Collegiate Professor of History at the University of Michigan. Please read the other six points at his blog.
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READ THIS ESSAY! It's important.
[In] 2011, which showed the greatest weather extremes in our history — 56 percent of the country was either in drought or flood, which was no surprise since “climate change science predicts wet areas will tend to get wetter and dry areas will tend to get drier.” Indeed, the nation suffered 14 weather disasters each causing $1 billion or more in damage last year. (The old record was nine.) Masters again: “Watching the weather over the past two years has been like watching a famous baseball hitter on steroids.”
In the face of such data — statistics that you can duplicate for almost every region of the planet — you’d think we’d already be in an all-out effort to do something about climate change. Instead, we’re witnessing an all-out effort to… deny there’s a problem.
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Mountain Lion attacks six year old; Dad stabs it with pocket knife: this, my friends, is fucking survival....and one of the many reasons I always carry one or more knives.
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Although the U.S. focus remains on exerting diplomatic and economic pressure on Syria, the Pentagon and the U.S. Central Command have begun a preliminary internal review of U.S. military capabilities, CNN has learned. The options are being prepared in the event President Barack Obama were to call for them. Two senior administration officials who spoke about the review to CNN emphasized that U.S. policy for now remains the use of non-military options.
U.S. military beginning review of Syria options – CNN Security Clearance - CNN.com Blogs
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(CNN) -- The unexplained beachings of scores of dolphins over the past month along Cape Cod, Massachusetts, is the largest "single-species event" of its kind on record in the northeastern United States, a marine mammal specialist said Monday.
A total of 129 common dolphins have been found since the animals began stranding themselves in early January, said Katie Moore, marine mammal rescue and research manager for the International Fund for Animal Welfare.
Massachusetts stranded-dolphin death toll up to 92 - CNN.com
#mass animal kill#mass fish kill#stranding#dolphins#climate change#pollution#earth changes#survival#SHTF
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Terror 2012: Be Very Afraid - War with Iran Update: Feb 2nd
Currently, if you believe the news, THERE IS A LOT TO BE AFRAID OF. Fear has been a constant in the US since 9/11 and the creation and manipulation of the fears of the average American has become a powerful tool that is used daily to justify a staggering number of atrocities and infringements on our rights.
Terrorists are old hat after Osama bit the dust, but we still have doubled the number of people on the no-fly lists in the past year.
The U.S. government's list of suspected terrorists who are banned from flying to the United States or within its borders has more than doubled over the past year, a counterterrorism official told CNN Thursday.
The "no fly" list produced by the FBI now has approximately 21,000 names on it, according to the official, who has knowledge of the government's figures. One year ago about 10,000 individuals were on it.
Only about 500 people currently on the no-fly list are Americans, the official said.
But we have even bigger Villains now! If you haven't noticed Iran is in the news daily.
The latest annual US Intelligence community's threat assessment report had this to say:
As for Iran, the report said it will attempt to "undermine any strategic partnership between the United States and Afghanistan" and it continues to play a destabilizing role across the globe. The report cites the plot last year to kill the Saudi ambassador to the United States and concern about "Iranian plotting against U.S. or allied interests."
"The 2011 plot to assassinate the Saudi ambassador to the United States shows that some Iranian officials - probably including Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei - have changed their calculus and are now more willing to conduct an attack in the United States in response to real or perceived U.S. actions that threaten the regime," the report said.
If you remember the supposed plot to kill the Saudi ambassador, then you should consider how bogus that whole scenario was and view it as more pretense to begin the move up to war with Iran.
But Clapper goes on to say:
Iran has the technical ability to build a nuclear weapon, Clapper said. But he, CIA Director David Petraeus and others reasserted their stance that Iran is not building nuclear weapons, [WTF??] in subtle contrast to Israeli officials' statements that Iran could have nuclear capability within a year.
That was just the opening volley - the stories grow by the day.
Today the Washington Post's David Ignatius wrote that U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta "believes there is strong likelihood that Israel will strike Iran in April, May or June - before Iran enters what Israelis described as a 'zone of immunity' to commence building a nuclear bomb."
In fact Israel may very well do that. They are dying to get U.S. permission to do so, but they could decide to go at it on their own even if it risks hurting their ties with the US and the billions of dollars we give them.
This week Israel, in an effort to stoke the fear and pressure the US to take action, said that:
Iran is developing a missile capable of delivering payloads up to 10,000 kilometers (6,200 miles) away, Israel's vice prime minister charged Thursday.
Speaking to Israel's annual Herzliya national security conference, Moshe Ya'alon, who also serves as Israel's minister for strategic affairs, suggested that an Iranian military compound that mysteriously blew up late last year was developing a long-range missile capable of hitting the United States.
Ya'alon said the project was "aimed at America, not us" and said it served as further argument that Iran posed a "military problem" that needed to be stopped.
Today Israeli Military Intelligence Chief Major General Aviv Kochavi said:
Iran has completed the development of a nuclear weapon and awaits nothing more than a sign from Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei to start assembling its first nuclear bomb.
by the end of 2012 or early 2013 Iran may have a single nuclear bomb, but by 2015 the figure would jump to four or five.
The officer was essentially amplifying the words of his predecessor, Maj. Gen. (res.) Amos Yadlin, who said on Jan. 26 that as long ago as 2007 or 2008, Iran had already passed the point of no return in developing nuclear weapons.
His comments coincided with the findings published Thursday by the Enterprise Institute, an American think tank, that Iran would be able to manufacture a 15-kiloton nuclear bomb as soon as August of this year, just seven months from now.
Along the same lines, responding to YET ANOTHER fucking think tank, the chairman of the House intelligence committee told CNN that the U.S. military needs to do more to "scare" Iran away from pursuing nuclear weapons.
Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Michigan, made the comment in response to a question about a new report by the Bipartisan Policy Center that says the United States must put more teeth into its threat to use military power to stop Iran's nuclear ambitions.
In an interview with CNN, Rogers said more needs to be done: "I'm not saying we ought to bomb Iran, but you almost have to scare them, you have to frighten them to get to the right place."
In order to stop Iran's nuclear clock, the report said, the United States "needs to make clear that Iran faces a choice: it can either abandon its nuclear program through a negotiated arrangement or have its program destroyed militarily, by the United States."
Yesterday SHTFPlan reported on a DEBKAFile story about a large massing of US troops on several islands in the GULF.
President Barack Obama is reported exclusively by DEBKA-Net-Weekly’s military and Washington sources to have secretly ordered US air, naval and marine forces to build up heavy concentrations on two strategic islands –Socotra, which is part of a Yemeni archipelago in the Indian Ocean, and the Omani island of Masirah at the southern exit of the Strait of Hormuz.
Since 2010, the US has been quietly building giant air force and naval bases on Socotra with facilities for submarines, intelligence command centers and take-off pads for flying stealth drones, as part of a linked chain of strategic US military facilities in the Indian Ocean and Persian Gulf.
Like any article that can't name sources I take it with a grain of salt. If this is true, then another Middle Eastern Oil War is just around the corner.
Whether or not this is viable information, Iran is squarely in the cross-hairs of Israel and the U.S. right now.
I don't pretend to understand all of the motivations and political interests at stake, I'm just watching the rhetoric and where it is leading. You know what happened the last time we went after WMD's and what a crock of shit that turned out to be.
Question everything. Don't believe the hype. Why would Iran be stupid enough to attack the US? They aren't as crazy as Al Queda - we KNOW where they live and we DO have nuclear weapons. Lots of them.
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Remember how the nation was outraged over ‘Jihad Jane’? .. she wasn’t real. It was a created actor used to generate terror fears.
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