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Life After the Oil Crash
Deal With Reality or Reality Will Deal With You
Massive Winter Sale at LATOC Affiliate Nitro-Pak:
Best of luck,
Matt
The three likeliest states to have civil unrest first are Michigan, California and Ohio. These are the states hardest hit by job cuts. Ohio is of most concern to me. California is just huge and fragmented. The "fires" here would be rapidly "extinguished" by a state that has well-developed and longstanding historical plans for civil unrest going back to the 1960s. There are really probably five states in California and the fire is unlikely to spread from one "region" to another because each region has a different economic base and a different culture. Michigan is geographically off to the side of the board and already something of a "wasteland". There are no densely-packed masses of dry kindling nearby.
But Ohio is entirely different. Already devastated by auto layoffs and other massive corporate failures, Ohio's industrial areas border and are in close proximity to Kentucky, West Virginia, Indiana and Pennsylvania. Lots of kindling in those states. At the same time as Ohio is devastated by DHL, auto and other layoffs, much of the nation's high-tech wind turbine industry in Ohio is also shutting down at the same time… just when we need it. The snake eats its own tail
for nutrition. It is the way money works… for now.
Civil unrest in Ohio could easily infect across state lines here, and cross another fault line that runs east and west, separating north from south; the Mason Dixon. Other earthquakes might be triggered. Eastward from Ohio are Pennsylvania and New Jersey. I wonder how much inter-agency advance planning DHS and FEMA have gone through so that they might operate fluidly across many borders, radio frequencies and jurisdictions. Those contingencies were planned for in the Patriot Act which congress didn't or couldn't read before voting on it.
There isn't even ten per cent of the military manpower required to impose national martial law in the Continental U.S. (CONUS). But my guess is that there will be an expansion of troop deployment in the region around Ohio soon. We should all be watching where troops are stationed as they (and if) they start coming home.
We all will have a clear understanding of who Barack Obama is and what he represents in short order. He, his administration, and whatever his base is are going to have to show their cards soon. Very soon. What we know is that many of the so-called energy and economic "solutions" espoused by Barack Obama during the campaign and since the election will fail abysmally, at or near the gate. What we pray for are more frequent and stronger signals that ears are open to any who might have some real answers… namely the Peak Oil/Sustainability movement.
In the meantime… In looking at how civil unrest will unfold in the United States it has become pretty apparent that martial law, as we understand it will not be marked by either large numbers of troops/police in the streets or the oh-so-beloved concentration camp myths of the Far Right. The reason I have made this statement consistently for at least nine years is the same in both cases: lack of resources. There are not enough troops and there is also not enough money, food and manpower to put millions of Americans in expensive concentration camps… AND feed them.
The current economic paradigm's approach will be to leave as many displaced Americans as a self-mobile migrant work force that will feed, clothe and house itself on its own. That is much less expensive! Plus, when massive labor is needed it will take the labor pool to the work like a man dying of thirst will run for fresh water. The basic expense here is just to police and contain the mess, sort of put a fence around it.
I am one of the few fools to have read all of both the Patriot Act and the Homeland Security Act, I mean every word. I dissected both at FTW.
All these landmark pieces of legislation are really preparing for is two things. First, the absolute protection of critical infrastructure (e.g. water, power, telecommunications, Internet, hospitals, police and fire stations, airports, military bases, etc.). This is where the military will be used. Second, the maximized control of civilian populations through technology which can deprive them of access to both cash and credit (i.e. food and mobility). That coupled with nearly ubiquitous electronic surveillance and some very effective, non-lethal, area-denial weapons. Already I can see that millions of Americans are locking themselves into their own "die-off" prisons and the realization will not hit them for several years. I would not want to be locked in that virtual prison knowing my fate there.
I think it is much less likely that TPTB are interested in us… or even me. I think they more fear a Spartacus now – or many of them – emerging from those who are about to die. Those of us here who followed the map and changed our lives have removed ourselves from that demographic. We will be needed, and soon. We must be ready.
So MY FIRST RECOMMENDATION is this:
Unless you live in a place surrounded by concrete canyons, and if you have family or a close network, a real neighborhood, go out and buy 5 watt FM walkie-talkies with rechargeable batteries. It's been a few years since I've done research but these radios, which can reach up to two-and-a-half miles, are important for two reasons. First, they do not require any kind of licensing. Neither do they require the use of a satellite or a microwave relay tower. They can't easily be jammed or shut off. They are direct point-to-point and they will work when everything else fails.
A few on this blog were talking about Ham and shortwave. Both are going to be important but (repeating myself) we must survive the transition stage first. In all thinking now, start locally and work outward. If you do not command the ground under your feet you will never command the ground beyond it.
In an emergency you and your family might be forced to move in a mass exodus with large crowds. How will you know where your family is? How will you keep them together? How will you find one who is lost? How can you use your family to do things that others can't? Remember that if a bear attacks your campsite you do not have to be faster than the bear. You only have to be faster than the slowest camper. (Wink to Barry Silverthorne.) Quick, effective, close-in intelligence and reconnaissance will allow you to keep your heads while others are losing theirs.
Now I know that the Army Signal Corps and Army Security Agency have equipment capable of jamming all these FM frequencies in any battlefield condition. If you have this kind of communications at your disposal, however, you'll probably be far away by the time anything like that happens.
From now on start all of your immediate thinking from the local outward. Those of us who have tried so hard to save the world must also seriously think about saving ourselves as well. Source
Mike's got a pretty important post up today, the following excerpt deserves particular attention for those of you in Michigan, California, and Ohio:
I recommend the following basic bugout gear
ccc
