You are assuming that any of those options are available when the SHTF. Basic needs such as water, food, shelter and self preservation are going to be the immediate focus for the average person not joining some para military group or militia. It’s not that cut and dry when chaos ensues and survival becomes the main focus, as human nature is unpredictable. Go ask rural Californians who are dealing with the power issues right now, they will tell you what to prep for.
No one knows the future. Even if we somehow could be absolutely certain that Something will Hit the Fan at some point, with the social order breaking down, we cannot say exactly how it will happen. The US is too diverse, the interacting variables are too many. Who could have predicted what’s happening at this moment in Iran?
All we can do is take some prudent preparations, depending on how likely we think it is that something bad is coming. If you think there is absolutely no possibility of the current situation of law and order and a functioning economy ever changing for the worse, then of course you should not do anything. If you are absolutely certain that this is not true, you should spend some serious time on it.
People are natural optimists: that’s why, after a volcanic eruption and/or mudslide wipes out villages on the slopes of a mountain, after a few years, people reappear there and build again. We can smile at what seems to us their foolishness, but … they thought it was their best option. Those villages were built there for a reason: good access to land and water, perhaps. So … maybe it won’t happen again.
As I see the Democratic Party being taken over by the post-American Left, who themselves are being pushed by the anti-American Left … and as I see the “cultural apparatus” in America being peopled by those trained in the universities by the America-despising Left … and knowing that the Democrats have a natural, and growing, majority … I’m pretty sure that bad times are coming.
If the world were on course towards the broad sunlit uplands, as Churchill called it – all nations getting more prosperous, liberal democratic norms advancing steadily around the world, war among nations becoming like war among the Europeans has become – I wouldn’t worry. We would be moving towards a post-nation future, a benevolent ‘New World Order’, in which national boundaries and ethnic distinctions fade into insignificance over the generations. But that’s not happening now, whatever the very long term prospects of such a development.
China is moving up, we are being displaced from Number One status, the Marine Corps will have females in the rifle platoons, some of which will be commanded by transgenders and homosexuals. This won’t be happening in the militaries of our adversaries.
All serious differences among people are settled by raw force. In the best of situations, this raw force is under democratic command and constitutional constraints, and we call it the justice system and the military. If this scaffolding is pulled down, anyone without recourse to organized force and violence will become the victims of those who do have access to it.
Beat your sword into a plowshare, and you will end up pulling the plowshare for the fellow who kept his sword.
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Well that is a tangential response as well as a verbose one to what was a short reply. Go figure!
Thank you for starting and maintaining a thoroughly interesting thread. Those are few and far between here as many of our threads morph at one speed or another into mindless pissing matches with participants of same being obviously unable to communicate using sensibly crafted paragraphs rather than puerile one-liners. (I admit some guilt in this activity.)
I’m guessing by your username that 1943 is the year you were born. If correct, you and I differ in age by 12 months or less as I first took a breath of air in March of '43.
Likely, we have experienced first hand many similar happenings and certainly existed through many happenings (including discoveries and inventions) that affected our lives from afar.
I look forward to Part 2.
The state of America’s social order isn’t the only thing pulling on the country. Foreign interference and military adventurism is taking a toll and the infrastructure in America is looking increasingly like developing countries in many sectors and though we once held the number one slot in a host of things like education, quality of life, health and infant mortality, research and development etc., etc… THE COUNTRY IS IN DECLINE.
I’m not sure that everybody would consider such behavior optimistic…
Thank you for the kind compliment, and your guess is correct. You are senior to me by nine months.
Dr_Manhattan is not wrong. I have never mastered the art of saying what needs to be said in a few words.
As regards one-liner pissing matches – this seems to be very common in forums. And it’s not just beween Lefties and Righties – conservatives are perfectly happy to tear each other apart at the slightest opportunity. I suppose the anonymity of the internet encourages this.
Part Two in due course.
My comments were not predicated on his. I had been conjuring up that post long before I got to the bottom of the thread. Coincidence should not be conflated with causality.
The system of identifying which post is being replied to here is flawed. It does not clearly identify replies that are directed at the OP and often incorrectly allows inference that the reply was to the previous post.
On occasion, posters are puzzled (and even miffed) by a post that follows their own.
Quite so…and anonymity is likely the major catalyst. Mental development is likely second with knee-jerk puerility by adults who actually know better taking third.
I meant no slight towards you, I have a lot to learn as my elder brother Asaratis is correct in pointing out!
Don’t we all.
…
I maybe a lot of things but I do respect my elders! Thanks for reminding me of that.
The more I know, the more I realize how little I know.
I used to have all of the answers when I was a teenager. 
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My parents used to be so dumb. It’s amazing how much they learned by the time I grew up! 
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Meh, goes to show people mature over the years and change their stances as real life (not ideals) differentiate themselves into hard and cold reality. 
Actually, it was me that was dumb. I think you missed the sarcasm. 
No, I did not, my friend 
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I’ve decided to Lazarus this nearly-year-old thread, because some people found it interesting … and we’ve had a year of experience since we all last posted in it.
Have the events of the year that followed this thread tended to confirm, or refute, the prognostications of those of us who pontificated on the state of America:
(1) that it was in decline (lots of agreement there), and
(2) that the prudent person would take various steps to anticipate bad developments – not themselves predictable – in the future? (Not so much agreement.)
I personally think the ‘pessimists’ and the ‘preppers’ have been thoroughly vindicated.
Reading through these comments, I see a couple of themes that are worth remarking on:
(1) American military activity abroad – good or bad? (For us.) My view: once it was basically good – how can anyone think we should have been on Hitler’s side in WWII ???, now not.
The same for a lot of foreign aid (a lot of it military). We’ve sent nearly 80 billion dollars to Pakistan over the years – a country where the rulers lie like they breathe, which harbored Osama Bin Laden … are we insane, or just crazy? Most foreign aid should just be sent straight to the rulers’ Swiss bank accounts, to save transfer fees.
(2) The decline of religion. This is an interesting topic, worthy of a thread on its own. My own view: it used to believed by some, that the growth of science would undermine religious belief, but this did not happen. What has undermined it, I think, is economic security, and security in general. But this may have been a temporary phase.
However … I personally want to see maximum unity among genuine patriots, so I usually try to avoid arguing about religion, which can only divide us. It’s not an issue about which factual data has any bearing whatsoever.
We can argue about deficit financing, overseas military intervention, affirmative action, welfare, socialized medicine, global warming-- there is a range of viewpoints on every one of those issues, even among people who think of themselves as conservatives. Each side can mobilize historical examples, factual data, the opinions of trusted authorities, in support of his case.
And, at least in theory, you might persuade someone to change their mind. But not on religion.
(3) (I know a said ‘a couple’. It’s inflation.) The attitude of patriots towards the armed bodies of the state, the police and military.
First of all, do not think that a bunch of good ole boys with their ARs, even a few tens of thousands of them, will defeat the American military. Any armed confrontation between patriots and the military will be over in three hours, with the rest of the day spent filling body bags.
Don’t kid yourself about this.
We must be as close to the military as possible, in it if possible. The same goes for the police. (I’m going to post a how-to-do-this thread later on this.)
Secondly, the first point does not mean we should remain unarmed, and if armed, un-organized. On the contrary, we should both arm, and then organize. More about this in another thread, perhaps.
Anyway … forgive me, moderators, if bumping this thread up after so long is against some sort of rule or custom. But I thought that it would be interesting to see what a year’s experience – and what a year!!! – would bring on last year’s opinions.
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How can that be when Trump was suppose to MAGA…
Ha ha. Good question. I think we both know the answer.
Or, my answer: the deep tendencies that are destroying our country cannot be fundamentally altered now, by anything that we can realistically expect the government to do. Half the population sincerely believe that the problems of non-whites in America are caused by white racism.
In other words, they believe that if the populations of the inner cities were transferred to a virgin continent, where no whites were allowed, where they could rule themselves – that they would build a peaceful, prosperous society.
Now, no one really believes this – we all know what would happen. It’s called Liberia. But a large fraction of the white population pretends to believe this … and they tend to be the people who staff the cultural apparatus.
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