As a crazy 2016 comes to a close...

2016 has been a crazy year, even if you don't look at anything else that happened outside of the presidential election. 2017 promises to be even crazier, with Trump taking the White House in a few weeks and beginning his changes.

Everyone needs to "stay frosty" and "keep your powder dry" and all that stuff. Don't stop buying guns and ammo. Get a rainwater collection and filtration system set up for yourself. Store away food for long term outages. Train, read, research, collect information on your area and the outside areas. Trump is not the savior. He may make some good changes, might make some bad ones.

Hurricanes still happen. Societies still collapse. Economies still fall.

Don't stop prepping.

Happy New Year, we're still here, but get ready for a bumpy ride.

NSA code breaking "legend" says Russian hacking accusations are false.

William Binney is the man who created the NSA mass surveillance capability and is well known for being the NSA's best-ever code breaker and cryptanalyst. He spent part of his 36 years at Fort Meade managing over 6,000 NSA employees, and is responsible for mapping out the entire Soviet Command and Control structure. In this Zerohedge article, Binney calls BS on the accusations that Russia is responsible for hacking into DNC servers.

Let me make a point here: Let's assume for argument's sake that the Russians DID hack into the servers and make the private emails of Hillary and her staff public. Do I WANT foreign intelligence security services (FISS) hacking into our databases? Of course not. However, assuming that it has happened, does it change the relevance of the content of those documents? If the Russians hacked the email servers, are we morally or ethically obligated to then ignore the content and implications of those emails? Are we to simply excuse the wrongdoings that are exposed by those emails just because FISS is the one responsible for their exposure? Is it to be expected that we omit these findings from our decision-making when it comes to casting votes?

Absolutely not, and no honest person would argue otherwise.

No honest person would argue otherwise.

ICE is dumping bus loads of illegals at bus stops.

Yeah. This is our current immigration system under our lame duck president. ICE is bringing illegals from Central America by bus and offloading them on their own recognizance at bus stops. I don't expect anyone to be surprised, but it appears 0bama is doing whatever he can in his last days as president to wreak as much havoc as possible.

A record number of criminal pardons.

Dumping illegals at street corners.

Introducing thousands of new regulations.

Signing numerous executive orders.


Seems like his pen and phone are working overtime.

Commies gonna commie.

Retaliation against Russia?

Apparently the 0bama administration sees fit to announce some retaliatory measures against Russia for... Well I don't what it's actually for. Are they legitimizing their claims that Russia influenced the election? I'd say they need to be retaliating against John Podesta and Hillary herself, in that case.

In other news, apparently 0bama's many vacations (one of which he is currently on) have cost taxpayers 90 million dollars. This is why people hold politicians in such contempt. There are so many things that take place in government circles that are facially so absurd, and without logical or rational explanation. I would never ever be one to deny someone a vacation, especially not someone with a job that I'm sure is as stressful as POTUS, but regardless of how badly said POTUS needs or deserves a vacation, the facts of the reality we live in do not give a damn about that. The fact is that we have no money, so how in the world did we pay for all that?

How will the crackdown on patriots be done?

It is becoming more dangerous now to be a patriot than it was before, despite a rise in populism and the election of Donald Trump. As it says in the above linked Zerohedge article, the "Deep State" functions beyond the reach of Presidents and Congress, and they will do whatever they have to do to silence you.

Orwell is correct on political language.

More examples of the government stepping on the people.

As you see from this ZeroHedge article, the government is still, in many states, causing problems for people who are just trying to use private water sources as well as collect rainwater. This example is in Oregon.

The government NEEDS you to depend on them, or else people will realize there is little use for government. Government is a cancer that does nothing but grow itself. It is not in the nature of government to shrink itself, thus empowering people to seek Liberty. It is in it's nature to grow and become more and more powerful over the people.

Government must be kept small, and when it gets too big, it sometimes must be beaten back into submission.

What if you had a pond on your property that was collecting rainwater and you used it for watering your garden and animals and to fill your emergency water barrels for your family? One day the local government shows up and tells you to drain it and empty your barrels, because that water belongs to THEM. You say no, so you fight it in court and lose. This is obviously absurd, that any court of man could ever dictate that you can not use God-provided, naturally occurring rainwater and bodies of water on your private property to feed your garden and animals, and for your family to drink from in emergencies. Pure lunacy. So this absurd court rules against you, but you know you are right, as you have a natural right, unable to be infringed upon by any man, to drink rainwater. So what next? The local government tells their armed employees, the cops (they do not serve you, they serve their government bosses first), to knock on your door and order you to comply with the absurd mandate. You refuse, because once again, you have an assailable right to the rainwater that falls on your own head. No man can say otherwise no matter how much government he thinks he has behind him, and you are correct. The cops will attempt to kidnap you (they call it "arrest") and trap you in a cage (they call it the "county jail"), and you will still have to comply with their ridiculous orders to drain your water supply. When you resist against this kidnapping attempt, they will beat you into submission. When you attempt to defend yourself or your family against this beating, they very well may just shoot you to death in your home.

But don't worry. They will kill you for your own good.

I hope that rainwater tasted good.

The government, whether it be federal, state or local, NEEDS you to need them. They will MAKE you need them. Their existence depends on it.

Hope y'all had a good Christmas.

Spent most of the last several days either sick, or after that, visiting family for Christmas. I hope my readers, assuming there are any at all, had a good Christmas season.

Faithless electors turned more against Clinton than Trump.

The left has been pushing for the faithless electors to save America from Trump. I don't think anyone thought the result would be changed but I think most people could see clearly that not every elector was going to vote the way the people in their state ordered them to. What I think surprised some people and especially surprised the mainstream media (of course) was that Hillary Clinton actually lost more of her electors than Trump did. He only lost two while she lost four, and she nearly lost an additional two, but one was replaced and the other was forced to change their vote to Clinton.

In the end, the result is the same, Trump wins, and now it goes on to the House of Representatives for official counting, where they certainly sign off on Trump's electoral victory.

The last event I can think of pertaining to anything is that 0bama has ordered the intelligence community to produce a report on Russian interference in the US election and to have that report on his desk by January 19, the day before Trump's inauguration. My question is: What is he going to do with that report? Is he going to act on it in any way?

In any event, the end of 0bama's two terms, which I refer to as "the punishment", isn't until January 20th.

Stay frosty and confirm your zero.

And then read what Denninger has to say.

Thank you, to all of the Joe Thomas people out there.

The people who keep at the daily grind day after day, they are why the S hasn't HTF yet.

They'll keep America going until they can't anymore.

Why AmeriKa Still Works.

A random information dump.

Soldiering tasks to get familiar with.

Intelligence analysis toolkit.

US Army Special Forces Advisor Guide. Wikileaks.

How to make charcloth.

What you need to know about military assistance to civil disturbances.

Karl Denninger on the rule of law. I may have posted this before. Read it again.

SHTF intelligence, part 1. From Foward Observer. I'll try to find part 2.

Edit: I found Part 2 of SHTF Intelligence.

Dear Liberal, here's why I'm so hostile. Sufficient Reason.

DTG: The Neighborhood Protection Team.

The Secrets of Countersurveillance. STRATFOR.

SIGINT resources. Brushbeater.

Get your floodplain maps here. Yes, you need them.

Speaking of maps, get topographic maps for your area at MyTopo or at NatGeoMaps.

Do your reps and senators follow the Constitution? Find out right here. Hint: They probably don't...

A word from Thoreau.

"Disobedience is the foundation of Liberty. The obedient must be slaves."

-Henry David Thoreau


I say: Maximum Liberty, move toward it in all things.

ISIS has claimed responsibility for the attack in Berlin. Surprise...

Is anyone surprised by this? Seems like Germans (leaders and population) are calling for martial law, whatever they think that means.

Europe is inching closer to war, but Islam is already fighting one.

The difference between the US and Russia when an ambassador is assassinated.

Without giving too much of my own opinion or analysis, I'll just say this: We are about to see what happens when a Russian ambassador is killed by terrorists. We already know what the response is when an American ambassador is killed by terrorists.

An obscure, independent filmmaker gets falsely blamed and imprisoned.

I have no love for Russia, personally, but I think their targeting will be a bit more accurate than ours was.

Interesting indictment of both the federal "war on drugs" and the privatized prison industry.

With the "Liberation" of Aleppo, Western Governments have been Exposed.

This Zerohedge article is worth reading to get some insight into what's happening in Aleppo, Syria.

An excerpt:

"They have been proven spectacularly wrong about Syria. The liberation of Aleppo this week exposes the Western governments and media in their unrelenting falsehoods and systematic complicity in the Syrian war. This was never a pro-democracy uprising. It was a Western-backed criminal regime-change operation that was unleashed in March 2011, and which is now staring at ignominious defeat."

The article also gives us a great example of what "fake news" really is, courtesy of CNN satirist journalist, Christiane Amanpour when she speaks with a Syrian "Doctor" who claims that the Syrian military have committed mass murders in Aleppo during this siege. It's later discovered that this person she spoke with is NOT a doctor of any kind, and in fact has been seen in multiple photographs working alongside US backed "moderate" Syrian rebels who are known to have beheaded at least one child.

People, the mainstream media is evil. Stop listening to them. Simply turn them off, and encourage everyone around you to do the same, please.

I've probably posted this before, but you need to read it again, as do I.

When the Music Stops: How America's Cities may Explode in Violence.

Read Matt Bracken's writing and then read some more at WRSA.

Buy more ammo.

Buy another AR-15 (you should already have one or more) while they're cheap. Just because Trump won doesn't mean by default that WE won too. You'll have to wait to see, and while you wait, prepare, train and store.

Shelter

Water

Food

Security

Intelligence

Commo

Medical

Transportation

As a former intelligence agent, here are my thoughts on the leaked emails.

In my professional opinion, the Russian intelligence services are not the ones responsible for the release of Democratic National Committee emails, nor are they responsible for the release of the emails of Clinton campaign manager John Podesta.

The story of how these emails came into public light is already public knowledge. We are this through some of the emails themselves. They weren't actually hacked at all. They were phished.

The best state sponsored computer network exploitation (CNE) hackers in the world generally come from the US, China, Russia and a few Western European nations like Britain and Germany. Russia has a good CNE apparatus. They don't use cheap methods and they do a good job of covering their tracks. In my opinion, they are nearly on par with the Chinese. For what it's worth, I do have professional experience in the collection of intelligence information against state sponsored CNE in East Asia, where I personally collected the IP addresses and names of six Chinese CNE operators in 2012.

The mainstream media is falling over themselves to delegitimize Trump's election victory (and his upcoming presidency) by convincing the public that the Russians put him in power by illegally hacking into the democrats' network and rigging the election. The problem with that lie is that there is zero evidence of this. The circumstances and methods don't even make sense for this to be a state sponsored CNE activity. We already KNOW that Podesta and the people he worked with shared their passwords with whoever conducted the phishing attacks by clicking on fake links sent to them in some of the emails that are now public record.

Professional, state sponsored CNE actors are not going to use phishing emails to obtain information at the highest levels. Once upon a time, this was a common method, but not so much in 2016, and not so much when the actors are Russian or European (the Chinese still try sometimes with low and mid level bureaucrats). Phishing attacks are fairly simple to either trace back to the sender or to simply close the "door" that the sender used once they've obtained access.

Aside from the Podesta group allowing their emails to be phished, we still have the recent claim by Craig Murray, a close associate of Wikileaks founder Julian Assange, that he personally met with a DNC operative who was angry that Hillary Clinton had cheated Bernie Sanders out of the party nomination, and who handed him much of what we see on Wikileaks' DNC files. Who was this source? Was it Seth Rich, the young DNC worker who was murdered in Washington DC in what we were told was a botched robbery? He was previously a Bernie Sanders supporter. He was shot four times in the back while walking at night on a sidewalk, and his belongings, including his cash, were untouched.

I feel it is much more likely that these supposed Russian hacks are not hacks at all, but are in fact, LEAKS from the DNC itself and from disgruntled intelligence community agents aiming to expose the fraud and liar that is Hillary Clinton and her inner circle.

But we need to all be clear on something. It isn't the "hacks" or the "leaks" that doomed her campaign. It was her behaviors, her statements, her positions and the CONTENT of those leaked emails that lost her the election.

Why are the democrats losing so much?

Reading this article on why the democrats are losing, I can tell that the author is a bit more socially left-wing than I am, but I agree with his points on why the democrats are losing elections (and influence) at breakneck speed.

You can't attack the single largest group of voters on a constant basis and expect them to vote for you. Calling people racist, sexist, bigots, deplorable, bitter Bible clingers and evil gun nuts is going to make them hate you and they will not vote for you. If you label them "irredeemable", just as Hillary Clinton did, then they figure they have nothing to lose by voting for a guy for no other reason than to poke a stick in your eye.

You can't focus solely on issues that MIGHT affect a minuscule fraction of the population and ignore the issues that are guaranteed to touch every single person and then expect to win.

If attacking gun rights has cost your party nearly a thousand nationwide legislature seats and several governors, and now the White House, then why would you continue to do so?

The democrats have convinced themselves that the left is the majority in America. Many of us have always felt like this is untrue. Ignoring the true philosophical majority (middle-right conservatives) in America doesn't actually cause that majority to disappear. That majority has finally shed the idea that because they are the minority (they aren't) that it means they are wasting their time by even showing up to the polls. They have shown up for the last few elections, including the most recent general election, and they delivered a stern message to the left.

I personally hope that the democrats and the left do NOT heed the advice in article (top link) or the points in my post here. While I do not want to see a single party government running things, we have no need for a far-left, Liberty-hating party like the Democratic Party. The author of the article suggests that he'd like to see the libertarian party replace the democrats. As unlikely as that is, America would benefit greatly if we had the R's and the L's competing for Congressional seats instead of the R's and D's. It could result in the two parties actively trying to out-Liberty each other to get your votes, kind of like when businesses compete for your patronage.

Wouldn't that be nice?

The Fed raises interest rates, and Americans feel it.

My family is already feeling the effects of the interest rate hike. Many more will too.

Americans are already in debt, the higher interest rates could hurt.

NYPD arrests Muslim woman for making up hate crime.

The NYPD has recently arrested an 18 year old Muslim woman after she admitted to making up her report of a hate crime.

This behavior is actually MUCH more common in left wing circles than the mainstream media will admit.

Story.

Internet security and how your free speech can be prevented from reaching an audience.

The Electronic Freedom Foundation shows how free speech haters can halt your free speech online by targeting one of the many stages of transmissions between the presenter and their audience.

Free Speech is only as strong as the weakest link.


And here we have an extensive but easy to understand lesson on Internet security at home from DeepDotWeb.

Jolly Roger's Security Guide for Beginners. I advise printing this one out if you can.


Thanks to JohnAmmo at SurvivalistBoards for digging this stuff up.

The steady deterioration of France.

Pay attention. France is seen as a solid, modern example of stability in the West.

But, look here and see the breakdown. This is a result of hundreds of thousands of third world migrants flooding over the borders.


Here are the people fighting back:

Marine Le Pen for France.

Donald Trump for the United States.

Geert Wilders for the Netherlands.

Nigel Farage for Great Britain.

Viktor Orbán for Hungary.

Björn Höcke for Germany.

The Democrats were not hacked by the Russians.

There is compelling evidence (and recent precedence) that shows that the Democratic Party was not hacked by the Russians, but was instead exposed by leaks from US intelligence (USI) operatives.

There is however, no evidence shown so far that points at Russian responsibility.

A hack and a leak are two different things.

Happy Acres makes a point.

Is what we are seeing taking place happening because the people running the show possess the mindset of a woman? Women's instincts? Men and women have different instincts and different things that drive them. They are well suited for differing tasks and rolls. Happy Acres, if you have Twitter. I don't.

Senate passes the "Countering Propaganda and Disinformation Act"

The Republican-lead Senate has very quietly slipped an act into the NDAA for 2017, called the "Countering Propaganda and Disinformation Act". Zerohedge makes the point that this could be further used to chip away at the First Amendment freedom of the press and speech.

All they have to do now is label a news outlet as "disinformation".

This fake news nonsense is how the elitists are striking back against the alternative media for not following the lead of the MSM in the coronation of Queen Hillary.

Countering Disinformation and Propaganda Act.

The Real List of "Fake News" Outlets.

With all the recent talk of "fake news" outlets and lists being produced based on who accurately guessed Trump would win the election, or based on who does not toe the line of the mainstream media narrative, Zerohedge has dropped a real list of fake news outlets based on which outlets (and reporters) have ACTUALLY LIED TO THE AMERICAN PUBLIC.

Instead of labeling as "fake news" any outlet that strays away from the worship of Hillary Clinton, the unwavering support of movements like Black Lives Matter and love for Social Justive Warriors, why don't we use that label for news sites who actually lie to us on a regular basis?

Imagine that.

The Infamous Day.

December 7th in 1941 brought an attack that roused a sleeping giant to a truly righteous war. There was, and still is, little or no arguing against our moral responsibility to engage the Japanese (and through that the Germans) in all-out conventional warfare. It wasn't until 2001 that we entered into a war without a moral argument to be made against it.

The country threw itself full speed and full hearted into WWII and never doubted itself. Hard resolve was not something to be had or not had. It just was. The effects of that war on history will be felt forever, good or bad. But that is not how we judge the merits of WWII. Some events' merits are judged by what caused them and others by what they caused. WWII is the former.

Electronic book burning is what this is.

The internet giants, Google, YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, etc., are going to start collaborating to rid the Internet of "extremist" viewpoints.

This means people with viewpoints like mine. Probably your's.

Zerohedge tells it.

On September 29 I posted that the US was relinquishing leadership of ICANN and that it would now run itself as a private entity. This means it can (and will) easily come under the influence of state actors like Russia and China.

Maybe I should have been more leery of the Internet players themselves. Seems Google isn't really into that whole "free speech" stuff.

I've said it before that the easiest way for the federal government to infringe on the free speech bit of the First Amendment is to simply get non-state actors to do the leg work for them. If the Feds can't legally shut you up, they'll find someone who can and will just have them do it.

Google. YouTube. Twitter. Facebook. All of the hundreds of companies those giants own. They hate your ability to think for yourself.

Trump's Cabinet as of December 6th.

Zerohedge has a background on each currently confirmed cabinet pick. Most of us had never before heard of a few of these people, at least.

Read up and get in the know.

FBI might be in a bad spot.

Just an interesting thought. The FBI has simultaneously put itself on the naughty list of the opposing sides in the issues surrounding the election.

The FBI conducted an investigation into the obviously illegal activities of Hillary Clinton, including her use of a private home server for her State Department communications. The FBI declined to recommend charges, even in the same statement where Director James Comey stated that she had, in fact, broken laws. The republicans, the right wing, conservatives, Trump supporters, the "alt-right", whatever you want to call them, basically anyone who didn't support Hillary, was incensed by the FBI's decision and they all (rightfully) assumed that there were political shenanigans going on. This was not helped by the Tarmac meeting between Bill Clinton and Attorney General Loretta Lynch. These are the things that have severely damaged the reputation of the FBI in the eyes of right wing America.

Next, the FBI only a few days before the election decided to reopen the investigation after roughly 650,000 NEW emails were found on Huma Abedin's laptop during a sex crime investigation into her husband, Anthony Weiner's activities. This seriously damaged Hillary Clinton's polling numbers, which after months of intentionally skewed reports were finally beginning to "accuratize" themselves in a final push toward November 8th. Despite the FBI apparently going through these emails quickly and deciding that there was no reason to change their minds on whether to charge Hillary or not, the damage was done and the Clinton campaign was out of time to play damage control. They attacked the integrity of the FBI and Hillary's supporters just about lost their minds. In the days following her loss, Hillary and Bill Clinton repeatedly blamed the FBI for sabotaging the Clinton campaign, and their supporters are carrying that animosity today.

It's worth saying that Hillary's loss can be blamed on any number of things, since she is probably the absolute most corrupt candidate to ever run for the White House.

Regardless, the FBI managed to nosedive any amount of trust either side of the country had for the organization. That's not an easy thing to do, even in a superheated America where people don't need a whole lot of reason to stop trusting our law enforcement agencies.

But they pulled it off.

December 4th, the Italian Referendum.

Today, December 4th, 2016, the Italian people will hold a referendum vote to decide on whether or not to concentrate additional power with their central government. A "yes" vote will do just that, and will also be a vote of confidence in the Eurozone and the Euro currency. A "no" vote will basically be a giant middle finger aimed straight at Brussels and the EU and will open a window to Italy's dropping the Euro.

All indications in Italy point to a victory for the "no" camp.

Zerohedge (in the above link) posits that this could lead to a worldwide economic crash like none ever seen.

The house of cards isn't going to stay up forever.

Educational knife blade material from Defensive Training Group

DTG has some good knife steel educational material right here for anyone who isn't well spun up on the different steels, various tangs, sheaths, etc. Just like firearms, there is no perfect, do-it-all, last knife you'll ever need. Read their piece and then read some more on DTG and add them to your lineup.

SFC Nathan R. Chapman receives well deserved CIA memorial star.

Good Washington Post article on SFC Chapman, the US Special Forces soldier killed during a CIA mission in Khost Province in Eastern Afghanistan shortly before the US invasion in 2001. Camp Chapman in Khost was named after him. I have some personal familiarity with Khost Province, Camp Chapman and nearby FOB Salerno.

Story of SFC Nathan R. Chapman