SLOW START MORNING

A POST FROM WOLVERINE

It was good to hear from you. While I read your blog daily it is always nice to have that personal touch. While I am sure that everyone of the bloggers on the subject of survivalism are all Alpha males, we still share a lot in common and would most likely be friends if we lived near each other.

Friday when I went into work, at 0500, I noticed gas had dipped to below $3.70, the price I set in my mind to re-fill my gas cans. Earlier this year I used up some of my older stock, bought at $.207 a gallon. By the time I got off work gas had jumped back up and was at $4 again. I am still going to wait and try to catch it lower before I refill the supply. I do hate not having the cans ready to go, but I am still frugal enough to wait.

Where I differ from most is the thoughts on "record obscene profits". It is not Texaco (I know they merged and no longer exist, just an example) that sets the price for a barrel of oil, it is traders. The gas station owners are not making tons of extra money, their profit margins are nearly the same as every other year. When crude was $55 a barrel gas sold for $2 a gallon. At $110 dollars a barrel it sells for $4. If crude was still $55 and prices were $4 then yes, hang the bastards. I truly believe that the wrong people are being vilified over this.

Another area I differ from the crowd on is what should be the reaction. If you think "big oil" is making obscene profit then you should be investing in their stock to reap the rewards of the high dividends. Get some of your money back from those obscene profits. I also think that union members should be buying the stock of where they work and give their proxy to a member so he can be on the board of directors. Then when the board says they want to close the plant in Terra Haute the union guy can fight it, or explain it to the union. Either way, make the system work for you until the system changes.

I hear that the solution to the problem is to tax the obscene profits. Who in the hell thinks that the profits will be paid buy the company? You and I and every swinging dick out here know that the tax will be added to the cost of the product and we will be paying that tax. Once again the government is going to fix a problem and I will take it in the shorts. What part of FOR THE PEOPLE does government understand? NONE! Hey, if they want to tax obscene profits how about Derek Jeter, Tom Brady, Madonna, and Harrison Ford? Hell, look at the obscene profits in sports and Hollywood. Movie and sports tickets have gone up more than gas in the last ten years and not a peep out of the public. Oh yeah, newspaper don't hype it.

If, as I do, you believe in capitalism then you have to let the oil companies run their business as they see fit, just like you let Hollywood and George Steinbrenner run their business the way they see fit. Michael, if Stay Alive suddenly gets hundreds of thousands of dollars from advertisers and donations should the rest of us scream that you are making obscene profits or should we congratulate you and try our luck and grabbing the brass ring?

Limited government should be what we want in everything. I hurt inside every time I hear someone say that the government should do something about a problem. Hell no they shouldn't. Look at how the government helped out by breaking up the phone company. When I lived in the city I got no less than three phone books put out in the sprit of competition. What a waste. I was left with two or three books to deal with. I used to pick up the phone and tell the operator I need help. Now they tell me to call my phone company. I thought I was! When my phone went out they told me to call a service company, they didn't deal with phones. Hell, at the farm growing up I dealt with one phone company that would send a guy out to fix the phone or give me a phone number I needed. The government helped us?
Airlines, trucking, and how many other things have they "deregulated" that have not cost us money? I hope you understand my point.

Ok, on a personal note, I finally got the slab poured so I can move the garage to the back of the farm and clear up my view and open up the garden area. The phone lines and cable lines got buried this week and some of the lawn was graded. I am hoping that in a month the lawn work will finally be completed and I can move on to getting more brush trimmed and trees planted. I need to add several fruit trees to replace the older ones. I do not want to wait until the older ones are done producing before I get the new ones going.

The youngest son is a week into his two months of training this summer. He is at a Fort out west and will not be home until just before he returns to college. While we miss him, we realize that he is getting some good training that will help him through the rest of his life. It is hard not to be a proud father watching him grow and become an Army officer. Maybe some day he and Theotherryan will cross paths. It would be good to have a couple of survival minded guys together.

Picked up a couple of books at a garage sale that will go in the survival library. One is Putting Food By, by Hertzberg/Vaughan/Greene. It is all about safe ways to preserve food. The other book is The Kitchen Garden Book, by Barr/Standard. It is a how to book on planting 32 items that you can mix and match into 500 different healthy meals. I am always on the lookout for any book that I think will help out in the survival library. Paying 25 cents at a garage sale beats the heck out of buying them new too.

Take care Michael. Keep on keeping on. Salvation is just around the corner, the government is coming to help.

Later,
Wolverine
*******
Michael sez:
I always enjoy hearing the views of our friend in Michigan.
******

This has been a slow starting day. A lot of blog writers have dropped out. That is upsetting in itself but it also makes my day a little duller. We got some weeding done to the garden this week but not caught up by any means. We have had too much rain! Then the heat of Summer finally arrives and here come the weeds! The Handmaiden is using plastic to place on the ground after it has been hoed. It seems to be doing a good job of keeping the weeds gone. I have an infestation of either Japanoses Beetles or Mexican Bean Beetles. I will take care of them very soon. I have no desire to lose my bean crop to some rotten Beetles.

We have a convention starting today. Don't know how many will be here but we already have folks in from Arizon and Missouri. Might be a lively conflab. We will certainly have plenty to talk about. Our convention is for the attendees and not for some speaker. The attendees get to do the talking. You can say anything you want but you are subject to question after you say it. That seems to keep things orderly and mannerly.

Things are looking up on the "hard times" front. This spike in the price of oil is making people fearful. What is going to happen when the price of gasoline makes it impossible to make any money because the drive to work is so expensive? We will discuss this issue further after the price of oil hits $150 a barrel. The main culprit, of course, is our federal reserve system which has the money supply inflated. The dollar is losing value and it just takes more dollars to buy the oil. And America no longer manufactures anything worth a damn so we have nothing to sell on the market to speak of except farm commodities. Farm commodities are getting pinched by rising costs so the farmers are taking it twixt the cheeks. Very shakey business. I have heard from survival food people that folks are buying to be able to feel comfortable. The paranoia is so deep that buying survival food makes a person calmer. Well, I am not stashing food to feel the tranquilizing effect. I am stashing because I want to eat when the globalist supermarket runs out of stuff to sell or the price is so dear that people can't afford it. Globalism is a shuck, folks. It's a scam. It won't work. The lines are too long and the conditions too varied. "Eat local!" will be the cry of the intelligent. There will be some more problems when America quits buying fuel. The commodity guys will be cut off from their cash cow of crude oil profits. Big oil may take a big hit! Ahh...it's so interesting watching the whore in her death rattle. But she deserves everything God gives her.

I am thinking about ordering next years seed for my garden right now. Who the hell knows about availability and price this Winter? As it stands, things could be cheap as dirt or precious and gold. Take your pick! Step up to the window and place your bet. Wanna be sure you eat? Buy your seed now! The same goes for ammo. If you need any ammo you had better get some of it while it is available. If this stupid gun grabbing Obama gets into office he will do his damnedest to make things safe for big government and do a gun grab. Screw the gun grabbers! Even that crooked Tom Delay from Texas has called Obama a Marxist. Funny how real political thought has been so limited these lawst few decades. But the handwriting is on the wall. Little Kinglets, little settlements, will be the look of the future. People will band together for security and help. Their individual leaders will be the governments of the future. And people vote with their feet. If a leader is in power some place and is repressive, there just won't be anyone to repress. They will be gone. Lots of places will be looking for joiners and a new home will be easy to come by for those looking. Bet on it.

I have not mentioned horses enough in this blog. When the hard times come, horses will be a tremendous help. They can do a lot of work. They can afford transportation. They can haul your goods to their destination. The Handmaiden reads a lot about the Amish and in her books are pictures of young girls sitting on a disc behind as many as 8 big draft horses. Quite a sight. Anyone who can train others in the use and care of horses will be a popular person in the days ahead. I strongly urge those with the potential to easily raise horses to do so. YOU TALK ABOUT BEING ABLE TO BARTER! Buggy horses are, I belive, made from a cross of a draft horse and an American Standard or a Quartrhorse. There are some old lines of Quarterhorses that are pretty big animals.

It rained last night. The sun finally peeped over the horizon and I saw water on the road and a full creek. A sure sign of rain.

I got an email from Dragon and he wants to know of anyone who can build a motor to run on straight alcohol. He says he has a sustainable supply of alky but he needs some help in building a motor that will run on it straight.

The news media is all in a tizzy about Hillary giving a speech tonight. They think she will concede the primary to Obama and the wonderment is that she might bring solidarity within the rankks of the Democrat Party. Who gives a shit? I mean really. What the fuck do I care if Hillary gives speech or not? I have already explained that the US President is not too significant a figure on the world stage these days. We still have the means to wage war but that will diminish fairly rapidly. An attack on our shores will just about destroy the mighty nation we once were completely. And it ain't gonna happen while China is preparing to host the Olympics. That will come afterward.

I'll be trying to stay alive.



Michael

mboone@rtccom.net