Monday, June 26, 2023

Losing the war against food inflation-tools to use

Poor Man Survival

Self Reliance tools for independent minded people…

www.poormansurvivor.net

ISSN 2161-5543

A Digest of Urban Survival Resources

Losing the War Against Food Inflation-Tools to Use

Even though central banks all over the world have been raising interest rates in recent months, food prices just continue to go up. There are a couple of reasons why this is happening. First of all, demand for food is very inelastic. In other words, no matter how high or how low prices go, people are still going to need to eat. So even if the Federal Reserve sent interest rates into the stratosphere, people would still need to go the supermarket to get food for themselves and their families.

Secondly, we are facing some severe long-term supply problems. As I have detailed in previous articles, food production is being significantly hindered in a number of different ways, and that isn’t going to change any time soon. There simply is not enough food to feed everyone on the planet, and supplies are only going to get tighter in the months and years ahead. No matter what central banks do, this is going to push food prices steadily higher.

Economic activity is starting to dry up all over the western world, and as I discussed the other day, Europe has already plunged into a recession.

In addition, higher interest rates have burst the global housing bubble, and here in the United States we have entered what will ultimately become the greatest commercial real estate crisis in our entire history.

On top of everything else, hundreds of small and mid-size banks are now struggling to survive because higher rates have blown giant black holes in their balance sheets.

After seeing all the damage that they have caused, officials at the Federal Reserve finally decided to “pause” their interest rate hiking campaign on Wednesday…

Federal Reserve policymakers left the central bank’s benchmark interest rate unchanged despite inflation that has run above its target for over two years, saying the pause would allow it to gauge the effects of earlier hikes on the economy.

The Fed said on Wednesday that it would hold its benchmark rate at a range of five percent to 5.25 percent, the range it set at its May meeting and the highest since the Fed cut rates at the summer of 2007. At the same time, the Fed signaled that it expects to hike at least two more times this year.

If they had any sense, they would start cutting rates.

But that probably won’t happen for a while.

The good news is that higher rates have crushed economic activity enough that the overall rate of inflation has started to come down…

Overall, consumer prices increased 4% from a year earlier, down from 4.9% in April and a 40-year high of 9.1% last June, according to the Labor Department’s consumer price index.

Of course you have to take those numbers with a grain of salt.

If the inflation rate was still calculated the way that it was back in 1980, it would still be well into double digits right now.

More at:

https://michaeltsnyder.substack.com/p/global-central-banks-are-badly-losing

SIDEBAR

Grocery Exec Thinks It Won't Be Until 2024 Before Prices Stabilize/Drop

Finding Frugal Fresh Fruits and Veggies

Making sure your family gets enough fresh fruits and veggies is a big part of a healthy diet, but produce can get pricey. Use these tools to find frugal picks.

Buying Beef for Less: Big Savings for Large Families

Is the price of beef wreaking havoc on your large family's food budget? Here are some tips from our frugal readers for cutting the cost of one of the most expensive meal components.

How to Make Flour from Beans, Nuts, Seeds and Even Corn Flakes

An old pioneer method for making flour was to use a hand-cranked flour mill to grind wheat grains into flour. That works. But a flour mill can turn lots of things into flour, from beans or rice to acorns and amaranth seeds.

And you don’t need a flour mill to do it. A food processor can convert a lot of things into dust, from corn flakes to chickpeas. That’s essentially what defines any flour—something pulverized to dust.

You can add your new flour varieties to any white flour to stretch your current flour supply. If you have some bread flour on hand, that’s all the better, and you can stretch your (high-gluten) bread flour over more recipes by combining it with other homemade flours. We’ll cover some gluten-free flours as well, along with the recipes that go with them...

How to Make Flour from Beans, Nuts, Seeds and Even Corn Flakes

Why do you need an emergency radio?

· . Just 60 seconds of hand cranking provides more than 45 minutes of radio

Radios: Having a couple small, portable radios on hand is going to be a must. If there’s a disaster, you’ll need to listen to the radio to get news about what is happening around you….grab a TacRight Emergency Radio:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/185665101473

4Patriots Patriot Power Cell Solar Phone Charger

USE THIS solar gadget to survive an emergency!

In 2022 alone there have been over 70 attacks on the power grid with reports of six in Florida, five in Oregon and Washington.

And according to national security experts, this trend is only going to continue.

As America's power grid comes under increasing attack and/or disruption…

THIS is your lifeline in a crisis.

It's peace of mind that you can...

· Call family and friends in an emergency

· Signal for help from first responders

· Stay connected to critical weather updates

· https://www.bonanza.com/listings/4Patriots-Patriot-Power-Cell-Solar-Phone-Charger/1419398891

Free enterprise, limited government, individual freedom!

Contributors and subscribers enable the Poor Man Survivor to post 150+ free essays annually. It is for this reason they are Heroes and Heroines of New Media. Without your financial support, the free content would disappear for the simple reason that I cannot keep body and soul together on my meager book sales & ecommerce alone.

You Can’t Buy Life Insurance After You’re Dead

Not Prepared?

That's Bad News...

You Can’t Buy Life Insurance After You’re Dead-Prepare NOW for Emergencies…

Support our efforts by shopping my storefront…

http://RetroGuy.net

A Smoking Frog Feature, Shallow Planet Production

Wednesday, June 21, 2023

The Constitution — the law of the land, although it’s tough to tel

Poor Man Survival

Self Reliance tools for independent minded people…

www.poormansurvivor.net

ISSN 2161-5543

A Digest of Urban Survival Resources

The Constitution — the law of the land, although it’s tough to tell

On June 21, 1788, the U.S. Constitution became the law of the land after New Hampshire became the ninth State to ratify it.

The Constitution had been signed on Sept. 17 of the previous year; and by the end of December, Delaware, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Georgia and Connecticut had all ratified it. But Article VII dictated that the document had to be ratified by nine States to become law. Other States were holding out because they believed it failed to adequately address freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom of religion, States' rights and other political freedoms.

In February 1788, the other States agreed to ratify the Constitution with assurances that amendments would be proposed that addressed the States' concerns. Massachusetts, Maryland and South Carolina all quickly ratified it once the agreement was reached, bringing the total to eight.

More than a year later, on Sept. 25, 1789, Congress settled on 12 proposed amendments — the Bill of Rights — and those Amendments were sent to the States. Ten of the Amendments were ratified in 1791.

Over the next roughly 230 years, subsequent Congressional acts and judicial decisions have almost made the document and amendments meaningless. Congress and presidents pick and choose what laws they want to enforce and issue executive orders that attempt to bypass Congress and the people.

The imperial Presidency and its enabling Congress have long subverted the Constitution: the imperial President through executive orders and the appointment of czars that impose regulation through unconstitutional government agencies, the enabling Congress by legislating in matters that are not enumerated and by ceding its duties under Article I, Section 1, which says: "All legislative Powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives."

The result is endless wars and a growing tyranny.

Unconstitutional Day

In 2004, Congress passed a law establishing a Federal observance of Constitution Day on Sept. 17, but it was not made a national holiday. Schools receiving Federal funding are required to provide educational programming on the Constitution as part of the observance.

Quiz your children or grandchildren about what they learned in their Constitution Day session. Then compare it with the Constitution and with history to see if they are being taught the truth or something else entirely.

"Constitution Day" is pretty ironic when you think about it, given that I can't find anything in the Constitution that gives Congress that authority. It's obvious that the public (non)education system has been has adept at teaching constitutional history as it has in teaching most everything else that is good and right and true.

And here's something you probably did not know. Thomas Jefferson — the third president and author of the Declaration of Independence — did not expect the Constitution to survive for very long. In fact, he advocated for the existing Constitution to be scrapped and a new Constitution be created every 19 years. And this wasn't something he took up on a whim. He stated it in different ways numerous times:

"Every constitution, then, and every law, naturally expires at the end of nineteen years. If it be enforced longer, it is an act of force, and not of right. It may be said, that the succeeding generation exercising, in fact, the power of repeal, this leaves them as free as if the constitution or law had been expressly limited to nineteen years only." — Thomas Jefferson to James Madison, 1789. ME 7:459, Papers 15:396

Politicians today act as if the Constitution did indeed expire in the early 1800s. If you think local governments, school boards, the president, the Congress or judges care that the Constitution is still the law of the land, you're fooling yourself. They are all employees of the government and their actions — with rare exceptions — benefit the government and not the people. It's like living in opposite world.

In an essay in the American Daily Advertiser, Alexander Hamilton succinctly summed up how best to preserve our liberty in the face of such apathy. He wrote:

If it be asked, What is the most sacred duty and the greatest source of our security in a Republic? The answer would be, An inviolable respect for the Constitution and Laws — the first growing out of the last. ... A sacred respect for the constitutional law is the vital principle, the sustaining energy of a free government.

It's easy to spot those of the elected class that don't hold "An inviolable respect for the Constitution and Laws." It is our duty as citizens to purge the government of them and install a new class that does.

At the very least, we need to start doing as Patrick Henry suggested in Constitutions, Governments, and Charters: ignore unconstitutional laws, as they are illegal. He wrote, "A constitution defines and limits the powers of the government it creates. It, therefore, follows, as a natural and also a logical result, that the governmental exercise of any power not authorized by the constitution is an assumed power, and therefore illegal."

Yours for the truth,

Bob Livingston
Editor, The Bob Livingston Letter^®

SIDEBAR

Our Ongoing March Into Dystopia and Oblivion

From the time the US government managed to sign the debt ceiling resolution, it took just thirteen days for the national debt to soar by nearly $600 billion.

At that pace, they added over $500,000 to the national debt every second.

Food and drug shortage crisis worsens - things are running out this year

The "experts" promised us this would never be a problem, but the lingering effects of the Wuhan coronavirus (Covid-19) "pandemic" – or so we are being told – have created a persistent shortage of food and pharmaceutical drugs across the United States.

Common antibiotics are running out, and our sources are telling us that food rationing will be instituted across western nations no later than 2024.

This means that getting prepared is now more important than ever. See full coverage of this story (and many more) in today's news items on NaturalNews.com (below).

Also: Check out my new interview with Mike Winner from Qortal, talking about decentralized apps, cypher punk philosophy, privacy, P2P content distribution and much more: https://www.brighteon.com/channels/hrreport

17 Best Vegetables for Bucket Gardening

If you've been waiting to grow your own vegetables until you have a large backyard, your wait is over. You can successfully grow veggies for your family in containers, and the best part is that those containers do not have to be fancy or expensive. Five-gallon buckets work very well.

In addition to the versatility of being able to harvest vegetables from your deck or patio, bucket gardening also offers versatility. You can move your buckets undercover inside during a frost or heavy rain or wind storm or out into the sunshine on an early spring day. Your container plants also are less susceptible to weeds or damage from pests.

The first step to bucket gardening is choosing a food-grade bucket. Be wary of cast-off buckets that may have stored toxic substances. Chemicals often leech into the plastic, so save these buckets for storing non-food supplies around the homestead...

17 Best Vegetables for Bucket Gardening

Whether it's a natural disaster such as a hurricane or an earthquake, or a human-made emergency such as an act of war, most essential items will disappear quickly from store shelves. (In many crisis situations, stores may not even be open to serve the public.) As you build your emergency pantry, here are 50 items to consider stocking up on now – before it is too late...

50 Items That Will Disappear Fast In A Crisis

A Firsthand Account of How Freedom Can Be Taken Away

In this video, Gabby Franco tells the story about why, after representing her native country as a shooting competitor for Venezuela in the 2000 Olympics, she fled Venezuela for the United States in order to keep her freedom. Franco previously detailed her journey to keep her freedom in a feature in America's 1st Freedom. Read More

Why do you need an emergency radio?

· . Just 60 seconds of hand cranking provides more than 45 minutes of radio

https://www.ebay.com/itm/185665101473

4Patriots Patriot Power Cell Solar Phone Charger

USE THIS solar gadget to survive an emergency!

In 2022 alone there have been over 70 attacks on the power grid with reports of six in Florida, five in Oregon and Washington.

And according to national security experts, this trend is only going to continue.

As America's power grid comes under increasing attack and/or disruption…

THIS is your lifeline in a crisis.

It's peace of mind that you can...

· Call family and friends in an emergency

· Signal for help from first responders

· Stay connected to critical weather updates

· https://www.bonanza.com/listings/4Patriots-Patriot-Power-Cell-Solar-Phone-Charger/1419398891

Free enterprise, limited government, individual freedom!

You Can’t Buy Life Insurance After You’re Dead

Not Prepared?

That's Bad News...

You Can’t Buy Life Insurance After You’re Dead-Prepare NOW for Emergencies…

Support our efforts by shopping my storefront…

http://RetroGuy.net

A Smoking Frog Feature, Shallow Planet Production

Tuesday, June 20, 2023

Prepare for coming further shortages

Poor Man Survival

Self Reliance tools for independent minded people…

www.poormansurvivor.net

ISSN 2161-5543

A Digest of Urban Survival Resources

Prepare for Coming Shortages

Over the years I have heard preppers lumped into the same boat as Hoarders. This is always with a negative connotation but I think that the connection, while it makes a certain amount of sense if viewed in the proper context, is instead almost always linked to the more severe and unrelated Psychological condition of Compulsive Hoarding. The conflation of these two terms takes the very real, natural instincts of preppers and equates them to people with psychological issues who live in squalor. We have seen in the news even now how the label of ‘hoarder’ is used to demean and even criminalize what should be considered rational behavior in my opinion.

Hoarding is normal by humans during times of scarcity. It is how the smart survive while the foolish perish. You accumulate or store additional provisions that you likely will need later but due to forces beyond your control, are unable to get. Hoarding by preppers is usually associated with food because if you can’t get food you die. It makes perfect sense to me that if I know there will be a shortage of food and I won’t be able to go down to the local grocery store to purchase more, that I should make plans before the scarcity arrives to obtain more food. My children still need to eat regardless of what is available for me on the shelves. To not plan for their needs when I have the ability and foreknowledge to do so would seem to be a type of willful neglect.

Animals hoard food all the time and we don’t look at them as having some type of mental deformity do we? Animals certainly don’t have access to grocery stores or shopping malls, but that doesn’t mean they don’t consider the very real fact that they have to provide for themselves in times when food is less plentiful.

Compulsive hoarding is completely different and has been the subject of at least one reality TV Show. Compulsive hoarders aren’t stocking up on food because the supply is inconsistent and prone to rationing. The compulsive hoarders simply don’t throw anything away. They feel attached to certain items and the space these items take up in their homes eventually cause health issues. To compare a father stocking up food because the lines at the grocery store stretch on for blocks and rationing has begun to someone who is living in a house of useless items they purchased on the Home Shopping Network, but can’t bear to throw away, is logically fallacious.

Why should I worry about hoarding anything

Preppers have a very real and valid reason of stockpiling basic supplies in my opinion. We stock up food and water for just the very possibility that we will need them and be unable to acquire them. This could be due to a disaster or sickness that forces everyone to stay inside until conditions are safe. It could be for something like the beginnings of an economic collapse where food supplies simply aren’t reliable as they once were.

Today in Venezuela they are experiencing this very thing. Venezuela is heavily dependent on imports for their food and medicine but their economy is in such bad shape that all of their supply lines are being disrupted. Things are so bad already that they are arresting store managers under the charge that they have been hoarding food. In this case, the managers allegedly were holding back supplies and selling them at higher prices.

They are also taking steps to prevent people from buying more food and stocking up by installing fingerprint scanners in grocery stores. This is done directly to enforce the policy of government rationing that is currently in place. They are demonizing people who want to store extra for their families and in the process they are creating less stability.

Can you envision a scenario like this in the United States? Venezuela’s inflation rate is expected to rise from 270% to over 720% this year alone. Earlier in the year, there were shortages of toilet paper and daily the citizens of Venezuela are already forced by rationing policies to limit their shopping to one day a week where they are only able to get what is available and have to stand in line all day. Even the electricity is being rationed.

No, the economic condition in the U.S. is not the same as in Venezuela. We aren’t as dependent on selling our oil to other countries and we don’t import a majority of our food. We actually export our food to countries like Venezuela. But the factors that lead to shortages and rationing don’t have to be the same for the threat to be realized. There are any number of reasons why in our future, events could conspire to cause shortages at the grocery store. We could be forced to abide by rationing policies on certain items or even shopping in general. We could be faced with electricity rationing or outages due to terrorist actions or even failures in fragile grid systems.

What items should I be hoarding now?

If you don’t want to be that poor mother who has to lock her children in doors as she goes down to the store to wait in line for hours for a chance to purchase the few remaining items on the shelf you can do something about that.

Take stock of items that you use every day that your family depends on for survival. The categories are pretty basic: Food, Water, and Medicine. You can use our Food Storage Calculator to figure out how much you need to store. The foods you regularly eat are the best, but long-term storable freeze-dried foods give you more flexibility.
Identify storage locations in your home and develop a good food storage rotation plan for the items you eat every day. Long-term storage is your back up.
Consider items that might sell out first or your family needs a little more urgently. Baby formula and diapers come to mind although both can be supplemented or even replaced by nursing and cloth diapers. Medicines your children or older loved ones need are more difficult. Try to gain additional supplies from your doctor by saying you will be traveling soon.
Firearms and ammunition usually seem to be confiscated at some point in a collapsing/tyrannical government. Venezuela instituted mandatory gun disarmament centers after they declared private ownership of firearms illegal. This was done they said to ‘make cities safer’ which they always conveniently forget to say that criminals don’t obey laws (hence the name criminal) and won’t turn in their illegal guns. In spite of every citizen turning in their legal firearms, Venezuela has the highest murder rate in the world. So if you don’t want to go quietly into the night make sure you have some firearms and enough ammunition stored safely away before this happens.
Backup Power Options – If the electric grid is compromised, having a backup solar power system could have multiple benefits. Obviously, with the means to provide yourself with power in the absence of grid-based options you can power electric devices like refrigerators to keep medicine cool or fans to offset the effects of a heat wave. You can charge your portable electronics like cell phones and tablets, recharge batteries for hand radios and if you have enough capacity you can also barter your electric charging ability for other items. You may be able to trade recharging a battery for food, medicine or ammunition.
Precious metals and extra cash – Banks around the world are already charging negative interest rates. They charge you to keep your money which they turn around and lend out at interest. Eventually they will limit the amount of money you can take out. Make sure you have alternate sources to purchase the supplies you need. It may eventually be on a black market type of system.
Have a backup plan to leave – You may find in the worst type of situation that leaving is your only option. Do you have passports for your entire family? Do you have bug out bags if you are forced to leave on foot? Do you have suitable transportation?

Prepping is about foreseeing bad situations and planning ahead so your family will be safe. Venezuela is only one example where the habits and traits of preppers could be helpful for survival. Let’s hope we never have to worry about that here, but prepare anyway in case we do. Your family will appreciate your efforts if you are forced into this type of scenario.

You can also access the latest news at this address: www.whatfinger.com

To Many Americans, It Already Feels Like We Are in a Deep Recession

SIDEBAR

SMART Ways to Save at the Pump

Here are several smart ways to reduce gas consumption so you can gas up less. And you could benefit in other ways as well...

12 Places To Hide Your Survival Supplies During Martial Law

If and when the government declares martial law after a disaster, it will be under the pretense of safety and security for the general public. And I'm sure that for many authorities, that will be their sole intention.

However, if the disaster is something that causes severe food and water shortages, the government could start confiscating supplies from "hoarders." They will demonize people who have stockpiled lots of food and call them "selfish" or "unpatriotic." They could even go door to door looking for hidden food stockpiles.

So you have to ask yourself: If the authorities searched my home, how quickly would they find my emergency supplies? Would they find them right away, or would it take a while? Would they find everything, or would they overlook a few things...?

12 Places To Hide Your Survival Supplies During Martial Law

Why Today’s Shortages Are a Sign of Worse to Come

Why do we STILL have shortages after Covid-19!?!

As well as rising prices and the threat of empty stores. That could soon ruin your life…

Or turn the US into a “Soviet Economy”.

And Why Are Our Politicians to Blame for It <<

Why do you need an emergency radio?