Every morning, one of the first things I do is hit the various newsfeeds. After all, you can’t be prepared against something if you don’t know its coming (or going on, for that matter).

Todays headlines as I woke up:

The Inside History of How Guns Are Marketed and Sold in America

Manufacturers of AR-style rifles would see 20% tax under proposed bill

‘It’s just insanity’: ATF now needs 2 weeks to perform a routine gun trace

Look, you and I both know that one of the very first steps towards ‘controlling’ a particular demographic is to create an atmosphere of animosity towards that demographic that the general public can get behind. Most notably, Hitler and the Jews. If he’d walked up to the podium and said “Today, we’re gonna wipe out the Jews” just out of the blue like that he probably would have not gotten very far. Instead, he creates a poisonous atmosphere for them (so to speak). He spends years telling the public how this group has misled them, bled them, is a threat to their values, etc, etc. He paints them as the threat for so long, and so intently, that after a few years people start thinking “Yeah, those people are a real threat to me. Someone should do something about it.” and the next thing you know the boxcars are steaming down the tracks.

An extreme example, yes. But it’s an accurate one: to oppress/marginalize/eradicate/control a particular segment of the population you need to get the broad public behind you. You do that by demonizing that particular group so that after a while the general public says “Yeah, those people have it coming.”

And these headlines? Thats what it looks like. I’m not saying they’re planning to throw gun owners into camps. What they are planning is to throw your gun rights (and your guns) into the shredder. Theyre fine with the people who own guns, its the guns themselves theyre after.

So, they load up the media with articles about AR-15’s being evil, ghost guns are everywhere, a national registry is needed, manufactures are profiting over dead children, no one needs a 30-round clipazine, etc, etc, etc. And they keep shoveling this stuff into the media outlets so that, after a while, the public can’t see things any other way….and thats when those ‘reasonable’ and ‘common sense’ bans and prohibitions start coming. Because, after all that indoctrination, how can anyone possibly disagree that all those evil black rifles rifles of color need to be taken out of the hands of those evil would-be insurrectionists and white supremacists.

But…you gotta start somewhere. And that starting place is by making out the guns and the gunowners to be out-of-touch racist anti-government social reprobates. Make the public believe theyre the bad guys and no one will speak up for them when the hammer comes down.

We saw this in the 90’s with the whole ‘militia/anti-government’ movement. Randy Weaver, for example, gets virtually no sympathy outside of our circles because even though his wife was gunned down for basically no reason, he was an evil ‘militia type’ who harbored ‘anti-government views’.

Make a particular group look bad and then you can do whatever you want to them without fear of the consequences. It’s a technique thats been around for thousands of years, the trick is to recognize it when it’s happening. We give it the benign name of ‘culture war’ but culture wars have a way of turning into real wars…or pogroms..or purges.

Watch the news, see how many pages of headlines you can scroll through before seeing yet another post about someone calling for AR-15’s to be banned, magazines to be limited, registries started, licensing mandated, etc. It’s not a coincidence.

You know what you need to do, get out your wallet and do it.

So the Supreme Court rules that NYS’ famous ‘gotta show a good reason’ clause for carry permits is unconstitutional. For those of us from NY, the answer as to what they will do is obvious – they’ll make the process so onerous that it will be a de facto ban. They’ll require ‘training’ from .gov-approved instructors and then simply not approve any instructors, they’ll raise the fees and prices into the stratosphere, they’ll put so many hoops, hurdles, and obstacles in the way that it may as well be ‘business as usual’ as it was before the decision.

But, take your victories where you can. Especially nowadays.

SPOKANE, Wash — Randy Weaver, patriarch of a family that was involved in an 11-day Idaho standoff with federal agents 30 years ago that left three people dead and helped spark the growth of anti-government extremists, has died at the age of 74.

I met Randy Weaver back in the late ’90s. Seemed like a nice enough guy…quiet, didnt say much. But, I guess having your unarmed wife shot by a .gov sniper will take the wind out of your sails.

This guy was one of several focal points for the ‘militia movement’ back in the ’90s. I think after Ruby Ridge, he just wanted to be left alone to take care of his kids and move on with what was left of his life. Raw deal all around.

The Chief Cultural Appropriator in Canaduh*  has initiated some ’emergency measures’ to stamp out terrorists who have been…committing parking violations. Whatever. Yet another reason no one takes Canada seriously.

But, what is interesting about all this is that amongst the powers that the Canuckistan government is giving itself is the power to shut down various financial activities that it thinks go against The Canadian Way and might benefit those evil double parkers.

We’re back to the old dictatorship-by-proxy that we see in this country every so often. Government can’t do a particular thing because of the Constitution or some other legal restraint….but it can encourage a non-government actor to perform the same function. An example would be when .gov leaned on banks and credit card companies not to do business with firearms businesses. Can’t really shut down the gun market but we can certainly make it so they can’t do business.

What happens when you get on The List and the bank is ‘nudged’ into freezing your accounts? Are you going to be left standing at an ATM with a dead bank card, $32 in cash, and no access to your money? Gotta think about these things, man. Yet another reasonable cause for having a buncha cash (or cash-like instruments) in a secure place. When .gov finally rolls out it’s own cryptocurrency (guaranteed to have a catchy-souding patriotic name like LibertyBucks, or BitEagle, or something) you watch how fast they’ll tie up that ‘money’ when they decide its going somewhere, or being used by someone, they don’t like.

What’s really fascinating is that Candians have this reputation as a perpetually-apologizing group of people who are just so gosh darned nice. Watching Trudeau ret to act like an in-control leader is like watching a toddler running around the house in dad’s cowboy boots and hat.

But, the moral of the story here is that this is an example of even more reasons not to put all your eggs in one basket..errr…bank. And, not that I would ever recommend such a thing, but it’s also a nice example why having banking under other names might be handy.

* = Ever notice how all those Socialistic and Draconian places start with ‘C’ and end in ‘A’? China, Cuba, California, Canada, etc.

Each box contains a portable two-way radio (think Walkie-Talkie), a light, clipboards with paper forms and mechanical pencils. The city has 74 boxes in total, distributed throughout different sections of the city, which are dubbed “zones” and clustered into 13 “Emergency Preparedness Areas.”

The basic plan goes like this: In the event of a disaster that lays waste to the town and impairs standard communication lines, those who are able will assemble at the boxes. The first person to arrive will be named a “zone leader.”

The residents will use the clipboards and paper to assess the damage at each house in the neighborhood. Their findings will be relayed to the city via the radios. The city can then deploy emergency resources to the places most in need.

I actually kinda like this idea, although, really, any group..family, congregation, tribe, clan, cell, whatever…should already have several rally points assigned and stocked ‘just in case’. If Utah really wanted to go nuts, they’d do like the Japanese and have their parks double as emergency facilities with wells, toilet facilities, cooking areas, etc.

But, I gotta give credit to those fun-lovin’ Mormons…they don’t screw around when it comes to the preparedness stuff.

Every family or other group unit should have at least a couple ‘rally points’ or ‘meetup areas’ designated and stocked as prudently as possible.