Sometimes, the bravest, most patriotic thing you can do is just mind your own business. By that I mean simply live your life as best you can, providing for your own, saving for the future, preparing for foreseeable disasters.
On that last point, make no mistake that I believe The Trimvirate of Greed and Envy (Obama-Pelosi-Reid) has plans in store for you that are not for the good of you and your family, but only good for the advancement of their Marxist-socialist political power plays. Raid/nationalize 401Ks? In the works. It may not succeed, but expect/prepare for a negative impact on YOUR financial future. Artificially raised energy costs via depression of development of oil resources at home, encouragement of inimical foreign powers in holding us hostage with their oil, extortion of coal-fired electrical plants (thus either forcing them out of business or forcing higher electricity pricing… or both)–and more coming from The Trimvirate of Greed and Envy. The policies of The Trimvirate of Greed and Envy are designed to squeeze the little guy past all endurance… and falsely point the finger of blame at “the evil corporations” forced by their policies to raise prices, cut down on (or cut out) 401K participation, etc., etc.
Standard Saul Alinsky “community organizer” strategies.
So, in the face of these and other pressures to knuckle under and say “Uncle Sam!” what is a patriotic American to do?
First, make sure your own affairs are in order. I made a few modest suggestions in “The Road Ahead,” 1.1 and 1.2. Do those. Find another job or start a small business you can (for now) run from home. If you have a hobby or outside interest that can be made into a money-maker, try making money with it, for heaven’s sake! Take ALL the tax advantages you can of such a business, and sock away all you make from it into precious metals, your home, a sound mutual fund or other relatively safe (there is no safety in investment, only relative degrees of risk) investment, and…
Disaster preparedness. Seriously. Treat preparing for the next few years of rule by The Trimvirate of Greed and Envy as you would preparation for a natural disaster. Build up your pantry with long-term and medium-term food storage. Make what preparations you can for power outages and brownouts. Learn first aid (or brush up on your first aid skills) and stock medical/health supplies. Stock up on clean water. Make sure you have basic hand tools and the skills to use them. Just basic disaster preparedness.
Check your self-defense measures. I’ll leave those up to you, but think about the topic carefully. Do you really want to be dependent on your local cop shop if/when the SHTF?
Make necessary home and car repairs NOW. Take care–as much as possible–of ongoing health/dental issues, NOW.
For worst case scenarios: have a “bugout bag” for every family member and SHTF bags in your cars–AND plan a place to go and several routes should things become untenable where you live.
Being paranoid, any? Nope. Just thinking ahead to possibilities and measuring them against straws in the wind.
And besides, any stockpiling of goods you do in preparation for emergencies will ALWAYS be useful. Food and water pantry? Use and replenish on a regular basis. Heck, if you experience a natural disaster (the TWC Great Ice Storm of 2007 comes to mind for me–no power, and mostly no water for a few weeks can lend a little perspective, eh?) you’ll be able to be “Warm and fed, nice and toasty” w/o any sweat. And if The Trimvirate of Greed and Envy takes your job through their shenanigans, your savings and your food pantry and your part time job/hobby business may just pull you through all right.
Don’t be a crackpot survivalist; be a survivor. Your country needs you more now than ever before.
A few disaster/emergency preparedness links:
http://cdtactical.com/survival-guide/
http://survivalism.blogspot.com/
http://areyouprepared.com/554845-554511-66551/guidebook.pdf
http://theepicenter.com/information.html
http://www.homeandhospicecare.org/disaster/home.html
http://www.ahrimangate.com/freePDFpage.htm
A simple web search will turn up many, many more in depth sites, but these are some places to start.
Trackposted to The Virtuous Republic, Rosemary’s Thoughts, McCain Blogs, The World According to Carl, Pirate’s Cove, Celebrity Smack, Democrat=Socialist, and Right Voices, thanks to Linkfest Haven Deluxe.