Shenandoah

How I Became a Survivalist and Remained Squeezably Soft

By John Galt

December 3, 2008

In the great year of 1999, I was prepared to hunker down in my humble home with my wife and critters for the end of the world as we know it (TEOTWAWKI for all you still learning the lingo). I was cushioned by my vast supplies of rice, beans, canned foods, guns, ammo and the one thousand rolls of toilet paper which I insisted would save our lives one day.

Sadly, the non-event of Y2K shattered so many of my illusions and dreams of leading a “Red Dawn” style movement to liberate the programmers that would save the day. Instead, the only thing that failed technologically in my household was a calculator which flickered off and on, which turned out to be a dying battery and not an error in code implanted by Chinese Communist agents looking to destroy our nation.

This lost dream forced me into a spiraling staircase of doubt that the survivalist mentality was not only wrong but misguided by people who wanted me to buy camouflage and learn how to roast pine beetles with dandelions in my back yard instead of just firing up the Weber Grill and creating my own masterpieces of culinary delight. Events in the coming year would prove my doubts wrong and my desire to resheeple during the year an almost irreconcilable mistake.

When the terrorist struck our nation on September 11, 2001, I feared the worst. I ran to my supply closets and started breaking out the ammo cans expecting an invasion of Islmofacist hordes much like the Mongols stormed the Turkish steppes centuries earlier. As I loaded magazines and watched the horror unfold on television, the realization that President Bush was in our area, speaking to those kids, hit me that indeed we could be at risk. As the President departed Sarasota on television, I had to go out into my front yard and see Air Force One as it ascended from our airport now fully realizing the horror of our new future began to sink in as the fighter jets roared overhead with the Boeing 747. “God help us” I thought to myself. Indeed, we, as a nation needed prayer and guidance more than ever.

As time moved forward, the doubts about the entire 9-11 disaster entered my mind, primarily via shortwave radio broadcasters who started to convince me that all of those years of college and information my professors relating to the fanaticism of the Islamic extremists was indeed a myth. I actually had a little doubt in mind about the events I witnessed with my own eyes on television or if Bin Laden was a real person or not or just a psychotropic illusion induced by a CIA planted hallucinogenic agent introduced into those red berries in my Captain Crunch Berries cereal.

Alas, the whiplash of being slapped back into the real world hit me like a ton of bricks as some personal misfortune made me realize that I needed the survivalist mentality to get by and to succeed. That is why I began to understand that allowing my stash to drop below three hundred rolls was a mistake, and learning to research to find out the truth about so many things became an important part of my life.

So I could help my wife and I and our families survive the coming times.

The tongue in cheek metaphor for so many people in the “prepper” or “survivalist” community is the measure of how many rolls of toilet paper you have stored up for hard times. There are some folks that I know who take that issue dead seriously, even creating spreadsheets measuring usage and cost which is fine unless of course you use more than the average bear which is much more information than I need to know in this lifetime. Alas, that is not the reality though, as freedom and independence are the real story which is what every fine person within this community has always tried to defend and convey.

The mindset in reality is to be prepared for almost anything, and that is what I have tried my best to get my family prepared for. You have to learn to live your lives and balance the day to day needs, practical and emotional, of your spouse and yourself. There is no reason to wake up every morning expecting to put green camouflage paint on your face and play Rambo in the reality of the proverbial real world. Yet letting one’s guard down is not an option as September 11, 2001 so vividly illustrated. That is where learning and dealing with the balance is so important.

I have tried my best to balance my time to prepare with the real world so I do not have my friends and relatives looking to have my household visited by those nice young men with the jackets with lots of buckles and snaps in the back. It is a difficult balance, at times annoying my lovely wife beyond belief, yet you have to find it or you will go insane. The times we are entering are historic for our nation and will eventually lead to the final revision of our system of economic and political structure which means our Constitution shall sadly be drastically revised. To me this means you have to follow the proverbial “prepare for the worst, pray for the best” line of thinking and hope to the dear Lord your actions will take care of those that you love.

I shall always endeavor to seek out like minded souls so I can learn more. The education process is so critical at this time that without it, I might slide back into the Jerry Springer version of America where reality is defined by the insane lack of practical morals and dependence on others to survive. That is not living if you think about it. That is leeching, the process of latching on to others for your existence which requires no moral compass, no spiritual guidance and a total abandonment of the principles which created our nation. The Marxist ideals so carefully infused into our education system and life principles one teaspoon at a time have finally born fruit for those that wished to bring freedom and capitalism down to their knees. The dual concepts of dependence and submission are creating the problems we see now, and unfortunately shall multiply in intensity in the years to come.

With that desire for the preservation of the original American system in mind, I hope that everyone takes a breath of fresh air and pauses to reflect on what your moral center is and how your own personal Declaration of Independence might help you to survive the trying times we are now in the midst of. I could suggest a list of goods, training and programs to help you start down this path but there is only one thing each individual must do. I feel you must look inward, which in my case was an insightful revelation during prayer, to get the guidance you will need to survive this morbid future our technocratic designers have in mind. Once you have taken that time, that moment to look inside yourself and then seek the knowledge you will need, you are light years ahead of your Playstation Two playing, Jerry Springer lifestyle living, four car and a home in debt over their heads neighbor who has three kids, a wife, a girlfriend and a lifestyle which they model after all those reality television shows.

Come to think of it, when I think about those neighbors which we all seem to have encountered at some point in our lives, it makes me want to take a deep breath and take some action to give me peace of mind:

Excuse my while I inventory the Charmin.

By John Galt

December 3, 2008

The much heralded return of bailoutmania was greeted with much ceremony and celebration by the hogs as they were fed their slop by the Fed.

So with that much celebrated Sunday evening in November now near and dear to our hearts, let us review a little history as to how Citigroup ended up being the latest in the line of horror to befall the American taxpayer and why the numbers being tossed around by the Federal Reserve are one big fat lie.

If anyone believes the terms of the agreement from November 23, 2008 (Insert PDF link here), then you have to be certifiably insane. The $306 billion guaranteed by the U.S. Government is less than 1% of the real risk associated with Citigroup and the danger lurking with some of the other arranged mergers executed by Hank and the boys thus far.

If you review the true danger, as displayed in the chart below, you begin to realize that the average American citizen has no clue as to just how much leverage will be required and the amount of money the Fed has to print.

(link to chart) http://www.institutionalriskanalytics.com/research/bankcds.pdf

The current reserves as detailed in the weekly report from the Federal Reserve shows approximately $2.2 trillion on the balance sheet. The amount of derivatives exposure that Citigroup alone is $38 trillion plus as the chart from Institutional Risk Analytics reported as of  June 2008.

This means just to create a 10-1 ratio in leverage, the Fed has to create another $1 trillion in reserves. And Citigroup is just the start of the problem. Look at the combined exposure of the new Wachovia-Wells Fargo, Bank of America and JP Morgan Chase.

Then start to think about the exposure.

If the best case scenario of only fifty percent of all of Citigroup’s current derivatives sour, that means the taxpayer will be on the hook for over $19 trillion. That is more than the 2007 GDP of our nation. Add in similar ratios for the other banks on that list and you can see that our nationalization policy for risk has a long way to go and the hopes of just slowly deleveraging the system is the only solution at this time. If the Fed can not create a large enough balance sheet to absorb these losses quarter by quarter instead of a sudden one or two month surge of defaults, then the only answer will be the hyperinflation route, which will create the Weimarica (link to article) I was concerned about in 2007.

Thus why I welcome everyone to the Federal Reserve’s new horror show titled “Citi of Death.”

Because without the commitment to bail out every bank, every key institution, every remaining primary dealer, the entire system will collapse in a matter of weeks or months. Citigroup is but one symptom of a bigger problem and that does not even begin to address the issues overseas banks and sovereign wealth funds have with the various instruments our institutions sold to them.

Our true exposure for those U.S. institutions and the Citi bailout of November 23, 2008 can now be summed up quite simply:

Unlimited until further notice.