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LICountryboy
LICountryboy
11 years ago

The Jiblees comment got me.

Hey Jack, did I spell that correctly?

Roundabouts
Roundabouts
11 years ago

HAPPY BIRTHDAY JACK!
My birthday wish for you May you be happy healthy wealthy and wise.
I just can’t believe it’s another year already.
Stop that! LOL

Cranberryrose55
Cranberryrose55
11 years ago

Your comment about making citizens dependent on government makes the government politicians powerful; I never understood why the government wants to remove people from the country and force them into the cities. This now makes sense. A small city lot or apartment is not conducive to independence. Forcing into cities makes dependence.

lowwattliving
11 years ago

Yes, I believe this is true. If we are totally dependent on the government and we become upset with something they do. All they need to do to bring us back into line is to withhold anything or everything we need to survive. This frightens me greatly when I think of all the people that ARE so dependent on government that they feel the need to fall into place with any decision the government makes. Or else loose all the things they have become so reliant upon.

Shannon
Shannon
11 years ago

To the man making a pond, like Jack said it depends on how rural you are, if you have a well and the depth of the well and if it’s relatively cheap to dig another one, if so, consider a windmill powered well to keep your pond full.
It’s dry as hell in west Texas and you can drive from miles and miles and never see a house but out in the middle of nowhere there are windmills feeding ponds for stock…Just a thought, I plan on having at least one windmill with a hand pump back up.

Rick Allen
Rick Allen
11 years ago

Best wishes brother. May your garden always be green.

Btw… Steve Harris cracks me up sometimes. Its so “wasteful”! lol.

Matt
Matt
11 years ago

Jack I just wanted to let you know that I knew exactly what you were talking about with your cryptic little comment picture small. You know that part where you said “someone else” had the idea a long time ago? From one married man to another that was just too funny!

Matt
Matt
11 years ago
Reply to  Matt

I meant “cryptic little comment about the small kitchen”

Eaglesteel
Eaglesteel
11 years ago

Jack,

You’re right about the Bersa Thunder 380. It’s a great little gun. I bought my wife one a couple of years ago and she loves it.

Damian P
Damian P
11 years ago

I guess he was going for funny while still making a point but man does Steven Harris’ condescending schtick get old fast. I’ve learned a lot from the man but I’d probably learn even more without the drawn out sarcasm.

Badger
11 years ago

This was a great episode, but Steven Harris came across like a cranky, condescending prick in that second to last call. By his own admission, TSP basically pulled him out of bankruptcy and gave his career and business a new lease on life. He needs to remember that the next time he belittles a TSP caller like that. Don’t sh*t where you eat Stevie.

Steven Harris
11 years ago
Reply to  Badger

Got the message
Steve

229Mick
11 years ago

I actually just showed up to comment on that and say that ‘I love Steven Harris!’. Ball buster, but well intentioned. Maybe it’s just from growing up ‘in the neighborhood’, you didn’t know you were loved if nobody was busting your stones, but it just seemed ‘playfully cranky’ to me, rather than mean spirited or something.
After seeing the exchange above, I thought about just ‘staying out of it’, but decided that it may be beneficial to chime in because I expect that the way I took it may be closer how he meant it.
Now I don’t say that to say ‘you’re wrong’, but to say ‘I can understand that it sounded bad (and clearly Steven can at this point as well) but there’s a good chance that he meant it more ‘playfully’ than it came off to you. However, since he recognized that it was a lack of consideration for the folks who could potentially take offense, he wouldn’t ‘argue’ the point, but rather just acknowledge your point and try to remember it in the future.
Not really trying to speak for anyone else, just give my impression to maybe help …

Mick

Mrs. Bettencourt
Mrs. Bettencourt
11 years ago
Reply to  Steven Harris

Hey, Don’t change! Always be you! We learn a ton from you! And your personality is exactly who you are!

doug_ks
doug_ks
11 years ago
Reply to  Badger

Mr. Harris would do well to develop a better appreciation for efficiency, as arrogance and condescension are very inefficient tools for getting people to hear your message or visit your web sites. I have never visited any of the flavorofthemonth1234.coms due to past statements like “I am the ONLY PERSON IN THE WORLD who can do X” and “I WROTE THE BOOK on Y,” and I have to say this show only seals the deal for me. Where I come from, saying it once is condescending, and saying it half a dozen times is just plain mean. But then, I’m from the midwest!

Everyone’s personality is a work in progress. Steven, I hope you will take this to heart, as you seem to have a lot to contribute in making others’ lives better. I, for one, would like to see you do that in as efficient a manner as possible.

Jim S
Jim S
11 years ago

Funny how two podcasts from different voices can come at the same observation from different directions. I listened to the discussion on today’s (8/2/13) call-in about the animosity toward survivalism and self-sufficiency. A couple of hours later I listened to James Howard Kunstler’s “KunstlerCast” podcast #240 interview with Dr. Paul Sears. Most of the interview had to do with building local economies in his home of Oberlin, OH. In the last 5 minutes of the podcast, Sears made an interesting observation that we reorganized our legal structure after the Civil War (e.g., the 1888 Supreme Court decision that “corporations are people”) to transition from an economy of self sufficient villages with the intention to make us “dependent and dependable consumers of purchased products and thereby incompetent as citizens and as neighbors and as people with two hands and a brain. We’ve become that model of the consumer economy. We purchased convenience at the price of sustainability, neighborliness, resilience, etc.” He ends on an optimistic note that things seem to be moving back in the other direction–local foods movement and other preferences for the local economy. He quotes Louis Mumford who at the end of his life speculated that the only optimistic future he could see was if citizens withdrew buying power from the system and pulled away from it”, basically what Jack was referring to as making the system irrelevant in your everyday life.

I think this is one of those interesting cases where “left leaning” (KunstlerCast) and “libertarian leaning” (Survival Podcast) converge at the same point. This seems to be happening more and more–starting with different premises but ending up with the same conclusions.

Badger
11 years ago

Everyone’s allowed a bad day every now and then Steve, and I do appreciate your acknowledgement of my comment. You just have to take a step back and realize that a lot of info that you as an engineer and expert in power feel are rudimentary may come across as very complicated to someone newer or less knowledgeable than you.

doktork
doktork
11 years ago
Reply to  Badger

Agree. I enjoy the knowledge that Mr. Harris has and is willing to pass on to us but would appreciate a little more kindness to those of us without his background that have honest questions. I had noticed that he seemed to make an effort towards this in the recent past and trust his renewed awareness of this will help in the future.

Bruce
Bruce
11 years ago

The government spends a lot on prepping but if a citizen does it, weirdo alert. If I was a public relations agent for preppers I’d say, “we prep so the government, FEMA, can help those who need it most” You don’t wanna hurt the poor do ya? We prep because we are not selfish not only do we, pay our, “fair share” we “do our fair share”. We practically owe it to our fellow human. We prep because we don’t want to burden the government. See if I am independent then my “fair share”can do more good for those who need it most. Not a prepper? Your potentially starving poor people and babies, how dare you. What about the children? The children! I am going to add that there is a Galts Gulch in Chile for anyone interested. Enjoyed the show, later.

kymedic
kymedic
11 years ago

Interesting how certain things come from multiple directions at once. With regards to the discussion of government attitudes towards preppers/survivalists, I offer up this link to an article in an online emergency management periodical that I get through work.

http://www.emergencymgmt.com/disaster/Emergency-Managers-Shouldnt-Alienate-Preppers-Opinion.html?page=1&
It was in response to an article from an earlier date that had the “they’ll get in the way or are up to something” flavor.

PeppyPreppy
PeppyPreppy
11 years ago

I’m looking forward to hearing a professional Steve Harris again. Love the guy, but this one was a little over the line to put it politely.

As far as hunting those power sucking devices, I find that saving 20 watts here and there can really add up and I don’t loose my sanity. Just buy a Kill-A-Watt meter and be aware of whats going on. No big deal to accomplish and it pays you and the environment back monthly.

thatmckenzie
thatmckenzie
11 years ago

Steve Harris is my kind of asshole.

By that, I mean that I’d much rather have a cranky, no-bullshit answer that a handwaving, wishy-washy one.

I’m coming from a background in industrial chemistry, though, and that’s a place where getting things done matters.

Pat
Pat
11 years ago

Hey Jack,

Alton Brown has already done a good video on dismantling a whole chicken.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RQ9OLPC-dkE

A slightly different (and more manic) take by Gordon Ramsay
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PEJSHRSJCn8

And Alton’s episode on making chicken stock.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kpfFQh5rLa8

Josh
Josh
11 years ago
Reply to  Pat

Pat,

Alton brown is pretty much a badass, and his ideals line up with ours, but I would be my bottom dollar that if you asked him he would say he isn’t a prepper. Mainly because of the image it would give him, which is sad : (

Mrs. Bettencourt
Mrs. Bettencourt
11 years ago

Can someone find the guy with the kitchen question? I have a small kitchen and do everything out of it and would love to show him what we did to make it work!