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Episode-1550- Listener Feedback for 4-6-15

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Join Me Today as I Answer Your eMails

Join Me Today as I Answer Your eMails

Today on the Survival Podcast I take your emails on politics, silver, bitcoin, critical thinking, private police forces, the California droughts and more.

Make sure if you submit content for a feedback show that you put something like “comment for jack”, “question for jack” or “article for jack” in the subject line to assure proper identification for my screening process.

Please understand I receive several hundred emails a day and can’t get them all on the air.

I also do put out a lot of information on Facebook from emails that I can’t fit on the program though so keep em coming.

Join Me Today As I Respond to Your Emails On

  • Here is a survival lesson, don’t always speak your mind or even half of it
  • Why Goldman Sachs is saying to buy Russian bonds right now
  • The Middle Class isn’t shrinking it is slipping and eroding as a class itself
  • Get your shit together NOW, every second you wait your opportunity shrinks
  • What the so called drought in California says about humanities future, it ain’t good
  • Can a private police force work, apparently it can work better then a public one
  • Thoughts on, “Selfishness is not living your life as you wish, it is asking others to live their lives as you wish”  ~ Oscar Wilde

Resources for today’s show…

Remember to comment, chime in and tell us your thoughts, this podcast is one man’s opinion, not a lecture or sermon. Also please enter our listener appreciation contest and help spread the word about our show. Also remember you can call in your questions and comments to 866-65-THINK (866-658-4465) and you might hear yourself on the air.

Also remember we have an expert council you can address your calls to. If you do this you should email me right after your call at jack at thesurvivalpodcast.com with expert council call in the subject line. In the body of your email tell me that you just called in a question for the council and what number you called in from. I will then give the call priority when I screen calls.

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Comments

Episode-1550- Listener Feedback for 4-6-15 — 35 Comments

  1. “The rich are getting richer and the middle class is losing value”
    My solution? Sell shit to the rich people and exit the class structure.

    Emphasis on exiting the class structure.

  2. The problem with California and water might not have to do as much with California’s population, except for certain areas, as much as the amount of food grown in the middle of the desert that is trucked off around the country and world. Even worse than that fact alone is the methods used for that agriculture and the water wasted on it.

    What will happen is everyone else will be subsidizing California’s problems by paying for higher food prices, if California is still able to irrigate all of those crops. Food will go up in price either way, for at least a short period of time, as either by essentially paying for salinization plants, or government jobs to assess a problem and the remidies described in those assessments and implementations, or California will have major crop failure and food will be priced higher accordingly.

    To get a good idea on how the media views it and how the government views it Bill Mahr had a government water guy on his last show. Then where does he point the finger at the problem–almond trees and agriculture. The government water guy is sarcastic saying but Bill you need to eat. Just evidence of how maybe a number of people are going to take it.

    I agree with your assertion on issues with growth. As a not so smart kid I figured it out when he was twenty years old some twenty years ago, but did not understand all that it meant. A lot has to do with removal from the necessities, such as growing your own food, turning on a faucet and getting water. This is only a recent phenomenon in at least human history as we know it.

    • Agriculture is about 80% of CA’s water use. Population is only 10%-20% of water use. The bigger problem is a water shortage for CA is a food shortage for the entire US. According to the CA Department of Food and Agriculture “More than half the country’s vegetables, fruits, and nuts are grow in California.”

      If CA doesn’t get more rain, food prices will pretty much go up across the US.

      • If you don’t think population has a correlation to agriculture, you don’t understand California at all. Trying to separate the two is like trying to seperate hydrogen from oxygen and still calling it water.

        • Of course population is correlated to food production, but maybe my point was not clearly made. If the food production decreases in CA then the food production needs to either increase in other states, or the populations of those state needs to decrease, correct? My point is that whether someone in CA showers less or waters their lawn every other day is insignificant to the water that can be saved through better agricultural practices. And these are issues that don’t just concern CA but anyone who eats the fruits, vegetables, nuts, and dairy produced there.

  3. 500 gallons, at 50 gallons/day on the low end of useage is still way too small. For a family of 2, that is 5 days usage. It doesnt rain for 6 months or more — I know a permaculturist here in Santa Cruz with a rainwater catchment tank of 10,000 gallons, a regular tank like those of us in the country have. With a 1200-1500 sq ft ranch house, 20,000 could easily be caught, but is too large for the side yard.

  4. It is 25% of the water used 2 years ago, for the entire state. NOT per household. The governor said 25% overall for households, this will be implemented in most cases by mandating how much per household, and that will also depend on household size. My county already did this last year. If it was by percentage of each households bill, it would punish previous conservers. SO, it is a county reduction of 25% overall, and the calculations are done and then the consumer gets an actual gallon amount per household. This county wont have to change much at all, the expensive cities are going to be the challenge, last year they did not change behavior at all. So, believe me it is already out in papers here how Fresno, for instance, used X gallons per household last year, while the Silicon Valley CEO’s in Woodside and Portolla Valley used 6 times as much for their households. So, when the actual plan for implementation comes out, it had better show how those districts are also cutting back

    Grey water usage is popular here, no yard watering unless it uses grey water is possible, has not been implemented everywhere yet.

    I live in the country and wish I had rain water catchment, I put in the correct roof for it 5 years ago, but never came up with the money for the storage tanks yet. I would like 20,000 gallons for the rainwater storage, and can get that in a bad year. My existing water tank is 2,500 gallons for well water storage

  5. Water: Both Jack and Chris D have valid points.
    Got into an interesting discussion with a friend last week – told him we don’t need to be trucking/flying lettuce across the continent so we can have a damn salad in January and promoted more local food.
    He said canning and seasonal eating was ‘old fashioned’.
    I laughed, he laughed, we had more wine.

    Read a review today about a waterproof speaker you can take in the shower.
    Who the hell is in the shower for more than 3 minutes in the first place ???
    Wash and GTFO is the rule in my house.

    Selfish: AHA! So I’m not the only one who wonders what couple would want pizza a] catered b] for a wedding. Go to CiCi’s already and don’t tell ’em what it’s for.
    My family owns multiple businesses and we reserve the right to tell anyone to go pound sand. Anyone.
    We haven’t gone out of business in over 75 years by using that option judiciously.

  6. Wow, I’ve been avoiding the news, didn’t realize Cali was that bad, well, I assumed, but. Remembered that Mos Def song “New World Water” from like 1999. He has a line, “Fuck a bank; I need a twenty-year water tank” And something about companies that pollute the water then sell you bottled water for a dollar twenty five and buying Evian to take a bath. Lol, old school hip hop son. Anyways, good show and a water retention focused company could be cool.

    It’s amazing how consistent, obvious, and conspicuous nature is, and we don’t pay attention, then scream disaster like shit just came outta no where.

  7. As water levels drop the rift between who should get the water (cities or farmers) grows. The problem by and large is both use the water in highly wasteful ways, then point the finger at each other. Like Jack said it is an enormous population putting pressure on a resource that spoiled farmers took for granted since the last drought emergency in the 1970’s. In my opinion, it is the farmers that are going to have the hardest time adjusting their operations because they will be reluctant adopt different farming methods and adjust the types of crops that they grow to be more compatible with the geographic region. Australians such as Colin Seis and Bruce Maynard provide perfect examples of sustainable food production that would work in California. The biggest unseen damage being done in California right now is from the massive ground water pumping by farmers to try to keep operations going business as usual until the rains return. Additionally, municipalities are also pumping ground water at high rates to compensate for less surface water which in some areas is causing small landowners wells to dry up. It will be quite a show to see how it all plays out.
    An interesting side note about U-hauls. A friend of mine just dove to Washington last week and there was a town in northern Oregon that had a sign up saying FREE rentals back to California.

  8. @JMAC, I agree with almost all you said except,

    ” The biggest unseen damage being done in California right now is from the massive ground water pumping by farmers to try to keep operations going business as usual until the rains return.”

    Man that is the crux of the problem,

    THERE NEVER HAVE BEEN RAINS IN CALIFORNIA THAT WERE SUFFICIENT ENOUGH TO NOT REQUIRE OVER PUMPING TO FARM AT THE CURRENT LEVEL, EVER. ALSO THERE NEVER EVER WILL BE.

    The concept that farmers only now started to over pump and over use that which is taken from elsewhere is nonsense. Just as long as the yuppies could water grass, there was water in the lake and swimming pools were full, no one cared.

    My guess is if rainfall had not gone “below” normal (what ever that means by the way) for the last four years and had remained at average (what ever that means by the way) California would be in the exact same place it would have just taken say another 7-8 years to get there. All the “drought” did was show the problem for what it already was a bit faster.

    • Your statement is mostly true about over pumping and probably more true for the southern 3rd of the state. The massive dam projects in the early seventies actually significantly slowed ground water pumping.(at least in Northern part) As long as the reservoirs were filled each winter all was fine with the average Joe. Back when the large dams were built, California had half the population it does now so the demand due to overpopulation is spot on. What is really sad is we have farmers now selling ground water to other farmers and municipalities selling to other municipalities for profit. All a nice big get ours while we can attitude. The next chapter in California will be massive lawsuits over water rights.

  9. In reference to the vetting of state and local LEOs vs Fed Agents. Other than a bachelors degree, A brand new probationary DEA agent has been through a polygraph, phycological exam, FBI background investigation, and an 18 week academy, whereas a brand new “Roscoe p coltrain” has gone through a materialy similar polygraph and phycological examination, the exact same FBI investigation, and attended whatever police academy their state or agency requires.

    The national average academy length for local law enforcement is 19 weeks, with the shortest I could find being 9 weeks, and the longest 56 weeks.

    For perspective, the average private security, Paul Blart, has no real training, only a orientation, and the average armed security has 8 hours of training.

    While researching further on the private security segment I found this:

    UPDATE: Since publication of this story, it has come to our attention that our sources contained serious factual errors about the extent of Sharpstown’s change in police force, the alleged drop in crime, and even the nature of Sharpstown itself. We would like to apologize for sharing this misinformation, retract our original article below, and direct Rare readers to a more accurate account here.

    “Here” was a hyperlink to:

    http://www.texasmonthly.com/daily-post/no-sharpstown-texas-did-not-fire-its-police-force-and-bring-about-huge-drop-crime

    It turns out they did not fire their police force, never even had their own police force, are still and have always been in the jurisdiction of the Houston police dept. And all that happened was they stopped paying off duty constables for extra patrols and hired private security to patrol and call the police if they see a crime.

    • Thanks for the update, I expect better vetting by the Blaze.

      That said, I think the truth lies in the middle!

      Sounds like the story while misleading was true.

      Community was paying cops, to do the job they are supposed to do anyway but don’t.

      Community hires private team and FIRES cops (as in terminates the contract).

      Residents are pleased, the community saves money, crime apparently is down, because if it wasn’t, the private force would be canned too.

      I think what happened here is alternative media gave traditional media their chin in a fight. The story if it had been presented accurately in the first place was good enough, it should have been presented accurately and the point would still have been made.

  10. RE: Train Man Beating:
    If Obama had a kid…

    Whites need to see things the way they are and take appropriate measures (short and long-term) to defend or evade those situations. Black on white crime is a statistical reality. That bus was full of blacks and not one did a thing to stop the attack. By that example, if you are not black and live in a predominantly black area, get the hell out of there and let those cities sink. Avoid their commerce, their buses, their streets, their neighborhoods, their schools, everything until they come to a civilized level on par with the rest of society. If you are black and have raised your family well, then, too, follow the advice above. If society wants to label you a racist or an Uncle Tom for that, wear the label like a badge of honor.

    The man should at least have stood-up and cover. He was already against the wall with a rail on one side and a seat on the other. That’s a rather defensible position.

    • And many would call you a racist for such comments, trust me I am not one of them.

      It isn’t about black and white, it is a subculture of the black community you are speaking about. People that call a welfare check a “pay check” and feel every part of their lives that isn’t what they hoped for is “the white man’s fault”.

      The sad part is we created this! Welfare, projects, etc, was a greater crime against the black community then slavery!

      Jose, say I make you a pie today, bring it to your house and give it to you. I get a thank you, you didn’t have to do that, etc.

      Now I do that for a year, when I show up, you are happy, likely you still say thank you but you also likely ask what kind of pie did I bring you today.

      Now I do this until your son grows up and my son continues this, then my grandson and yours, you and I are dead.

      So after 10 years of my grandson bringing your grandson a pie, one day he shows up with no pie, what do you think your grandson would say, regardless of skin color?

      Something like, “where is my fucking pie asshole, my family depends on that pie, I have it coming to me”.

      The black community in these cities don’t behave the way they do because of skin color, they do it because of societies conditioning.

      And the solution you propose is best, pull all support and let the people then choose to fix their own shit, or rot.

      Again this isn’t a black issue, my solution some would call racist I would apply to ALL PEOPLE on the dole, all people in shitty crime ridden places that we subsidize. I can show you places just as dangerous to you as south Saint Louis, and all the people there are white.

  11. I have been dumping compost on my lawn for 3 years now in an effort to transform my front and backyard into a giant sponge capable of retaining a lot more water than any rain catchment system. I think it has worked so far. In my area we get between 35 and 40″ of annual rainfall and most of it goes down the storm drains, taking with it tons of nasty fertilizer and chemicals from the lawns. I have not watered the lawn, the bushes or the Oak trees in 3 years. It’s not an award winning front lawn, but it’s good enough for a pesky HOA if that’s any indication.

    • HOAs really are just a makeup of whos in them. Which is why when Jack talks about little blue hair old ladies, he’s really spot on. Those type of people in an HOA are just mind numbing. My parent’s house in Fredericksburg, VA had an HOA and other than some small incidences was definitely about as lax as it gets.

        • We get 6-10″ of water annually, i do the same thing as you, and we don’t need to water. I’ve watered my lawn once in the past 2 years. The only fertilizer I use is mowing the lawn on the mulching setting.
          Eventually the rest of my yard will be as resilient as my lawn is, but right now it’s too young.
          I wish my neighbors were as responsible with water, but they’re not.

  12. Great podcast. The whole California thing is just a solid point about the state. As being the most “progressive” and the most “all about recycling resources” they’re the most over the top wasteful possible.

    At PV2 I remarked to this point about how unsustainable San Diego is a whole, and yet you have all sorts of Permies from there who think its the nicest thing since sliced bread. There were numerous times at the event that I heard a bunch of dipshit morons discuss the south with negative remarks, and yet, the south is probably one of the most sustainable places in the US! Why? They consume far less than their environment is capable (easily) of producing. You look at top soil erosion maps and you pretty much won’t find it in the South East.

    But then again Toby Hemmingway definitely nailed this topic so well with his discussion of hill people and valley people. Very different ambitions and views on life.

    • Great comment Steelhead, I hardly ever hear anyone else who knows that the whole central valley was a lush wetland area.

  13. The water problem in California goes way beyond what can be done at this point. If you really want a clear vision on the West and the water situation I recommend a book called Cadillac Desert. Learn how the agriculture of Southern California (a true state and region of its own) was created by Mormon irrigation from small runoff streams from the SGV. Look into the Water Wars way back in freaking 1913 and what Mulholland did to one of the largest inland spring-fed watersources in the region (Owens Valley), http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_Water_Wars it was running out way back then folks. Note how much water is diverted hundreds of miles down the Central Valley, where it irrigates dying croplands, then through the vast arid planes that were once marshlands, over a mountain range and down into the Los Angeles basin…where there is no agriculture. Count the number of swimming pools south of Bakersfield (a quarter of the State) compared with north…where the water comes from. The Hetch-hetchy feeding to San Francisco, the wells alongside the massive Sacramento River going dry. Talk to the people that have lived in the country for generations.
    The state of California is not a desert albeit it is arid. The north coast is cold, wet and green year around. To be more exact is that the majority of the population lives in a desert that has been covered by a massive city and has their water piped in from hundreds of miles from the north and from the east and refuse to recognize it. Believing Los Angeles to be some sort of haven, even some permaculturists, the survivalist, the primitive skills types in So Cal don’t seem to see it. You live in Arizona West, nothing more. You have been living in a temporary environment propped up by resources that never existed there.

  14. Maybe the water problem is a self correcting injury.

    California doesn’t have enough water to support itself because they used it all on pools and fucking *grass* (grass. Come on.) and idiotic farming practices and the whole unsustainable population in a desert.

    So, eventually they’ll either die off, leave, or learn. In the end they figure out how to not be stupid with their water (or they aren’t there), and then the water problem goes away.

    And the world stays in balance. Zen.

    • This community (TSP) is unique, most of the world could not withstand CA not producing food.
      Now, why have they been farming the area for 100 years with perennial crops like almonds, pistachios, grapes, avocados, and citrus and yet still can’t do it without wasting huge amounts of ground water? Obviously, they haven’t done any techniques featured in Geoff Lawton’s videos.
      For the urban areas, the problem is worse than just pools. Look at an aerial shot of any urban or suburban area in CA. Almost entirely roofs, patios, driveways, roads, and parking lots. They all drain to the storm drains, and to the ocean. None of it is collected. so then they say we need rain, but what difference does rain make when none of it goes into the ground or is collected?

      To me, the only way you can solve this problem is by separating CA (and its water problems) into much smaller pieces. For example, the central valley’s water problems bare no resemblance to Palm Springs’ water problems.
      The areas that are purely wasteful desert areas with golf courses need to figure out if they can support golf courses, and if so, how many. The rest need to become desert again.
      The urban/suburban areas need to collect water better, rain catchment and composting is a start, but there’s a ton of water that will still end up in the storm drains. If you clean it, you can either reuse it, or put it into the aquifer or reservoirs. That would reduce a pollution problem and a water problem at the same time.
      Desalination is supposedly too expensive and impacts the environment too much, but that’s because of the way the government insists on doing it. If they let free market enterprise come in and turn sea water into two parts: sea salt and fresh water, there would be two commercially viable products that would come out of one plant. And no waste water creating huge ocean dead zones. They could stop these huge companies from pumping and bottling huge amounts of our fresh water and instead direct them towards establishing commercially viable desalination plants.
      Lastly, the agricultural areas of CA have to begin implementing water sustainable farming practices. Permaculture Voices meets in CA every year, if the state doesn’t know how to implement it, they have the best in the world come to their state anyway, use it!
      If every farm became a pistachio, pomegranate, almond, peach, pear, apple, pecan, walnut farm etc. with Swales everywhere it makes sense, now the biggest user of water, suddenly doesn’t need to use any water.
      Lastly, and one most people don’t think of: stop the NSA data collection program immediately. We need the Colorado river water for people, not to keep the servers cool.

      • I know the scope of the problem is huge, and there are solutions to it. It’s too bad the rest of the country is dependent on California agriculturally, because then we could just say screw it it’s their mess they can figure it out, even though in reality I’d much rather work on finding solutions to the problem even if it didn’t affect me.

        It does blow my mind that we’re not using permaculture even in the places it’d be easiest to implement, like where we’re already growing tree crops. I know it would take a lot of work to fix the problems around corn wheat and soy with tree based systems, but we should really be able to apply it to our existing demand for tree crops.

        Do you have a number for how much water the NSA servers use? I’m just curious about that since you brought it up, I sure never thought about it

      • I’ve heard as much as a billion gallons a year, but that assumes the NSA building in Utah is only above ground (no additional floors built underground)… If you believe that I’d like to sell you a bridge in Brooklyn:)

    • Sad I met both he and and Sonny Shroyer (Enos Strate) back in the 80s when I was just a kid and the show was a big deal. They were both very nice to me, I was only about 7 years old and tons of kids and adults were clambering to get to them. They both took time to talk to me, tell me about being on the show, etc.

  16. Christian business serves homosexuals pizza but((has opinion)and takes stand against same sex marriage.Receives death threats and decide to close ..people decide on their own to send money to help and they are called dumb asses?????

    what”d I miss?
    Isn”t that freedom too?
    (I listened to podcast at noisy machineshop job.so maybe i missed something?

    • Christian business picked a fight that never existed ever even one time. Closes doors and people are dumb enough to send them more money then they would have made in the next 10 years selling pizza!

      I think you missed that!

      Not one time ever was this business asked or forced to serve anything to anyone. They pulled a cheap ass publicity stunt, they are likely now sitting on beach sipping drinks while those who funded it feel like righteous crusaders. Really you don’t think this was the plan from the get go?

      More to the point, do you think Jesus would have refused to share bread with a gay person? Isn’t a pizza basically bread and cheese?

    • If this checks out it dramatically changes my opinion of the owners and simply reenforces my opinion of media.

  18. Second time around, the Oscar Wilde definition of “selfishness” made me think of Mollison’s Prime Directive.

    …Am I going too far there?

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