Exploring practical methods for preparing for the end times, including analysis of end time scripture and prophecy, current events, prepping and self-defense.
Instapundit recently linked to an article on the Sig P226 entitled "SIG P226: The OG DA/SA Gun You Really Want" by Kat Ainsworth Stevens at Shooting News Weekly. She begins:
Sometimes, you have to go back to the classics—or at least the OG. The SIG SAUER P226 is one of the original guns that started it all, and it’s still a great pistol in its own right. Sure, it’s been reimagined and enhanced quite a few times over the years, but the original standard model P226 is still worth having. It’s not identical to the newer models, either. The design varies, features are different, and the various models will feel different in your hands. Here’s why we think you should go ahead and add the basic P226 to your collection.
The rest of the article is her impressions of the weapon and a brief review of its performance. The funny part to me was that, although she called her model the "OG" (short for "original gangsta") in the title and referred to her pistol as the "original" P226, she doesn't picture or review the original P226. She has a newer version with a Picatinny rail, different grips, and, I assume, the milled slide. The photo above shows what a Sig P226 would have looked like in the 1980s and early '90s, and you can see that it differs from the one pictured in her article, below.
P226 pictured in Kat Ainsworth Stevens' article
I owned one of the older versions for awhile when I was younger. I picked it up as a second-hand police trade-in from CDNN Sports for relatively cheap--it was still in the years when police were switching over to .40 S&W from the 9mm. It came with night sights, but they were pretty dim given the age of the weapon. As you might expect with a police weapon, it had a lot of carry wear (and an alarming amount of surface rust on the slide) but virtually no sign of having been shot much. When I first got it, it was wearing a pair of Pachmayr grips which I replaced with a set of original grips for a short time before switching back to the Pachmayr. It also had the original folded and wielded slide (I believe Sig changed over to milled slides in the mid-90s). Unfortunately, a few years after I bought it, I was forced to sell it along with some other firearms in order to pay some bills. Such is life.
I have to say that it was a good shooter. But my principle complaint about it was similar to other double-stack "wonder 9s" of the 1980s and '90s: the grips were simply too bulky for my hands, particularly when trying to shoot double-action or using only one hand. I certainly wasn't the only one with that problem, which is why the military ultimately wound up adopting the smaller Sig P228 (M11) for certain of its troops and officers. But I also didn't like the anemic palm-swell: one of the reasons I switched back to the Pachmayr grips from the factory grips.
For a long time I wanted to replace that old P226, but the prices have remained high on the original 9mm models or even for the newer 9mm models. And, of course, there are no more cheap police trade-ins available in 9mm. Rather, the tide has shifted and the police trade-ins over the past several years have been in calibers like .40 S&W and the occasional .357 Sig. I wound up getting a P220 that was a police trade-in and in excellent condition with the only wear being marks from whatever weapon light had been mounted on it. The P220 is essentially the same weapon as the P226, but in .45 ACP and employing a single-stack 8-round magazine. It scratched my itch for an old-school Sig DA/SA pistol while also satisfying my desire for a dependable pistol in .45.
First up, the New York post reports that "Russia floats idea of ‘reset’ with United States after Trump declares victory." Their hope is that a business savvy and pragmatic president like Trump will not want to keep throwing good money after bad, and so he might be able to get both sides to sit down for serious discussions. Ukraine knows that this will result in it having to concede some territory to Russia, so expect Ukraine to try and throw a wrench into all of this.
Next up, "North Korean soldiers hooked on porn after getting internet access for first time while helping Russia fight Ukraine: report." Not having ever had free access to the internet before, the North Korean soldiers apparently have discovered and become quite taken with all the porn. But I'm sure that along with the porn, they are probably getting a look at the life (and prosperity) of all places not North Korea. I'm not sure that North Korea will be able to accept these troops back into their country because of what they now know.
Each month, John at the Wilder, Wealthy & Wise blog releases a Civil War 2.0 Weather Report. His most recent dropped yesterday morning, so be sure to check it out. While he is not predicting that a Civil War will necessarily break out immediately, he believes that it is inevitable at this point because of:
Popular immiseration--i.e., economic impoverishment. John uses the specific example of how jobs that used to pay living wages no longer do so; and, in fact, such a lifestyle would now require two incomes and probably a college degree.
Lower birth rates, with his pointing out that when the age of marriage exceeds 28, a civil war is inevitable ... and the U.S. is at 30. I would note that marriage age is often tied to how long it takes for young people to become financially stable.
Too many elites. Not just college graduates, but also too many billionaires jockeying for power.
Widespread belief that the system is fraudulent.
A failing economy.
Unpopular wars.
That there have been two attempts on Trump's life, illustrating how unstable is society.
Much of the foregoing points come from Peter Turchin's historical analysis, summarized in his book End Times: Elites, Counter-Elites, and the Path of Political Disintegration.
The threat of civil war largely arises from dissatisfaction and unmet expectations. The masses (for lack of a better terms) are dissatisfied with their lives and feel hopeless and helpless; a large number of elites (or putative elites) are dissatisfied because there aren't enough positions of power for them all. Moreover, and I think this is a key point, as a country gets closer to civil war it becomes apparent that the elites do not care about the masses even as far as trying to ameliorate their immiseration. Rather, their power relies on perpetuating that immiseration on one hand, while promising a "remedy" on the other.
For instance, Turchin points out in his book how mass immigration is often encouraged by the elites because it drives down wages, allowing the elites to take a larger share of the revenue generated by a business or industry. This occurred in the late 19th and early 20th Century and was the cause of the labor violence of that period. It was only in the face of political violence that the elites finally instituted reforms. But it should be noted that there were many decades between the beginning of the political violence (in the late 1800s) and when the elites started to institute reforms (primarily the 1920s and '30s).
We have seen wage stagnation among men since the 1970s because of two surges in the size of the workforce. The first was the large scale entry of women into the workforce in the 1970s and early '80s. The second was the influx of immigrants thereafter, once the number of women entering the workforce had stabilized. The lack of political violence this time around can, I think, be explained by the ready available of escapism (e.g., entertainment), various forms of welfare to prevent widespread starvation, and the growing pervasiveness of the police state.
At the same time as the expansion of the work force, there was an explosion in the number of putative elites graduating from college. Where to put them? Most of them went into the managerial/bureaucratic class.
It is the bureaucracy that hems us in on all sides making any resolution short of a civil war nigh impossible. The recent raid of a couple's home to seize and kill their pet squirrel, P’nut, and a raccoon named Fred, is just one example of the smothering nature of the modern bureaucratic state. Hannah Arendt used the term "banality of evil" to refer to the bureaucratic nature of the Holocaust, but we have reached that point in the United States.
But whether bureaucrats in a supposedly free country would willing follow blatantly illegal and deadly orders isn't really a matter open to speculation. We've already been through a period governed by the banality of evil, when bureaucrats rushed to lock Covid infected individuals up with elderly people causing tens of thousands of unnecessary deaths; locked down society such that elderly people died without being able to see their families, and interrupted the critical development of children; crashed economies; arrested people for leaving their homes; and, to varying degrees, mandated that whole populations take experimental "vaccines" without evidence of its effectiveness or safety.
There are no longer any effective checks on the bureaucracy within the system. The "power of the purse" is largely theoretical: none of the threats by Representatives to "shut down the government" have ever amounted to anything. And it is obvious that the bureaucracy operates independent of the President. And because the role of the courts is largely to decide individual disputes rather than set public policy, their impact on the bureaucracy is limited. We will never, for instance, see a court rule that the existence of a government agency is illegal.
But the period of relative calm may be coming to an end because popular immiseration may pass an inflection point where the anger can no longer be contained. Over at The Burning Platform, in a post entitled "Fourth Turning Election Igniting A Firestorm," the author points out:
Anyone living in the real world knows inflation is at least twice as high as the reported government manipulated figures. They gaslight us about GDP growth, number of jobs added (850,000 overestimation last year), unemployment rate (% in labor market hugely underestimated), and every government statistic, in order to portray a false narrative of an economy doing well and raising all boats. The only boats being raised are the yachts of the .1%.
In reality, economic distress is creating psychological trauma on young and old alike. Seniors on fixed incomes and the poor dependent upon welfare, sink further into poverty, as the cost of food, energy, rent, medicine, and most necessities reach all-time highs. No one earning the average income in this country can afford a home. Credit card debt and auto loan debt have reached unpayable levels, and an avalanche of defaults and re-possessions has commenced. Meanwhile, with stock markets and housing markets at all-time highs, the wealthy have gotten wealthier, so the plight of the bottom 90% is of no concern to their day-to-day luxurious existence.
Against the backdrop of remarkable Chinese progress, America mostly presents a very gloomy picture. Certainly America’s top engineers and entrepreneurs have created many of the world’s most important technologies, sometimes becoming enormously wealthy in the process. But these economic successes are not typical nor have their benefits been widely distributed. Over the last 40 years, a large majority of American workers have seen their real incomes stagnate or decline.
Meanwhile, the rapid concentration of American wealth continues apace: the richest 1 percent of America’s population now holds as much net wealth as the bottom 90–95 percent, and these trends may even be accelerating. A recent study revealed that during our supposed recovery of the last couple of years, 93 percent of the total increase in national income went to the top 1 percent, with an astonishing 37 percent being captured by just the wealthiest 0.01 percent of the population, 15,000 households in a nation of well over 300 million people.
But as Turchin explains, popular immiseration, even when combined with civil unrest, does not equal a civil war. A civil war requires money, organization and leadership. That is, it requires a group of elites or putative elites intent on supporting a conflict in order for civil war to break out. Will this be through the counter-elite leaders of a populist movement being frustrated in their attempts to replace existing elites and turning to violence, or through existing elites turning to violence to prevent the loss of power to their lawful replacements? Time will tell.
Black Pigeon Speaks notes that a weakening Yen has resulted in more of a certain demographic visiting Japan and enriching Japanese lives. While the video focuses mostly on the antics of a Somali YouTuber, it appears the problem extends beyond that one individual as official signs have been posted in train/subway stations reminding passengers to be considerate of others.
In this video, the YouTube channel "Dirty Civilian" tested different uniforms under night vision/near infrared to see if there is any difference between the genuine issue uniforms and cheap knockoffs (mostly from China). They also tested whether washing using a detergent with brighteners makes a difference, and the difference between solid colors versus camo patterns.
Basically, there was no difference between the genuine uniforms and the knock-offs when viewed through night vision. Also, using a detergent with a brightener made no difference, nor did it matter if the uniforms had gone through many washes. There was some advantage to certain camo patterns over solid colors simply because the patterns can still break up the shape.
What they discovered, however, is that different fabrics vary in how they reflect in the infrared. The standard uniform fabrics appear equally dim in the near infrared as in daylight, but polyester fabrics can show up as very bright under an infrared light.
Right near the top, Jon links to a video presentation by Mas Ayoob on how to argue for the Second Amendment by making an appeal to emotions. As Vox Day has pointed out repeatidly, the left (probably because it is so feminized) generally eschews logic, facts, and statistical evidence in favor of emotions. Everything is an emergency, crises, or risks the death of innocents. And because the left emotes rather than thinks, logical arguments simply won't sway them. You have to reach them through emotions.
Jon links to an article entitled to "Safety after Dark: Practical Tips for Shorter Days" by Elizabeth Bienas. The author states:
We need to be smart about managing time as the days grow shorter. Consider running your errands before it gets dark; if that’s not possible, use the buddy system so you aren’t alone. If you work late hours or can’t get away during the daylight, try a delivery service for things like groceries and other household necessities.
If you must to go to the store alone after dark, park as close to the entrance as you can. Park under a bright light or a LotCop camera to increase visibility around your vehicle. Also, do your best to get in and out quickly, reducing your time in parking lot.
When you park, keep your doors locked until you’re ready to get out. Don’t sit in your car and scroll on your phone. Do your best to stay alert and become aware of your surroundings. The same goes for when you return to your vehicle. Get your bags and yourself in the car, lock the doors, and drive away.
The article adds some additional basic safety tips: avoid crime hot spots (such as ATMs); practice increased situational awareness; change paths or routes you use for walking, running, etc., to somewhere less isolated; and carry a weapon and flashlight everywhere. In the latter case, the author suggests: "If you can’t or won’t carry a firearm, get some other self-defense tool and train with it. Many options exist, like pepper spray, pepper ball guns, tasers, stabby tools, and knives. Remember, these all require some form of training." Jon adds some context to this latter advice:
Pepper spray doesn't work against 10% of the population. Any dedicated enemy can fight his way through pepper spray. [Citation: U.S. Marine Corps Military Police training and personal experience.]
Pepper ball guns are just as hard to shoot as real guns, but with much less range and much less effect. Because it's a pepper ball instead of a bullet.
Tasers are only effective in the classroom demonstrations, because one dart must penetrate the body above the belt line and one dart must penetrate the body below the belt line (says so in the instruction manual and certified training). The darts will not penetrate leather belts, leather jackets, canvas overalls, canvas jackets, etc. The darts are easily brushed off the body. Tasers rely on batteries. Tasers are much more difficult to aim than pistols.
Stabby tools do not penetrate deeply enough to affect vital organs. So there is no affect. Knives are legally considered lethal force, so you might as well use a pistol, because the pistol has much more range than the knife. If the scared bunny says, I could never carry a gun, but could use a knife, this is cognitive dissonance.
Jon links to an video from Gabe Suarez on "Justify Shooting First". Jon comments:
In order to PREVENT the attack, you must strike pre-emptively.
The purpose of self-defense is to prevent the attack, so you don't get hurt.
Failing to stop the attack, the purpose of self-defense is to STOP the attack, so you don't get hurt anymore.
After the attack, there is no self-defense. Sorry, you waited too long. After the attack, there is only revenge and retribution, which is not self-defense. (And not legal.)
I would also add that this is why it is so important to recognize and understand pre-attack indicators: not only to protect yourself, but to explain why you acted before the other person completed their attack.
Jon also links to a video entitled "Improve Your Pistol GRIP w/ a Grand Master USPSA Shooter" by Hunter Constantine, and offers some of his own tips and observations. Some examples of the comments from Jon:
"He says his hand goes all the way around the grip. In detail, he means that the tips of his fingers are pointed back toward him. If you can't achieve this, the grip is too big for you."
"What do you notice when watching a pro golfer drive the ball from the tee? He continues to look at the ball on the tee, even after the ball is well on its way down the fairway. Similarly, when watching a pro shooter you will notice that she continues to look at the sights, watching them recoil and return to the target. No peeking to see where the bullet hit. Such is follow through."
Another tip from Jon: "Those scum bags at Ruger refused to sell me magazine springs for my Ruger American in 45 ACP. They insist that I buy a new magazine. But I found a substitute that fits and works perfectly. Wolff gun springs"
If you don't know, each week Greg collects a number of links to articles and videos on the topics of self-defense and prepping that is well worth going through. Some of the ones that caught my attention this week:
The new Range Master news letter. What caught my attention from this most recent newsletter is a piece on people who explain why they don't need to learn anything by invoking the phrase: "Hell, I grew up around guns." Unfortunately, exposure to something does not translate to skill and good habits. I can honestly say that I grew up around sewing machines (and still live around sewing machines as my wife both embroiders and quilts) and I don't even know how to thread one.
An article from Mike Boyle with suggestions and techniques for defending yourself with a handgun at extreme close quarters (the infamous "bad breath" distance where you are in contact or almost in contact with an aggressor). As he notes, "When danger is but a step or two away, we all recognize that snapping into that preferred two-hand shooting stance is not going to work."
A gun digest article on the importance of carrying your self-defense pistol with a loaded chamber. There are still a lot of people that argue in favor of the "Israeli carry" who rarely have a cogent argument for such a method other than "the Israelis do it so it must be good." The technique is not actually Israeli and is derived from out-dated military practices developed for minimally trained troops who couldn't be trusted to empty the chamber before cleaning or turning in a weapon. As Greg mentions, if you feel uncomfortable with carrying a semi-auto pistol with a loaded chamber, you should probably get more training or consider using a revolver. As another article in Greg's list, from Revolver Guy, notes: "For very low-skilled users, [revolvers] are probably one of – if not THE – safest option."
For my Idaho readers, now that the BLM fire protection order has expired for this year and shooters can once again use steel targets on BLM land, you might find the article on "Rotating Steel Targets: Benefits and Options" to be useful.
Greg has linked to an article that goes over 6 cases where open-carry led to less than desirable outcomes.
A 17-year-old suspect, Jaylen Dwayne Edgar, has been arrested after gunshots were heard in two different locations and he was tackled by police, according to police Chief Eric Smith.
Edgar was previously arrested for grand theft in 2023.
Wilson Castillo Diaz, 26, of Westbury, is accused of raping the young victim at an undisclosed location on October 16, according to Nassau County Police.
Diaz, who illegally crossed the US border near Rio Grande, Texas in April 2014, was arrested by US Border Patrol agents and then released.
In July 2024 a Chinese national who arrived at the border and attempted entry illegally was detained by federal authorities and placed in detention. Medical screening of the individual subsequently showed that they had an extremely virulent drug-resistant form of TB. Despite that, the feds put the individual into general population in a detention facility. The individual in question was then moved to at least two other facilities where again they were put in general population. It is estimated that this individual came into contact with 200 persons in total.
The federal government now proposes to release this individual and put them on the street where they can infect thousands. Louisiana is suing to prevent the federal government from conducting what amounts to a biological weapons attack on the American people. Washington is fighting back.
Of the 14 million illegal border crossers reported under the Biden-Harris administration, more than 3 million are from four countries whose citizens were granted expanded entry through a parole program created by U.S. Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas: Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela (CHNV).
DHS has announced processes through which nationals of Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, and Venezuela, and their immediate family members, may request to come to the United States in a safe and orderly way. Qualified beneficiaries who are outside the United States and lack U.S. entry documents may be considered, on a case-by-case basis, for advanced authorization to travel and a temporary period of parole for up to two years for urgent humanitarian reasons or significant public benefit.
"In Canada, you’re not allowed to become a doctor if you’re a white guy…"--Revolver News. The article reports that Canada's newest medical school is not only reserving 75% of its seats for POC and LGBT+, but in order to accomplish this will accept such incoming students with GPAs as low as 3.3. By comparison, the University of Toronto's Medical School's average incoming GPA is 3.95.
"REVEALED: Child Killer Who Sparked Riots *IS* Islamist Terrorist, Govt Hid Info From Public."--The National Pulse. You may remember this incident which occurred in late July. The UK authorities were quick to cover up the facts of this case and it only leaked out slowly over time that the perpetrator, Axel Muganwa Rudakubana, was the child of Rwandan immigrants. Now it has been revealed that not only was he Muslim, but he was a terrorist: "He not only possessed jihadist terrorism instructions [an al-Qaeda instruction manual] but also tried to procure the deadly nerve agent ricin."
More: "Hate crime, terrorism charges filed in Chicago shooting of Jewish man walking to synagogue"--ABC 7. Per the article, "Sidi Mohammed Abdullahi, 22, already faces 14 felony counts, including attempted first-degree murder, aggravated battery, and attempted murder of a police officer, after allegedly shooting a Jewish man walking to synagogue Saturday morning," but authorities have now added hate crime and terrorism charges.
The Schultes say they were surprised to discover the home their Haitian friend Pierre-Marc was living in was owned by a city councilman, Chris Seibert, who owns 87 properties in Limestone County.
The migrants in the house said they were paying $2,000 per month to stay in the 1,216-square-foot home, but were recently told their rent would be reduced to $1,500 per month in December, according to a text message viewed by The Daily Wire. Brenda, a lifelong resident of Athens who lived in the home for over 10 years until October 2023, told The Daily Wire that she paid just $325 to rent the home.
"Small midwestern town 'overwhelmed' by 3,000 African migrants living tax-free"--Daily Mail. The town is Lockland, OH, and the complaint is that Mauritanians have doubled the population in the last year; the complaint is that since they can't (legally) work, they don't pay taxes to pay for the services which they are sucking up.
In a leaked recording, Kevin Oyakawa, an operative working for Sen. Sherrod Brown and Rep. Emilia Sykes, was heard discussing what has prevented Sykes from discussing her position on immigration.
'Open the f****** border, I don't give a s*** who the f**** comes in here,' Oyakawa said in the recording, as reported by Ohio.news.
I am always impressed by large and varied vocabulary employed by Democrats.
