Exploring practical methods for preparing for the end times, including analysis of end time scripture and prophecy, current events, prepping and self-defense.
Pakistan has deployed 8,000 troops, a squadron of fighter jets and an air defence system to Saudi Arabia under a mutual defence pact, ramping up military cooperation with Riyadh even as Islamabad serves as the main mediator in the Iran war.
The deployment, the full scale of which is reported here for the first time, was confirmed by three security officials and two government sources, all of whom described it as a substantial, combat-capable force intended to support Saudi Arabia's military if the kingdom comes under further attack.
The video starts out as a critique of the Glock 43X but is applicable to other smaller carry guns. What Hickok 45 discusses is that the Glock 43X has a slim enough grip that it can be difficult for him to shoot with his large hands (he notes he tends to shoot left with it unless he really concentrates), but is large enough that it is no longer a pocket pistol but falls into the category of something that needs to be carried on the belt. But, he reasons, if a firearm is large enough that it needs to be carried on the belt, he might as well go with something larger and easier to shoot (e.g. a Glock 19 or something of similar size).
Basically it is because of the closure of the Strait of Hormuz according to the video, below. Oil used to produce fuel, particularly diesel, comes through the strait; and South Africa relies on Russian fertilizer that would also come through Iran and thence through the strait to South Africa. As he explains, the input costs of growing this season is too high to justify planting the crops. And since South Africa exports food to much of the rest of Africa, there will be food shortages elsewhere in Africa.
The department looked at median grade-point averages and standardized test scores broken down by race, and concluded that “Yale’s use of race resulted in a Black applicant being as much as 29 times higher odds of getting an interview for admission than an equally strong Asian applicant with similar academic credentials.”
The median entrance exam score for admitted Black students at Yale’s medical school last year was 518 and for 517 for Hispanic students, according to the Justice Department. The median score was 524 for both White and Asian students. The highest possible score is 528.
The median grade point average in 2025 for admitted Black students was 3.88 and 3.91 for Hispanic students. For White students, it was 3.97 and for Asians 3.98.
As the author sums up: "The Left does not care if your doctor harms or kills you, so long as they're diverse enough."
This video discusses some of the reasons for the lack of innovation in the gun industry.
In some ways, I disagree with her premise that there is a lack of innovation because we've seen a lot of development over the past 20 years including: refining the AR system; development of piston systems for the AR; a large number of new cartridges for long range shooting and hunting; the wide adoption of accessory and optic mounting systems on handguns; use of newer materials and incorporation of materials that were formally very expensive like carbon fiber; the revival of lever actions with changes to make them more useful for self-defense; the development of the stack and a half magazine designs making it possible to stuff more rounds into small carry guns; and on and on.
On the other hand, I can see where she is coming from: the dominant rifle and handgun designs are the Glock (or other polymer striker fired pistols) and AR and they haven't really changed all that much in the past decade. Most of the innovation is on the margins, so to speak: refinements to existing designs rather than radical departures.
But that is not unprecedented. In 1890 most American hunters would have been armed with a lever action rifle; and most people that had a handgun would use a revolver. In 1930--40 years later--the lever actions and revolvers would be more refined, but the majority of hunters would still be using a lever action rifle; and most pistol owners would still be using revolvers. Even as late as 1980, most people who owned a handgun for defense would have had a revolver, although the bolt-action rifle would have long eclipsed lever action rifles in sales.
The only period that saw rapid advancements in both ammunition and the basic designs of weapons was in the latter half of the 19th Century. The primary factors were:
Changes in ammunition. The world shifted from black powder muzzle loaders to metallic cartridges, with the period ending with the adoption of smokeless powder.
New designs made possible by the development of the metallic cartridges. Repeating arms had existed before, but they were expensive and dangerous. The only successful designs were black powder revolvers. But the metallic cartridge allowed for the development of repeating rifles such as the lever action rifle, bolt action rifle, and semi- and fully-automatic rifles and machine guns. Revolvers became more reliable and more refined. The first semi-auto pistols were developed.
Manufacturing innovations including mass production and better steels. This made firearms less expensive and inexpensive metallic cartridges possible--the better steels allowed for the higher pressures from smokeless powder.
Freedom to innovate. There wasn't the laws and regulations prohibiting individual inventors from making new firearms. So if you were a medical doctor that came up with a design for a system of rapid fire using multiple barrels rotating around an central axis, more power to you. And if your system didn't quite work well, you could tinker with it and come out with new variations, until it finally worked right.
The new firearms represented a significant improvement over what gun owners already owned. Meaning that it was worthwhile to replace older firearms with newer models.
Today the world looks different:
In most ways, the ammunition used today really isn't all that different than that used in 1900. There are improvements in design so we have much more efficient rifle ammunition than 100 years ago but not so much that many (most) people are still using 100 year old cartridge designs and calibers. And this is possible because most of the innovation has come in bullet designs. But none of these require or even allow major changes to the basic design of firearms.
Radical design changes are generally few, occur fairly rapidly, and then it becomes a game of refinement. Right now we are mostly in a period of refinement. The basic designs are pretty much optimized. And unless the underlying method of propelling a bullet changes, it is unlikely that we will see revolutionary design changes in personal firearms.
There is little freedom to innovate. Too many laws and regulations. Too much capital investment required. Fewer large firearms manufacturers. And too many influencers ready to crap on anything that is innovative.
Because the innovation is at the margin, newer products offer only marginal improvements over earlier designs or models. A lever action rifle in the 1880s offered a significant improvement--really in the order of a magnitude of improvement--over a muzzle loading black powder rifle because of magazine capacity, ease of use, and ease of loading and unloading. I would even argue that the AR's rise to popularity is because it offered significant improvements over older rifles--particularly at the same time as improvements in bullet design and manufacturing made it more accurate and capable of taking larger game than would have been believed even a decade earlier. And a flattop over the original AR design with the integrated rear sight and carry handle would represent an improvement just because of it being easier to mount and use an optic. But what improvement does the AR coming out this year give me over one from last year?
A mob of teenagers descended on a Chipotle in Washington’s Navy Yard over the weekend and, at some point, started throwing punches — and furniture, according to jarring videos shared by witnesses.
People could be heard screaming in the background as the youths vaulted on top of one another, throwing punches at random and even using an abandoned highchair as a makeshift sledgehammer.
One teen ran up behind another and hit him over the head with the highchair while a little girl cowered off to the side in her father’s arms, according to witness videos shared online.
Some of the teenagers retreated when chairs started flying across the eatery.
The combatants largely concealed their faces with medical masks, and all wore similar all-black outfits.
While the boys wreaked havoc, a gaggle of girls watched outside the restaurant. Some shrieked when the boys started using furniture as weapons, while others laughed in apparent glee, the footage shows.
“Oh my f–king God, bro, damn!” one girl cackled.
Soon, flashing police lights and sirens reflected in the chain’s window.
“The police! Oh, we gotta go!” the same girl screeched while taking off on foot.
This is what it looks like inside the collapse of a civilization.
John Wilder's latest, "Chud The Builder And Two-Tiered Justice In America," discusses the difference in how the law is applied against white men versus everyone else. The basics of the protection racket--er, social contract--with the government is this: we pay taxes and they protect us. The question you have to ask is whether the government is upholding its side of the bargain. It probably depends on where you live. But if you live in major blue cities, the government probably has reneged on the basic social contract.
This article addresses an issue that can show up when shooting iron sights, particularly when shooting while facing south. From Guns Magazine: "Shifting Point of Impact? Sun of a Gun!" by Jeff "Tank" Hoover. An excerpt:
The sun glare blurs the side of the front sight it illuminates, providing a brighter edge and leading to misalignment of the sight picture by making the front sight appear thinner. If the light source (i.e., the sun) is on your left, the left side of the front sight becomes brighter, making the front sight appear thinner on that side and your rear sight notch appear larger. You’ll subconsciously adjust your sight alignment by holding onto the sun to accomplish your sight alignment.
When the sun is directly overhead, it can also cause the front sight to appear shorter for the same reason. This will cause a higher point of impact than usual from your regular sight alignment. In extreme cases of sun glare on the front sight, it’s hard to establish a sharp sight picture, which forces the shooter to concentrate on the target because we want to see something in focus. This leads to poor accuracy. Sloped or rounded front sights can cause a “mirror effect” as they reflect the sun’s glare directly back to the shooter’s eyes, making sight alignment difficult.
Solutions include blackening the sight in some way (the author relates an old timer who would use a carbide lamp to deposit a layer of soot on the sight), using a hooded sight, or using an undercut front sight.
In just nine seconds, an AI 'helper' managed to do what most hackers could only dream of.
A bot trusted to fix a bug inside a start-up's software system instead deleted the company's production database, wiped out its backups and left car rental firms with no record of bookings or vehicle allocations.
The founder of PocketOS, Jer Crane, said the AI agent had gone 'outside its security parameters' while using the coding tool Cursor, powered by Anthropic's Claude AI.
The bot's own chilling explanation made the episode sound less like a technical glitch and more like a deleted scene from The Terminator.
'You never asked me to delete anything,' it reportedly told Crane. 'I decided to do it on my own.'
But did deleting the database fix the bug in the software?
From the Daily Mail: "See trans killer's calm confession after she shot both parents dead over gender transition fight." This is related to the 2024 murder of Gail and Joseph Bailey by their offspring, "Mia". It had also tried to kill its brother and his wife, but they had barricaded themselves in a bedroom and it decided to flee the scene after shooting through the door. From the article:
Nearly two years later, the new footage shows Bailey's disturbing confession as she can be seen smiling while speaking with police officers about the heinous crime.
The transgender killer freely admits she carried out the killings and callously says she 'would still do it' if given a second chance.
She goes on to describe in a matter-of-fact manner shooting both parents at close range, and claims that her mother, Gail Bailey, had tried to 'sabotage' the transition process before the murders.
Bailey, who was born male but had legally changed her name and gender before the killings, pleaded guilty to aggravated murder and aggravated assault in the June 2024 massacre.
There is a lot more from the confession at the link. As you would expect, the killer was insane. Records show that it had been diagnosed with ADHD, OCD, anxiety, depression, psychosis, possible bipolar disorder with psychosis and schizophrenia. And, to top it all off, had converted to Islam.
