September 26, 2017 -- A Quick Run Around the Web

"'CO2 Overestimated 50%' | The Authors Respond"--Suspicious Observers (4-1/2 min.). More discussion on the top climate scientists having overestimated the impact of CO2.

• A new Woodpile Report. Among  other things, Ol' Remus discusses prepping, and different types of preppers. One article, though, that caught my attention was "Is there a single food that you can survive on forever?" From the article:

          Technically, the traditional white potato contains all the essential amino acids you need to build proteins, repair cells, and fight diseases. And eating just five of them a day would get you there. However, if you sustained on white potatoes alone, you would eventually run into vitamin and mineral deficiencies. That's where sweet potatoes come in. Including these orangey ones in the mix—technically, they belong to a different taxonomic family than white potatoes—increases the likelihood that the potato consumer will get their recommended daily dose of Vitamin A, the organic compound in carrots that your mom told you could make you see in the dark, and Vitamin E. No one on a diet of sweet potatoes and white potatoes would get scurvy, a famously horrible disease that happens due to a lack of Vitamin C and causes the victim’s teeth to fall out.

          Even with this combo, you'll still need to eat a lot of spuds before you intake the right levels of everything. Consuming five potatoes would give you all the essential amino acids you need to build proteins, repair cells, and fight diseases. But unless you ate 34 sweet potatoes a day, or 84 white potatoes, you would eventually run into a calcium deficiency. You would also need 25 white potatoes a day to get the recommended amount of protein. Soybeans have more protein and calcium—but they don’t have any Vitamin E or beta-carotene.

Also:

       For all of 2016, Andrew Taylor ate only potatoes. There were a few caveats: He ate both white potatoes and sweet ones, and sometimes mixed in soymilk, tomato sauce, salt and herbs. He also took B12 supplements. 

Throw in some eggs (including grinding the shells up to consume for calcium) and you might have everything you need.

• "What’s the difference between AKs produced in different countries?"--The Firearms Blog. Kalashnikov Concern answers a few questions about its licensing and what it means as far as quality and meeting specifications.
• "Your survival depends on water"--Backwoods Home Magazine. Discussion of water, including problems in a grid-down/post-disaster situation, treating water, and ideas on conserving water. The author also gives some instructions on using bleach to disinfect water (note that this doesn't remove chemicals or minerals that might be in the water):

Amounts of bleach for different containers:

• quart bottle: 4 drops of bleach

• 2-liter soda bottle: 10 drops of bleach

• 1-gallon jug: 16 drops of bleach (... tsp.)

• 2-gallon cooler: 32 drops of bleach (¼ tsp.)

• 5-gallon bottle: 1 teaspoon of bleach

Unlike old-time iodine water purification (tasted awful and didn’t kill some organisms), chlorine dioxide tablets and water treatment drops effectively remove the worst viruses and bacteria without leaving an unpleasant aftertaste. Chlorine dioxide tablets and liquid drops are highly effective and affordable " on average, they cost between 50 and 75 cents. Vacuum-sealed tablets are shelf-stable for four years, making them an excellent choice for emergency storage. Chlorine dioxide kills giardia in 30 minutes and the more stubborn cryptosporidium in four hours. Potable Aqua, Aquamira, and Katadyn MicroPur are a few of brands that manufacture water purification tablets and chlorine dioxide drops. One pack of 30 tablets usually costs less than $15.

• Related: "Rain Harvesting: How To Store & Filter Rainwater"--Knowledge Weighs Nothing. A couple different plans: one for a storage system (including provisions for an overflow) and the other for a filtration system.

• Related: "Top 10 Backpacker Recommended Water Filter and Treatment Systems – 2017"--Section Hiker.

• "Reprise: When is it Time to Take Away the Keys to the Gun Cabinet? — Alzheimer’s and Gun Ownership"--Ballistics by the Inch. Unfortunately, old age can bring with it problems with dementia or other problems impacting behavior. And with that comes the question when it may be appropriate to get a loved one to give up his or her firearms.
• "916 yards on steel - sitting with shooting sticks"--Long Range Hunting Magazine. Tips on using shooting sticks. The article presumes that you will be sitting (probably on a hill side) when taking the shot.
• Sometimes "bugging in" isn't an option: "$100,000 in 'preps'… and having to evacuate and leave it all behind."--Modern Survivalist. FerFal discusses the situation of a man in South Carolina who was heavily invested in preparations, but had to leave it all behind when forced to evacuated from his house. Reminds me of something that Solomon at the SNAFU blog wrote recently about adding a lockable utility trailer to his preparations so that he could at least load up some items.
• "The Box O’ Truth Tries a Suppressor on a Rifle"--The Box O' Truth. Speaking of a .22 rifle, he writes: "Tests have shown that it will have an average of 140 decibels of sound without a can. With the can, it averages about 114 decibels. Quite a difference."
• The desire to restrict weapons is nothing new: "Kentuckians And Their Knives"--Bowie Knife Fights, Fighters & Fighting Techniques. He begins his article: "During his visit to Kentucky in the 1830s, Sir Charles Augustus Murray, a Scotsman, was dismayed at seeing the residents there carrying knives." From the quote from Murray book, Murray was especially dismayed by a long bladed folding knives carried and displayed by many of the men.
• "Detroit regains its crown as most violent large city in America, overtaking St Louis, according to new FBI data"--Daily Mail. The FBI is saying that Detroit showed a 15.7 % increase in violent crime. However, the Detroit P.D. is disputing this, saying that their records show a 5% decrease. The discrepancy is mostly related to differing numbers on the number of aggravated assaults. Rounding out the top 10, after Detroit, are, in order:  St. Louis; Memphis; Baltimore; Wilmington, Delaware; Rockford, Illinois; Kansas City, Kansas; Cleveland; Flint, Michigan; and Milwaukee, Wisconsin. 
• Why does this not surprise me: "People who prefer listening to rap over pop and classical music are more likely to by PSYCHOPATHS"--Daily Mail. 
• "Where We Are"--Anti-Dem. He writes:

         On the grand Spenglerian curve of civilizations, Trump is not our analogue for Augustus (all of the interenet’s talk of “the God-Emperor” aside). He is not our Julius Caesar. He is unlikely to be our Sulla. But (whether or not he ends up being physically assassinated), he just might be our Gracchae – the first of a series of populist reformers who take on a powerful and entrenched system, with both sides using increasing levels of force, until finally that system topples, keeping Plato’s perfect record of being right on these matters intact. This toppling of the system may come in the form of a single authoritarian figure taking power in Washington, or in the breakup of the republic into smaller entities that will have mixed fates (some will find good authoritarian leaders and survive; others will collapse), but either way, inevitability is catching up to the current system.

           It is worth here noting that the Spenglerian curve that the West is on has always run more quickly than that which the Greco-Roman civilization traveled, meaning that what took a hundred years to happen for them may take a considerably shorter time for us. So if you haven’t bought one of those AR-15s already, now might be a good time. I don’t know when you might need it, but I now believe that day will come a lot sooner than I believed it would back in 1994.

On the other hand, as I've noted before, Spengler believed that the West would reach the age of Caesarism about the year 2000. 

• "Rattled ‘Rocket Man’ Claims Right to Intercept US Aircraft—Which Would Mean War"--Austin Bay at the Observer. Bay points out:

        Several of North Korea’s most important nuclear weapons development sites and ballistic missile test facilities are located in its northeastern quadrant. Aircraft flying east of North Korea and north of the DMZ could quickly strike those facilities.

        The flight path [of the September 23 show of force] was the key diplomatic message. The U.S. and its allies have weapons that can approach and attack those facilities from any direction (examples include cruise missiles and drone-delivered munitions). However, the facilities in the northeast are definitely vulnerable to an attack from the sea, particularly with air and sea delivered stand-off weapons.

He goes on to note:

        North Korea’s nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programs may have advanced beyond the point where economic strangulation can halt them, no matter how total the embargo.

        If that’s the case, then the Obama administration’s policy of “strategic patience” failed utterly, and Bill Clinton’s 1994 Agreed Framework was its hideous forerunner.

        If North Korea’s weapons programs are beyond the reach of economic strangulation, then it is possible the Kim regime believes it has outfoxed Beijing as well as Washington. Beijing has stepped into a war trap. Keep paying us off, China, Kim Jong Un says, or I’ll start The Big One.

But, as Bay continues, the show of force has rattled Kim Jong Un enough that he has threatened to shoot down U.S. aircraft outside North Korean airspace, which would be an act of war. Bay believes a rattled Kim Jong Un is a weak Kim Jong Un, which may encourage more moderate elements in North Korea to intervene. I would note, however, that North Korea has attacked South Korean ships in the past, and shelled South Korean villages, without any significant reprisal, so Kim may be under the impression that he could get away with doing the same against an American aircraft.

• God, He's a really smart guy: "The fight to control an impending anal cancer epidemic among gay and bi HIV-positive men in America's South"--Daily Mail. People seem to think that moral codes are purely the result of some petty bigotry, yet time and again, we see that violating God's commandments and prohibitions has severe physical, mental and social consequences that have nothing to do with "bigotry" or "hate." Anyway, the article reports:

         Almost 620,000 gay and bisexual men in the United States were living with HIV in 2014, and 100,000 of these men were not even aware of their infection. 

          These men are 100 times more likely to have anal cancer than HIV-negative men who exclusively have sex with women.