{"id":2233,"date":"2015-03-25T08:52:46","date_gmt":"2015-03-25T12:52:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ttgnet.com\/journal\/?p=2233"},"modified":"2015-03-25T08:52:46","modified_gmt":"2015-03-25T12:52:46","slug":"wednesday-25-march-2015","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ttgnet.com\/journal\/2015\/03\/25\/wednesday-25-march-2015\/","title":{"rendered":"Wednesday, 25 March 2015"},"content":{"rendered":"

08:52 –<\/span> I got one of those obnoxious robocall IRS scam phone calls yesterday. I understand that most of these scam calls and most spam calls in general originate overseas, and I wonder why the feds aren’t giving them higher priority. I mean, we have SEAL teams operating internationally, kicking down doors and killing terrorists, who are a minor annoyance compared to these phone spammers. Why aren’t the SEAL teams tracking down and killing phone spammers instead?
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Every morning I make the rounds of a dozen or so of the top prepping websites. I’m not sure why I bother. There’s seldom any new material worth reading, and it seems that most of these sites are simply attempting to monetize what material they do have at their readers’ expense.
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Those attempts often come in the form of Amazon affiliate links, which I consider a questionable activity. You won’t find any affiliate links on this site or in the book, because I consider them a conflict of interest. People who click on them don’t pay any more, at least in theory, but I always wonder what motivated the authors to choose these particular products. Was it because they’re actually good products or because the author gets paid for recommending them?
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Then there are the recommendations for outrageously expensive products like freeze-dried foods and MREs. I just read an article on one site that recommended one of those so-called 4-person\/1-year food supplies and talked about what a bargain it was for only $5,000. Geez. At 1200 calories\/day, it’s actually more like a 2-person\/1-year supply, at $2,500 per person. And most of the food is bulk staples that can be purchased elsewhere at a small fraction of the price. But even that’s not as bad as the sites that recommend stocking up on MREs, which cost about $10 each for a 1200 calorie meal. Is anyone really crazy enough to spend $30,000 for enough MREs to feed a family of four for a year?
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And it continues with stuff like $70 flashlights, $180 knives, $260 solar ovens, $500 solar battery chargers, and so on. All fine, assuming your audience can drop $100,000 on food and other supplies. Most people can’t. And, from what I can tell, most of these recommendations are thinly-veiled paid endorsements. The company sends the author a $260 solar oven or $500 solar battery charger. The author writes a glowing review, and wink-wink-nudge-nudge isn’t expected to return the product. To my way of thinking, that’s unethical bordering on fraud.
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That’s why you won’t see me even using Amazon.com affiliate links, let alone accepting bribes in return for favorable reviews and links. I’m sure a $70 Streamlight is in some sense “better” than the $3.50 flashlights I recommend (and buy in quantity myself with my own money). But it’s not twenty times better in any respect, and if I were going to spend $70 on flashlight(s) I’d much rather have 20 of the $3.50 models than one Streamlight. I know from experience that those $3.50 flashlights are just fine. I’ve been carrying them myself for a couple of years now. I did a drop test with one of them, holding it over my head and dropping it on concrete ten times. It still worked, and didn’t even suffer any cosmetic damage. I have it in my jeans pocket right now. That’s the same flashlight that I (intentionally) ran over with my SUV. Again, no damage at all and it still works perfectly. Same deal on other stuff. The $35 Baofeng HT works fine, so you won’t see me recommending the similar $800 Yaesu model that one prepping blogger recommends. As Jerry Pournelle says, this inexpensive stuff is Good Enough.
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\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

08:52 – I got one of those obnoxious robocall IRS scam phone calls yesterday. I understand that most of these scam calls and most spam calls in general originate overseas, and I wonder why the feds aren’t giving them higher priority. I mean, we have SEAL teams operating internationally, kicking down doors and killing terrorists, who are a minor annoyance compared to these phone spammers. Why aren’t the SEAL teams tracking down and killing phone spammers instead?<\/p>\n

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