[DomusAlbion]

To answer the question of the thread.

I feel quite hopeful. We were already reasonably prepared for any emergency before we gained knowledge about PO. We've been planning for years to move to the country and set up a small self-sustaining farm.
We were waiting until our youngest (16) graduated from high-school but we've now decided to move this summer and to begin setting up our homestead.
We were planning on building from scratch but now will buy an established farm/ranch and make the improvements we want. By the end of this year we'll be moved in and quit secure. We were hoping for the Yakima Valley in southern Washington but it looks like we'll now be in west central Idaho on the Nez Perce Indian reservation; very beautiful country with lots of water with good fish and plentiful hunting grounds.

[Njegosh]

Fucked but not fubar.
And i agree with with the other european poster here,for completely different reasons tho.
In a Hard crash Eurpoe wil survive where America will Balkanize.

[gnm]

The missle defense system "won't" - what a crock - have you taken a serious look at any of the scientific assesments of it? You don't need a country with ICBM's just a terriorist with a pickup...

keep the guns and go build a bunker for the fallout - then you're golden...

-B

[Ludi]

Although I voted the optimistic choice, I'm really pretty much fucked because I have health problems and will probably die relatively young because of lack of medication and healthcare in the future. But I sort of expected that anyway....

[smiley]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Specop_007', 'B')ut, there has to be a country with ICBM's that can reach my front door firstly, and secondly they have to get past the hopefully-soon-to-be missle defense systems, and thirdly they have to be brave enough to face assured destruction at our retalitory strike.

[spear]

Specop ,I really enjoy your posts.Really.You keep me laughing in these trying times.
Please post more often.

[Madpaddy]

Well 8 million Paddies lived here on potatoes and milk prior to 1840 so 4 million of us should be ok now - still pretty fucked though and we won't go into how depending on one crop affected us

Anyway - Happy Paddies day everyone

"May the road rise up to meet you, may the wind always be at your back and may all your ups and downs be in bed"

[smiley]

Happy paddy's day

You might not be fucked now, but I gues a lot of you will be pretty fucked tomorrow morning. Beware of those Leprechauns on your way back from the pub.

[Chocky]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'A')nd i agree with with the other european poster here,for completely different reasons tho.
In a Hard crash Eurpoe wil survive where America will Balkanize.

[DomusAlbion]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Madpaddy', 'A')nyway - Happy Paddies day everyone

"May the road rise up to meet you, may the wind always be at your back
and may all your ups and downs be in bed"

[Njegosh]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Chocky', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'A')nd i agree with with the other european poster here,for completely different reasons tho.
In a Hard crash Eurpoe wil survive where America will Balkanize.

[jaakkeli]

First of all, anyone saying that "Europe" is likely to "balkanize" clearly hasn't understood what balkanization means. Europe has little potential to balkanize, because <b>Europe has already been balkanized</b>! We have Austrians in Austria and Hungarians in Hungary and so on, with some but not very significant overlap. That's what balkanization is supposed to achieve: it's about drawing borders according to cultural lines and driving away people to what's perceived as their area (or killing them, if they refuse to go). It's not going to happen now, because in most of Europe it has already happened; we've already had enough murder over the centuries to achieve enough cultural segregation.

There are still some very potential trouble spots, but as a whole Europe is done through it. And it's not really because of some enlightenment ("we're sick of war and so peaceful now" - rubbish!), but because we've already killed most of the people we'd want to kill. America, on the other hand, hasn't gone through that phase of violent drawing of cultural borders... yet. (That one incident 150 years ago had a rather inadequate death toll compared to all the European wars. And it didn't end up drawing a border.)

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Njegosh', '
')You have how many privately owned firearms?Automatic firearms?Mil-spec weaponry?
The only place comparable in Europe would be....yep the balkans.

[Njegosh]

secret militias???
wtf?
you mean you still have 'm?
wow!
Seems some people haven't forgotten suomosalmi and Antaa tulla tänne vaan then. nice

btw
where did you get your stats on private firearms possession?
I always thought the US was the top dog in this aspect.
and in a not per capita but total count i still believe the US still is the top dog.

[threadbear]

You people have it all wrong. If tshtf, you have to find older people who've been through hard times themselves. Have them explain to you how to survive. Be patient, learn as much as you can, and then, cook them and eat them.

[RIPSmithianEconomics]

My family will go on much as it has always done. The sheep will still be sheared, the cows still milked, the children shall still play on the moors, harvests will still take place, and the rain shall still fall. Poorer? Certainly. Less happy? Well, my grandparent's grandparent's grandparent's weren't rich, but they still were able to smile for paintings, and leave their names in parish records. The advantage of having a generally problematic life (relying on the weather in order to make a profit or a loss) is that you can always feel that there are better times ahead.

But if I was in LA, or even London, I'd feel fucked.

[oowolf]

Pardon my Laphroaic, but we're ALL fukt--homo copulatus--ask any Kogi.
ANWR--HA HA! much too late,way too little.( The Irish may've invented whishkey but us Scots perfected it.)

Robbie Burns: "Freedom an' Whisky gang thegither"

"..when true hearts lie withered
and fond ones are flown
Oh! who would inhabit
this bleak world alone?"
words by Sir John Stevenson, melody by Tom Moore

[Ayoob_Reloaded]

Inspiring!

Homo habilis
Homo erectus
Homo sapiens
Homo petrolius
Homo copulus
Homo dispersium

[Budmeister]

I think we're all pretty much fucked if any country has or can get nukes, and decide that Bushco can't have thier oil.

Thats the two things that really, really scare me, nukes and ravening, starving, cannibilistic surburbanites and mall-shoppers.

Bud

[Chocky]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'N')ow the rest of europe on the other hand seem to have learned it's lesson after,the 100 Years War,the 80 Years War,the 30 Years War,the Napoleonitic Wars,The Franco-Prussian War,WWI and last but not least WWII.

[gg3]

Jaakkeli makes an interesting point. Europe has already done an awful lot of cultural partitioning, and now for the most part Europeans get along with each other. America hasn't done it, partially because we've had lots of space to spread out.

However the signs are visible. The prevalence of religious extremism in some parts of the US, and what might be called extreme secularism in other parts, is something to watch. The NeoCons like to use the phrase "culture wars," which could become a self-fulfilling prophesy.

The lack of social infrastructure, and the equity gap that is leading toward a new aristocracy, are also relevant. Disparities in wealth are the singular largest cause of violent social upheavals, and we are heading right for it on that one.

Recall my reference to a graph, where a typically "successful" middle to upper middle class family has $200k in equity (house etc.) which is a line 2" tall; the family you normally think of as "rich" has perhaps $2mm in equity, a line 20" tall; but a typical member of the new aristocracy, those for whom money has become raw power, that line on the same graph is 833 feet tall. That kind of disparity can't stick around for long before something breaks. The millionaire on the hill has more in common with the guy who mows his lawn, than he does with the new aristocracy.

I would gladly see Northern and Southern California become two separate states. Draw the line somewhere shortly below Santa Cruz. We have water, the south has oil, we can have a mutually beneficial trading relationship. We get to keep Governor Schwarzenegger though!:-).

The US may also see a shift toward a phase where central government is weakened (primarily via the consequences of its ongoing deficits) and power shifts back to the states. This is a realistic counter-scenario to the usual forecast of an all-powerful tyrannical Federal government. As long as freedom of movement is preserved, we could see a very interesting sorting-out of the culture.

Though, that would be sad if it went much further. I still subscribe to the 18th Century Enlightenment ideas about liberty and equality, reason and empiricism, and humans being able to govern themselves in a lawful and consistent manner. To accept Balkanization in its full sense, is to give in to entropy.