Financial
Total Currency Collapse? People across the globe are losing faith in traditional national currencies. In Europe, this spurred the creation of the Euro and now the popularity of digital currencies such as Bitcoin. In the United States, it is fueling renewed interest in the use of gold or silver coins as currency. The most interesting experiment is going on in Texas, where Governor Rick Perry (who is hardly a libertarian) is pushing an effort to create a Texas Gold Depository. This proposal wouldn’t create a gold currency; instead it would create what amounts to a sort of exchange-traded
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Precious Metal Manipulation The volatile ups and downs in the market prices of precious metals read like a soap opera. It begins with the Federal Reserve—they confirmed they had every intention of continuing quantitative easing for the foreseeable future (to the point that those of us in the financial sector now refer to it as QE infinity, as
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Fiscal Crisis Or Political Posturing? The so-called fiscal crisis in Washington is nothing but politics. Even though Congress and President Obama claim that the country is out of money, politicians on both sides of the aisle seem to be able to come up with money for pet projects. An investigation by Senate Republicans found that the Labor Department had enough funds to spare to promote unions and collective bargaining overseas. Republicans learned that the Department had given $2.2 million to the Solidarity Center (an AFL-CIO organization set up during the Cold War to help workers in Communist countries) to promote
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Religion
Tim Tebow Fired For Being A Christian? Like most sports controversies, the Tebow story is already yesterday’s news. Google his name and you will see how few stories there are out there over the last month. He was hot for a while: Denver had a nice little run with him back in the dark ages of two seasons ago, and then the New York Jets fans and team kicked him to the curb and said good riddance. Since the New York Jets released Tim Tebow, various voices have either relegated his name to that junkyard reserved for superior college athletes that could
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The Princess and the Wicked Queen The princess trope represented passivity, entitlement, materialism, and submissiveness, and no daughter of mine would wear a onesie that celebrated such loathsome values. —Andy Hines, The Atlantic (2013) What’s Wrong with Princesses? In January of 2000, Disney executive Andy Mooney made a brilliant if obvious business decision. He consolidated the most popular Disney princesses into a single franchise and from it spun out through licensees some 25,000 varieties of princess merchandise. Princess lip balm, princess alarm clocks, princess bedspreads, princess nighties. According to Mooney, Disney merely discovered (finally!) an already existing demand and licensed all
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Should We Love A Wicked Nation? The early councils had as their primary purpose the defense and establishment of truth, not unity. —Rousas J. Rushdoony, Foundations of Social Order (1978) Loving Those Who Hate God? “Should you help the ungodly, and love those who hate God?” This was the rhetorical question the prophet Jehu put to Jehoshaphat, king of Judah (2 Chron. 19:2). Jehoshaphat had gone to Israel, the northern kingdom, on a good will visit. The two Hebrew kingdoms had been at odds for a long time, and Jehoshaphat was trying to fix things up. He hoped to reunite the
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Politics
The Growing Threat Of Liberal Anarchy The media is ignoring a growing threat to civil society on the left: the strange resurrection of the dangerous dogma known as anarchism. Simply put, anarchism is the belief that human beings are basically and intrinsically good and all authority is evil and corrupting. It can also lead to violence such as the riots in Seattle on May 1, when a mob roamed through the city’s downtown attacking police and destroying property. The crowd, composed largely of anarchists, threw rocks, firebombs, metal pipes, and fireworks at police. Such riots have become a yearly event in
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No Need For Conspiracies When We Gladly Give Away Our Freedoms Immediately after 9/11, there was a groundswell of support for anything the government deemed necessary to make us safer. American flags flew on every car and new legislation passed at a dizzying rate as everyone wanted to do something, anything, to let the world know we weren’t going to just sit here and be a target for every two-bit terrorist that wanted to make a name for himself. There result, among other things, was the behemoth we now know as the Department of Homeland Security. The idea seemed right: ensure that all of our intelligence
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EXPOSED: ATF Set To Collect Your Personal Data The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) is seeking to create a massive online database that can pull up an individual’s personal information, connections, and associates. Currently called “Investigative System,” the ATF is asking private companies to provide bids to build it. The system is described as a “massive online data repository system that contains a wide variety of data sources both historically and current that can be utilized in support of investigations and backgrounds.” According to the ATF’s official web site, the system will be utilized by staff “to provide rapid searches on
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Energy
This Insulation Could Save You Hundreds On Your Electric Bill During a 2009 stop at a Home Depot in Alexandria, Virginia, President Obama called on Congress to pass a tax credit that would help homeowners pay for energy-efficiency retrofitting projects, and he referred to insulation in particular as “sexy.” “Most of this stuff is going to pay for itself,” the President stated. “You put in the insulation, you weatherize your home now, you will make up that money in a year or two years or three years, and then everything after that is just gravy.” Whether you agree with his politics or not, if you
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Building-Integrated Photovoltaics: The Future Of Solar Energy? Despite the political scandals, the failed promises, and the general difficulties that new energy technologies face when trying to break the stranglehold of fossil fuels, the field of solar energy has continued to advance and expand. Past disappointments aside, at the end of the day the sun is potentially a limitless source of power, and
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Biodiesel And You: A Fully Functional Fuel You Can Make Right At Home The short-term cost of petroleum-based fuel is erratic and unpredictable, but over the long-term, it has been on a steady upward trend that has been slowly eating away at the pocket books and bank accounts of every American. As the reality of peak oil hits and perpetual war in the Middle East turns from worst-case
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Privacy
The Only Argument You Need To Defend Your Right To Privacy “We are rapidly entering the age of no privacy, where everyone is open to surveillance at all times; where there are no secrets from government,” Supreme Court Justice William Douglass lamented over sixty years ago. Unfortunately, he was right, as former Sun Microsystems chief said in 1999: “You’ve got zero privacy . . . so get over it.” Well, nearly fifteen years later, I can’t get over it. There are many reasons we’re losing individual privacy in the United States. Many of the reasons have rational explanations. For example, the Supreme Court’s legal standard for
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What Personal eReader Data Are They Storing? “Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind,” said famed champion of individualism Ralph Waldo Emerson. Unfortunately, even the last refuge of privacy, our thoughts, is under attack. From the Electronic Communications Act of 1986 to the Patriot Act of 2001 to the recent legislation allowing domestic drones, we’ve watched our privacy inexorably shrink to the size of our paycheck after taxes. The new threat to privacy is the ubiquitous ebook reader. Over 40 million have been sold in America, and many Americans have installed ebook reader apps on their tablets
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Could Big Brother Know What’s On Your Kindle? Digital reading devices such as the Amazon Kindle, the iPad, and other tablets aren’t just convenient for average people. They’re also very convenient for Big Brother and anybody else that wants to see what you’re reading. Professors at Texas A&M University can now monitor their students’ reading of digital textbooks with software from a company called CourseSmart, The New York Times reported. Using CourseSmart, the professors can tell what textbooks the students are reading and how many pages they’ve looked at. That’s bad news for a lot of lazy college students and very bothersome for
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Health
How To Make Medicinal Teas Over the next four weeks, I am going to tell you how you can make your own herbal first-aid kit from common herbs that are readily available. Sources of the herbs include your kitchen, garden, fields, woods and occasionally, herb or natural food stores. I will teach you techniques for herbal medicine making as well
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7 All-Natural Medicines From Your Kitchen Did you know that you have some powerful medicines right in your kitchen? Herbs and spices do more than add delicious flavors and variety to meals. They are potent natural medicines. Many herbs and spices were traditionally used to preserve food, which they do well. The same properties that keep foods from becoming rancid prevent the human body from infection, aging, and a multitude of illnesses. Let’s take a look at some common herbs that you can use to create healing medicines with. Basil Beyond being an essential ingredient to pizza and pesto, basil has
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How To Beat Depression With These Superfoods When it comes to treating mental disorders naturally, most of us know that changing basic aspects of our lives can help make a difference in our mental health. People who have depression or other mood disorders sleep too much or too little compared to people without a mood disorder. Treating insomnia naturally leads to resolving
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Education
Surprising Material For Home Construction Off-the-grid living is revolutionary in the best sense of the word. To successfully break free from the chains of a society gone amiss, off-the-gridders must learn to step outside the box in their thinking and never miss a chance to live more independently, self-sufficiently, and according to their own standards of what is right and in harmony with God and nature. But surprisingly, many who choose to embrace this lifestyle never take the time to fully investigate alternative styles of home construction, preferring instead to stay safely ensconced in their own version of the timber-framed
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Top 5 Chickens For Producing Meat One important aspect to keep in mind when looking for livestock for homesteading is that animals you choose should be self-sustaining. Once again, chickens top the list of great animals for self-reliance. They are small and take up less space than most meat animals, they produce both meat and eggs, they are easy to feed and require very little in the way of housing, and best of all, they usually breed and reproduce easily and without intervention. Newcomers to the lifestyle are sometimes a little dismayed at the end result of dressing out some of
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How To Pick The Best Butter Storage Prepping food plans commonly call for the token beans, rice, canned goods, and dried food products you can purchase online and at the grocery store. However, one thing that might be overlooked is a fat source to use in baked goods and for general cooking. Many fats and oils have the tendency to go rancid,
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Extreme Survival
How To Survive With Little Water Or Food So you’re in a bad situation. You’re in the middle of nowhere; you don’t have much food and very little water. Maybe it’s the desert, maybe it’s a mountain or a forest. Either way, survival skills may change with your environment, but the basics stay the same. First, what do you have? If you’re lucky, you have a bottle of water, a power bar, your keys, a belt, and the clothes on your back. In reality, what you have is more than you think. Everything in survival can have a purpose, so save everything, from
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5 Critical Survival Rules For Disaster Aftermath Imagine a national crisis has occurred: FEMA has actively suspended the Constitution, rounding up all dissenters. The Bill of Rights is suspended, as anyone caught in protest or in possession of a firearm are immediately scooped up and taken to a FEMA internment camp for “reeducation.” Their reasoning is that it will maintain order, and the suspension of liberties is only “temporary” …but martial law seems indefinite. The formation of a one-world government is making headlines as a realization, and it is no longer just a conspiracy theory. What’s a patriot to do in such
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Bug-Out Ready Weapons And Tools In most desperate survival situations, you won’t have much on you. If you’re lucky, you’ll have a knife. (I’ve made it my own personal rule to always have a knife on me—nothing fancy, but at least a small folding pocket knife or Gerber multi-tool.) Assuming you don’t even have that though, acquiring tools and weapons
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Misc
Springtime Disasters: Don’t Let This Happen To You I’m not an expert at yard work, nor am I proficient at being self-supporting. I do know, however, what doesn’t work. I am very good at creating disasters around the house. Maybe, by writing this column, I can teach someone what not to do when working around the yard. Every spring, as soon as the weather turns, I start digging out the mess I made all winter in the garage. After I put all the tools back in their place, after I pick up remnants of every winter project I did, after dragging bicycles, wheel
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3 Proven Methods To Make Money In Hard Times Have you ever wondered what you might do if your income suddenly disappeared? Maybe it’s happened to you. Our economy is volatile, folks, and hard times could very well be just around the corner. When it comes to making a living, hard times do present opportunities, and you don’t have to have a lot of money to start making money right now. After twenty-eight years in the newspaper business, my livelihood was taken away from me not long ago. Newspapers were dying everywhere, and the profession I gave my life to was no longer needed. Below
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3 Simple Ways To Prepare To Hit Rock Bottom As he read the newspaper in the morning, my father used to say, “The world is going to hell in a handbag.” It has taken a little longer than he expected, but I believe his statement rings true today. From terrible government policies to terrible presidents’ decisions, our country is falling apart quickly now. So
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Food
4 Easy Steps to Efficiently Stock Your Emergency Home Pantry Survivalists and preppers alike know how having a properly stocked pantry and surviving perilous times go hand in hand. Regardless of your reason for preparedness, every prepared home has a well-stocked food pantry. For generations, storing food has long been an important factor in preparing families for survival. Throughout history, there can always be found
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How To Keep Disease Out Of Your Vegetable Garden Vegetable gardening is the most popular hobby in the United States. In addition to the pleasure gardening provides, many gardeners cite a desire for organic food as a motivation in vegetable gardening. Yet, plant diseases in the garden can thwart your efforts to grow chemical-free produce. How much your garden is affected by disease depends partly on your climate. Gardens in dry climates with cold winters suffer fewer disease problems than warm, moist climates. This is one aspect of gardening that you don’t have much control over. Fortunately, how you tend your garden also plays
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How To Stockpile Meat And Poultry In Your Survival Pantry I’d canned vegetables, fruits and jams for years, but I was a bit skeptical when I first heard about canning meat. How could that possibly be safe, I wondered, and what would the quality of the finished product be? Then, my friend Janice, a registered dietician and canning diva, came to my house and spent an afternoon teaching me how. I was surprised and pleased with the results. The meat was perfectly preserved, tender, and flavorful. Since it was already cooked, I could use it for spur of the moment, quick meals. Canning meat is
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Host Bill Heid has a spiritual conversation with award-winning screenwriter and a true Renaissance man, Brian Godawa. Godawa uses his left and right brained thinking to bring a modernization to ancient theologies. Heid and Godawa talk about the history involved with ancient theologies and how the perception that people create can be misguided by cultural inconsistencies.
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