Memo To Baby Ducks

Some of us remember "experts" telling us about how Iraq had "the world's sixth largest army", and how we needed "half a million body bags" for a ground war there.

And then watched the 72-Hour War finished up by two dozen A-10s on the Highway To Hell in an afternoon.

Take notes, shitheads. Clever readers may note certain trends.

Chances Iran stays smart, long-term: 0%, based on historical trends.

But them having the sense to quit while they're behind is a good sign that some learning has occurred this past week.

I Predict A Run On Midol And Tampons From Certain Websites...

Suck it, bitchez.

And Trump adds about another 30,000 scalps to the pile, from people that opposed him and got their asses handed to them.

And he did that in a weekend.

You'd think folks would have learned a lesson by now.

Calm Down! Get Ahold Of Yourself!

It's okay, stewardess, they speak Jive...

Lying With Half-Truths

 h/t WRSA

Today's unattributed soopergenius Biff Tannen Award-winner is the upper left panel of this work of Half-Assed Half-Wittery On Parade, which we have helpfully amended for your illumination.

You could look it up! FFS, this is even on Wikiretardica.

This is before we point out that the US spends $18.6Billion per day on itself, so that means Israel gets $1/person/day (and the US gets no oil embargoes nor gasoline selling for $7/gallon in return for that), and the US spends $54.79 per person/per day on its own citizens, including billions and billions annually squandered on Common Core education and healthcare for the shiftless lazy fucks of the nation, all paid for by the less-than-half of the US that actually works for a living, so fuck off with that "we're so neglected by our own government" commie bullshit, you innumerate and illiterate total jackass. Pull up your pants, spin your hat around, get a haircut, and get a job, and stop whining about other people. Or else move to Israel, and take a chance on a homemade rocket or an MRBM up the ass every day for 30 years. Give a holler when you can buy college and healthcare for $1/day, while you're up.

And as usual, when you lie by only telling part of the truth, your meme smacks its face into the pavement like a passenger dropping out of an Air Pinochet helicopter ride.

We congratulate another bravely Anonymous Shit For Brains memester for another award-winning meme equivalent of LZ Hindenburg, and commend the earnest dipshit who created it to go back to school, and take another shot at the second grade, probably after getting rid of the Klan hood and robes.

It must be hell to own a computer, still have a mid-70s IQ, and put that mental prowess on display for the whole world to see, like walking around with no pants all day, completely oblivious to the breeze twixt your knees, and spewing half a wit as if it were a whole truth.

Rush Week

Another pledge is initiated into Yu Fuckded Upda

If Cats Had Thumbs...

 ...they could rule the world.

I don't care who you are, you probably need to see this today.

And Tom Cruise should see it, and maybe take home a little humility.

Sunday Music: Like A Rolling Stone

Released in July of 1965, barely four months into what would balloon into Mr. Johnson's War, in the heart of the civil rights movement, this epic 6-minute monster transitioned Bob Dylan from folk musician into rock star, and lit up a generation, rocketing to Number 2, and taking a place among the greatest songs of the century. Listen close, folks. This isn't just Dylan's mid-60s bluesy bile as the fantasy of Camelot morphed into napalming jungles. "When you got nothin' you got nothin' to lose." The song's message isn't over yet. You are seeing, and will see, this material again. "How does it feel?"

Another Biff Tannen Award Winner!

h/t WRSA

As proof of yesterday's post, we bring you today's Biff Tannen Award winner, and repeat a lesson some people are too stupid to know they're too stupid to know.

Comedy, by which we mean successful comedy, requires two things:

1) It must be funny.

2) It must be true.

When you bring neither, but try anyways, you're just the clown from the Volkswagen who kicks himself in his own ass, and falls flat on his face.

Comedy may happen at that point, but only at your own expense, because you're just a public jackass.

Much like the too-chickenshit-to-sign-it creator of today's ass-tastic meme-fail, by the galactically stupid.

When you resort to building a straw man to get to your punchline, you're about as unfunny as SNL and David Letterman for the last 10 years of Trump Derangement Syndrome On Parade.

I.e., not one fucking bit.

This is what happens when you lie just to get a laugh from Other Stupid People, because the smart people are laughing at you, not with you. You're Alec Baldwin, yelling about how bad guns are, then shooting your own director and DP on your own movie. Which is hilarious to most people, just not the way you intended.

That's what happens when when you substitute the jackassically deceitful set-up of "Because They Have Nuclear Weapons" for the truthful and accurate set-up of "Because They're Trying To Develop Nuclear Weapons".

Which wee bit of bull's eye truth-telling sucks the funny right out of that self-ass-kicking meme, and makes you look like the jackass moron you are for lying about it when you created the original.

Well-played, Anonymous Shit-For-Brains.

This is what happens when you learned civics from a Common Core curriculum, and got your current events news from Tik-Tok.

(We'll leave out that you tried to make it look, with the American flag, like the U.S. was attacking Iran at all, when in fact the current war is solely Israel's doing, because too much actual geopolitical reality at once might explode your eggshell-thin understanding of the world as it is in such a big dose at one time.)

Own your award with pride, Biff, and you can pick up the picture documentation of it on any roll of TP at the nearest men's room. Right after you wipe. And stop trying to make memes until you do some pull-ups, and can get your IQ up above 70.

Thinking Is Hard

 

Imagine you were any of 90% of the Internet commentariat, and imagine you were a total idiot (but I repeat myself).

Irrevocable Truths:

1) Nations don't have friends, they have interests.

2) Israel has nuclear weapons. (50-100, give or take.)

3) Iran does not have any, yet. Despite trying for 40 years. (Exploding nuclear scientists and Stuxnet virus aren't coincidences, in case that thought never crossed your mind.)

4) Iran has missiles that will reach Israel, and if they get so much as one nuclear weapon, you'll know it just about the time the weather in Tel Aviv hits 1400° F.

So, knowing only those four things, does it make more sense (for the Common Core grads: "Is it in America's BEST INTERESTS...") to let things get to #4, knowing that thirty seconds after that, 50-100 nuclear weapons begin their journeys from Israel to every Arab capitol from Tripoli to Islamabad, to every oil field in the region, and every Islamic holy site, starting with Mecca and Medina, igniting a world wide jihad and a Crusade in response in milliseconds, and sending the worldwide price of oil to $5000/barrel by 2PM that day? Probably inducing Islamabad to launch all of theirs, which in turn prompts India to launch all of theirs? (We will leave aside how much this would affect the nuclear responses of China and Russia, which would then influence the nuclear responses of Britain, France, the United States, and possibly involve North Korea, or what that would all mean for the Northern Hemisphere for the next 100-1000 years, for the moment.) 

Or would the world be better served (and more importantly, "Be In America's BEST INTERESTS...") if Tehran and Persian culture were returned to that delightful time when most of the country was lit by fat lamps, fed on goat meat and date cakes, and most of the population travelled by camel between desert oases?

Pick one or the other.

Show all work.

Given the choice between a world without Israel, or a world without Iran as it is now constituted, with all that each choice would necessarily entail, I vote for Iran returning to the stone age.

For but one example of the proposition, consider how marvelously a gentle nudge from civilization improved Japan's interactions with the world circa mid 1945-present, and moderated what had been centuries of militant religious fanaticism and xenophobia.

The UCMJ And His Commanding General Should Have A Word With Col. Jackass

People have been posting this news with outrage, but the sensible response should be loud cheering and the sound of popping champagne corks.

One can oppose Israel and its policies without descending into unbridled anti-Semitism and flagrantly gross insubordination. This jackass will be lucky to make it to retirement without a general court martial, and we yet live in hope that his CG convenes such. This happily relieved colonel's excretions were exactly such, and correctly recognized as that by his senior commanders, as well as being wholly incompatible with service at the highest and most sensitive levels of this (or any) administration's defense establishment. Huzzah.

Outside the restrictions of the UCMJ, well known and studiously ignored by Colonel Jackass, one may hold and express such rabid Jew hatred freely, but they should understand that to most people, the halo of froth around one's mouth is generally off-puting.

We wish former colonel Nathan Bedford Forrest our best wishes in his future (and happily) non-military endeavors, and our final hope is that his separation from military service comes from his last duty assignment, somewhere involved with the mess and maintenance operations of McMurdo Sound, Antarctica, until his inevitable separation from military service, unless the Pentagon finds both a spine and the command determination to bust him to private and saddle him with a farewell BCD or Dishonorable Discharge after a few months in the Military Correctional Facility in Leavenworth, KS, which he so richly deserves, thus zeroing out his future retirement and medical benefits.

Shitheads gonna shithead, but the military is no place to subsidize such shitheadery.

We hope he wears the boot prints on his ass a long, long time after his pending, inevitable, and richly-deserved separation from service.

Weather News You Can Use

h/t WRSA

Sic semper terroristis

Tell Us More

Quite The Poser There...

This is almost as big a mystery as why commercial music
folded when it went to all-rap, all the time

FIFY

 h/t  Rhea, WRSA

Gell-Mann Amnesia in full effect.

"But hark, what light through yonder window breaks..."

FIFY

h/t WRSA

Israel, while never admitting it, is largely acknowledged to have possessed nuclear weapons for 50 years or so. To date, they've never used one, and haven't provably even tested one.

By contrast, you'll know the day Iran gets one, because it will go off at the head of an Iranian-launched missile headed for Tel Aviv. Which reasonably enough, Israel's government considers unacceptable.

To this point, the only thing they've done wrong is to not nuke Tehran proactively. And maybe a few more cities in Iran, just to make the point unmistakable. They may yet do so, and would be no more despised if they did so than they are now, and yet they restrain that response, rather than risk a wider, and perhaps inevitably global, nuclear conflict.

And every time they spank Iran, a dozen Arab nations, and the governments thereof, hand Israel cash, prizes, and sincere thanks, backchannel or under the table, because they want a nuclear Iran even less than Israel does.

Iran has been the bleeding ass sore of the Middle East since 1979.

We should have been flying Arc Light rounders to their cities from Diego Garcia hourly for the last 50 years, but we've been too chickenshit to man up and do what's both deserved, and long past necessary.

Israel lacked the ability to do what they did yesterday as anything but one-way suicide missions, until they were sold US KC-135 tanker aircraft during Obozo's administration.

Israel can't wait until after there's a mushroom cloud overhead to act. It's an existential luxury, and asinine to expect it of them. So Wikileaks should either STFU, or quit the charade by just putting on a pointed white hood, and get their true feelings out in the open.

They could be that stupid once, but to stay this stupid perpetually is the calculated and deliberate act of someone maliciously hoping they could see all of Israel smoked under a rain of nuclear destruction, partly as wishcasting, and secondarily as a shout out of affirmation to their fellow mouth-breathers worldwide.

Like the internet was short of that at any point since it started existing.

20-Dimensional chess move: while Trump's hands are clean in Israel's strike, one consequence of it now has Iran cutting off drone sales to Russia, because they need them to attack Israel. So in one move Israel has cut the Houthi terror pipeline, yet again severely crimped Iran's nuclear ambitions (as if exploding nuclear scientists and Stuxnet viruses weren't enough), and taken some heat off Ukraine - supposedly by accident.

That's what diplomats and the E-ring at the Pentagon call a hat trick.

Sunday Music: Good Vibrations

 

There was no way we could know the week we picked Kokomo as Sunday Music would be the same one in which Brian Wilson passed away a few days later. But it's definitely the reason we're putting this classic up as today's choice the Sunday after that, having also been written and produced by Wilson, with lyrics by fellow Beach Boy Mike Love, after becoming the longest and costliest studio track in production history to that point in time. After taking most of 1966 to nail down, it was released in October of 1966, and became the Beach Boys' third ever #1 hit by December of that year, spending seven weeks at the top of the charts, and eventually becoming one of the most influential singles of all time after double platinum status.

Some Thoughts On AI

h/t Wilder

Regarding JW's essays on AI, we offer the following:

Reality Check:

AI doesn't think, it aggregates, which only mimics thinking.

It doesn't learn, it merely aggregates and averages, over time.

Think of it this way: AI brings you water out of your pool.

The problem is, you, your neighbors, and everyone you know is pissing and crapping in your pool every day.

Because it doesn't think, it aggregates, so AI keeps pumping the product out of your pool and delivering it as drinking water. And that's the best versions of AI.

And every day on the internet, more neighbors from farther away come to your pool to relieve themselves.

Bottoms up, friends.

AI doesn't screen out bad info. It doesn't, for example, take every smiling jackass who thinks chemtrails are a conspiracy theory, and sh*tcan their input, and only accept info from people that have even a grade-school understanding that the products of hydrocarbon combustion are CO2 and H2O, since ever, and that the H2O contrails at altitude is nothing but the ice crystals of that water vapor flash-frozen at 35,000 feet, like we've seen since we flew B-17s, FFS.

This is the reason AI can't screen the poo and pee out of that swimming pool. It just adds them to the mix it considers, and averages them out.

So take any comment section from anywhere, on any topic, and realize that on its best day, AI is giving you the input of the 51st percentile of IQ there, multiplied by how many idiots post that level of discourse.

Which is why, 0.2 seconds after AI is turned loose on any topic, you can expect that it will sound like someone with kneejerk "Joooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooosss! Run for your lives! They're everywhere!!!" to a level generally and formerly found only on Stormfront websites.

AI has no BS filter.

And any BS filter constructed will be nothing but the manifestation of the biases of the programmer(s).

So it's always going to be ten pounds of sh*t in a five pound bag, no matter what anyone wishes.

It will replace, and sound smarter than, the people at about the 60th percentile of IQ.

That's 103, bog-middle of average.

But it will be dumber than f**k compared to anyone at the 70th or better.

IOW, compared to AI, an Army 2d Lt. outperforms it, 24/7/365, because they have to have a 110 IQ.

So AI will make the 80 IQ crowd obsolete, except as ditch-diggers, because AI can't do manual labor.

(Until Skynet makes robots it controls.)

You can teach it to play chess, and beat you, but it can't think its way out of a pyramid of crap any better than a sh*thouse rat trapped in an outhouse cesspit.

This is therefore only a problem for the people on the internet who think sh*t is a substitute for brains. (I could name any number of examples you all know, who post incessant crap, but I won't embarrass them any further than their bloviations have already done.)

It's a threat to the left half of the IQ bell curve.

To anyone 1/2 an inch beyond the peak middle on a 20-foot IQ bell curve, AI is, and always will be, a joke.

And the only way to change that is an AI aggregation pool that's only people with IQs at least two standard deviations above the mean (about 130), which is less than 3% of the population. Three deviations (145) is less than 0.5% of the whole planet.

That would be an AI where all your neighbors pee and poo in their own toilets, instead of your pool.

One idiot in the mix, and it's Caddyshack, and AI is Carl Spackler eating a Baby Ruth out of the pool, every single time. Except it won't be a Baby Ruth, 99.9% of the time.

And there will never be enough smart people posting within AI's aggregation pool to overcome the number of thoroughgoing jackasses spewing bullshit by the metric fuckton, every time they fire up their keyboards, which is why most blogs and websites worth reading eventually have to moderate comments, just to keep the sanitation level tolerable.

It's also why ABCNNBCBS and print urinalists, substituting equally dipsh*t editors for AI, have become unreliable and intolerable piles of raw sewage, 24/7/365.

Because at the end of the day, AI isn't Artificial Intelligence. 

(Artificial Intelligence is an oxymoron.)

It's Artificial Stupidity, with a thin patina of the genuine article.

Which only fools people for whom indoor plumbing and electric lighting seem like witchcraft.

QED

Follow Up: Medical References

 

From a question in comments to the previous post today.

In order:

First Tier

1. The ACEP First Aid Manual Start here. PERIOD.

2a. Wilderness Medicine: Beyond First Aid, Forgey 

2b. The Prepper's Medical Handbook, Forgey

3. Special Operations Forces Medical Handbook 

4. Survival Medicine Handbook, Alton and Alton

5. Auerbach's Wilderness Medicine (2 vol.)

6. SOF Combat Casualty Care

7a. Where There Is No Doctor *Medical care for the Turd World, but that may be you someday.

7b. Where There Is No Dentist *One of the only texts I know of that deals with dental care under austere circumstances.

Honorable Mentions:

The entire medical section in the classic SAS Survival Handbook.

Also, any Red Cross medical handbook from before 1960, solely for the sections on bandaging and splinting, which cover techniques that still hold up, and are no longer covered by anyone currently. Forget anything from that era having to do with snakebite treatment, or whatever CPR was called then, but the bandaging and splinting techniques, though old, are just as good now as they were then, and you won't find them easily too many other places.

Secondary

There are a ton of second-tier texts out there, seldom actually bad, but not anywhere near the same league as the above texts. If your favorite isn't listed above, bummer. I've seen a lot of books that are okay, but the ones I named above are comprehensive, and good. You can do worse, but you won't do better.

You may find some utility in military medical manuals, for some purposes. Other than the two I mention last, there may frequently be found some utility in learning geared towards someone who dropped out in 9th grade, working in Turd World conditions. As long as the text isn't pre-Vietnam, you might get your hands on something worthwhile in some aspects. But check anything found against the comprehensive and modern references listed at the top of this post first.

The next level is actual medical texts, used by doctors, if you have a licensed practitioner (MD, PA, RN) in your midst.

The go-to for my career field is Tintinalli's Emergency Medicine Handbook.

2160 pages, $189, and geared for an ER doc with access to Xrays, ultrasound, CT scanners, MRIs, plus a lab and a pharmacy. But still how residents learn how to do ED medicine.

Other good choices would be a nursing pharmacology handbook, and standard medical manuals on primary care and diagnosis, orthopedics, an atlas of skin disorders, and on and on.

Anything beyond primary and preventative care is either going to require definitive treatment beyond what you can do yourself (which you may or may not have access to), or your patient(s) are going to have problems ranging from chronic to terminal. You're not going to solve surgical problems, most infectious diseases, major burns, or most critical traumas, because you don't have the resources to do much beyond initial stabilization, which assumes access to secondary and tertiary care.

Which means if you're beyond access to 1st world care, including anesthesia, antibiotics, and general pharmacy needs, like you will be in extreme circumstances - people will die, including those nearest and dearest to you, and you can't prevent that.

So mortuary texts on handling bodies, prevention of outbreaks after people die (potentially with infectious diseases), and strong disinfectants, aren't a bad idea. Burial and cremation activities become more important as life spans shorten, in austere circumstances.

Bottom Of The Barrel

Books that are mostly a complete waste of time and money, except as historical reference:

Special Forces Medical Handbook ST 31-91 (1982) - any version

50 years out of date, this is about as currently useless as medical texts from the Civil War, or ancient Greece. If you want to learn things from 1982, go ahead on. After you're completely fluent in the first ten or so books at the top of this post. In your ample spare time.

Emergency War Surgery

If you're a doctor, you know better medical texts. And if you aren't one, you aren't going to be doing anything in this book, and if you do, your patient will die. Either screaming, or from the inevitable infection from trying to do 21st century surgery under 17th century conditions. Just...don't.

We're not trying to get you through medical school here, just get you up to speed on fundamentals of primary care, both in the field, and in an off-grid (short-term or longer) situation.

Get all the knowledge and experience you can now, while it's both cheap, and easily available.

When you're 5000 miles from help up Schitt's Creek, or in a Turd World/Civil War era medical situation, it's too late to crack a friggin' book, or take a class.

Let's Revisit The SHTF Med Kit From 2014, Shall We?

 

So 11+ years ago, we gave Baby Brother a blueprint for a SHTF Medical Kit. (He's still a smiling idiot, and after getting the list, never did another thing about it.) But we were wondering where, with inflation, the current price point for it is.

FTR, it was circa $850 in 2014.

_____________________________

1. The divider set and lid liner for your Pelican 1600 case

$153.15 268.95

1605EMS EMS Accessory Set (Lid Organizer and Divider Set) | Pelican Official Store

2. Quickclot ACS Gauze Pads Quickclot EMS Dressing

(3) X $9.99

https://www.chinookmed.com/06734pa/z-medica-quikclot-ems-4x4-dressing.html

3. Quickclot Combat Gauze Rolls Quickclot EMS Rolled Gauze

(2) X $25.30

https://www.chinookmed.com/05245/quikclot-ems-rolled-gauze.html

4. Asherman Chest Seals

(2) X $14.80

https://www.chinookmed.com/12102/asherman-chest-seal.html

5. Combat Application Tourniquet

(4) x $29.99 $31.59

https://www.chinookmed.com/01294/c-a-t-tourniquet-gen-7.html

6. NP Airways 1 ea 28Fr/30Fr/32Fr/34Fr

(3) X $3.74 $3.99

(1) X $5.00

https://www.chinookmed.com/02120pa/nasopharyngeal-airway.html

7. Surgical lubricant for using NP Airways,  (6) 3gm packets

$4.95 $1.04

https://www.chinookmed.com/?page=item&id=801520

8. SAM Splints

(2) X $12 $12.50@

9. Israeli Emergency Bandage 4"

(4) X $6.29 $8.95

https://www.chinookmed.com/05130/israeli-emergency-bandage-4.html

10. Israeli Emergency Bandage 6"

(4) X $6.56 $9.35

https://www.chinookmed.com/05131/israeli-emergency-bandage-6.html

11. PriMed Compressed Gauze Bandage Responder Compressed Gauze Bandage

(6) X $2.44 $2.98

https://www.chinookmed.com/023297/responder-compressed-gauze.html

12. Israeli Emergency Abdominal Bandage

(2) X $12.12@ $17.87@

https://www.chinookmed.com/05150/israeli-abdominal-bandage-8-wide-w-12x12-pad.html

13. Muslin Triangular Bandage

(6) X $0.47@ $8.75@

https://www.chinookmed.com/05001pa/berry-compliant-cravat-triangular-bandage.html

Nota bene: And these are the cheapest ones. This is govt. contract ripoff pricing. Go to WalMart or the local fabric store, buy about 4 yards of the cheapest olive drab or dark brown cotton broadcloth you can find (or repurpose 3 old bedsheets), and cut it into triangular bandages yourself. Fold or roll each to a compact size, and put them into 6 ziplok snack bags. And save yourself $40 out of the $50+ buying them would cost. If you're paying 9 bucks apiece for triangular cravat bandages, you're rich, an idiot, or both.

14. BZK antiseptic towelettes (100 bx)

$3.44 $9.50

https://www.chinookmed.com/05111pa/antiseptic-towelettes.html

15. Povidone-iodine prep pads (6s)

$6.88 10 X $1.33

https://www.chinookmed.com/01911pa/povidone-iodine-prep-pads.html

16. Bottles of Bactine and Betadine solution (3-6oz.)

$10@

WalMart, CVS, Target, etc.

17. Burn kit

$61.95 (2) x $35.99 

https://www.chinookmed.com/01402/chinook-burnpak.html

18. Water jel burn gel

(12) X $0.53 $8.16

https://www.chinookmed.com/500000/burn-jel-2oz.html

19. Triple antibiotic ointment (Generic Neosporin, 6 x 0.9gm packets)

(3) X $4.30 (12) X $1.82

20. Military casualty space blanket

(2) x $19.67 $15.99

Casualty space blanket

 21. Band Aids Assorted (100)

$9.49 $8.48

Band Aids Assorted (100)

Band Aids 1"x3" (100)

$8.29 $9.33

Band Aids 1" x 3" (100)

Band Aids Extra Large (10)

(2) X $5.49 $4.15

Extra Large Band Aids

Knuckle Bandages (40)

$3.49 (4) x $4.14

Knuckle and Fingertip Bandages 10+10

Butterfly bandages (100)

$5.99 $7.99

Butterfly bandages

22. Self-adhering 3" 2" bandage wrap (36)

$30.59 $136.44

https://www.chinookmed.com/200017/coban-wrap-bandage-elastic-tan.html

23. 1" First Aid tape        silk (12s)

$14.19 (12) X $1.75@

silk first aid tape

                                            plastic (12s)

$12.99 (12) X $6.09@

plastic first aid tape

24. Gauze sponges 4"x4" (200)

$5.69 $8.46

4"x4"s

                                    2"x2" (200)

$1.69 $6.88

2"x2"s

25. Gloves, nitrile

$10

WalMart, CVS, Target, etc.

__________________________________

Around $850  $1200, out the door.

There's 11 years of inflation for you. Over 40%, although some items decreased in price, the total for almost the same load-out has gone up. 

And all the links are updated. You're welcome. Here's the rest of the OP. Best wishes.

__________________________________

You can trim back some of the spendier high-speed tactical stuff to save a few bucks, but it's your ass (or someone near and dear to you), and I don't think you want to run out of supplies before you fix all the holes.

 

Notes:

Drop the money on the divider. It's the reason the EMS Pelican is another $150. It gives you small clear pockets for the small stuff, and 18+ pockets in the bottom for the big stuff.

 

I set this up so you could handle the most likely emergency problems (cuts, punctures, burns, sprains & fractures), including the TCCC {look it up!} supplies most likely to save your or someone else's life if someone catches a cowboy load at the range, as well as GSWs after the Zombie Apocalypse. Dual utility.

The plain gauze, tape and band-aids are for the far more frequent little stuff, to prevent turning it into bigger problems.

 

I didn't source (but you should add) two things:

* A good AAA LED headlamp, because you'll really appreciate light and both hands free when it's dark. My personal favorite ( I have 3 of them) is the Petzl Tactika Plus Headlamp. I get mine at REI for about $46 or so. http://www.rei.com/search?query=petzl+Tactika

Runs on 3 AAA, has a red lens that flips on or off, and has 4 light settings - econo, medium, bright, and flashing.

* * * 2025 UPDATED INFO: The current comparable model now goes for $129.95:

Petzl three-level red light and strobe headlamp  * * *

 

* The other thing is a good disposable CPR face shield, so you don't swap cooties in CPR. I'd get one in case you need to do CPR on family members, or them on you, but otherwise, I can't see you doing rescue breathing on anyone not on the cover of the Sports illustrated Swimsuit issue, so I left it out.

 

Until such time as you re-acquaint yourself with First Aid, bear in mind that it's still mostly what you learned in boot camp in the prehistoric era: Stop the bleeding, start the breathing, protect the wound, and treat for shock.

 

Direct Pressure, Pressure dressing, elevate the limb, tourniquet (don't be shy - unlike in the 1980s, they now know tourniquets like the CAT applied early is a lifesaver for bleeding extremities).

For minor holes, pressure with the 2x2s or 4x4s, then clean with the BZK/Bactine (same thing, except Bactine has low-dose lidocaine to make it sting less!), clean any penetrating trauma with Betadine and sterile non-preserved saline, then sterile dressing and clean bandage. pressure and pressure dressings, including Israeli bandage, or plain old ACE wraps, and if necessary, a tourniquet as well.

 

Airway is simple once 911 isn't an option: either a nasal trumpet, lubed outside with the Surgilube, up one or both snotstrils will open it, or they're going to die.

If you want to learn about TCCC needle decompression, and cricothyrotomy airways, we can talk. There are actual military/medical training vids on YouTube right now.

 

But outside of civilization, you aren't going to save anyone with CPR after 30 minutes, unless they were immersed in frigid water. If they stop breathing for other reasons, and you can't get them breathing again after half an hour, and help isn't on its way, that's probably a hint to go through their pockets for loose change, and collect one of their dogtags.

 

And in any victim unable to move around afterwards, whip on those space blankets, either for shade, or for warmth.

 

I also left out things like C-collars and anything diagnostic, until such time as you learn how to use it.

If you get a wild hair up your ass, find out who's doing basic EMT training at the local CC out there, and consider doing the class.

Training is the only thing you can't pull out of a kit, and some things, you just have to learn.

 

If you want, I can teach you how to measure blood pressure in about 20 minutes, but you need a stethoscope (A $20 Sprague works fine) and an adult cuff (manual, with a squeezy bulb, not one of those pieces of electro-garbage.) Let me know, anytime you want. One of the $60 fingertip pulse oximeters gets you pulse and O2%. Add a good thermometer, and you've now mastered the same triage vitals done in every ER from coast to coast.

 

A couple of good tweezers for splinters (a flat set, and a pointy set) are always a good idea, and you can grab those at any decent drugstore. Several small sewing needles work great for working out splinters and shallow stuff imbedded at the surface of the skin. An X-acto knife if you're feeling daring. Note that the large burn kit has a pair of good EMT shears in it, to use anytime you need to cut clothes open or off, so no need to buy a separate one.

 

*** 2025 UPDATE: That's changed. They're not in the current kits. Buy a pair of good, SHARP EMT shears. ***

Resist the urge to get a "kit, instrument, surgical". They're overpriced, under-useful, and you could get better instruments just by visiting a gun show.

And unless you know what you're doing, you don't need the toys to go poking around in holes, or start yanking things out until you know what they're into. Anything deeper than your range of sight needs to be left in a hole until someone with better training decides whether it can come out or not, verstehen sie?

 

When you get the box, and the goodies, not everything on that list can or should fit inside it. And adhesives don't like hot cars. So put some of the items inside, and replenish as you use them, or annually check them and replace the crusty ones.

 

DO put the kit in your truck, because if you need it at a shoot, or on the highway, it won't do you any good at home on top of the gun safe, right?

 

I hope you have stashed/are stashing a cushion of any family Rx meds by any means possible, including "oops, I lost my meds and need a whole month's replacement!" provided you're footing the bill, or any other legal way possible. Cycle through the overstock first in/first out, so you eventually always have 3-6 months of fresh stuff in reserve. Imagine a major earthquake, and no pharmacy for a month or three. Let alone anything more dire.

 

Note also I didn't include any meds except topical wound stuff.

I'm a big fan of getting the unit dose packages of whatever you already use, like Tylenol, Motrin/Advil, Tums, Pepto, and anything else. OTCs don't magically go bad after three years, so don't throw them out, just don't give them to anyone not related to you by blood. Except for certain antibiotics, most pills remain useable for 10-30 years if stored properly (cool, dark, dry).

 

Don't forget sunscreen, chapstick, and high DEET percentage bug juice.

Any questions, fire away.

 

__________

Always Use Enough Club

Some folks are worried there will be a nationwide repeat of Los Angeles this weekend. And that those will be provocations, to create another George Floyd poster martyr for the entire Wetback Protection Movement.

Pish-tosh. Exceed their expectations. Instead of one martyr, give them a million such. See how that fits into their plans.

Give them 10M, and the problem goes away for 100 years.

Give them 60M-70M, and it goes away forever.

The surest way to success, as every businessman will tell you, is to under-promise, and over-deliver.

And the best way to solve a multi-generational problem is to leave your enemies dead by the metric fuckton, with surprised looks on their faces. The beauty of deportation is that it doesn't matter to the deporting country whether it's dead, or alive.

QED

Follow me for more strategic advice.

RELATED:

Go to the 5:42 mark, and it gets really good at the 7:00 point.

Hoo buddy, fucktards, please riot in red counties like Brevard County FL.

The videos will go viral.

And BTW, we warned you turning a blind eye to endless wetback infestation would bite everyone in the ass, since before this blog began. But you kept electing endless Lindsay Grahamnestys and Marco ScrewYoubios from the GOPe RINO slate, writing endless attempts to make the invasion permanent and perpetual, and kicking the can down the road. Because the problem was just California. Now you're all Califrutopia. Ain't it hard when you discover that they really weren't where it's at, after they took from you everything they could steal? How does it feel?

R.I.P. Brian Wilson

Brian Wilson, the creative heart and soul of the Beach Boys, died yesterday at age 82. Despite lifelong mental health and substance abuse issues, and a recent dementia diagnosis, he was one of the most innovative and prolific hit-making singer/songwriter/producers of the 20th century, creating a new sound, and at times doing everything on Beach Boys songs except for the other members' vocals. He was still touring and working on projects up until his death.

IANAL, But This Sounds Like A Splendid Approach

Make Insurrection And Sedition Penalties Great Again

8 U.S. Code §1481:

(a) A person who is a national of the United States whether by birth or naturalization, shall lose his nationality by voluntarily performing any of the following acts with the intention of relinquishing United States nationality—

 ...

(7)

committing any act of treason against, or attempting by force to overthrow, or bearing arms against, the United States, violating or conspiring to violate any of the provisions of section 2383 of title 18, or willfully performing any act in violation of section 2385 of title 18, or violating section 2384 of title 18 by engaging in a conspiracy to overthrow, put down, or to destroy by force the Government of the United States, or to levy war against them, if and when he is convicted thereof by a court martial or by a court of competent jurisdiction.

For the link-impaired those three sections are Rebellion and Insurrection, Overthrow, and Seditious Conspiracy against the United States.

Everyone attempting to hinder ICE raids, or vehicles and government agents undertaking them, qualifies under those provisions, under 18 USC §2383:

Whoever incites, sets on foot, assists, or engages in any rebellion or insurrection against the authority of the United States or the laws thereof, or gives aid or comfort thereto, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both; and shall be incapable of holding any office under the United States.

So the government is perfectly justified in declaring martial law, rounding up anyone who does so in the future, and finding them at a court martial guilty, stripping them of their American citizenship, and shipping them to Gitmo, as upon conviction they lose all rights of US citizenship, and the Constitution and its protections no longer apply to them.

The rest of 8 USC §1481 helpfully notes that anyone who performs any such act is considered to have done so voluntarily, and performing the acts renders one guilty under that statute until proven innocent. Literally. So getting rounded up at such an incident justifies stripping you of your US citizenship, putting you in prison with other non-citizens, and sentencing you to death, in short order. Yes, really. One declaration from POTUS, and we could be shipping people to Gitmo and hanging them by Friday!

That could even be applied to Gov. Gabbin' Nuisance, L.A.'s derelict and full communist Mayor Karen Basshole, and any federal judge who attempts to stick their nose into the government's business.

As a bonus, the president, without let or hindrance from anyone else, can unilaterally declare martial law in Los Angeles or any other city similarly besieged UFN, which takes the entire purview of the subsequent business out of the jurisdiction of both the federal courts and the DoJ, leaving weak sisters like Kash Patel and Pam Bondi - not to mention 677 federal district judges - wholly irrelevant to further activities, and puts the chain of command directly from the president to SecDef Hegseth and the military tribunals the designated local commander establishes, putting the entire area under the jurisdiction of the UCMJ, which treats sedition rather harshly, under Article 94. The time to appeal any decisions out of the military trial system to where civilian authorities could have a say could be accounted in years, by which time whole swaths of former US citizens could already be sentenced. Or worse.

BTW, any such citizenship-stripping act merits 10 years in federal prison, but sedition, which is any action of violence or disturbance against the civil authorities, adjudicated by a military court martial, can be used to invoke the death penalty.

Be still, my beating heart! We could skip Air Pinochet, and just go with gibbets in ranks ten abreast.

Pour encourager les autres.

L.A. Postage Stamp Overnight Riots

 

Some folks wanted (or expected) we'd have something to say on the blog about the Sunday Night festivities in a few square blocks of Sh*thole Los Angeles (the part you wouldn't visit most of the time even for money), that no one cares about most days even at high noon, let alone after dark. There is no instrumentation yet devised that could measure our total lack of interest for the burning of that portion at the corner of Woketardia and Migraville. Mayor Karen Basshole, and governor Gabbin' Nuisance made their bed, and they deserved to lie upon it. Now the adults are back in charge, and the festivities are cancelled UFN. 

So, no, IDGAF about riot/arson/looter's one-night silliness.

The rioting was confined to the tiny part of downtown generally ruled by homeless wastes of skin and mestizo illegals 24/7/365, and even if they burned all of downtown Los Angeles to the ground, most of Califrutopia would send them a thank you note in response.

Even five miles away, no one gives a shit. And we're currently much farther from Sh*tholia, CA than five miles. In fact, it all becoming Sh*tholia in the first place is mostly why we left that entire county twenty five years ago. (A fiancée was also involved.)

And it was officially over at dawn Monday, when the 2nd Battalion of the 7th Marines were deployed there.

People not wanting to test the resolve of the Marines is exactly why presidents send the Marines to such places, over and over again, and in preference to any other part of the military, since...ever.

The header video explains this beautifully. Would that we had a similar scene from Los Angeles. If it happens at any point, we'll be properly ecstatic.

So if you have a problem you'd like the Marines to solve for you, and you have the opportunity to let them address it, we highly recommend it.

They're not only eager (to the point of frothing at the mouth) to solve it, they're probably sharpening their bayonets on the drive to the problem, in hopes they'll get to charge with them fixed, just for the practice.

Trump knew this when he sent for them. So do the rioters. They're retarded, but they're not suicidal. They're done f**king around, because they know what the FAFO Medal looks like when it comes with the star denoting a posthumous award.

Game over.

QED

Oh, and for Comedy Relief, I could watch this on an endless loop:

About Those "Unjammable" Fiber Optic-Controlled Drones...

File that info away for future reference.

Looks like not much has changed since Private Reese was dealing with Skynet.

Any Day Now™: Day 1200+

Nota bene for the 80 IQ contingent, once their fingers come out of their ears:

This does not therefore = "Ukraine Is Winning", something which we've never said, unless you think France "won" WWI, after having its countryside obliterated, sacrificing 40% of its domestic production, as well as 1.4M military dead, 4.2 million wounded, with 1M of those crippled for life, as well as another 250K civilian casualties, and thousands of pieces of unexploded ordnance from both sides littering the countryside, still going off to the present day. Furthermore scarring the French national psyche to the point it has never really recovered, and tilting the economic slope straight into Depression as soon as the euphoria of the end of the conflict wore off, and teeing up an even bigger battlefield do-over in just 20 years. That's the "winning" Ukraine has to look forward too, even if Putin retreated tomorrow unilaterally.

It simply points out that Putin's ongoing megalomaniacal folly has Russia headed to the exact same place now, and at warp speed. The dictionary is going to have to make "Putinic victory" the upgrade from merely "pyrrhic".

But hey, what's a little thing like 40-60x the casualties of their ill-advised 1980s Afghanistan debacle in only 1200 days, between friends? Keep huffing that hopeium hookah, kids.

Related: Russia is now tying ending their latest Ukrainian invasion with NATO withdrawing troops from the Baltic NATO-member states. Sh'yeah, that'll happen, when monkeys fly outta Trump's butt.

This is like a surrounded third-strike bank robber saying he'll only release the hostages if the police throw down their guns and go home. Clearly, Put-poleon isn't the only delusional psychotic in the Russian government.

Sunday Music: Kokomo

 

One last trip around the bases for the Beach Boys, as their first new hit in 20+ years, and their last Top 40 hit. Dropped as a single in 1988, and also part of the soundtrack for the Tom Cruise flick du jour, Cocktail, and despite critical disdain, the Beach Boys rode it all the way to platinum certification, and #1 on the charts that year.

Musk Rat: Shots Fired

h/t WRSA

So, evidently, Elon Musk has chosen to self-delete himself from further participation in this administration, and he's going to take all his toys, and go home.

Dear Elon,

DLTDHYITAOYWO

Nobody elected you to anything, and they aren't going to do so in the future.

So you should probably take a deep breath, and never pass up a good opportunity to STFU.

- signed, 

the whole country

This isn't the first time Musk has had to have his head kicked lose from his ass to break suction. (And our commentary there still applies, with full force.) But as far as the 47 admin is concerned, it'll be the last time as anyone connected with this White House. Trump, at this point, might piss on Elon, but only if he was first allowed to light him on fire.

We could pile on, but the relevant fact is that the list of people who took Trump on and got their ass (and usually, career) handed to them on a platter makes everyone else with a list blush from embarrassment at the small size of their list, except Hillary Clinton's list Of Dead Former Associates, and Jeffrey Epstein.

For most people, considering the number of people who have crashed and burned after taking Trump on, going back to 2015, signing up to be the next contestant would give one pause. Unless he goes public with being Iron Man, he can also look forward to getting drubbed in every WH press conference until he learns to STFU, slink off, and let it go.

But Elon's fatal flaw has long been hubris, right along with being a billionaire, so one must suppose it's only fitting that his flame-out and smoking hole is going to look like a meteor crater in Arizona before this all dies down.