Protect Your Identity - Seeking Alpha

Protect Your Identity - Seeking Alpha

Info just in case

Neanderpundit � For the automotively challenged:

Neanderpundit � For the automotively challenged:

Have the Grandkids read!

Francis W. Porretto - Eternity Road

Francis W. Porretto - Eternity Road

The Survival Mentality

By Wahrheit

I decided to not to write about the murders at Virginia Tech right away--I had a pretty good idea of what was coming from the media, and the political class, and the only pleasant surprise there were the low key, limited cries for gun confiscation from the Democrats. The New York Times editorial was utterly predictable, which is why I don’t read that particular paper anymore; I recall that information theory says that a signal only conveys information if it contains unexpected data. And the MSM and most politicians had nothing unexpected to contribute, anymore.

I’m not interested in writing about media coverage today, anyway. I’m going to write about survival.

Conventional wisdom about aircraft hijackings used to be that passengers and crew should obey orders and act like good little sheeple until negotiations resulted in their release, hopefully with minimal casualties. This worked, most of the time, because most hijackers wanted achieve some objective that didn’t include their personal obliteration. It’s a commonplace now that after 9/11 passengers and crew will never again be so cooperative. Tragically, as the events at Virginia Tech show, this mentality hasn’t been fully accepted and integrated by enough individuals to make a difference in a non-hijack situation.

DISCLAIMER: As you consider what follows, you might keep in mind that I am not a black belt in any unarmed combat art, though I have had some training. I’m not a certified firearms instructor, though I’m quite familiar with most major weapons systems, and am a competent marksman. I’ve never had to fight for my life against an armed assailant, and fervently hope never to confront that necessity in the future.

I am a student of human history and the human mind, and based on what I know I’d like to offer some thoughts on the proper mindset, and actions to be considered, should you ever have to deal with a madman with a gun, whether at work, school or in some other setting.

The first, absolute and non-negotiable thing you must do is refuse to be a “victim.” The victim mentality is evident when a person obeys orders that he is fairly sure are going to lead to his own death. For example, a van pulls up next to you on the street and a man points a gun at you and orders you to get in. You
DO NOT get in, as the odds are high that you will meet a horrible, painful death if you do so. Instead, you drop, roll, spin, run away weaving and screaming bloody murder.

It is important to note here that handguns are involved in the vast majority of school and workplace attacks, carjackings and other public violent crime. Handguns are extraordinarily difficult to shoot accurately, especially at distances greater than a few yards and at moving targets. In most cases, if one takes sudden evasive action at a decent distance your average psychopath is not going to be able to hit you with a shot from a handgun. If he does hit you, even with a torso shot, the odds are at least even money that you will survive. If you stand still and let him control the situation, the odds are very, very poor for you--as so many found out in Virginia that day.

There’s no way that I can attempt to cover the great variety of tactical situations that you might face in this gravest of extremes, so I will outline what I would advise you to do were you to find yourself in a situation similar to that at Virginia Tech. First, clearly, at the earliest sign of trouble or sound of gunfire I would have fled the building and not stopped until I was a mile away--that’s almost too obvious to need restating. Yet, there are many situations on record where people, even after the warning signs were glaringly obvious, did not flee the scene in time. Many of us live much of our waking lives in a mild haze, a routine, and don’t pick up subtle clues until it’s too late. So first, be aware, as much of the time and as keenly as you can manage as you concentrate on the routine business of living.

Let’s move to the worst possible scenario, though; you’re in a classroom, or office, a gunman is in the hall firing, you can’t get out the window safely and you don’t have a firearm available. Here is where your mind and heart and courage, your mental preparation for this moment in time will give you the best chance of survival. This where you are going to refuse the victim role.

Obviously, if the door has a lock it’s locked by now, but that’s not stopping this killer. There’s a terrible clamor as rounds are fired at the handle and a tremendous crash as the door is kicked open.

You are not cowering under a desk hoping against hope that he will not notice you, or spare you if he sees you. You are behind cover, if there is any available, out of the line of fire through the door at a ninety degree angle to the side of the door that opens, and if the killer enters the room you are ready with your weapons, a chair a desk a backpack a telephone, anything big and heavy enough to look as if it would hurt, and as he takes the first step in that room you stay low and you start throwing things at his head like you’re Nolan Freaking Ryan, or sliding a table right at his crotch like a freight train. You are taking the initiative, unbalancing the psycho bastard, who has so far encountered nothing like this, and whose scenario only includes a feeling of absolute power over his chosen victims. He may fire wildly as he tries to duck; he may not even get off a shot in his surprise as you close on his sorry form. His aim will be bad and his mind will be in turmoil, but you know what you’re about; you’re about to take him OUT.

Hopefully, you have some kind of club or like object, but I don’t care if all you have is a stapler, or your bare hands; you come at him like his own doom, as fast and low as possible, as almost all shots under pressure go high. Even trained police officers have been known to fire over the head of the opponent from a few yards away; this guy is not trained, he’s a psycho who thought he was going to hold the power of life and death over a bunch of ciphers. He isn’t going to have factored you in at all.

Now you’re going to get control of the weapon by any means necessary and keep it out of action. If you get both hands on a revolver cylinder the thing isn’t going to fire at all, and if you get a hand on the slide/hammer area of almost any auto pistol it’s only going to be able to fire once. If you’ve got a club of some sort belt down on the wrist as close to the weapon as possible and then when the weapon is pointed away from you go to work on the face, the kneecap or the crotch, whichever is available, immediately and ferociously, but first and foremost keep the weapon unusable. If, thank God, he drops it, kick it away as far as you can.

If you do get shot, just keep going. Too many stupid movies and television programs have given all the wrong impressions about the effects of bullets on people. Much of the time, the person shot can continue to fight. If they’re in the Berserker mode, they may not even notice that they’ve been shot. You are going to be in the Berserker mode. You are going to fight until your strength is completely gone.

By now, if you were in a classroom or office setting with others, they have hopefully come to your aid, for if you had more than a couple of seconds preparation you took leadership and informed them of what you were going to do. If half a dozen people of any age, sex or condition will just fall on the killer, grab his arms, sit on his head, he will find it almost impossible to fire the weapon. Don’t count on anyone or anything else, however; your mentality must be that you are going to win, at any cost, by yourself. Even if all you have is a coffee cup, once you get the advantage, once you have controlled the weapon you are not going to stop, ever, with your coffee cup or your fists and elbows and feet and knees and fingernails and teeth until the vermin is unconscious or dead. I emphasize that again: You will not stop if he is crying, you will not stop if he is cowering with his hands over his face. Unconscious or dead, those are the options he has chosen for himself; and if you, through your efforts, get his weapon in your hands and it will fire, you will shoot him in the chest and continue to shoot until the weapon is empty, regardless of anything, of what he or anyone else says, or does. You must have this mentality, throughout the entirety of this situation, if you are to succeed in saving your own life and the lives of your classmates and coworkers.

I’m not talking about technique or training, though these would obviously be so very valuable in this kind of situation. I’m talking about a state of mind. I don’t care if you’re a 110-pound woman, a 70-year-old man, overweight, diabetic and a smoker.

You may not succeed; you may die. But if you cower in a corner you’re going to get shot in the face, or the back, and you are almost certainly going to die. If you can safely run, run. If you can safely hide, or barricade yourself, do it. But don’t let them find you later with a hole through your hands where you tried to stop a bullet.

If you going to die any way, die trying. You’re going to give yourself one hell of a lot better chance of living.

Channon Christian and Christopher Newsom murder - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Channon Christian and Christopher Newsom murder - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Colton Levi Clark: Channon Christian & Christopher Newsom - A Story That Must Be Told

Colton Levi Clark: Channon Christian & Christopher Newsom - A Story That Must Be Told

Francis W. Porretto - Eternity Road

Francis W. Porretto - Eternity Road
Horrible black on white crime. Where is media?

: "An Introduction to Square-Foot Gardening
Saturday, 21st April 2007 (by J.D."

The Oil Drum | Simple mathematics - The Saudi reserves, GOSPs and water injection

The Oil Drum | Simple mathematics - The Saudi reserves, GOSPs and water injection: "Simple mathematics - The Saudi reserves, GOSPs and water injection"

Land of Black Gold: Once More, with Feeling!

Land of Black Gold: Once More, with Feeling!

T BOONE PICKENS:

"You take 30 billion barrels out of the world's reserve base and we have not replaced 30 billion barrels since 1985. You're talking about twenty years. You keep drawing down on the world reserve base... and it is happening because you can't find big oil fields anymore. They're just not out there to find."

etc etc

American Thinker Blog: Was Cho taught to hate?

American Thinker Blog: Was Cho taught to hate?

321energy :: PETRODOLLAR & IRAN & IRAQ :: Jim Willie CB

321energy :: PETRODOLLAR & IRAN & IRAQ :: Jim Willie CB

Wonderful explanation of things not heard or seen!!!!!!!!!

Pearls Before Breakfast - washingtonpost.com

Pearls Before Breakfast - washingtonpost

Excellent story of one of worlds musicians playing at the subway for a lark. No one paid much attention.

BRING BACK DDT!!!!!!

Michael Fumento.com - Weblog - Future weapons against malaria - and the one we have now

Future weapons against malaria - and the one we have now

By Michael Fumento

O death, where is thy sting? Far too often it comes at the end of a mosquito’s proboscis. The worst mosquito-borne disease, malaria, infects about 400 million people worldwide each year (90 percent in sub-Saharan Africa) and kills about 1.3 million of them. Compare that to the histrionics we've suffered over avian flu, which as of 2 April had infected 25 people and killed 12 this year. Or SARS, which killed 774 people worldwide before petering out.

As I write in TCS Daily, biotechnology may eventually come to the rescue. Scientists have announced they've built a better mosquito, one that doesn't become infected with the parasite that causes malaria. Ultimately, it's hoped, these mosquitoes will outbreed natural ones. A biotech malaria vaccine is also in the works. Aye, but there's the rub. A malaria vaccine has been in the works for decades. For now what we need is something that's tried and true and readily available. Yes, that means insecticides and yes that means DDT. Fortunately, pro-DDT activists are finally starting to gain the upper hand over spoiled brat environmentalists who think the deaths of black- and brown-skinned people don't count and know nothing more about DDT than that Rachel Carson made all sorts of horrible claims about it of which none have proved true.

BEWARE OF QUACKWATCH - alt.support.cancer | Google Groups

BEWARE OF QUACKWATCH - alt.support.cancer | Google Groups Flor Essence testimony re Cancer healing

OpinionJournal - Federation

OpinionJournal - Federation

"Act quickly," Gen. Petraeus wrote in January 2006, "because every army of liberation has a half-life." This is true not only in the field but at home. James Thurber once said that the saddest two words in the English language are "too late." Terrible as it is to think that our surge may have come too late, it is much more terrible to think that feckless politicians, out of whatever calculation, may pull the plug before the new approach is fully tested.

And terrible not only for Iraqis. For the French, the price of failure in Algeria was the collapse of one Republic and a permanent stain on the next--along with the deep alienation of the French military from the political establishment that it believed (with considerable justification) had betrayed it. Here at home, it took the American military almost a decade and a half to recover its confidence and resiliency after the failure and humiliation of Vietnam. How we would weather another and even more consequential humiliation is anybody's guess; but the stakes are enormous, and the clock is ticking."

How t6o Win in Iraq!! Excellent

Talisman Gate: Absolutely Worth It

Talisman Gate: Absolutely Worth It

Pretty good summation:

"Was it worth it?" is a question that I hear at every anniversary of the Iraq war, and it gets more pointed and pained — and asked more accusingly by some — with every passing year and especially this week as we mark the fourth anniversary after a particularly rough year.

And I can never understand the bewildered and disappointed look upon the questioner's face — whether they be well-meaning or sanctimonious — when I answer, matter-of-factly, "Yes, of course."

I am expected to atone for all that's gone wrong, and when I don't, it seems that I am violating some social norm. I am expected to repent the sins of war and recant the folly of wanting to fix things by war, as some of the earlier war-supporters have done.

But I don't feel guilty over wanting Saddam Hussein gone, and I am certainly not guilty of what his loyalists and what the jihadists and death squads have done to Iraq since his ouster.

I don't answer for other Iraqis, or for the Americans who too have sacrificed so much. I answer for myself as a war supporter, a war enabler, and a continuing believer: Yes, it was worth it.

I've spent the better portion of my life working toward Saddam's overthrow. I was fully aware of the very real sacrifices made by those before me who had confronted Saddam and his Baath Party, and the consequences of their actions. The tyrant would not vanish by wishing him away — he had to be fought.

Iraqi Mojo: What Went Wrong?

Iraqi Mojo: What Went Wrong?

Those were simpler days indeed, before the endless waves of car bombings, before the thousands of Iraqi and American deaths, before the descent into chaos and sectarian violence that has driven liberal idealists like Makiya into bouts of hand-wringing over a single inescapable question: What went wrong?

Which brings us to his next book.

"I want to look into myself, look at myself, delve into the assumptions I had going into the war," he said. "Now it seems necessary to reflect on the society that has gotten itself into this mess. A question that looms more and more for me is: Just what did 30 years of dictatorship do to 25 million people?"

Econbrowser: Some Implications of "Staying the Course"

Econbrowser: Some Implications of "Staying the Course"
Interesting info on trroop strength and casualties.

Wishing Wealth: GMI: 6; GMI-L: 100; Markets in Stage 2 up-trend

Wishing Wealth: GMI: 6; GMI-L: 100; Markets in Stage 2 up-trend

Good info:

Monday, March 26, 2007

GMI: 6; GMI-L: 100; Markets in Stage 2 up-trend

The GMI remains at 6 and the GMI-L is back to 100. Thus, all of my short and long term indicators are positive. My long term trend indicator is based on Stan Weinstein's stage analysis (see book to right). Stan used the 30 week moving average as the best indicator of a stock's or the market's trend. The recent steep decline in the major indexes caused my short term daily indicators to flash negative. However, Weinstein's indicators stayed positive throughout the decline. In fact, the major indexes all found support at their rising 30 week averages. Thus, as this chart of the Nasdaq 100 index shows, the markets remain in a Weinstein Stage 2 up-trend. I never own stocks when they or the market are below their 30 week averages. The recent support found at the 30 week average in all of the major stock indexes suggests to me that that the up-trend remains intact. In my trading account I get in or out of stocks based on my daily indicators. In my long term mutual funds, however, I only get out of the market when the 30 week averages flash trouble. This rule got me out of the market in 2000 and back in in 2003.

See my disclaimers at the bottom of my prior post.

Monday, March 26, 2007 at 12:01 AM | Permalink

Simple Tip Lowers Heart Disease Risk, but Your Doctor Frequently Ignores It

Simple Tip Lowers Heart Disease Risk, but Your Doctor Frequently Ignores It

"Hey, give these 'poor' doctors a break. They slaved through medical school, stacking supermarket shelves and washed greasy 'common' people's dishes, whilst continually having to remember their high-falutin' edyoocation mantra: 'depression, Prozac. Male pattern baldness, Propecia. High cholesterol, statins. Toenail fungus, Sporanox. Hypertension, AT2 antagonists. Heart failure, beta-blockers, alpha-blockers, diuretics, BNP inhibitors?..and all the while having to keep up with the 'new diseases' and new, increasingly expensive drugs that are flooding the market.

"They couldn't justify 5-6 years of medical school to simply learn that eating well and moderate exercise can maintain good health. 'Your renin-angiotensin-aldosterone system has run amok and will require some highly complicated polypharmacy to get control.' sounds much more important than 'All you need to do Mrs. Smith is to eat a healthy, unprocessed food diet and get some moderate exercise.'"