Shutters

Ever since seeing the security shutters that shops in Japan use, I've been interested in security shutters for windows at my house.  One of the roofing companies I checked out had photos on their web site of a window with real shutters, not the lame vestigal ones used on most houses these days.  That prompted me to see what I could find, and a search turned up a site with a bunch of links to various manufacturers.

Living in the upper Midwest, obviously I'm not going to have issues with hurricanes, but the functionality is similar.  One manufacturer's site that I checked, QMI, had pretty much what I was looking for.  Unfortunately, no prices are listed.

This sort of thing would be good to have for SHTF scenarios, at least for one's first floor windows.  They won't stop bullets, but it'd at least protect one of the weaker access points in the home, buying time to repel the invaders.

Link Dump

The time has come for another link dump so I can close some tabs in Firefox....

Blowout kit - Interesting praxis from 762rifleman
There's a Secret Patriot Act, Senator Says - From Wired
U.S. Housing Crisis Is Now Worse Than Great Depression - Uplifting news...
War Belt - By ATS, because it just sounds cool

MRE Info

Last weekend I'd decided to try an MRE, one of a partial case that I'd bought at the gun show in January.  I didn't know how old they were or how they'd been stored, so I wanted to see if I had usable rations or if I needed to pitch them.  Anyway, the package said that commercial resale is unlawful (not purchase, though!) so I wanted to find out what the deal was.  And so I found a site that documents the legality of procuring military MREs.  There's other useful info as well, such as how to decode date codes.

The Ready Store sells civilian MREs as well.

Gun Deals Club

While searching for specs on Golden Tiger ammo, a link to Bill St. Clair's ammo dealers page came up.  That had a link to the Gun Deals ammo page, which appears to be like a Hot Deals Club for gun stuff.

Orson Welles' Tesla Short

A friend pointed me to an interesting YouTube video of a dramatization of the decision to use A/C power for Niagara Falls.  Orson Welles plays J.P. Morgan, although I don't think that he controlled the decision to us the A/C system.

Guerena

More on the Guerena raid (previous link):

Here's the report from the county attorney describing the incident and saying that it was justified.  Dirty sons of bitches.  Hey, their names are all in the report.  Hmm....

SWAT Team Mania: The War Against the American Citizen

Adversity

"Scorn poverty: no one is as poor as he was at birth. Scorn pain: either it will go away or you will. Scorn death: either it finishes you or it transforms you." (Lucius Annaeus Seneca)

I saw the middle sentence somewhere and tracked down the quote.  Good stuff, and there's more on that site.

The Framers of the Constitution and Technological Progress

Codrea has a thought-provoking article that debunks the argument that the authors of the Bill of Rights couldn't have anticipated the technological progress that brought us machineguns and the like.  (I've always liked the counterargument that if that's the case, then the First Amendment protections on freedom of speech only apply to quill pens on parchment or old-school printing presses a la Gutenberg.)  Pepperbox revolvers (multi-shot revolvers in those days), volley guns (also multi-shot guns), and Puckle guns (a Gatling-gun type contraption, aka a hand-crank machinegun)?  Plenty of multi-shot and, indeed, rapid-fire technology existed.  Those anti-gunners are full of shit!

Survival Lit

An article over at Alpha Rubicon lists a bunch of books one ought to have on hand.  Perhaps they're worth checking out.

Dare to Prepare

There was a link to this book on Sipsey St a couple weeks ago.  I haven't decided whether to get it or not; I need a more in-depth assessment first.

Mil-Spec Monkey

I think I'd come across MSM on the Net before the Magpul chikara-patch debacle on Facebook.  Still, it needs to be bookmarked, so here it is: Mil-Spec Monkey, the blog (of sorts) and the store.  The reviews are interesting, and I identify with the praise of Vertx tactical pants.

M14 Mags

So I'd bought M14 mags from CDNN marked "W", supposedly mil-spec.  Well, I did some searching to find out more about them, as I should've done before.  It turns out that the real thing were manufactured by Westinghouse Electric back in the day, and these probably aren't the genuine article (info).

James Wesley, Rawles wrote an article on M14 mags just after the 2008 election.  His prediction on prices was off, but the info looks useful.

Rifle Company has a flowchart or three on how to identify the nature of M14 mags.

Lastly, 44mag.com has Check-Mate Industries mags on slight discount in quantities of 10, which is good to know.

Joel Rosenberg

I found out via Codrea's blog that Joel Rosenberg has passed away.  He fought long and hard for carry rights in Minnesota—I used his textbook to get my license.  The gun culture has lost one of its most ardent citizens today.  Rest in peace, Joel Rosenberg.

Earth Star Voyager

I'd forgotten about this Disney made-for-TV movie that I saw as a kid, called Earth Star Voyager.  The premise is that in the future, Earthlings have irreparably damaged their ecosystem and are searching for another planet to colonize.  Obviously this isn't the typical Disney subject matter.  I'd buy it on DVD, but it hasn't ever been released.  I'll have to look for a bootleg copy.  Incidentally, I think Star Trek: The Next Generation ripped off the idea for the Borg from ESV: the cyborg Shell that keeps talking about "Assembly", and whose organic components are controlled by his robotic ones, is like the Borg and "assimilation".