Off The Grid News Better Ideas For Off The Grid Living
While the reaction in the Muslim world to the death of Osama bin Laden has been somewhat muted, there’s definitely an anger simmering below the surface. There have been calls for retaliation from Muslim groups and Homeland Security has said that we’re under a heightened level of alert until all the players calm down.
However, terrorism is not strictly limited to those who wish to kill us. What about the terrorism of debt that threatens to overwhelm each and every American? What about the terrorism of rising fuel and food prices? What about the terrorism of Mother Nature herself as we brace ourselves for the floods that are coming our way? Is there any way to mitigate these very real threats to our every day lives?
We hope you’ll join Bill and Brian on Off the Grid Radio today as they discuss ways that you and your family can use to help you through the rough times ahead, whether it’s planting survival seed or equipping your home with a solar generator, or if it’s starting a community garden with your neighbors or church members.
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Off The Grid Radio
Ep 046
Released: May 6, 2011
Brian: Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to a very special edition of Off the Grid News – the radio version of offthegridnews.com. I’m Brian Brawdy, as always here with Mr. Bill Heid. Today, a 30 minute show with only one commercial interruption. Bill, you know we wanted to get together and do this show quickly as a response to our listeners, people reaching out to us on Facebook, on Twitter, sending us emails and the like. But I wanted to go over today some of the blowback – and by blowback it’d be easy to talk about – is there going to be blowback from the Osama bin Laden situation? Is there going to be blowback from the fact that they say now that the Mississippi River – the flooding is so bad, the Mississippi River has reversed course.
Bill: It’s been a while since it’s done that.
Brian: It’s been a while since it’s done that. So I want to talk about blowback, Bill, with you. I want to reframe blowback. It can be from, as we’ve said before, tornadoes, terrorist attacks – whatever it is, but that blowback is going to absolutely effect … I stopped this morning on the way in to pay gas. Unbelievable what a gallon of gas is up to. Went to the grocery store the other day. Looked at a quart of ice cream – $6 for a quart of this particular type of ice cream. The blowback’s hitting us in the pocketbook. I think people get into the debate and they go “let’s Washington figure how that’s going to all happen.” But events on the world stage, whether down country or across the globe, they’re affecting people right at their own kitchen tables, and that’s why we wanted to do today’s show.
Bill: And I think we’re forced into making a comment on what’s going on, what are repercussions with the Osama bin Laden issue. I have to tell you that on the way back from – we were in Nashville – on the drive back, just to tell you the average American mindset – I was both listening to the radio, because this thing happened when we were in Nashville and I watched it Sunday night from a restaurant in Nashville. As I came back, I walked into a McDonalds – just to give you an example of the things I was saying and listening … I walked into a McDonald’s and said to the gal behind there, and I think this was in Kentucky, “well, they finally got Obama.” And she said “well, it’s about time. I hate Obama.” I think she meant bin Laden. I said that just to throw that out there because I think people can’t make it … the world is in such a confusing state. Then, I got back in the car, started driving and I begin to hear radio talk show hosts do the same thing. I think maybe you have heard the same thing with people saying it, and I’m talking about people that are nationally known people that have gotten bin Laden’s name mixed up with our President’s name. The things you hear in the news as a result of the assassination, or attempted assassination, whatever it was, are so confusing. Panetta and Brennan don’t agree on what happened. Everybody’s got … like they’re the three stooges there. They’ve got Carney – Carney’s not … he’s got a different story. Panetta has a different story. Brennan has a different story. What’s the story?
Brian: I think what’s fascinating to me is you see the picture that they’re putting out of everyone sitting – their attention is glued to the TV screen. The first report is they’re watching the raid in real time. How can you get 11 people in a room watching one TV screen and come out with 11 different stories? I’m not being critical of anyone, I just want an answer to that question. How do you have 11 different people of that ilk, of that intelligence level …
Bill: They’re all smart people.
Brian: They’re all smart people! No doubt about it. Look at the television screen. Then we hear yesterday “well, for the most crucial aspect of the raid, there was a 20-minute blackout, Brian. We weren’t able to actually see the video when the raid raid was going down. We saw the video of the tangential raid. ‘Here come the helicopters. Tch tch tch tch. They land.’ But the most crucial video – we didn’t get that. There was a 20-minute blackout.” So what are folks … not that we’re going to buy into a conspiracy theory, because I said at the start, there’s so much more going on. But all the media’s going to focus on now is this whole Osama bin Laden …
Bill: Great point, Brian.
Brian: … people are having trouble eating …
Bill: At the end of the day, it doesn’t matter what your perspective was. Off the Grid News Radio really isn’t around to – there’s plenty of great people saying “this is what really happened …” I don’t think it’s necessary for us to do that. Either way, what’s the repercussions for the average guy? What’s the off-the-grid perspective? The world is a more dangerous place now because this guy was basically – I think had kidney disease – they say that he was running things and some of them say he wasn’t running anything. Again, you don’t know. But we hadn’t heard from him. He’s basically buried, self-buried. He had buried himself, on some level. He wasn’t even a part of the conversation. Now all of a sudden, you’ve got a recruiting tool again, so what’s that mean to Americans? What’s that mean to the Middle East? What’s that mean to our relationship with Pakistan, India, all these other countries? That’s an important thing.
Brian: Sure. And Pakistan now – the reports are saying that Pakistan is burning US flags as the backlash over his death grows. But then you can’t look away from the headlines that say “jobless claims rise to an eight-month high.” This is first-time jobless claims. People have never done it before. People that for the first time ever, walked into line. That number’s up to an eight-month high. Yesterday, that the dollar, its value – three-year low. In 24 hours, Bill, we log on, we see the news going down. Dollar – three-year low; jobless claims – eight-month high. You’ve been talking about this as long as I’ve known you. For me, when they go “who shot bin Laden? Where are the photos? Where’s this? Where’s that?” Don’t care. Don’t care. There’s more pressing things to focus on. The Treasury Department comes out yesterday and leaks that “not only are we going to have to raise the debt ceiling, we’re going to have to raise it by $2 trillion. In case that leaks out … we’re going to need an additional $2 trillion.” That’s where the terrorism is. Terrorism … it’s not Islamic fundamental terrorism anymore, it’s the terrorism of trillions of dollars in debt and how it’s affecting our food prices, our gas prices … cotton is off the charts – highest that it’s ever been. That’s why I was so fired up about getting to talk to you today because we’ve got some real terrorism in this country and it has nothing to do with Osama bin Laden or the Taliban or Al Qaeda.
Bill: We’ve got some big problems and someplace between terrorism and recklessness – it’s worse than recklessness, I’ll give you that – it’s crazy. It’s off the map. I think what’s going to happen with respect to this situation in the Middle East is – here’s how this goes – you start out with unrest in Egypt or Tunisia or someplace. This is growing. As if it didn’t need more fuel? So you’ve basically, Brian, you’ve got a Sunni-Shiite issue in most of these countries, and we’re going to come back to food. I’m going to bring this back a little bit. You’ve got the Sunni-Shiite issue. In every country you’ve got that issue. Saudi Arabia’s the crown jewel of “if we can disrupt issues in Saudi Arabia then the whole world changes,” because gas goes to $15. That’s it. In Libya, for example, we’re paying – we’re arming Al Qaeda, right? At the same time that we’re carrying out assassinations against Al Qaeda. We’re arming them to fight Gaddafi – a chump – I don’t think anybody’s going to have any pro-Gaddafi things to say. He’s a chump. All these guys that run these Muslim countries are chumps. There’s no way you can say that. But what happens when you disrupt the equilibrium that exists … for example, when we went in and took out Saddam Hussein, he was a very nice buffer, and we’ve armed him – just like bin Laden – we’ve paid his bills, we’ve done all these things. I think the reason Bush thought he had weapons of mass destruction is because his father sold them to him in a previous administration. We’ve armed these people, they’ve been on our payrolls. But interestingly, there’s a delicate equilibrium in the Middle East, and when you disrupt that – you take out Iraq and you allow Iran to have a significant influence in that area – predominantly Shiite, right? They’re going and finding all of their like-minded Shiites in all of these countries and disrupting them. All in the name of hegemony for Iran. This is becoming an Iranian – and Iran’s a big country with money and smart people. They’re not all crazy ayatollahs. There’s a lot … go look at pictures of Iran. People are driving cars. This is the real world. Their influence, the Iranian influence, continues to grow. It’s almost as if we’re paying for it. The net result where I’m going is, you see these countries continue to fall. You see … and if it goes through Libya and it goes through these other countries – Egypt still has problems. Bringing the military in doesn’t mean anything. You’re going to see Saudi Arabia have oil problems, problems with riots, problems with protests. Then you’re going to see oil go crazy. Now, every time oil goes crazy, its best friend, chart-wise, is food prices. There’s no way this can’t happen in the way that they’ve cooked it because for some reason, it seems like, we want a disrupted Middle East. Thereby, higher oil prices. That translates into higher gas prices and an incredible disruption to our economy. The crux of it ends up being food because who pays for that? You’re going to be able to afford … you mentioned that you made a decision not to buy that ice cream the other night. Poor families are going to buy milk and they’re going to have to buy milk if it’s $10. So where’s this going?
Brian: That’s why I say, when we think about the Sunnis and this Shiites, I’m more worried about squash and soybeans. I’m more worried about the cost of corn. I’m more worried now, or more focused I should say, on those, literally, bread and butter issues, Bill, that people will – can be distracted – in the great political bait and switch where politicians say “hey, look over here! Look over here!” And then they’re busy doing something else. It’s the something else that I’m always looking at. Right now, with fuel costs up, with jobless claims up, with the value of the dollar down … Pakistan’s coming across the wire now. Pakistani officials – there was no resistance in “the cold-blooded US raid.” There’s going to be backlash. There’s going to be a blowback. I know you have friends that are pretty well connected. They’re telling you the same thing. There’s going to be an attack. There’s going to be some type, and whether the attack is with bombs or however else it works out, our food supply, which is what we go back to that for this show – there are things that are at risk that our a lot closer to home than what’s going on in Saudi Arabia or Iran or Iraq.
Bill: And I’m thinking as that pans out though, maybe you have – maybe you need an attack on Iran. Maybe that’s where all of this is going, is that the Israelis are ready to let it fly. They need a partner in this deal. We need a reason to do this. Typically, chronologically I would say, there’s an event here. I don’t know how that even takes place. And we pray that that event never happens. But some sort of event happens here. We react to that event by going to Iran. We commit ground troops. WE commit all this stuff. And you’ve got a huge embroil … that’s spiraling out of control. You have the potential for World War III. Pakistan – Pakistan, there’s the potential. There’s saber rattling already for some of the members of Congress and the media, some of the neocons are back at it saying “Pakistan wasn’t our friend.” That’s probably true but what’s that mean? Pakistan says “don’t blame us.” Well, how could they not know he was there?
Brian: He’s the only 7 foot guy in the country. He’s the only person that’s 7 feet tall in the country.
Bill: It’s a ridiculous thing.
Brian: It really is.
Bill: It’s a ridiculous thing to say that they didn’t know where he was.
Brian: They’ve got satellites now that if you put an illegal hot tub in your backyard and you don’t pay the taxes for the building permit, Google Earth can spy – whoever it is.
Bill: The little girl with the lemonade stand …
Brian: Yeah, the little girl with the lemonade stand … they can’t stop him? They can’t spot a guy in a compound that size that can jam a basketball? Really? What do they say – 100 yards from …?
Bill: Is he 7 foot tall?
Brian: Yeah, he’s a tall guy. He’s taller than me. I’m 6’4”.
Bill: Taller than most people in the area.
Brian: I would guess. The point I’m trying to make is, he would have to stand out.
Bill: Sure.
Brian: You know what, Jeremy? Can you Skype real quick and see how tall – if they have the height of, whether you believe he’s former Osama bin Laden or the Osama bin Laden on the run…
Bill: What was the casket size that they dumped in the water?
Brian: I know he’s taller than me and I’m 6’4”.
Bill: Do you think they got that right? Whether it’s real or not real, that they would at least … what if they ended up having a casket that they dumped overboard that was very small or something?
Brian: That would be wild. I don’t know. I made the joke the other day that he was looking for 40 virgins and ended up with 40 mermaids. So maybe in the end we really did exact our revenge. I don’t know. For me, it still comes back … Jeremy, any idea? Go ahead.
Jeremy: 6’6”.
Brian: He’s 6’6”. Alright, so he’s not 7 ft. He’s 6’6”. He’s a big guy.
Bill: 6’6” – that’s pretty tall for his region – is that a good way to say that? Certainly he could have made the Olympic basketball team.
Brian: Well, you’re a huge basketball fan, how tall’s Michael Jordan?
Bill: 6’6”.
Brian: 6’6”. So a Michael Jordan running around, we can’t find him.
Bill: We can’t find Michael Jordan.
Brian: That’s all I’m asking. Please send all the emails to Jeremy at Solutions from Science. I am not equating Michael Jordan with Osama bin Laden. I’m simply saying someone of that stature, someone of that height, trying to put … so please, Michael Jordan, accept my apologies.
Bill: It doesn’t make any sense, so something’s not right with this whole thing. Without getting into a big long – like I said, there’s better folks than us at developing conspiracy theories – just know that something’s not right with the picture and it’s going to affect you. One of the ways it can affect you – we are in the heartland – one of the ways that it could affect you is a lot of the cries for retribution, for some reason, from the Imams came and said “attack the heartland.” I’m not sure where that’s coming from but they had been talking about talking the food supplies. They want to instill fear. So how can we do maximum damage – there needs to be a … terrorism needs a fear element for it to really be effective – so how can we create the most fear for the buck? I asked one of my friends who’s very well connected to some sources that actually does some consulting for Homeland Security. He said probably low tech Somali shopping mall type thing in the United States. He would guess someplace like Omaha. That’s just a guess saying someplace in the middle of the country. You had mentioned another way to me the other day – you want to discuss it?
Brian: Yeah, the art of war. When you attack one of the tallest buildings in the country, if you’re Sun Tzu you attack them at the tallest and the smallest. I absolutely agree with you and your friend that the next terrorist attack is not going to be in a massive building or an airplane or the like. They’re going to hit us once at the tallest structures and then they’re going to find what we perceive to be smaller, because that’s more personal to us. They’ll find the smallest structure to attack. What’s smaller, as you and I have discussed, could be an individual’s ability to get electricity. An individual’s ability to get food. An individual’s ability to travel freely without that fear. We’re going to go ahead and run to a quick commercial break. Only one break in this special 30-minute version of Off the Grid News. Stick around. We’ve got an answer to how you can mitigate all of this craziness going on in the world.
[0:16:43 – 0:21:01 break]Brian: Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to a very special edition of Off the Grid News. The radio version of offthegridnews.com. Brian Brawdy here, as always, with Mr. Bill Heid. Bill, you know, as we talked about in our opening segment, there is all kinds of craziness going on in the world. All kinds of craziness. Manmade. Craziness wrought by mother nature. There’s not a lot you can do, me can do, Jeremy can do, our listeners can do to fight what’s going on at the macro level, what’s going on in the big world. But there are some things you and I can do, and we talk about it a lot, there’s some of those things we can do to mitigate those outside influences. We did the report “Food Shock,” which by the way has been going great, the number of people reading that story and complimenting you on writing it. Commenting on it, reaching out to us on radio interviews and the like that we do. But one of the things we’ve talked about is if you grow your own garden, which is something you’ve got to start doing pretty quick given the weather, if you grow your own garden you could cut $600 off of your family’s food budget by the end of the summer. You were telling me in the break there’s some long-term things and there’s some short-term things. Let’s start with the short-term first. You have some suggestions, given the craziness in the world.
Bill: I would say during the short-term, you obviously need 72 hours worth of food. Without a doubt, that and your food and water supply’s very important. We’ve talked about that before. You’ve got dehydrated food – that’s great. If you just go get canned food, canned food’s great as well, for short term. The next few weeks, some of my sources say, are the most dangerous because if Al Qaeda does have any fire power, if Al Qaeda has any kind of traction at all, they need to react in the next couple of weeks. That’s what my intelligence sources tell me. I think that makes sense to me, that it’s important for them to retract and make a statement. And, as you say, probably make a statement against, again, innocent lives. You had mentioned some possible targets. I’ll throw an elementary school out there. None of us want to talk about this. It’s painful stuff. We have children, grandchildren, and this is painful, painful stuff. But what is it that someone’s likely to do? Probably take some kind of action with low-grade weapons or whatever it is, something manageable, at an innocent target and scare us, again, like they did 10 years ago, into our own little cocoons. That’s what they want. That’s the short term. You better have, if something happens, you better be prepared to weather something out. Long-term, how does the Middle East deterioration affect milk prices? It’s a clear path, because you’ve got higher gas prices, you’ve got this increased Shiite rebellion against these old-line, more or less, Sunni tyrants. That friction’s not going to go away just because the UN comes in and lands a helicopter or you send in the Secretary of State or something. This is deep seated stuff. This is going to go on a long, long time. Those two factions exist almost as long as the tension between Christians and Muslims has existed. There’s problems within problems. But it means a continued deterioration of the Middle East, which means higher prices for fuel, which means not only do you get hit on the way to the grocery store, but you get hit at the grocery store. You add to that fact another convergent line of the United States in total self-destruct mode with respect to what we’re doing to our currency, QE-infinite, and you have a very dangerous situation for food, because are our wages rising as fast as some of these costs? I think you could ask the average guy, Brian, if he’s making – if his wages have increased at the same level that all of these things have increased, like food and gas and so forth. He’s going to say no – the average guy’s going to say no because businesses, for the most part, are under pressures – all kinds of pressures – pressures from China, your electric bill … businesses can’t make it either. What are they going to do? Lay people off? Shave off some wages? “We can hire this guy – it’s either hire some new guys for lower wages or go out of business.” You can’t blame business people for trying to exist. There’s a lot of pressures that exist right now that are absolutely going to get – they’re bad now? They’re going to get more pronounced as the summer goes on.
Brian: Not only the summer, Bill, but taking your long-term and going a little further long-term, when the UN comes out and says “great, we’re going to jump from 6.5 to 9.1 billion people running around on the face of our planet by 2050.” Whether you say it’s going to get warmer or colder, it’s definitely going to get more crowded. Tensions are going to get more heated up – just like packing a bunch of people onto an elevator. That has to cost something. What it’s going to cost is, you’ve got to feed these people.
Bill: You have to feed them and …
Brian: Clothe them, put electricity on them … all those different things that we think about.
Bill: And you have to figure out a way for them to be productive too, which socialism doesn’t want to do. If you let the markets run with this, the markets would figure out a way to make them productive. The churches would figure out a way to feed and clothe them. What you’ve done by creating this socialist system – by the way, almost everyone in South Carolina – did you see the poll? Almost everyone, Republicans, it’s like 78 percent or something – believe President Obama is a socialist. That’s a pretty high number. We do have these socialist … anybody who says “let’s spread it around a little bit” – tell me that’s not socialist. Tell me that’s “I’m a capitalist just like you,” or “I’m an American,” or “I’m for free enterprise.” IF someone says “let’s spread the wealth around a little.” And he said that. He can’t deny that he said that. That’s been his motif.
Brian: I think what happens, Bill, is everyone wants – and I’ll try to get the thought out – everyone wants to say “ugh, what a socialist.” Well, stop and think for a second. If you don’t assign a negative to it, it’s a political philosophy that says “you spread the wealth around.” There’s coming a time in our country, because all the people screaming that he’s a socialist “how horrible!” – they’re advocating socialist policies. Pretty soon it’s just a debate. There’s no evil. Do we want to live in a country that’s a republic or do we want to live in a country that’s a socialist country?
Bill: A socialist country is going to, as I always say, create shortages.
Brian: Absolutely.
Bill: Typically … let’s rehearse that again because you’re going to see this. I saw it as a young man in the ‘70s but you’re going to see this because what inevitably happens is prices – we print the money to buy the votes. WE reduce interest rates artificially to create a false sense of where things should be. Markets aren’t being allowed to operate. We put ourselves in a precarious position. Food prices rise because you inflate the currency. So food prices rise, first step. Second step – no one can afford the food. No one can afford the gas. What do politicians do? Especially if the democrats grab control. We have to make sure that people don’t pay too much for food, so we start putting caps on how high food can go, how high gas can go. That’s step – what am I at, three? Then what happens in step four? Producers of those commodities say “can’t make any money at these levels. So why should I do it?” The idea – what socialism does – it produces a malaise. It produces, and our friend Bochadar?? talked about that in Bulgaria, it produces non-productivity. That’s more dangerous than anything. That’s the most dangerous thing. That malaise of non-productivity. That’s what’s going to kill us.
Brian: Absolutely. But all the people say “Brian, you’re heartless because you don’t want to help people” in terms of some of the more liberal programs that we have to help. What I’m suggesting is, those are the ones doing the disservice. Everyone wants to slam the people that don’t want those extended programs going on but I’m going “look, you’re gifted with a human mind. Anything that you do to allow that malaise to set in, that’s the negative. That’s the evil.” But they’ve done a great job on the left of saying “if you’re not going to contribute to all these social programs, you’re evil.” I would offer to you that the real evil is the coddling of a human mind. The ultimate long-term evil is saying to a human mind “you get something for nothing.” You don’t have to be productive. That malaise is OK. That’s the ultimate evil. They wrap themselves in the banner going “we’re going to take care of the downtrodden.” The only way to take care of the downtrodden is to find ways for them to exercise their inalienable rights. Their right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, to get out of that malaise themselves. That’s the true evil. But they’ve done such a great job of hijacking the debated. If you don’t believe in spreading the wealth around, well then “you’re just horrible, Brian.”
Bill: Right. And the assumption, Brian, the assumption on this is that it’s the government’s prerogative, as God walking on earth, to be the distributor of wealth or the re-distributor of wealth, when from my perspective, certainly the government should be the force that prevents the evildoer from doing something. You protect our country. Protect our perimeter, as it were, and you also protect against the evildoer. Then it’s up to the church. So you’ve in effect robbed the church and of charitable organizations of their place. You’ve actually stolen something that wasn’t yours by abrogating this idea of “it’s up to us as the government to control it.” And everyone knows, if you have a government employee administer help, you have six layers of bureaucrats. If you have somebody from the church administrate help, that’s doing it on their own time, you have zero level. So help from the church is unbelievably more efficient than help from – and it comes from the heart, not from some distant place, some nameless bureaucrat that writes a check and it comes from Washington or ends up on some little credit card that you can activate on Thursday night from someone nameless. When you get help from the church, you see somebody helping you. You look that person in the eye. Our friend, Ted Nugent, made that point very well.
Brian: Absolutely. And I would say to you, Bill, that that’s what they fear. That’s what big government is threatened by – the power of local institutions to do it the right way, do it passionately, do it correctly. As you said that “the church is very efficient at doing it” – that’s why the government hates it. Local community organizations that know where the rubber meets the road, what they need to do to help in that moment – that’s what the government despises. That’s why when you think about the money that you could donate – to any charity, whether it’s a church or a secular organization – wherever you donate that money. If you’re busy taking that money and spending it on increased food, increased electricity, increased gas, increased all this – there’s not enough left to give your 10 percent, or whatever it is that you’re going to donate. There’s nothing left to give to those organizations so the government keeps growing bigger, bigger, bigger and getting taxes and here’s the people that should be helping folks, that we want to. The government can’t have someone being more powerful. The community? Being more powerful than the government? Dare you say! Of course they’re going to go ahead and keep chipping away at what money we have to donate to local organizations that have, as you say, they’re smart, they’re efficient, they’re passionate, they’re powerful. The government hates all those words. If I’m wrong, then show me one program where the government has been passionate, efficient, powerful and targeted. Give me one program. Just one.
Bill: I agree. And I think it’s not – right now, it’s not the church taking over the state, but the state taking over the churches’ duties. I think that’s where the action is. No one sees that. No one’s talking about that. That really needs to be where the action is in our points of conversation because there’s a battle going, an epic battle going on, between church and state about who’s supposed to do what. Who gets to do what? We all know what’s most efficient.
Brian: And Bill, I would say here’s our own little commercial for why I love Off the Grid Radio and everything we do at offthegridnews.com. We talk about changing paradigms. People go “there’s got to be a separation of church and state.” Yeah, because the government’s doing everything it can to wiggle its little fingers in. Think about it, when you hear about “there’s got to be a separation of church and state,” people go “yeah, you can’t have the church running the government.” I couldn’t care less about the church running the government. I’m more worried now about the governments running churches and local community organizations by the tax, and as you say, the inflation – the dollar being deflated to such a degree there’s no money left for us to donate to local charitable groups to do the targeted, passionate professional work that you referred to earlier. That’s the separation of church and state that bugs the living daylights out of me.
Bill: Yeah. And church should be doing things like, and our listeners should be doing things like, having community gardens, having a church garden. We just ran a sale on survival seed banks and so forth. Listen, you don’t have to buy seeds from us but you should be buying seeds or started plants or something to start becoming more self sufficient as a family, as an individual, as a community, whatever it is. Don’t give the state 100 percent of your life, because that’s the downfall. It’s easy to fall into it because they want to help you. They want control of you.
Brian: Yeah, I would say they want control. The only people that are interested in helping are themselves.
Bill: I’m almost saying they want your help in return for a vote. A return for a way of thinking. A return for being on the control grid. It’s like you’re selling your soul to this huge, evil power that it’s become. A piece of you is gone when you accept that.
Brian: Absolutely. We talk all the time, everyone knows now that our parent company is Solutions from Science and our ability to do Off the Grid News – our reports, “Food Shock,” “Black Out,” “Peak Water” – all that comes from the proceeds, our parent company helps fund what we do. So you know now that I do the commercials for survival seed bank. But I’m sincere when I say “buy one for yourself, buy one for a family member. Donate one to a school, donate one to your church, bury one in the backyard.” That’s why the containers are constructed that way. But get seed banks. Whether, you say, whether they buy ours or someone else’s, God loves you, I’m with you. But learn how to do CPR. Learn how to find your own water. Learn what to do if the power goes out, whether you buy one of our solar generators, or you buy one of our seed banks. The only way to mitigate outside influence is to rely on yourself. That’s what self-reliance means. Off-the-grid living means self-reliant living. If that’s a little too commercial then folks are welcome to email Jeremy … [laughs]
Bill: Again, no one’s got to buy stuff from us, Brian, I agree. I think it’s helpful to us because we have employees, we have people, but at the same time, please buy some seeds from a competitor, from your local place. Buy something. Do something. You’ve got a little bit of time in the next period. We’re into May and there’s only so much time to get a garden in. That’s one thing that you can do. That’s one way for somebody to take control. If you buy heirlooms, Brian, you can take the seeds from those seeds. If you’ve got the time and the interest in taking seeds and replanting those seeds again the following year. The amount, and if you factor in inflation, the amount of money you can make or at least save by creating a garden that’s going to sustain itself for years is – you mentioned $600, it’s probably $6000 or more in that you can save in the long term, if you just … that’s the way people used to do it. That’s the way my wife Kim’s grandparents lived. All of our grandparents lived that way. They took the seeds and they replanted them the next year. There’s no reason why people can’t do that.
Brian: And, Bill, we have a fairly – a very articulate, and I would say educated group of listeners. But I’ll be honest with you, when I first met you, I didn’t know. Maybe Jeremy knew, I didn’t know, that seeds didn’t replenish themselves from year to year. I had no clue about that. I was like “great, I’ll run over, I’ll buy a little bag of tomato seeds and I’ll squash a tomato and then the following year I’ll have seeds.” A lot of that was new to me as well. But think about what you’re putting into your body. Why wouldn’t you want something as natural as possible? Something that reproduces itself year after year after year. That’s what nature intended. Someone said the other day “you guys have a lot of cutting edge, new ideas at Off the Grid News.” 95 percent of our ideas are old ideas.
Bill: Some of the best ones are the oldest ones.
Brian: They’re the oldest ones. They’ve been around forever. You and I didn’t invent this stuff. They’re the oldest ideas available, which is why I think our listeners are so passionate about defending them and embracing them, because it is old world stuff.
Bill: Somehow, some way, this got lost because we got busy – I’m using ourselves – we got busy with our winnings. Just like China, we had a period of time where as Americans we got wealthy. We got busy doing other things. We’ve got to get back to what it is that makes us tick, back to the earth. We’ve got a great interview Sunday that’s going to come out where Mark Rushdoony and I talk about the theology of the land. Check your email on Sunday because that theology of the land is – how are we going to plant? How are we going to think about sustainability? Is it in the sense that Al Gore wants you to be green? Or is it in the sense of what the Bible’s articulated about stewardship? What’s Godly stewardship look like, meaning how would you treat your land if you knew your great, great, great, great grandson was going to be farming that land? You’d have a whole different attitude about spiking it with this chemical or doing that because you can only pull so much out of the land.
Brian: And I would offer to you guys, and this is a little more parochial for me, but I would offer that when you look at the book of Genesis, God put Adam and Eve in a garden. People are quick to say “well,Brian, because the technology …” I go “whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa … if you’re smart enough to give in cubits, the way the ark should have been built, and you give that to Noah. I’m pretty sure you’ve nailed how to build a high-rise. If God wanted Adam and Even in a high rise …”
Bill: Pretty high tech.
Brian: Pretty high tech, I would think. The ark in its day was pretty high tech. You’re calling out “build it this cubits by that cubits.” I don’t buy it. I’m not listening to your baloney anymore. We were put in a garden so gardens, in my mind, will always be a great idea, because that’s the story of Genesis.
Bill: I think there’s always a place for us. Another one of our familiar themes is you can’t outsource everything. You can’t let the division of labor raise your kids, raise your food. There’s some things that you ought to take control of, prayerfully, thoughtfully, take control of. It’s time – listen, there’s no time like the present. Make a call. You’ve got only so much time this summer. Here we are in Illinois, we had a cold spring, but it’s warming up. Take the opportunity that you’ve been given. Plant a garden, somehow, some way. Get your neighbors involved. Meet some people that you haven’t met before. Say “you want to help me weed this garden? We’ll share this stuff.” You’ll make friends. You’ll get a little dirty. You’ll get a little sweaty, but you’ll have a blast doing it.
Brian: Absolutely. We’re going to cut our show off by this, by saying some of the best salsa I ever had didn’t come from New York City, it came from your garden. The garden that you grew, with your family, the salsa you gave me – some of the best I’ve ever eaten. Ladies and gentlemen, thank you so very much. We have to run right now but we want to thank you for hanging out this very special edition of Off the Grid News – the radio version of offthegridnews.com. Thank you so much on behalf of everyone from Solutions from Science and Off the Grid News, I’m Brian Brawdy.
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