Politics of the Tribe - Between a Rock and a....

I think it is pretty easy to see how we got into this mess. From Federal power grabs, to social welfare vote buying. There are many many reasons, some are mini-conspiracies of their own like the Federal Reserve. Some are obvious self interest like Feminism and Affirmative Action. Some are just greed trussed up as whatever feel good emotional response they could hitch their wagon to. However the fact is 99% of all these "reasons" would never have gotten off the ground without the huge surplus of energy our politicians had to play with.

Now that the surplus is coming to an end how can the Federal government keep up appearances and continue paying their liabilities? Well in short, they can't. Eventually all the money printing, account confiscations, and resource grabs won't matter because the energy which the dollars represent won't be there. Where the Federal government has really placed itself into a dangerous position is that it has never weaned any of it's babies off the flow of surplus energy. Now either the government can begin drying up this flow of surplus and risk large scale civil unrest and riots not to mention being accused of civil rights violations or they can begin siphoning off as much energy from groups they feel will not resist to continue support for the groups who will resist.

As we have seen that takes the form of Infra-structure decline, police force declines (not all declines are bad), air control tower decline, border security, prisons, justice systems etc. The next step as we are seeing in Europe now will be direct confiscation of wealth and the erosion of property rights and other rights the government sees as a threat mainly of course firearms and speech but other regulations will be enacted as well in an attempt to lessen as much resource use as possible. We see the latter in all the Federally owned land, global warming regulations and  other EPA actions.

The final step (they hope) as transportation costs rise will be areas of regional control where rural property directly around urban hotspots will see their stores and wealth confiscated to feed the population centers. Since we are almost into the account and wealth confiscation at this point I believe we have a little time before rural areas are really targeted but the means and tools for this next stage are being moved into position. They take the form of the armored transports and ammo purchases by Homeland security. We will also see a concentrated effort to move as many suburban residents into the cities as possible just prior to the open confiscation phase.

Now I believe during the confiscation phase our brothers and sisters in the very remote Western states will have a supreme advantage over us who are simply rural residents of more populated states. Many of the Western states will be completely outside any zone of control. This will ultimately be a big problem for them in the long term but a huge advantage in the short term unless some local event causes premature infra-structure damage which would put them below sustainable level early in the game.

For the rest of us the confiscation phase will be the hardest single time we will ever have to live through. Storage food and other resources will absolutely have to be scattered, cached and hidden which will bring with it many risks especially if you do not own large amounts of land. Not that property rights will be honored once confiscation starts but land you do not own will also see more traffic regardless and therefore more chances for a cache to be discovered.

Key transportation hubs and other areas will also be occupied to facilitate the confiscation.

Any of us who plan on surviving in place through sustainable living or storage items will certainly need to have the skills necessary to hide our stores. Being able to pack up and bug out at a moments notice will also be a skill the rural dwellers will need to learn. The ability to melt away and then come back will do much to starve the beast.

At this point I know I have mentioned nothing about fighting back or any number of a multitude of problems the Federal government will face during confiscation. The biggest one I see is that in order to pull it off they must keep the cities pacified and they will not be able to do that by force. The sheer amount of man power necessary to keep the cities supplied will make it impossible to wield force in both the rural and urban areas.

Ultimately the cities will fall to crime, decay and riots. There just will not be the energy available to keep them going. There are many factors that can impede the Federal take over plan but at this point I think it is the most logical direction I believe they will take. How well they will do following this course is mostly up to us.

Keep Prepping Everyone!!!