The great frustration of being actively involved in the Liberty Movement is the fact that many people are rarely on the same page (or even the same book) during political and economic discussion.  Where we see the nature of the false left/right paradigm, they see “free democracy”.  Where we see a tidal wave of destructive debt, they see a “responsible government” printing and spending in order to protect our “best interests”.  Where we see totalitarianism, they see “safety”.  Where we see dollar devaluation, they see dollar strength and longevity.  Ultimately, because the average unaware citizen is stricken by the disease of normalcy bias and living within the doldrums of a statistical fantasy world, they simply have no point of reference by which to grasp the truth when exposed to it.  It’s like trying to explain the concept of ‘color’ to a man who has been blind since birth.

Americans in particular are prone to reactionary dismissal when exposed to facts that disrupt their misconceptions.  Our culture has experienced a particularly prosperous age, not necessarily free from all trouble, but generally spared from widespread mass tragedy for a generous length of time.  This tends to breed within societies an overt and unreasonable expectation of ease.  It generates apathy, and laziness.  A crushing blubberous slothful cynicism subservient to the establishment and the status quo.  Even the most striking of truths struggle to penetrate this smoky forcefield of duplicitous funk.

In recent articles, I have outlined the very immediate dangers of several potential economic events that are likely to take place this year, including the exit of peripheral countries from the European Union, the conflict between austerity and socialist spending in France and Germany, the developing bilateral trade agreements between China and numerous other countries which cut out their reliance on the U.S. dollar, and the likelihood that the Federal Reserve will announce QE3 before the end of 2012.  All of these elements are leading in one very particular direction:  the end of the Greenback as the world reserve currency.

In response to these assertions I have received letters from some people (some of them indignant) questioning how it would be even remotely possible that the dollar could be replaced at all.  The concept is so outside their narrow world view that many cannot fathom it.

To be sure, the question is a viable one.  How could the dollar be unseated?  That said, a few hours of light research would easily produce the answer, but this tends to be too much work for the fly-by-night financial skeptic.  Sometimes, the job of the alternative analyst is to make the obvious even more obvious.

So, let’s begin…

The Dollar A Safe Haven?

This ongoing lunacy is based on multiple biases.  For some, the dollar represents America, and a collapse of the currency would suggest a failure of the republic, and thus, a failure by them as individual Americans who live vicariously through the exploits of their government.  By extension, it becomes “patriotic” to defend the dollar’s honor and deny any information that might suggest it is on a downward spiral.

Others see how the investment world clings to the dollar as a kind of panic room; a protected place where one’s saving will be insulated from crisis.  However, just because a majority of day trading investors are gullible enough to overlook the Greenback’s pitfalls does not mean those dangerous weaknesses disappear.

There is only one factor that shields the dollar from implosion, and that is its position as the world reserve currency.  Without this exalted status, the currency’s value vanishes.  Backed by nothing but massive and unpayable debt, it sits frighteningly idle, like a time bomb, waiting for the moment of ignition.

The horrifying nature of the dollar is that it is only valuable so long as foreign investors believe that we will pay back the considerable debts that we (the American taxpayer at the behest of our criminally run Treasury) owe, and that we will not hyperinflate in the process.  If they EVER begin to see their purchases of dollars and treasuries as a gamble instead of an investment, the façade falls away.  Yet again this year Congress and the Executive Branch are “at odds” over the expansion of the debt ceiling, which has been raised to levels beyond the 100% of GDP mark:

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/17/us/politics/obama-presses-congress-to-act-on-his-priorities.html 
Barack Obama has made claims that increases in the debt ceiling are “normal”, and that most presidents are prone to hiking the barrier every once in a while.  Yet, back in 2006, when George W. Bush increased debt limits, Obama had this to say:

“The fact that we are here today to debate raising America’s debt limit is a sign of leadership failure. It is a sign that the U.S. Government can’t pay its own bills…Instead of reducing the deficit, as some people claimed, the fiscal policies of this administration and its allies in Congress will add more than $600 million in debt for each of the next five years…Increasing America’s debt weakens us domestically and internationally. Leadership means that ‘the buck stops here.’ Instead, Washington is shifting the burden of bad choices today onto the backs of our children and grandchildren. America has a debt problem and a failure of leadership. Americans deserve better.”

For once, Barack and I agree on something.  Too bad the man changes his rhetoric whenever it’s to his advantage.

Today, Obama now asserts that raising the debt ceiling is not an opening for more government spending, but an allowance for the government to pay bills it has already accrued.  This is disingenuous and hypocritical prattle.  Obama is well aware as are many in Congress that as long as the Federal Government is able to raise the debt ceiling whenever it suits them, they can increase spending with wild abandon.  It’s like handing someone a credit card with no maximum limit.  For most men, the temptation would be irresistible.  Therefore, one can predict with 100% certainty that U.S. spending will never truly be reduced, and that our national debt will mount in tandem until we self destruct.

How has this trend been able to continue for so long?  Our private central bank has created the fiat machine by which all economic depravity is possible.  Currently, the Federal Reserve is the number one holder of U.S. debt.  The Federal Reserve creates its own capital.  It prints its wealth from thin air.  The dollar, thus, has become its own lynchpin.  The secretive institution which has never been subject to a full audit is now monetizing endless debt mechanisms with paper promises.  What value would any intelligent investor put on such a fraudulent economic system?

The epic dysfunction of the dollar is rooted in its reliance on perception rather than tangible wealth or strong fundamentals.  It is, indeed, like any other fiat unit, with all the inevitable pitfalls built into its structure.

Ironically, the value of the Dollar Index is measured not by its intrinsic buying power, or its historical buying power, but its arbitrary buying power in comparison with other collapsing fiat currencies.

The argument I hear most often when pointing out the calamitous path of the dollar is that it is the go-to safe haven in response to the crisis in Europe.  What the financially inept don’t seem to grasp is that the shifting of savings back and forth between the euro and the dollar is just as irrelevant to our currency’s survival as it is to Europe’s.  BOTH currencies are in decline, and this is evident by the growing inflationary pressures on both sides of the Atlantic.  Ask any consumer in Greece, Spain, France, or the UK how shelf prices have changed in the past four years, and they will say the exact same thing as any consumer in the U.S.; costs have gone way up.  Therefore, it makes sense to compare the dollar’s value not to the euro, or to the Yen, but something more practical, like the dollar of the past….

In 1972, just as Nixon was removing the dollar from the last vestiges of the gold standard, a new car cost an average of $4500.  A home cost around $40,000.  A gallon of gas was .36 cents.  A loaf of bread was .25 cents.  A visit to the doctor’s office was $25.  Wages were certainly lower, but they kept much better pace with the prices of the era.  Today, the gap between wages and inflation is insurmountable.  The average family is unable to keep up with the flashflood of rising prices.

According to the historic buying power of the dollar, the currency is a poor safe haven investment.  With the advent of bailout efforts and debt monetization through quantitative easing, its devaluation has been expedited dramatically.  The Fed has left the door open for what I believe will be a final destructive round of publicly announced QE, weakening the dollar to near death:

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/05/16/us-usa-fed-idUSBRE84F12320120516 

The question then arises; why do foreign countries continue to buy in on the greenback?

The Dollar Dump Has Already Begun

One of my favorite arguments by those defending the dollar is the assertion that no foreign country would dare to dump the currency because they are all too dependent on U.S. trade.  To answer the question above, the reality is that foreign countries ARE already calmly and quietly dumping the dollar as a global trade instrument.

To those people who consistently claim that the dollar will never be dropped, my response is, it already has been dropped!  China, in tandem with other BRIC nations, has been covertly removing the greenback as the primary trade unit through bilateral deals since 2010.  First with Russia, and now with the whole of the ASEAN trading bloc and numerous other markets, including Japan.  China in particular has been preparing for this eventuality since 2005, when they introduced the first Yuan denominated bonds.  The bonds were considered a strange novelty back then, especially because China had so much surplus savings that it seemed outlandish for them to take on treasury debt.  Today, the move makes a whole lot more sense.  China and the BRIC nations today openly call for a worldwide shift away from the dollar:

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english2010/indepth/2011-08/06/c_131032986.htm 

With the global proliferation of the Yuan, and the conversion of the Chinese economy away from dependence on exports (especially to the West) towards a more consumer based system, the Chinese have effectively decoupled from their reliance on U.S. markets.  Would a collapse in the U.S. hurt China’s economy?  Yes.  Would they still survive?  Oh yes.  Far better than America would, at least…

In 2008, I warned of this development and was attacked on all sides by more mainstream economists and Keynesian proponents who stated that such a development was impossible.  Today, it’s common knowledge that our primary creditors are “diversifying” away from the dollar, though MSM talking heads and those who parrot them still claim that this is not a threat to our economy.

To be clear, the true threat to the dollar’s supremacy is not only due to the constant printing by the private Federal Reserve (though that is a nightmare in the making), but the loss of faith in our currency as a whole.  The Fed does not need to throw dollars from helicopters to annihilate our currency; all they have to do is create doubt in its viability.

The bottom line?  A dollar collapse is not “theory” but undeniable fact in motion at this moment, driven by concrete actions on the part of the very nations that have until recently propped up our debt obligations.  It is only a matter of time before the dollar diminishes and fades away.  All signs point to a loss of reserve status in the near term.

What Will Replace The Dollar?

My next favorite argument in defense of the Greenback is the assertion that there is “no currency in a position to take the dollar’s place if it falls”.  First of all, this is based on a very naïve assumption that the dollar will not fall unless there is another currency to replace it.  I’m not sure who made that rule up, but the dollar is perfectly able to be flushed without a replacement in the wings.  Economic collapse does not follow logical guidelines or the personal pet peeves of random man-child economists.

Though, to be fair, and to educate those unaware, there IS a replacement already conveniently ready to roll forward.  The IMF has for a couple of years now openly called for the retirement of the dollar as the world reserve currency, to be supplanted by the elitist organization’s very own “Special Drawing Rights” (SDR’s):

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2011/feb/10/imf-boss-calls-for-world-currency 

The SDR is a paper mechanism created in the early 1970’s to replace gold as the primary means of international trade between foreign governments.  Today, it has morphed into a basket of currencies which is recognized by almost every country in the world and is in a prime position to take the dollar’s place in the event that it loses reserve status.  This is not theory.  This is cold hard reality.  For those who claim that the SDR is not considered a “real currency”, they should probably warn the U.S. Post Office, which now uses conversion tables that denominate costs in SDR’s:

http://pe.usps.com/text/imm/immc3_007.htm 

So, now that we know a replacement for the dollar is ready to go, the next obvious question would be:

Why would global elites destroy a useful monetary tool like the dollar?  Why kill the goose that “lays the golden eggs”?

People who ask this question are simply unable to see outside the fiscal box they have been placed in.  For global bankers, a paper currency is not important.  It is expendable. Like a layer of snake skin; as the snake grows, it sheds the old and dawns the new.

At bottom, men who promote the philosophies of globalization greatly desire the exaltation of a global currency.  The dollar, though a creation of a central bank, is still a semi-sovereign monetary unit.  It is an element that is getting in the way of the application of the global currency dynamic.  I find it rather convenient (at least for those who subscribe too globalism) that the dollar is now in the midst of a perfect storm of decline just as the IMF is ready to introduce its latest fiat concoction in the form of the SDR.  I find the blind faith in the dollar’s lifespan to be rife with delusion.  It is not a matter of opinion or desire, but a matter of fact that currencies in such tenuous positions fall, and are in the end replaced.   I believe that the evidence shows that this is not random chance, but a deliberate process, leading towards the globalist ideal; total centralization of the world under an unaccountable governing body which operates a global monetary system utterly devoid of transparency and responsibility.

The dollar was a median step towards a newer and more corrupt ideal.  Its time is nearly over.  This is open, it is admitted, and it is being activated as you read this.  The speed at which this disaster occurs is really dependent on the speed at which our government along with our central bank decides to expedite doubt.  Doubt in a currency is a furious omen, costing not just investors, but an entire society.  America is at the very edge of such a moment.  The naysayers can scratch and bark all they like, but the financial life of a country serves no person’s emphatic hope.  It burns like a fire.  Left unwatched and unchecked, it grows uncontrollable and wild, until finally, there is nothing left to fuel its hunger, and it finally chokes in a haze of confusion and dread…

You can contact Brandon Smith at:  brandon@alt-market.com

Alt-Market is an organization designed to help you find like-minded activists and preppers in your local area so that you can network and construct communities for mutual aid and defense.  Join Alt-Market.com today and learn what it means to step away from the system and build something better.

To contribute to the growth of the Safe Haven Project, and to help us help others in relocating, or to support the creation of barter networks across the country,visit our donate pag.

[Via SHFTPlan.com]

[Via WD40.com]

Via GoalZero.com

[Via InfographicJournal.com]

Foster The People – Helena Beat

I Am The Dr (Official Video)

Jay-Z, Rhianna – Run This Town

Muse – Uprising

My Chemical Romance – “Na Na Na”

Arcade Fire – The Suburbs

Rhianna – Disturbia

2Pac Featuring Dr. Dre – California Love

Rihanna – Hard ft. Jeezy

Rick Springfield – Bop ‘Til You Drop

Spice Girls – Spice Up Your Life

Duran Duran – The Wild Boys

Tom Petty – You Got Lucky

Britney Spears – Till The World Ends

Kirby Krackle -Zombie Apocalypse

More Great Resources
http://io9.com/5789871/10-greatest-apocalyptic-and-post+apocalyptic-music-videos
http://newageamazon.buzznet.com/user/journal/8219921/5-post-apocalyptic-music-videos/
http://www.rollingstone.com/music/photos/ten-best-apocalyptic-dance-music-videos-20110406

 Scientists say they moved the ‘Doomsday Clock’ a minute closer to midnight because nations are failing to sufficiently address nuclear proliferation, climate change, and other global threats.

Citing “inaction” on renewed nuclear proliferation, climate change, and the urgent need to find sustainable sources of energy, a group of scientists has moved the “Doomsday Clock” a minute closer to midnight, saying nations are “failing to change business as usual.”

It was a back-to-the-future moment for the “Doomsday Clock,” which just two years ago had been shifted backward to indicate global catastrophe was a bit less imminent.

Directors of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientist, a group originally composed of University of Chicago scientists involved in the Manhattan Project, created the clock in 1947 to use the imagery of apocalypse (midnight) to convey the peril of nuclear weapons proliferation. Through the cold war it tolled, reminding nations of the silent danger.

Over the years, the hands of the clock have moved around a lot. In 1949, the clock was moved to three minutes to midnight when President Harry Truman told the American public that the Soviets had tested their first nuclear device – starting the arms race. By 1991, with the cold war officially over and the US and Russia slashing their nuclear arsenals, the clock retreated to 17 minutes to midnight.

Terrorism, tensions between nuclear-armed rivals India and Pakistan, renewed friction between the US and Russia, North Korea’s nuclear push, and other tensions had pushed the clock to five minutes to midnight by 2007.

But movement on nuclear arms talks, climate change, and other threats so buoyed the scientists two years ago that they ordered the so-called Doomsday Clock’s minute hand to be pushed backward to six minutes before midnight.

Now, despite the Arab Spring and other pro-democracy movements around the world, including in Russia, lowering clouds have rolled back in for these scientists. So much so that on Tuesday the BAS directors announced they were moving the minute hand of the clock back to the 2007 position – 11:55.

“Two years ago, it appeared that world leaders might address the truly global threats that we face,” the BAS directors said in a statement. “In many cases, that trend has not continued or been reversed.”

“Inaction on key issues including climate change, and rising international tensions motivate the movement of the clock,” the group said in its statement. “As we see it, the major challenge at the heart of humanity’s survival in the 21st century is how to meet energy needs for economic growth in developing and industrial countries without further damaging the climate, exposing people to loss of health and community, and without risking further spread of nuclear weapons.”

But in a year in which the Mayan calendar and other doomsday prophesies are getting more than their share of attention, how seriously, really should the public take this obviously subjective – and critics might argue meaningless – relic of the cold war?

“Is this ridiculous thing still around?” Darrin Cothran, a commenter on a Los Angeles Times web page noting the clock’s shift moaned. “Time to tell these elderly gentlemen that it’s time to retire.”

“They’re just trying to stay relevant,” piped up an anonymous commentator on Slashdot. “We all forgot about them when the Cold War ended, and they crave attention again.”

Others, however, argue in favor of at least some type of global warning clock – as a simple indicator for society that unseen looming problems exist and need public attention.

Daniel Abbasi, a former senior adviser at the Environmental Protection Agency, has argued that the world needs a Global Climate Change Index akin to the Dow Jones Industrial Average to chart humanity’s gains – and reversals. It needs to be simple enough to keep public eyes from glazing over and still hold policymakers’ feet to the fire on really lowering greenhouse gas levels in the atmosphere.

Bulletin scientists argue that the need for their clock remains strong. Key recommendations for a safer world that they say have not been taken up include:

• Ratification by the US and China of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty

• Implementing multinational management of the civilian nuclear energy fuel cycle with strict standards for safety, security, and nonproliferation of nuclear weapons

• Strengthening the International Atomic Energy Agency‘s capacity to oversee nuclear materials and technology development

• Adopting climate change agreements to reduce carbon dioxide emissions

• Transforming the coal power sector of the world economy to retire older plants and require new plants to capture and store carbon dioxide they produce

• Increasing public and private investments in alternatives to carbon-emitting energy sources, such as solar and wind, and technologies for energy storage

“Whether meeting the challenges of nuclear power, or mitigating the suffering from human-caused global warming, or preventing catastrophic nuclear conflict in a volatile world, the power of people is essential,” Kennette Benedict, executive director of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, said in a statement.

“For this reason, we ask other scientists and experts to join us in engaging ordinary citizens,” she said. “Together, we can present the most significant questions to policymakers and industry leaders.  Most importantly, we can demand answers and action.”

[Via CSMonitor.com]

From: BestHealthDegrees.com

Scott Hunt and his wood-powered truck (nationalgeographic.com)

The National Geographic Channel has launched a new program, “Doomsday Preppers” (National Geographic Channel, Tuesdays at 9pm ET/PT) that places four to six families per episode in a theoretical, apocalyptic setting and chronicles how they respond under doomsday pressure.

As part of the show, Nat Geo enlisted Scott Huntand his partner David Kobler, who run thePractical Preppers, a disaster preparedness business. Hunt evaluated how well the show’s contestants have prepared for their doomsday scenario and gives them advice on how to be better prepared to subsist on their own.

“Most people rely on [calling] 911,” Hunt said in an interview with Yahoo! News. “Most people don’t have a plan. If there’s social chaos, you won’t be able to count on someone providing goods and services.”

From zombie outbreaks to Mayan prophecies, Americans have a seemingly limitless interest in how and when civilization might end. What they appear to spend far less time on, is thinking and preparing for such an event.

“The biggest mistake people made on the show is going alone,” Hunt said. “You have to sleep. You’re making yourself vulnerable where one bad person could easily take you out.”

More than 800 people attended a recent prepping conference hosted by Hunt in Columbia, South Carolina.

So, where would be the safest place in the world to bunker down in an extinction level event? Would you want to be near an ocean or major river? Or, maybe in the mountains, far away from population centers? Hunt says there’s no one good answer to prevent against unforeseen disastrous events.

“People can’t move easily in a disaster and we’ve found most people don’t have the financial resources or desire to pick up and move before a disaster,” Hunt said.

Hunt has prepared a Top 10 list of essential items anyone should have in order to survive for at least a few days in case of disaster. But he says the most important survival element isn’t food or water.

“The most important asset is a community network,” Hunt said. “If you live in a major population center like Los Angeles, you’re going to want to tap into the community for knowledge and resources.”

“We’re trying to restore a back-to-community mentality,” Hunt said.

Beyond food, water and shelter, Hunt said the most desirable non-essential item in anyone’s survival shelter is electricity. Having access to a small manual generator or some form of solar power won’t run an entire house, “but can help power some lights, some critical piece of medical technology, or maybe even a washing machine,” Hunt said.

But what if the world doesn’t end? “Preparedness is a lifestyle,” he says. And he encourages people to possess the basic survival skills he says were commonplace only 50 or 60 years ago.

In his spare time, Hunt is pursuing one of his long-term projects. “I’m trying to get a truck to run on wood,” he said with a laugh.

[Via Yahoo.com]

[Via HobbyFarms.com]

That’s assuming, of course, that the world doesn’t actually end.

Fact is, these times are rife with doomsday predictions, be it Harold Camping’s failed end-times prediction this past May to his updated doomsday date of Oct. 21.

You may prefer to fret about Dec. 21, 2012, when the Mayan calendar runs out, and then there are those dubious rumors that Comet Elenin could hit Earth as early as Sept. 11.

Even though world is as likely to end on these dates as it was on previous end-of-the-world dates (meaning it won’t), there is no reason not to prepare for the worst, right?

That’s the thinking of “John,” a business consultant in Colorado, who has spent the last five years building a doomsday shelter just in case there is a calamity of biblical proportions.

“I first started decided to build one in 2006 because of the economic climate,” said John, who asked that his location and last name not be revealed, in case the worst happens and people show up at his home trying to get inside.

“I could see there were a lot of rogue groups, and I knew there was a housing bubble as early as 2004. I would drive down the road and see all these houses and wonder where all the money was coming from.”

Since then, other potential threats — including wacky weather, Japanese earthquakes, the Mayan calendar, the alleged arrival of a “Death Star” called “Planet X” that is supposed to wreak havoc here as well — have made him feel secure that he made the right decision.

“We’ve gotten out of real estate and converted everything to gold and silver,” he said.

Oh, and there’s that doomsday shelter.

“To be honest, we consider it more of a safe room,” John said. “My builder, Joe Campo, dug next to the home and created a tunnel that leads to the shelter. He covered it in dirt and basically extended our home.”

The shelter, which cost around $300,000, is big enough to keep John’s wife and two kids safe and snug from nuclear war, tornadoes and, hopefully, telemarketers for up to 30 days.

“We stocked it with food,” he said. “But we rotate it. If you’re going to spend 30 days inside, you better have food you like.”

Not only does the home have state-of-the-art filtration systems for air and water, but John says Campo “saw into the future” and installed filters to protect against electromagnetic frequencies.

According to Campo, who is also currently racing to build several of state-of-the-art floating Noah’s Ark-style survival shelters by 2012 on 80 acres of property in Alamosa County, Colorado, EMFs are the unsung doomsday danger.

“This is a very serious issue. NASA has recently published information warning the people that they forecast severe solar storms for 2012 and 2013,” Campo said by email. “It shows a strange scenario of a gigantic solar storm or solar flare breaching our magnetic sphere, torching a satellite. It appears to be prophetic in nature and is open to interpretation.”

Although John takes pride in his doomsday shelter, he doesn’t use it for entertaining and doesn’t let anyone know about its existence.

“I don’t use it for entertaining,” he said. “My parents are the only ones who know — that’s it.”

That includes building inspectors, John admits, although he quickly adds that everything his builder did exceeded any code or regulations because it’s designed to survive practically every type of conceivable disaster.

Campo declined to discuss John’s comments, citing a confidentiality agreement he signs with every client, but he is convinced that he is doing his best to help those who want to be prepared just in case something dreadful happens.

“No one responsible is saying that it is the end of the world, but there is alarming evidence that most of us may be living on borrowed time,” Campo said. “Clearly the recent Japanese tsunami, earthquake and nuclear meltdown was merely the tip of the iceberg.”

Campo learned much of his skills building doomsday shelters by building 1,500 McDonald’s restaurants.

“There are some similarities,” he said. “McDonald’s had three or four different plans, but they ended up looking the same. But many of those had underground areas that were sort of like minishelters, with emergency generators, but the walls weren’t as thick.”

Campo got interested in the doomsday market after 9/11, but has seen interest skyrocket in recent years because of the aforementioned Mayan prophecies and other alleged end-of-world predictions.

Despite his suggestion that “there is alarming evidence that most of us may be living on borrowed time,” he insists that he is not fear-mongering to get business.

“I do not believe the world is coming to an end, and I refuse to use fear tactics,” he said.

Campo also points out to potential customers that even if the shelter isn’t needed for survival, it can also work as a basement or spare room.

“This is not like an austere post-World War II-type shelter,” he insisted.

Although some people have doomsday shelters built for them, others prefer to do the work themselves, such as “Glenn,” a liquidator in east Texas, who has built a shelter using a kit purchased from Monolithic, an Italy, Texas-based maker of dome-home kits. Glenn is a survivalist who decided to build the underground home inside a mountain near his house.

“In the long term, things are not going to be as they are now, and I might need the extra benefit,” he said.

It doesn’t have to be a flood or a tornado or an earthquake, he said, even the record heat plaguing much of the country is reason enough.

“It’s got a great insulation factor,” he said. “We are protected from hurricanes, tornadoes, bullets and bombs. And the utility bills are low.”

There is one thing that the home may not be safe from (two, if you count the aforementioned telemarketers).

“The only thing that could be a problem is a flood, but I am higher than my neighbor’s house.”

Another issue: The homes are dark when the power is out, which Glenn says means he has to keep flashlights and candles on hand.

“There’s an upside to that, though,” he laughed. “You don’t have the sun shining in your eyes in the morning.”

David South is the CEO and President of Monolithic Dome Institute, the company that supplied the dome-home kit to Glenn. It has been in the business for 35 years.

Depending on what is happening, his product appeals to different groups.

“Sometimes people buy them to store potatoes or for underground homes, and I’ve been getting calls from Joplin, Mo., from people trying to rebuild after the tornado.”

Although many people want to build them underground, South says that’s not really necessary.

“The basic egg shape is the strongest there is, and with concrete it becomes stronger,” he said. “My buildings can handle pretty much anything.”

South says his dome homes cost the same as any custom home, but recommends that any person who wants one should write down what they want the home to do.

“Do you want it to protect you? Well, who or what do you want protection from? What do you expect it to do?” he asked rhetorically. “If you’re worried most about nuclear fallout, you’ll have to bury it five feet underground. On the other hand, if you fear tornadoes, put it on top of your property because those really only happen once every 40 years.”

South has a droll, laid-back way of speaking that probably comes, in part, from surviving 35 years of doomsday predictions. Although he seems comfortable that the end of the world is probably not nigh, he says it never hurts to have a plan.

“If we live long enough, we learn that we don’t know what will happen tomorrow,” he said.

[Via TheHuffingtonPost.com]

Featuring Painter, poet & song writer Billy Childish, Harry Malt from Bare Bones, Luke Turner from The Quietus, journalist Huw Nesbitt, broadcaster Max Kaiser, author Nicholas Shaxson & Artists Anika, Comanechi, Gaggle’s & Saul Williams.

But “going off the grid” is a daunting proposal, especially for those with families. Non-homesteaders rely on others for virtually everything; not just our haircuts, but our electricity and our eggs. It’s hard enough to figure out the right amount of groceries to buy for a week. Figuring out how many crops to plant to feed a family of four is exponentially more daunting. There are plenty of resources to help – message boards, how-tos. And here’s one more, aesthetically pleasing resource from solar panel discount company One Block Off the Grid: a useful chart illustrating the typical land requirements for a family of four seeking nutritional and electronic self-sufficiency.

According to the company’s research, a family of four that eats meat, dairy and eggs would need around two acres of land to feed themselves for a year. Ready to try it yourself, but short on land? A 2.9-acre plot of land in South-Central Alaska is available from the State for as little as $2400, payable by MasterCard or Visa.

Here’s the chart.

[Via HuffingtonPost.com]

Marc Kroll/Sharp Entertainment

There’s a new modifier on the TV grid, and we should all be afraid.

Television has long been full of “Americans” (“American Restoration,” “American Chopper,” “American Hoggers”) and “Extremes” (“Extreme Marksmen,” “Extreme Makeover,” “Extreme Couponing”) and “Tops” (“Top Gear,” “Top Chef,” “Top Shot”). In recent weeks, though, an interloper has staked a claim: “Doomsday.”

Last month the National Geographic Channel introduced “Doomsday Preppers,” a Tuesday-night reality series about people who are stockpiling, arming and otherwise preparing for some kind of apocalypse. Last week it was the Discovery Channel’s turn. Its new “Doomsday Bunkers,” on Wednesday nights, is about Deep Earth Bunker, a company that builds underground getaways for the types of people seen in “Doomsday Preppers.”

Watch either show for a short while and, unless you’re a prepper yourself, you might be moderately amused at the absurd excess on display and at what an easy target the prepper worldview is for ridicule. Watch a bit longer, though, and amusement may give way to annoyance at how offensively anti-life these shows are, full of contempt for humankind.

“Doomsday Preppers” introduces an array of end-of-civilization types who at first seem surprisingly varied. These preppers live all over the country, in rural areas, suburbs and cities. Each has a different reason for turning a perfectly adequate home into a canned-food warehouse or building an escape hideaway (or bug-out location, to use the prepper term) in the mountains. One expects the North and South Poles to swap places, one a global economic collapse, one “an electromagnetic pulse that will disable the transportation system of the United States.”

National Geographic Channels/Sharp Entertainment

But the people on this show and the customers of Deep Earth Bunker are more alike than diverse. Who knows how representative these shows are of the prepper universe, but the people they feature are disproportionately white. They can’t speak for long without employing that cliché involving excrement and a fan. And whatever their religious beliefs might be, something “Preppers” doesn’t generally explore, most of them put their real faith in firearms.

“Preppers” and “Bunkers” are both full of footage of people firing or lovingly cradling their weaponry, which in many cases is frighteningly extensive. (You really don’t want the guy in last week’s “Preppers” living next door; in addition to a house full of ammunition, he has stockpiled 50 gallons of gasoline, an unsettling combination.) One notable exception was Kathy Harrison, a New England woman profiled on a recent “Preppers.”

“It’s easy to feel a little left out of the prepper community if you live in New England and if you’re not fairly right wing and conservative politically,” she said in the segment. “But I just don’t spend my time worrying about stockpiling guns and ammunition, because our security comes not from stockpiling weapons but from having a community that respects each other, supports each other, and we have each others’ backs.”

A noble sentiment. But the unmistakable impression left by these programs is that what these folks want most of all is not to protect their families — the standard explanation for why they’re doing what they’re doing — or even the dubious pleasure of being able to say to the rest of us, “See, I told you the world was going to end.” What they want is a license to open fire.

The number of bullets sprayed around in these shows, by adults and even their children, might give Rambo pause. Yet “Doomsday Preppers” and “Doomsday Bunkers” might still qualify as decent television if they were less credulous — if, for instance, they asked a few basic questions:

Won’t it be hard to find a plumber after civilization collapses? What will happen when that methane-harvesting septic system clogs?

Have the “Doomsday Bunker” diggers talked to the “Doomsday Prepper” people who think the Big Catastrophe will originate underground, via volcano or earthquake?

More seriously, what is the attraction of continuing to live in a world that forces people to cower in an underground box and spend all their time fending off those who want their freeze-dried apricots?

Even more seriously, what is the attraction of continuing to live in a world that will almost certainly not have television or the Internet, depriving doomsday types of the shows and Web sites that fuel their paranoia and sell products exploiting it?

“Doomsday Preppers” even offers the people it profiles advice on improving their preparations. (National Geographic, though, on a Facebook page, gives commenters a chance to mock the preppers with a photo caption contest. Under a picture of a man neck-deep in a hole in the ground, someone has written, “It looks like we’ll be alright as long as the end of the world doesn’t involve rain.”)

At their worst the shows don’t merely give the prepper universe a pass on difficult questions; they reinforce its ugliest undercurrents. The most recent “Doomsday Preppers” included a white family 40 miles from Atlanta that is worried about rioting caused by economic collapse. “Civil unrest will most likely ensue in the metropolitan areas and then spread out to the suburbs,” the patriarch says.

His defenses include a generous supply of guns and a couple of German shepherds. An expert with a trained attack dog comes by to demonstrate what a properly schooled dog can do. He has a man dress up in protective gear and act menacing, then turns the dog loose. The fake intruder is black, the only black face in the hourlong program.

A free country, of course, includes the freedom to be a prepper. From a television perspective the real question is: What are these shows, so disdainful of life and human potential, doing on these outlets?

Discovery Channel

The Discovery Channel has on its résumé some of the most beautiful, life-affirming documentaries ever broadcast, among them “Life” (2010) and “Planet Earth” (2007), with another, “Frozen Planet,” coming up this weekend. And National Geographic plasters this motto on most everything, including the television channel’s Web site: “Inspiring people to care about the planet since 1888.”

Hmm. Apparently “inspiring people to prepare a personal fortress and pray for cataclysm so they can start blasting away at their neighbors” was deemed not to have quite the same ring to it.

[Via NYTimes.com]

End Of The World Commercials

Jeep 2012 Call of Duty Modern Warfare 3 Commercial

Pepsi Max – Asteroid (End of the World)

Chevy Silverado “2012″ Super Bowl XLVI Ad

Terminix – End of The World Commercial

Shock Top End Of The World

Bridgestone Apocalyptic Super Bowl 2010 Commercial

Lynx Body Spray – 2012 End of the World Commercial

AXE 2012: End of the World Survival Guide

Survival Commercials

Verizon Survival of the Fastest – “Swamp” Commercial

Bear Grylls Degree Commercial (Wolves)

Bear Grylls Nissan X-TRAIL Commercial

Bear Grylls Trail Mix Cereal Advert (Lion)

Zombies

FedEx – Zombies TVC

Doritos: Zombie Party Commercial

Doritos – Better Than Brains

New Honda Civic Zombie Commercial

Zombies: The Ramifications of Yes (Official Toshiba Commercial)

Zombie GEICO from the 2010 Spike TV Scream Awards

Toyota Zombie Car Commercial (2010)

Polaroid Zombie Ad – “SOUL”

Polaroid Zombie Ad – “NETWORKING”

Polaroid Zombie Ad – “TANGIBLE”

Video Games

Mass Effect 3: Official Launch Trailer

Fallout Intro

Gears Of war

X-men Legends II: Rise of Apocalypse Commercial

Stubbs The Zombie: A Rebel Without A Pulse

Tom Clancy’s EndWar

What do you think about companies using the end of the world theme for advertising? Leave your comment below.