When the Riots Begin

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Well, if an agricultural community has lots of lettuce pickers, one of the costs generated by the businesses that created these jobs is the schooling for the workers' kids. Likewise, if a factory is creating jobs and hiring people, those workers are going to use services. Their immigration status isn't that much of a factor.

In most places, real estate taxes are the biggest source of revenue for schools. If someone owns a house, they pay real estate taxes. If someone rents, they pay real estate taxes (indirectly, through their landlord). If they don't pay state income tax, their employers are to blame ... the employer has a legal mandate to do so. If they don't pay sales tax, it would be the store that is committing tax fraud. Even if the workers were documented citizens and paying taxes, they are on the bottom end of the economic ladder, and may not pay in as much as they take out. Really, it is a case of the economic development model in place.

Having classes taught in Spanish doesn't add much to the cost - a teacher might get a small bonus in their paycheck, but the total increase isn't that much.

Seems that if this is a problem, the root is the fact that a community has lots of low-income jobs, and the employers are not following the tax laws. And Prop 13 deserves some credit.

The belief system of the American economic and financial establishment comfortably predicts a recovery after an economic shock. After a period of reduced economic activity and rising unemployment, everything will get back on track and everyone can enjoy full employment again. That is how it has always been and this is how they think the present crisis will eventually track. I think that as bad as things may seem they are going to get worse. The problem is that the base of the American economy is fundamentally wrong. America runs a massive trade deficit not because other countries have a surplus of savings or that they manipulate their currencies and thus make it impossible to balance trade flows, but for the simple reason that America has nothing to sell to the rest of the world.

What does America actually make that the rest of the world wants? Actually what does America still make aside from jet airplanes and war machines? I find it hard to come up with a decent list of world beating made in America goods that can be sold profitably to consumers outside of the United States.

If America has no goods it can sell, then it must invent securities which the rest of the world will buy. But after the cruel hoaxes of one bubble following another, the world is fresh out of dummies that are willing to buy into broken American promises.

There seems to be no way out of this predicament. Still the people who have been laid off have been hanging onto any thread of hope because they too believe in America. And yet everyday delivers fresh evidence that their faith has been in vain as more unemployed people jostle with them for the same minimum wage jobs. Those who do get the minimum wage jobs are the lucky one. Everyone else sits on a ticking time bomb as they draw the last of the unemployment benefits and max out their credit cards. By now the first casualty of the subprime credit crisis will be in this position of utter desperation. Their ranks will only grow.

I recommend the AK-47 because it is intimidating and fatal even in the hands of a complete newbie. Unlike handguns, semi-automatic rifles do not require much training which is why it is the experienced army officer who carries the handgun but the disposal infantryman who carries the rifle. I say this only half in jest because the dislocations which have grown more serious are showing signs that they will get much worse. Unemployment in California according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics was 11.5% for May 2009. I believe that it is a virtual certainty that the number will climb to around 15%. Finally, I focus on California because a) they deserve it for being so ignorant and profligate, b) talking about places like Detroit or Charlotte is just downright cruel, c) and finally, California actually represents in the purest form the sort of economic structures which have created America as we know it today.

Not true - we sold goods and services to the world valued at $1,826,596,000,000 in 2008, but our imports exceeded that by ~30%.

US exports have shown a general pattern of steady growth over the past 3 decades, but the imports have grown faster. That is the problem.

This overspending is tied to many factors (strong dollar, consumer debt, etc) and a correction can and will happen. It won't be fun, but it won't be the end of the world.



I recommend shotguns and revolvers for home defense (as do most people that know anything about weapons). A shotgun can be used inside a house with relatively little danger to household members in other rooms, or neighbors. A shotgun fires a spray of pellets that expands, and does not require perfect aim. Even in the darkness, in area where one cannot be seen, the sound of a pump shotgun being chambered is intimidating. An AK-47 or M-16 round will go through every wall in the average house in the US, and one or two walls of the next-door neighbor.

A good revolver is the height of simplicity and reliability - it requires little training, and is unlikely to misfeed, jam, or malfunction in the way any semi-auto may (the AK is quite reliable for a semi-automatic, but is more complicated and requires more familiarization). Handguns also of value in tight spaces, and can be carried for back-up in addition to a long gun. Revolvers are like simple cameras - point and shoot.

Last edited by monty on 09 Jul 2009, 11:01 am, edited 1 time in total.

" An AK-47 or M-16 round will go through every wall in the average house in the US, and one or two walls of the next-door neighbor. " Totally true, i reckon seeing a doc about a comparison of the two, at the time that the Americans had to fight the Viets, obviously the viets had the AK-47, they could shoot through trees with that thing o.O the rifle that the americans had (can't remember the name, but i think it was M-16....was made of carbon fiber, would break easily) could barely make it past half the length of a tree, the drawback with a AK-47 is that it shoots kind of randomly, so it could be good when surrounded, but bad when you need to make precise shots. <.<

Ah, the M-16 vs AK-47 debate! There has been discussion on whether a weaker round that only wounds is sometimes better for the battlefield. Kill a person, and one is removed from the combat; wound a person, and 2 or 3 are removed from combat. But both pose a hazard to non-combatants in an urban environment.

Last edited by monty on 09 Jul 2009, 11:09 am, edited 1 time in total.

The M16 is meant to kill, the AK 47 is meant to wound.

My grandfather had two revolvers during the drug craze of the 70s, when the hippies ran wild. He had a 1930s Spanish snubnose revolver for his pickup (even though it was technically illegal to carry a gun in one's car then), and a really ancient wood handle six shooter for home. The six inch wood handle is at least 100 years old. According to the stamps on the barrel, the gunsmith works also made bicycles. He may have had a Colt revolver at one time, but we only found a box. He also had a BB rifle for killing cats that went after his chickens. He wasn't big into guns.

I know that a blogger called Ferfal who lived through the Argentine collapse recommends a .357 SIG (Glock 19), but that's for carrying, since robberies increase after an economic crisis, and the 19 is small and light. At one point my grandpa slept with the wood handle revolver under his pillow. An assault rifle is problematic for use in an American suburb-spray that thing and you're likely to kill 3 or 4 people, none of them the robber. American cops still carry shotguns, since a shotgun is quite intimidating, a lot of people who are hidden in a house will surrender once the cop cocks it a couple times. People are obsessed with assault rifles, partially thanks to the bloviating of American politicians, but an AK is a long range weapon, that's why they're used in war.

Unemployment benefit extensions are due to run out in September for the first casualties of the depression. Congress has no money to extend them. Already we are seeing robberies where the guy tells the clerk that he has no job, no money, kids to feed, and is out of options. The good news is that such newly minted criminals tend to be sissies, and the cocking of a shotgun or a warning round from a revolver is usually enough to convince them to rob somebody else. The hard core gangbangers are not the ones robbing impoverished homeowners. They have bigger fish to fry. The other good news is that humans are rich in protein. Kill the burglar and bbq him for dinner. Yummy!

Try one of these:


It's called a Crossfire 1200, it's a 12gauge pump on top with a .556 semi-auto where the magazine tube normally would be, the shotgun loads from a tube in the butt. Best of both worlds in a compact package for home defense or a riot situation.

Nitpick alert! The G19 is actually a compact 9mm, the .357 Sig cartridge is chambered in the G31, G32, and G33, as well as the Sig P228 and P229, and is available as an option by several other manufacturers. The .357 Sig is an excellent cartridge for self defense, it's essentially a .40 S&W necked down to a .356 9mm bullet, so it's performance is almost on par with the .357 magnum revolver cartridge, and it will chamber in a fairly compact pistol with a decent magazine capacity. It also is quite reliable due to it's bottleneck shape, this allows for easier feeding in an automatic mechanism. The only real drawback is price and availability, since it isn't cheap and the ammo isn't nearly as widely available as 9X19mm, 9X18mm, .45ACP or .40 S&W ammo, especially outside the states. It's also very loud, if that is a concern where you live.

.556 or .223?

Curious - I like the Saiga semi-auto shotgun (AK-style magazine) but this over/under combo is interesting. I have seen some over/under survival weapons before, but they were longer than this ... meant more for a person in the wilderness.

Slight typo, 556mm/.223 caliber, takes a 30 round NATO standard magazine, and I believe it holds 8 shot shells. I know the combo guns you're talking about, typically they would be a .22LR rifle over a .410 shotgun, meant as an emergency survival weapon. The old AR-7 was kind of similar, it was a semi-auto .22LR that took down easily with all of the components fitting into the hollow butt. Sean Connery used one fitted with a scope and silencer in From Russia With Love, and it was actually a pretty accurate representation of the weapon (and a damn good movie).

America is a net exporter of food, and is also the world's leading manufacturer. We are also the world leader in science and technology.

Anyone that cannot take 10F in shorts is a sissy. My friend wore shorts every day of the year for years. In Canada. Some days are -40F.

I've been to L.A. We went right into east LA. It looked a hell of a lot better than Buffalo New York or Coney Island.

I dont intend on ever going to Flint Michigan.

The biggest problem with outdoor activity in LA is lack of accessible potable water. A day with no water will stop a riot dead in its tracks and nobody needs to die. I was shocked how dry it is there. Does the Los Angeles river even flow year round?

I bet not <.< Cali has problems with their water supplies. They've probably drained the water from their first geological stratum. ;p

This is why i'm worried when Canada is trying to push water as a consumable good -.- consumable good means any amount of water in the country can be bought -.- Heh, the Newfies have started considering this, sadly, mostly because they get almost no money ;p . Mostly Quebec would lose from that deal though <.< we have tons of rivers and lakes ~­.~ If we nationalize them all, they won't be touched until another 100 more years or so, and by then, water should be a luxury. Means we'll be filthy rich! XD

The vast majority of water in LA comes from either the Owens Valley, which is a desert in its own right, or from the far north of CA, via the Sacramento River delta. A court has ordered cuts in flows through the delta, so LA is really hurting. Ultimately, the desert cities of the Southwest, including everything south of Bakersfield, Vegas, Phoenix, and others, will look somewhat like the zombie overrun fictional Vegas in Resident Evil Extinction: a few crumbling skyscrapers and lots and LOTS of drifting sand.

If you search google for the phrase "Phoenix Falling" you will eventually get to a High Country News article from 2007 that describes how the Hohokam tribe, who once inhabited the Salt River Valley (Phoenix), ended-a massive drought crippled their society to such an extent that people died right and left, they have found vast killing fields of Hohokam skeletons that are obviously malnourished. Eventually the valley was simply abandoned, about 400 years before the first whites showed up there. The article is downright frightening-the canal system and settlement patterns of modern Phoenix EXACTLY mirror those of the Hohokam. The great desert civilization we built will be rubble, and people will go to where the water is, mainly the Pacific Northwest (along the coast) and east of the Mississippi.

Los Angeles was always a bad idea, and once the riots start all we need to do is shut the valves and halt food shipments, and the mobs will turn on each other. Once you go into the central valley, it gets dicier-everything south of Modesto is pretty much desert, but north of there there are great rivers and lots of dams, and high groundwater tables. Sacramento, where I live, has an eternal problem with termites, which thrive in the semi-wet soil. The house my grandfather built in the 1950s is now uninhabitable due to termites. He never had the money for pest control, so they spread.

All of Nevada depends on imported water, they even have limited agriculture, but the soil is so toxic they can only grow alfalfa. Fallon, which bills itself as "The Oasis of Nevada", almost never was-Churchill County was dissolved by an overwhelming vote of the Nevada legislature in 1875, due to lack of population, and it was only through bribing the governor did it get saved. Even then, efforts to find crops that would grow out there had limited success, and the Newlands Project, which was premised on the idea that Nevada soil could grow anything if only there was water, came close to failure. That was the era in which any soil that you could plow was considered ok for farming, which some historians consider to be THE major cause of the Dust Bowl. Utah is already dying an unholy death, and so is the Mormon Church. Small towns in much of Utah are only a third populated from original highs. The West simply isn't able to hold millions of people. The sun always shines there for a reason-it's a frikkin DESERT! Chicago has many problems, but lack of water is not among them. Eventually, people will realize it.