Alaska is huge in size, but our population is small. All of us Alaskans together couldn’t begin to fill one your big American cities. But this isn’t about population; it’s about freedom. Ten thousand liberty-minded patriots, with their voices and their votes, could help Alaska - and affect the course of world history forever.
Be one of those liberty-minded souls.
1. If you’re an Alaskan who wants to remain here, make provisions to do so independent of any government handouts or stretched emergency aid. Do whatever it takes to make yourself as independent as possible. If you’re in debt, pay it off as quickly as you possibly can.
When – not if – the government dollars dry up, things will get uncomfortable here; there will be shortages. There will be hardships, by modern standards. The shutting off of dollars from D.C. will be very unpleasant in the short term. If you’re at all interested in owning land, then make your plans to get some.
Make provisions for food and fuel. Stock as much non-perishable food as you can afford. See to your water supply. Cut wood for heating, if necessary. City dwellers may need to get a few extra propane tanks for their BBQ grills. Consider: if the electricity goes down due to a decreased or completely-shut-down natural gas supply, what will you do?
If you’re a renter and can’t make those changes where you are, and if you have the means, look for land now - double up with like-minded friends in a similar situation, if needs must. Our pioneer forefathers "made do" with a cabin and an outhouse. If we have to, we can do it, too.
You don’t have to own land to make this work, but you need the freedom to act independently. Having land of your own would help, but it’s not the only way.
However you do it, make sure you can survive a few months without income, without fuel, without stocked grocery shelves. Be prepared.
It’s not too soon to start.
2. If you have ever considered moving to Alaska, perhaps now is the time. Get here IF you can do it responsibly.
If you cannot do it responsibly, please stay home. It’s nothing personal, but you will not survive the barely-getting-by, holy-crap-this-is-tougher-than-we-thought times ahead.
Yes, we mean that literally. Alaskan winters are tough with all the modern conveniences. They can be murderous without them.
Bring your firearms. Newly-arrived folks in Anchorage are somewhat insulated from "the wild" ... but even here in town we have black bears, brown bears, and 800-pound grizzlies who would like tourists for lunch. A full-grown moose may weigh 1,400 pounds, and moose will attack and maul when cornered or threatened. We have wolves, too, and they hunt in packs.
This isn't a Disney movie, and the bear you stumble across on the trail - or in your yard - isn't Winnie the Pooh. Do the responsible thing and protect yourself.
And some predators go about on only two legs.
Don’t come here expecting a handout from the State of Alaska; that’s an modern myth. There is no monthly payment of any kind, nor is there any annual payment approaching anything like a living wage. Robert Heinlein said it best: "TANSTAAFL: there ain't no such thing as a free lunch."
There is a once-a-year dividend payment from Alaska’s oil saving account, after you’ve been a resident for two years … and that will probably cease as soon as the federal payments do, because the state will have to raid that account to remain solvent in the short term … at least until we can bring our natural resources to market. That may take a few years … and maybe several. Even then, it's only about a thousand bucks a year, and you can't live on that ... even if we assume the dollar will still have any value at that point.
In short - if you’re the type who’d consider moving three thousand miles for the rumor of a check, save us all the trouble and stay home. Whatever shortages and price problems you see in the U.S. could be worse here, and we'll have enough troubles as it is.
Hollywood recently celebrated the short life and ugly end of an ignoramus who thought he could live off the land without any training or proper equipment. He starved and eventually died of exposure in one of the richest, most abundant areas in Alaska ... because he didn’t know what he was doing.
People like that, we don’t need.
There are many cabins in the wild … but they’re almost never abandoned. This isn’t a place for squatters, and attempting to live in someone else’s digs could find you on the wrong end of a rifle. Again, that’s not the kind of person we need.
But can you provide a service we need?
Can you build or maintain a power generator and wire it up to a some cabins, a hundred miles from the nearest road? Maintain a medical clinic with irregular or improvised supply?
Can your business provide food or fuel at a relatively competitive price without relying on Outside (i.e., outside Alaska) help? Have you worked in the resource industries - mining, timber, oil, fisheries? Can you fly a plane or crew a ship? Repair appliances or other machinery?
What can you do that will serve you and us in hard times, as well as easy ones?
If there is a mass exodus of nanny-statists who bail at the first sign of hardship … which would be the expected response to the sudden realization that government help isn’t coming … then many homes, at least in the settled areas, may be available on the cheap. But don’t count on that.
Are you prepared to be independent - needing little-or-nothing from anyone else for most of your day-to-day needs?
Then sell everything for a grubstake, and get here.
3. It is almost inevitable that, should history continue to unfold along this current path, Alaskans will once more have the opportunity to consider independence. If enough of those dependent on Uncle Sugar have gone home, it will pass. So be prepared to hold out through the hard times. It will get better. Be determined to make it ... to survive ... to thrive. Adopt the attitude of America’s rugged Yankee forebears: "use it up, wear it out, make it do, or do without."
Bring your voice. Bring your vote. Bring your guts, your skills, and be determined.
4. And after? If we find we must slip the Federal chains, and can manage to take our own equal place among the powers of the earth - what then?
Bring with you any passion that serves the self-sufficiency of Alaskans and can compete internationally. Can you bring a company here? Information technology, aerospace, defense, biotechnology - if you can keep your start-up running a thousand miles from the Continental US... please consider bringing it here, and pick your staff carefully. It may be rocky roads at first, but tough it out and you’ll be in the position of a lifetime.
Nothing is guaranteed, but Alaska offers a chance to not only survive, but to be successful. It's not a free ride. You have to earn it.
There’s no paper to sign, no club to join. No secret handshake. Just a mission.
Just one promise to yourself, and to your posterity.
Come here.
Tough it out.
Make it work.
(This is part 3 of an essay jointly authored by Jenny S. and me, about a year ago.)
Be one of those liberty-minded souls.
1. If you’re an Alaskan who wants to remain here, make provisions to do so independent of any government handouts or stretched emergency aid. Do whatever it takes to make yourself as independent as possible. If you’re in debt, pay it off as quickly as you possibly can.
When – not if – the government dollars dry up, things will get uncomfortable here; there will be shortages. There will be hardships, by modern standards. The shutting off of dollars from D.C. will be very unpleasant in the short term. If you’re at all interested in owning land, then make your plans to get some.
Make provisions for food and fuel. Stock as much non-perishable food as you can afford. See to your water supply. Cut wood for heating, if necessary. City dwellers may need to get a few extra propane tanks for their BBQ grills. Consider: if the electricity goes down due to a decreased or completely-shut-down natural gas supply, what will you do?
If you’re a renter and can’t make those changes where you are, and if you have the means, look for land now - double up with like-minded friends in a similar situation, if needs must. Our pioneer forefathers "made do" with a cabin and an outhouse. If we have to, we can do it, too.
You don’t have to own land to make this work, but you need the freedom to act independently. Having land of your own would help, but it’s not the only way.
However you do it, make sure you can survive a few months without income, without fuel, without stocked grocery shelves. Be prepared.
It’s not too soon to start.
2. If you have ever considered moving to Alaska, perhaps now is the time. Get here IF you can do it responsibly.
If you cannot do it responsibly, please stay home. It’s nothing personal, but you will not survive the barely-getting-by, holy-crap-this-is-tougher-than-we-thought times ahead.
Yes, we mean that literally. Alaskan winters are tough with all the modern conveniences. They can be murderous without them.
Bring your firearms. Newly-arrived folks in Anchorage are somewhat insulated from "the wild" ... but even here in town we have black bears, brown bears, and 800-pound grizzlies who would like tourists for lunch. A full-grown moose may weigh 1,400 pounds, and moose will attack and maul when cornered or threatened. We have wolves, too, and they hunt in packs.
This isn't a Disney movie, and the bear you stumble across on the trail - or in your yard - isn't Winnie the Pooh. Do the responsible thing and protect yourself.
And some predators go about on only two legs.
Don’t come here expecting a handout from the State of Alaska; that’s an modern myth. There is no monthly payment of any kind, nor is there any annual payment approaching anything like a living wage. Robert Heinlein said it best: "TANSTAAFL: there ain't no such thing as a free lunch."
There is a once-a-year dividend payment from Alaska’s oil saving account, after you’ve been a resident for two years … and that will probably cease as soon as the federal payments do, because the state will have to raid that account to remain solvent in the short term … at least until we can bring our natural resources to market. That may take a few years … and maybe several. Even then, it's only about a thousand bucks a year, and you can't live on that ... even if we assume the dollar will still have any value at that point.
In short - if you’re the type who’d consider moving three thousand miles for the rumor of a check, save us all the trouble and stay home. Whatever shortages and price problems you see in the U.S. could be worse here, and we'll have enough troubles as it is.
Hollywood recently celebrated the short life and ugly end of an ignoramus who thought he could live off the land without any training or proper equipment. He starved and eventually died of exposure in one of the richest, most abundant areas in Alaska ... because he didn’t know what he was doing.
People like that, we don’t need.
There are many cabins in the wild … but they’re almost never abandoned. This isn’t a place for squatters, and attempting to live in someone else’s digs could find you on the wrong end of a rifle. Again, that’s not the kind of person we need.
But can you provide a service we need?
Can you build or maintain a power generator and wire it up to a some cabins, a hundred miles from the nearest road? Maintain a medical clinic with irregular or improvised supply?
Can your business provide food or fuel at a relatively competitive price without relying on Outside (i.e., outside Alaska) help? Have you worked in the resource industries - mining, timber, oil, fisheries? Can you fly a plane or crew a ship? Repair appliances or other machinery?
What can you do that will serve you and us in hard times, as well as easy ones?
If there is a mass exodus of nanny-statists who bail at the first sign of hardship … which would be the expected response to the sudden realization that government help isn’t coming … then many homes, at least in the settled areas, may be available on the cheap. But don’t count on that.
Are you prepared to be independent - needing little-or-nothing from anyone else for most of your day-to-day needs?
Then sell everything for a grubstake, and get here.
3. It is almost inevitable that, should history continue to unfold along this current path, Alaskans will once more have the opportunity to consider independence. If enough of those dependent on Uncle Sugar have gone home, it will pass. So be prepared to hold out through the hard times. It will get better. Be determined to make it ... to survive ... to thrive. Adopt the attitude of America’s rugged Yankee forebears: "use it up, wear it out, make it do, or do without."
Bring your voice. Bring your vote. Bring your guts, your skills, and be determined.
4. And after? If we find we must slip the Federal chains, and can manage to take our own equal place among the powers of the earth - what then?
Bring with you any passion that serves the self-sufficiency of Alaskans and can compete internationally. Can you bring a company here? Information technology, aerospace, defense, biotechnology - if you can keep your start-up running a thousand miles from the Continental US... please consider bringing it here, and pick your staff carefully. It may be rocky roads at first, but tough it out and you’ll be in the position of a lifetime.
Nothing is guaranteed, but Alaska offers a chance to not only survive, but to be successful. It's not a free ride. You have to earn it.
There’s no paper to sign, no club to join. No secret handshake. Just a mission.
Just one promise to yourself, and to your posterity.
Come here.
Tough it out.
Make it work.
(This is part 3 of an essay jointly authored by Jenny S. and me, about a year ago.)
6 comments:
Anything for agrumpy old Paramedic? EMS Instructor(Teach Nurses, EMTs and 1st Responders)?
Somewhat dangerous with most any kind of tool, implement, etc?
Willingly tears apart most anything and puts back together and it works(sometimes!)!!
Lived in a cold weather climate of his life(we get Alaska's leftovers here).
Just wondering....
Tell us you have more of these to post.
Best article I've read on the blog all year. Watched a show set in Alaska last night...think it was on the Discovery Channel. I about ready to pack. I just need to figure out how to convince my son to allow me to take my grandchildren.
maddmedic: absolutely. Medical personnel of whatever stripe or persuasion will be needed. When Medicare collapses (note I didn't say "if"), a lot of doctors are likely to head south. An experienced paramedic who knows how to keep the equipment going would be worth his weight in gold.
Matt: there's no more right now, but will be more soon, including a website/forum (so Jenny S. tells me).
Stephen: thank you. You would be welcome, sir.
Good one Sir, to the point and ON point...
Old NFO: thank you, sir. That means a lot, coming from you.
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