Patriot Express Newsletter Edition #74
Fellow Patriots,
Welcome to the Patriot Express Newsletter (PENL) Edition #74. Thanks for stopping by to spend time checking out the newsletter. Ms. Lucy and I appreciate you stopping by each week to spend part of your day with us.
Ms. Lucy and I hope you had a safe and blessed holiday weekend. If you are like us you are asking “where did the summer go?” Here we are in mid-September, headed rapidly towards the November election and the unknown. Are you ready?
For the newcomers to the website, the foundation of Hope for Survival is my book, by the same title. If you would like to a copy of Hope for Survival – How Food, Water, Shelter, and Security, Could Save Your Life, at this link. https://www.hopeforsurvival.com. All proceeds from book sales goes to charity to support a local foodbank in our region. Thank you to everyone who purchased books.
The basic platform for HFS is this:
Hope for Survival Mission – To help individuals and families get prepared.
Hope for Survival Goal – Help as many people as possible become self-reliant.
The book is a basic framework to get you started in Preparedness, but you should continue to build upon the basic-foundation and processes. The theme, Hope for Survival, is built around the book, with the PENL, the HFS website containing over 390 articles and folders set up for specific topics, online and in-resident training, and Zoom rallies conducted each Thursday evening.
My desire and hopefully yours is to help the individual, the family and team, and the community. Why? Who covers your back while you sleep? Who protects you while you work in your garden or tend to livestock or work on your ham radio antenna? Do you plan to sleep with one eye open? How many tasks on your list requires two or more people?
I want to thank you for your support and continued visits to the HFS website. I want to welcome the new readers to the HFS family and our ongoing mission to be prepared and self-reliant. Help us build the HFS following by recommending or bringing a family member or friend to our effort of preparedness and self-reliance.
TRAINING:
Hope for Survival Podcast – One of the areas HFS provides training opportunities is through the HFS YouTube channel. We currently have about 25 short training type Podcast on the Hope for Survival YouTube channel covering numerous topics of interest to help in your preparedness planning. Consider bringing a friend or family member and check it out. If you like what you viewed, hit “like” and consider subscribing so you are notified when I post something new. The number of subscribers and likes helps me determine trends and where folks spend time. The purpose of the YouTube videos is to get information to you, the preparer.
You can visit the Hope for Survival YouTube page at: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCAxzpwOcydroW96rFBd2Vvw?view_as=subscriber
Thursday Zoom Rallies – HFS continues the Thursday HFS Zoom Virtual rallies weekly. We completed week 22 with a great Zoom meeting. This week I conducted a class on the information (Intelligence) you should consider including in your Risk Analysis process that helps identify possible threats or barriers in your preparedness planning. We also covered news from the week, some preparedness topics and answered questions on the topics. Once the short briefs are completed, we have our weekly “Chatter that Matters” session with the attendees.
If you have interest in attending a Thursday evening “Hope for Survival” Zoom virtual training event please email me at preparedness101@protonmail.com to get on the distribution list for attendance information. This is a great group and platform to learn and build friendships. The virtual conference room access information will not be posted in open on the website for OPSEC reasons.
Special Saturday Training Class - I will be conducting a virtual Zoom class on Preparedness 101 on Saturday, Sept 12, 2020 at 10 AM EST. The cost to attend this training is $25 for the three-hour class. If you would like to attend go to the donate tab on the website and in the comment-section enter Prep 101. I will receive your information and email you the Zoom link and UN to enter the room. This is a great course for beginners, family and friends who are just starting into preparedness.
Moving along …
We must make this brief public announcement to protect the innocent.
Ding, Ding, Ding...."Attention HFS readers..... Opinions shared in this newsletter are just that, opinions, and nothing more. Read at your own risk. The owner and author of this site are not responsible for hurt feelings or thin-skinned readers. I do my best to show restraint and respect to the best extent possible. I take as many precautions as possible and try to remain as nonpolitical as possible, however, there are times when I just can't help but point certain things out. Sometimes we must pull up our spenders and suck it up. Just saying. Stay the course, read what you want, and avoid the rest. Avoid fear porn as much as possible and the day will be okay.) When all else fails… Keep the faith and always have Hope."
Thoughts for the week –
It wouldn't be appropriate to lead with any other thought without remembering this horrific day in our history and sharing some thoughts on the Anniversary of September 11, 2001. It was 8:45 AM EST when the first plane loaded with 20,000 gallons of fuel struck the north tower. You know the rest. Now, here we are nineteen years later and we will probably witness the 911 anniversary not even making the headlines on many news sites or printed papers. How soon we forget, huh? Have we grown so shallow as humans to not remember this horrific event? Remember how the politicians stood on the capitol building steps showing unity as one, a nation together. The echo of "God Bless America" rang from the steps. Chest out and determined, we vowed to march forward and strike back.
Do you realize how many deaths happened as a result of 911?
Twin Towers - 2,606
Four crashed airliners - 265
Pentagon - 125
Emergency Workers - 412
Firefighters - 343
Paramedics - 2
Chaplains - 1
Cancer Deaths from 911 response - 420
The Pentagon reports deaths related to wars Post 911 to be approaching 200,000 at a cost of $6.4 trillion dollars. I will note, my point here is not about the cost, but the lives lost at any cost. Each human lost is a son, a daughter, a husband or wife, a mother or father. Someone still walks this earth with a empty place in their heart. Many died without warning by simply going to work on the morning of 911. Others died as committed professionals working as first responders.
I remember 911 today like it happened yesterday. As I talk about in my book, Hope for Survival, I had recently returned to the US of A from my military assignment in England. I was assigned as the Superintendent of Antiterrorism to Headquarters Air Force Special Operations Command located in Fort Walton Beach, Florida. Rough assignment. (smile) The time was 7:20 to 7:25 and I was sending out an email to my POCs who worked battling terrorism around the world. The title of the email article was "Bin Laden Vows to Strike America" and I hit send at 7:28 CST. I ran down the hallway to make my 730 CST morning meeting with the Director of Operations where we received updates and information to operations involving our resources around the world.
Shortly after the initial brief, we heard a knock at the door and my Colonel boss motioned for me to come to the door. it was around 7:50 CST and he said "it appears terrorist just struck one of the towers. Before I could get back to my office a second plane struck tower two. For those of us in uniform at that time, our world just changed completely. While the world rightfully focused on the Twin Towers, the Pentagon and Flight 93 that crashed in the distant field in Pennsylvania, those of us in Special Operations immediately started to spin up to launch resources to the other side of the globe to pre-stage for what was to come. It was another world remaining in the distant view from other