Divemedic

Communications Training and Gear

With things appearing to deteriorate on a constant basis, I think that it is a good idea for this blog to be a bit more proactive in not just commentary, but in tidbits that people can use. After all, that is why I store and distribute training manuals with the link that the top of the site. With that in mind, I want to put more information out there.

Let’s do communications for this post. It is difficult to fight and resist oppression if you cannot communicate. You also don’t want the secret police rolling you up too easily. When the DOJ was conspiring to overthrow Trump, they were well aware of the NSA’s capabilities, yet they chose to communicate with each other through HAM radios to coordinate this effort, even though such use was in violation of Federal law.

The National Security Agency (NSA) picks up and records almost all electronic communications, thereby effectively wiretapping telephone conversations, email, and practically everything else we send out electronically. What the NSA doesn’t get, their partners in social media and at Google do.

The wife of a Deputy Director of the DOJ was coordinating this attempted coup, and would be well aware of the NSA’s capabilities. There are many technical reasons why spying on HAM radio would be a nearly impossible task. Just by using the frequencies and methods permitted to a person with a Technician license, there are thousands of available channels. Toss in the various modes like Digital, SSB, USB, AM, FM, CW, etc., and then consider that the higher frequencies are short range and would require hundreds of listening stations in every state, and it becomes a very difficult proposition to monitor HAM radio.

A HAM radio running low power on VHF or UHF would be audible for less than a mile or two, making interception a difficult process, at best. A high quality handheld radio that is capable of both the VHF and UHF bands can be bought for about $20. I bought a few of these to loan out to people in an emergency. You can get a nicer one for $70, and that is the one I use. I still own a nicer, far more expensive Yaesu that cost me almost $400, but I have found that the Baofeng works just as well at a fraction of the cost.

I am currently reading “The Guerrilla’s Guide To The Baofeng Radio” and I think it is a great book, full of both technical and practical tips to using this radio. It’s well worth the $23 it cost me. There are other ways to communicate, and we will talk about them later.

Now, the disclaimer: I don’t advertise, and receive nothing for my reviews or articles. I have no relationship with any products, companies, or vendors that I review here, other than being a customer. If I ever *DO* have a financial interest, I will disclose it. Otherwise, I pay what you would pay. No discounts or other incentives here. I only post these things because I think that my readers would be interested.

By Divemedic, ago

Kangaroo Court

From Gateway Pundit: Judge Juan Merchan Who Oversees Trump’s Case in NYC Court Made Political Contributions to “Stop The Republicans” and “Biden For President” The Judge’s lack of impartiality doesn’t stop there: his daughter’s LinkedIn account reveals his daughter is not just a Democrat but a Democrat who previously worked on Kamala Harris’ Presidential campaign. While she was working with the Kamala Harris campaign, Loren also served as the Vice President of Authentic Campaigns which per its site is a digital agency that raises  “hundreds of millions of dollars for progressive campaigns” through digital persuasion programs.

As I have been saying- Trump is going to go to jail, where he will be either killed or never heard from again.

By Divemedic, ago

A word on comments

I grow so weary of going to websites where the host allows comments to degenerate into name calling and team politics. I also hate when people post spam to the comments, talking about how they make $5,000 a minute from home. I do my best to moderate that, but understand that I can’t let this blog become too much of a time waster for me, because I have a life and it is a busy one. Even writing posts takes anywhere from one to three hours a day, counting research, writing, and editing. This blog gets between 2,000 and 10,000 hits a day. It gets between 20 and 100 comments a day. So keep that in mind when you see how I moderate the comments:

I don’t mind disagreement. I encourage it. It is through disagreement and debate that we grow and modify our stand on controversial subjects. With that being said, there are a few basic things that keep this place running smoothly:

I don’t allow personal attacks. I do this because I want comments to stay on topic and not degenerate into the name calling mess that the comment sections of so many other websites. I will let some minor transgressions slide, but I do my best to keep things from becoming too heated. Attack ideas all you want, but don’t let it get personal.

I don’t allow comments that are advertisements. Note that I don’t advertise products or services here at all. Not even my own. When I do articles about products, I don’t do them because I stand to make money. I am even careful to include disclaimers. At my discretion, I will edit your comment to remove advertisements or simply not allow the comment. How that goes depends on a few things: Are you a long time commenter? If your first comment is an advertisement, it likely goes in the trash heap. In the nearly 16 years of this blog, I have made only three exceptions to this rule that I can remember. In each of them, the post and/or comment was because of injuries or danger to a child, and were directing people to a donation site so people could donate to help the child’s family. In each of those cases, I was contacted by email and asked to post the information.

The only other ask is those few occasions that I ask for donations to cover the costs of running the site.

I close posts for comments after 21 days. No use beating a dead horse.

One other rule- at the end of the day, this is my blog. I pay for everything here from the server space to the software that runs it. Since it’s my property, I can modify the rules here anytime that I want to. There have been commenters who have come here and demanded that I allow them to say what they want under the guise of “free speech.” I’m not preventing you from starting your own blog at your own expense, but people comment here on my dime, and that means I get to set the rules.

Violate the rules, and I may give you a warning, I may edit out offensive words, advertising links, or I may just toss your comment in the trash. I won’t ever change your comment to make it something that you didn’t say. ( I did it once to a supposed self described “hacker” who was trying to be very personal and publish threats against me. I changed his comment to make it seem like he wanted to perform a certain homosexual act on me. Childish, but funny. I deleted it once he saw it.)

If the violations are bad enough, I will ban you, or your entire IP address. I moderate all comments, thanks to the aforementioned hacker who wouldn’t take “go away” for an answer. That particular person was making death threats as well as posting my address.

Anyhow, comments have been relatively calm for several months, except for a few spammers. I just wanted to remind everyone of the rules.

By Divemedic, ago

Canada

Now that guns are illegal in Canada, there goes free speech. It is about to be a crime to say anything that offends a member of the alphabet brigade:

It has been said that the 2A protects the other rights. If we allow RKBA to be taken from us, the rest of our rights will follow.

By Divemedic, ago

Profiteering

This guy complains that Florida’s constitutional carry is dangerous because there is no training requirement for people to carry a weapon. While I agree that people need training, this guy is being a disingenuous prick. Let me tell you why.

This is how he fulfills the “instructor must observe the student firing a weapon” requirement that is under Florida’s current CCW training requirement. Does that look like a class being taught by an instructor that cares about firearms training? Does that look like a high quality class? He gives a 2 hour class, where there is a 20 question quiz at the end that he gives the students the answers to, then makes them fire a single round into a bullet trap.

His class is nothing more than a scam to meet the bare requirements of the law, extract $49 from students, and try to sucker them into taking other courses that aren’t required by the law. Reading that article, I would steer clear of Brandon Gun School. There are other schools out there that deliver a much better class than that, and aren’t of the “I’m a gunowner, but” brand of instructor who is willing to sell out gun owners for a quick buck…

By Divemedic, ago

Actions have consequences

People didn’t get their way under the rules of the legislative body, so they joined protestors on the floor of the chambers and began shouting with bullhorns. This prevented the legislature from being able to carry out its job. We were told that this was an insurrection, and was thus treason. It is a threat to Democracy, they claim.

Only this wasn’t DC, it was Tennessee. The perpetrators were Democrats. The Republicans have grown a spine and are voting to remove the offenders from the Tennessee legislature. Now the Democrats are angry that they are being held to their own standards.

By Divemedic, ago

There’s More to the Story

JKb over at Gunfreezone gets angry at the cops because they went to a girl’s home to retrieve a goat. I would have commented over there, but I just don’t want to pay to make comments, seeing as how I already pay for this website, so here is my answer. He says:

I read shit like this and I wonder how anyone can “back the Blue” anymore.

How about the entire story without all of the tear jerking spin?

Mom bought daughter a goat last April. They named it, fed it, and raised it. Then mom sold the goat at a livestock auction. The auction sold the goat at auction June 25 for $902, of which $63.14 was supposed to go to the state fair and $838.86 to the mother and daughter.

It was at this point that the daughter found out that the goat was to be slaughtered and eaten, a fact which mom was well aware. Daughter promptly threw a fit and demanded that mom rescue the goat. It’s proper to point out that the rules of the state fair say that all sales are final, and that’s that. So when the fair wouldn’t undo the sale, mom stole the goat right out of the auction’s barn. Mom then hid the goat on someone else’s property (an animal rescue organization) so that the fair and the police could not recover the stolen property. The stolen goat was eventually recovered, slaughtered, and barbecued.

Now mom is suing, and JKb has his panties in a bunch because he thinks that police should ignore grand theft, conspiracy to commit theft, and fraud because someone’s snowflake child is upset.

So I guess he is now OK with California decriminalizing theft if someone is really upset? Or are the cops wrong for enforcing the law? Just what should the cops do when someone buys something, the seller then steals the item back, and then hides the stolen property in order to prevent its discovery?

The response should be that the cops arrest mom for grand theft, the animal rescue for conspiracy to traffic in stolen goods, and conspiracy to commit grand theft.

By Divemedic, ago