A Time For Choosing

Friday, June 13th, 2014

In 1962 Ronald Reagan switched to the Republican Party, and two years later he gave his A Time For Choosing speech, which set up his run for governor of California:

(I stumbled across this while perusing a site about civil defense that our Slovenian guest recommended.)

Comments

  1. I clicked through to that site and I have to say that while certain things are overstated, I like the cut of his jib! A two phase civil defense system with distributed locally based groups staffed by citizens, aided where necessary by a centralized rapid-reaction force with special/heavy equipment, seems most reasonable to me.

    Thanks, Slovenian guest.

  2. Sam says:

    I agree with Scipio Americanus. Another extremely good source of information is Nuclear War Survival Skills. A search for the title will reveal different formats.

    Nuclear War Survival Skills is a more practical book. It has a lot of good tips on shelters, water storage, air filtering, etc. It’s also a great tip book for tying rope to tarps and all kinds of practical stuff if you camp.

  3. Sam says:

    My apologies, I forgot a good site, a Google map nuke blast simulator.

    In my case, I found the largest conventional weapon, 300 kilotons, would not even put me close to the 5-psi overpressure range that knocks down conventional stick-frame housing. Even a Megaton would, just barely keep me out of the Thermal radiation radius (3rd-degree burns). So a decent tornado shelter would be all I’d need to escape serious injury. Add an automatic overpressure ventilation closure system as detailed in NWSS and you would be more than good.

    Bomb shelters in Hiroshima survived directly under the blast and carbon coated steel balls have survived within hundreds of feet of nuclear blast.

    The real trick is to have a place to go with water and food that is three feet underground. Wait two to three weeks before leaving. If you have that you have the largest part licked. All those that don’t will probably wander around and die of radiation poisoning.

Leave a Reply