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When I was young, I set aside a Beretta .380 with a tip-up barrel for when I got too old to run the slide on a semiautomatic pistol. Ain’t there yet, thank God, but it got me thinking. There’s sarcopenia, the loss of muscle mass that accompanies old age. There’s sciatica, that can be a problem when […]
The Florida legislature has passed a bill including tax holidays for firearms accessories, and hunting, fishing and camping supplies. Firearms silencers/suppressors are included as firearms accessories. If Governor DeSantis signs the bill, it will go into effect on July 1, 2026. The tax holidays for firearms accessories are for the entire year.
The Florida Legislature passed HB 7031E, as amended by the Conference Committee Report, YEAS 29 to NAYS 6, on May 29, 2026. The bill passed the House a couple of hours earlier 88 YEAS to 11 NAYS. The bill is a major taxation bill for Florida. The bill includes Section 46 (Exemption for firearm accessories) and Section 47 (Hunting, fishing, and camping sales tax holiday). Section 46 starts on page 62 of the 66 page bill.
The firearm accessories are for pistols, rifles and shotguns which fire projectiles using an explosive charge. According to the NRA, whether suppressors/silencers would be included in the bill was uncertain until the vote on May 29. An amendment had included them in the bill, but those tax holidays could have been stripped from the bill before the final vote. They were not. If Governor DeThe items will be exempt from taxes in Chapter 212 of Florida statues, which are primarily sales taxes.
The tax holiday for firearms accessories are scheduled to start on 1 July, 2026 and to continue through an entire year to June 30, 2027. The accessories include:
- Firearm Barrels.
- Firearm cases or range bags.
- Firearm charging handles.
- Firearm grips.
- Firearm handguards.
- Firearm holsters.
- Internal firearm parts and components.
- Firearm magazines or other ammunition feeding devices or carriers.
- Firearm muzzle devices.
- Firearm shooting mats, rests, or bipods.
- Firearm shooting chronographs.
- Firearm sights or optics.
- Firearm slides or cylinders.
- Firearm slings.
- Firearm stocks or braces.
- Firearm cleaning kits.
- Firearm suppressors or silencers.
- Firearm triggers.
Alert readers may find some parts of firearms which are not covered.
The Hunting, fishing and camping sales tax holiday is not so generous. It only lasts from September 1 through December 31 of 2026. This tax holiday covers complete firearms as well as ammunition for firearms, bows, crossbows, arrows, bolts, quarrels, quivers, releases, sights or optics, and wristguards.
Fishing and camping supplies are included in the tax holiday, but limited in the price of the items covered. The price listed is the maximum cost of the item to qualify for the tax holiday:
- Rods and reels: individually, $75, as a set $150.
- Tackle boxes or bags: $30.
- Bait or fishing tackle: individually, $5 or $10 if sold as a group.
- Camping supplies: $200 for a tent
- Sleeping bags, portable hammocks, camping stoves and collapsable camping chairs: $50 or less.
- Camping lanterns and flashlights: $30.
Sales tax in Florida is generally 6%, with up to 2% added by cities or counties. The tax holidays apply to the entire sales tax, not just the state portion of the sales tax.
The Florida tax bill has to be sent to Governor DeSantis for signature. Major tax bills are seldom vetoed.
©2026 by Dean Weingarten: Permission to share is granted when this notice and link are included.
Gun Watch
On June 9, 1628: The first deportation from what is now the United States: Thomas Morton was deported from Massachusetts. For the local Puritans, Morton’s behavior was just too much. He was a drunken womanizer who constructed a May Pole, organized orgies, and sold guns to Indians. — And on June 9, 1772: The first naval attack of Revolutionary War took place in Providence, Rhode Island. — A reminder: SurvivalBlog is now a weekly web blog, delivered Fresh Every Tuesday. — Today’s feature article is the conclusion of a guest piece by long-time SurvivalBlog reader “Tunnel Rabbit”, who makes his …
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(Continued from Part 1. This concludes the article.) Considerations for Projectile Selection There are many different bullets and powders to choose from. Given the very long throats of their chambers, we are mostly limited to heavier and flat based bullets. Choosing the best projectiles for the antique Mausers will help us get the best all around results, quickly. For the purposes of hunting, I would like it to shoot no larger groups than 2 MOA with iron sights and that would limit my shoots to 250 yards if I had 20-20 or better vision and had the rifle on …
The post Modern Handloads for Antique 7mm Mauser Rifles – Part 2, by Tunnel Rabbit appeared first on SurvivalBlog.com.
The 4 Patriots 72-Hour Survival Food Kit is misnamed. In terms of caloric requirements and nutritional value, it does not quite qualify as a 48-hour food kit. In terms of packaging, it would be best suited as a 24-hour food kit. The food is packaged conveniently for things like camping trips. But it is important to realize that the number of servings listed on each package is hopelessly optimistic. Double each serving size, and it will be just about right. Also make sure to take other foods to supplement the packaged courses. At the time of this writing, the kit …
The post 4Patriots 72-Hour Survival Food Kit, by Thomas Christianson appeared first on SurvivalBlog.com.
Today’s graphic is a map that shows the status of social media age verification legislation around the United States. (Graphic courtesy of Reddit.) The thumbnail image below is click-expandable. — Please send your graphic ideas to JWR. (Either via e-mail or via our Contact form.) Any graphics that you send must either be your own creation or uncopyrighted.
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In Economics & Investing Media of the Week we feature photos, charts, graphs, maps, video links, and news items of interest to preppers. Economics & Investing Links of Interest At The Telegraph: Gold overtakes US bonds as world’s favourite investment. A Ron Paul interview: The Economic Implications of the Iran War — Phillip Patrick. Reported on June 6th: Over $1Trillion wiped out as chip selloff impacts Nvidia, Broadcom, Micron. Warren Buffett’s Successor, Greg Abel, Overhauled Berkshire Hathaway’s Portfolio and Has 61% of Its Assets Invested in Just 5 Stocks. At Zero Hedge: UK Conservatives Blast Labour North Sea Ban As ‘Utter …
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SurvivalBlog presents another edition of The Survivalist’s Odds ‘n Sods. This column is a collection of news bits and pieces that are relevant to the modern survivalist and prepper from JWR. Our goal is to educate our readers, to help them to recognize emerging threats, and to be better prepared for both disasters and negative societal trends. You can’t mitigate a risk if you haven’t first identified a risk. In today’s column, more out-of-control AIs.. Anthropic Seeks Pause of AI Development First up, over at Yahoo News: Anthropic calls for pause of global AI development, The article begins: “Artificial intelligence …
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Our weekly Snippets column is a collection of short items: responses to posted articles, practical self-sufficiency items, how-tos, lessons learned, tips and tricks, and news items — both from readers and from SurvivalBlog’s editors. Note that we may select some long e-mails for posting as separate letters. — Several readers mentioned a recent interview of actor Josh Duhamel by Shawn Ryan. At just after the 30-minute mark, Duhamel credits reading my novel Patriots for putting him on the preparedness path. o o o Peter Thiel’s Plan B, Plan C, and Plan D: Why Peter Thiel Is Decamping to the End …
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This weekly column features media from around the American Redoubt region. (Idaho, Montana, eastern Oregon, eastern Washington, and Wyoming.) Much of the region is also more commonly known as The Inland Northwest. Redoubt News Links: Avista agrees to framework to provide single business with power equal to half of all Spokane County customers. JWR’s Comments: Huge industrial electrical power customers (read: data centers) tend to be given “sweetheart deals”, where the customer is offered rates below 6 cents per kilowatt hour. So, in effect, the residential customers end up subsidizing the cost of the local grid expansion. It is also …
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To be prepared for a crisis, every Prepper must establish goals and make both long-term and short-term plans. In this column, the SurvivalBlog editors review their week’s prep activities and planned prep activities for the coming week. These range from healthcare and gear purchases to gardening, ranch improvements, bug-out bag fine-tuning, and food storage. This is something akin to our Retreat Owner Profiles, but written incrementally and in detail, throughout the year. We always welcome you to share your own successes and wisdom in your e-mailed letters. We post many of those — or excerpts thereof — in the Odds …
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The latest meme created by JWR: Meme Text: It Used To Be Shunned As One Of The Seven Deadly Sins But Now, If We Fail To Endorse “Pride” We Are Shunned as “Homophobic” Notes From JWR: Do you have a meme idea? Just e-mail me the concept, and I’ll try to assemble it. And if it is posted then I’ll give you credit. Thanks! Permission to repost memes that I’ve created is granted, provided that credit to SurvivalBlog.com is included.
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“Man’s cleverness is almost indefinite, and stretches like an elastic band, but human nature is like an iron ring. You can go round and round it, you can polish it highly, you can even flatten it a little on one side, whereby you will make it bulge out the other, but you will never, while the world endures and man is man, increase its total circumference.” – H. Rider Haggard (Sir Henry Rider Haggard) 1856-1925
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I had to go to the Courthouse this morning to take care of a little family business. A quick stop at the Clerk's office thin across the hall to the Assessor. First, I had to go through the security kiosk in the lobby. Knowing the drill, I left everything I did not need in the car before I got to the steps of the Courthouse. That metal scanner is set so tight that I am surprised it did not detect the filling in my teeth
This is all theater. They started this bullshit after 9/11 to make the unaware unconcerned. Anyone with a smattering of operational knowledge knows that a routine security protocol is easy to bypass. Anyone with nefarious intent would find it easy to defeat. Even a feeble septuagenarian such as I could cause mayhem.
Still, the security detail provides employment for a half-dozen people. I suppose that is a god thing, even if the mission is kabuki.
By Dave Workman Sometime between now and the end of June, the U.S. Supreme Court is expected to hand down rulings on a pair of Second Amendment cases which could have considerable impact on the rights of law-abiding gun owners, and those who use controlled substances. The cases are known as Wolford v. Lopez—which challenges […]
The post SCOTUS 2A Decisions on Horizon; More Cases Waiting in Wings appeared first on Liberty Park Press.
The biggest mistake of modern military rifle procurement (so far...) is without question, the SA80. Can it be fixed?The post Romanian vz24 Sniper Rifles from World War Two first appeared on Forgotten Weapons.
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| It’s hard not to smile in Venice |
The May, 2026 National Instant background Check System (NICS) numbers are in. The National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF) adjusted background check numbers show expanding firearm sales as the number of total background checks done through NICS continues to drop. In May, the drop was almost 11 percent from May of 2025. From NSSF:
The May 2026 NSSF-adjusted National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) figure of 1,105,758 is an increase of 3.2 percent compared to the May 2025 NSSF-adjusted NICS figure of 1,071,685. For comparison, the unadjusted May 2026 FBI NICS figure of 1,780,230 reflects a 10.9 percent decrease from the unadjusted FBI NICS figure of 1,998,440 in May 2025.
The 2026 adjusted background check numbers are designed to be highly correlated to actual sales numbers. They are not the same because the NICS checks are used for multiple purposes. The adjusted numbers take out the checks done specifically for firearms permits and permit renewals. They do not adjust for multiple firearms sold with one NICS check, or for firearms sold without a separate NICS check such as those in states where possession of a permit is allowed to be substituted for a NICS check. Most private sales do not involve a NICS check.
The NSSF Report over the last 12 months shows consistent increases in the adjusted NICS checks in 2026 since January. This is four months of increases in the adjusted NICS checks over the same four months in 2025. The NSSF has started to track NICS checks done for Form 1 and Form 4 applications to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) by month. There are very large increasin in these numbers since the $200 tax has been remove by the Trump administration. In April, the numbers were up 130%. In May of 2026, the numbers were up over 100%. From the NSSF:
• The May 2026 NFA figure of 146,551 is an increase of 100.4 percent compared to the May 2025 figure of 73,138.
The increase in numbers shows how much the exercise of Second Amendment rights has been infringed in previous years. Although the tax has been removed, there are still numerous infringements. People who wish to comply with the National Firearms Act (NFA) are required to submit fingerprints, photographs, and to wait for approval by the ATF before making or purchasing a piece of safety equipment such as a suppressor / silencer / gun muffler. They are required to go through the same procedure for short barreled rifles or short barreled shotguns. Several lawsuits are in progress challenging the constitutional validity of the continued bureaucratic infringements. Some states are moving to protect silencer/ suppressor owners.
Analysis: Firearms sales thrive during times of uncertainty. The constant attacks on President Trump in the old media probably aid in keeping firearm sales high. The conflicts being waged overseas in Ukraine and the Persian Gulf are likely contributors. Removing the $200 tax on NFA has helped. If current lawsuits challenging the constitutionality of the continued infringements in the NFA succeed, there will be a boom in the sales of suppressors / silencers / gun mufflers and in the sale of short barreled shotguns and short barreled rifles. The Second Amendment is a very popular part of the Bill of Rights. The economy is doing pretty well. If peace is reached in the Middle East, prosperity is likely.
©2026 by Dean Weingarten: Permission to share is granted when this notice and link are included.
Gun Watch
Birmingham Fire and Rescue took the victims to the hospital where one was pronounced dead. Police say the second victim was taken to UAB Hospital with life-threatening injuries.
Officials say the incident began when the two men were involved in an altercation between the doorway of a hotel and a parking lot before gunfire erupted.
Police say the victim with life-threatening injuries is also one of the suspects, and that the two men shot at each other. There is no threat to the public, police say.
6/7/26 Fortune article title:
‘The golden years are not golden’: Boomers are hoarding most of America’s wealth and power because they’re terrified of outliving their money
The arrogance of that title really steams me even the article quotes a number of Boomers refuting that title in part.
1. "Hoarding": like we are never going to spend it. For the most part, Boomers are not overwhelmingly rich. There are homeless Boomers and many barely making their rent or mortgage payments. I am not one of them, but I know such.
2. Power: does he mean we elected Trump? Or that we reliably show up to vote? Zoomers can fix this easily enough.
3 Where is our "hoarded wealth" going after we die? We are not taking it with us. We are going to leave it to our GenX children who Zoomers will again claim are hoarding. Much of my wealth is already spent on meals out and services overwhelmingly provided by younger people.
4. Houses? Yes we bought houses for $106,000 in the 1980s on wages commensurate with those prices ($45,000 was my salary at the time). We paid interest rates that seem horrifying today. I refinanced a mortgage at 10.5% in 1989. We had a 18.5% car loan. (We had pretty good credit at the time.) Life was not easy back then.
5. We had limited capabilities because of technology. A few years ago, my son asked, "Hiw did you buy houses before the Internet." Slowly and carefully .
BZoomers need to stop whining or Boomers might buy billion dollar yachts and sink them at sea to deny that wealth to the Zoomers.
Canis Ex Machina
It had been 40,000 years since the Great Collapse when our expedition reached HD56689 B. We knew that before the GC our ancestors had seeded B with our distant cousins. Would they still be recognizably human in culture. Other planets we had explored were still physically human with slight variations in size and color (two-meter adults on Rigel F with coal-black skin, one meter adults with interesting and sometimes beautiful primary color skin spotting on HD44449 C). These were startling, but we grew to see them as just interesting variants on the basic human pattern.
What we found too disheartening was civilizational drift. Some had gone cannibal; the sociologists recorded what they found. After losing a few sociologists to the pot, we decided this was a civilization best studied from drones and moved on. Others completely lost technological knowledge; they had reverted to hunter-gatherer societies with no apparent forward progress in 40,000 years to the state from which they had regressed.
HD56689 B was unique. We could see evidence of an advanced civilization: large cities; some strangely narrow, unpaved roads; what seemed to be something like very large bird roosts made of concrete. The population was clearly shrinking. We contacted the small remaining leadership. After a bit of struggle getting the AI Translators working with what seemed (t us) a very primitive language, we pieced together what happened.
Their ancestors separated from the mainstream of human technology by the GC had started insanely breeding the Earth-origin mammals to do the important jobs of machines. The swifferhound had a large fine haired tail. It was very small, about 500 grams. It would climb shelves and use its tail for dusting.
They bred the vacuum shepherd to inhale dirt and dust into outsized lungs, then exhale the contents outside. They had fairly short lifespans because of high lung cancer rates.
They bred a transport elephant with a very broad flat back on which enormous loads could be strapped to the mid-abdominal tusks. (Our biologists suspected some now lost to them gene editing played a part in that one.)
They bred bats to 40 meters long with commensurate wingspans that carried humans on transcontinental journeys from batplane roost to batplane roost. They consumed vast quantities of insects and birds on the way. This limited them to travel on the only settled continent and outlying islands.
Tractordogs operated the only agricultural machinery they had still produced. Combines were operated by their canine pilots through the fields.
It was both unsettling and impressive to see our mighty species operating almost without technology. So why was the civilization dying. Some centuries before, at what they now called Peak Animal Helper, an interspecies virus spread rapidly through all the mammals killing most of them in one generation. While survivors carried a gene for immunity, the generations of careful breeding made the survivors weak and less effective at their functions. As an example, chauffeur dogs sometimes intentionally crashed ground vehicles so that they could devour the occupants.
We tried to explain the concept of machines as less vulnerable helpers and dogs as companions, but I fear the concepts would not stick and future explorers would find empty cities here.
This whole concept was dreamed up by my wife as ww were returning from a star party in Payette. There has to be a better title for this. Maske suggestions!
On May 31, 2026, before 11 a.m. a woman who had obtained a domestic violence injunction, escaped kidnapping in a church parking lot. Two armed Samaritans intervened and prevented an armed man from dragging the woman away. In a news conferenced Police Chief Leo Niemczyk identified the suspect as Jose Tsu Zamora, 64, who had been in a long term prior relationship with the victim.
Zamora is a convicted felon who is reported to have said to the victim, words to the effect: If I can't have you, nobody can. The suspect is reported as knowing the victim attended the church in Port St. Lucie, and intercepted the victim as she exited a vehicle. From cbs12.com:
Two male bystanders, who told police they were armed, intervened and confronted Zamora. Chief Leo Niemczyk with PSLPD credited the two bystanders for saving the woman's life.
Several people are reported as seeing the attempted kidnapping. One man is seen confronting the suspect, seconds later, another runs into the scene. The video appears to show what may be a holster on the second armed Samaritan.
Before 1987, it would have been unlikely two people in a church parking lot in Florida would have been armed and able to respond to a kidnapping by an armed man. The suspect was reported to have held a handgun against the victim's side as the kidnapping was attempted.
In 1987, Florida passed a shall issue concealed carry permit bill, which is credited with being the start of the shall issue revolution in the United States. Another change since 1987 is the increase in church security teams. News coverage has not mentioned if the armed Samaritans were part of a church security team.
As of 2025, over 20 million concealed carry permits were active in the United States. In 29 states no permit is needed for people to carry loaded handguns, either openly or concealed, in most public spaces.
John Lott and others have published peer reviewed papers which show an increase in concealed carry permits is correlated with a drop in violent crime. Other academics dispute this finding. Papers sometime claim to show a limited increase in very specific types of crime in particular states. Most of the literature shows either a decrease in violent crime or no measurable change.
©2026 by Dean Weingarten: Permission to share is granted when this notice and link are included.
Gun Watch
Details:
On Friday, June 5, 2026, at 10:23 p.m., deputies from the San Jacinto Sheriff’s Station were dispatched to the 1300 block of Heron Way in San Jacinto, regarding an assault with a deadly weapon. Upon arrival, deputies located evidence of a shooting and a subject with injuries consistent with a gunshot wound. The subject was pronounced deceased at the scene. The Riverside Sheriff’s Central Homicide Unit responded to the scene and assumed the investigation.
During the investigation, deputies learned the homeowner was visiting a neighboring residence when he heard screaming and the sound of gunfire from his residence. The homeowner ran to his residence and saw an unknown male intruder inside his home, armed with a shotgun. The homeowner armed himself and confronted the suspect inside the residence. During the confrontation, the suspect fired multiple rounds at the homeowner. The homeowner returned fire, striking the suspect. There were no additional injuries reported.
The homeowner was transported to the San Jacinto Sheriff’s Station for further investigation. The suspect’s identity is being withheld pending notification to the next of kin. No arrests have been made at this time. The case will ultimately be submitted to the Riverside County District Attorney’s Office for review. This is an ongoing investigation, and no further details will be released.
A heated conversation between the victim and Miller escalated.
Miller and an unidentified black male co-defendant fired at the victim, and the victim returned fire, according to MCSO.
The shooting left the victim injured and caused damage to his home.
The sheriff’s office said that the homeowner reportedly overheard the suspects stating, “we need to take care of him as well”, but they had discharged all their ammunition before fleeing the location.
The New York State legislature recently tackled the vital, pressing issue of whether the terms “mother” and “father” are cruel and oppressive. They concluded that these terms are indeed transphobic and need to be replaced in law by “gestating parent” and “non-gestating parent.” “Paternity” is also bigoted and axed. Among the Democrats, the vote was, natch, a few shy of unanimous. And let’s not kid ourselves: Hochul’s signature is inevitable. On all questions gay and trans, the Dems are now entirely controlled by trans and “queer” extremists....I suspect the queers are so insulated they don’t even realize that this is what they have been effectively saying to Joe Public for a decade now. Remember when they told you that gay and lesbian people were just like everyone else, and just wanted to be left alone? Scrap that. We’re actually queers who believe marriage is a “fundamentally violent institution” and that the sex binary is a white supremacist fiction. Now we’ve gotten marriage, we will indoctrinate your kids in queer and gender theory, fire you if you don’t repeat our pronouns, force girls to shower next to boys in locker rooms, give irreversible sex changes to minors, and insist that “a penis is not a male body part. It’s just an unusual body part for a woman.”
Yes. When LGBs pleaded for rhe right to be left alone, there was little argument. Active and aggressive prosecution of LGB activities in private was out of fashion. Police had more important problems to pursue. When "the love whose name we dare not speak" refused to shut up, it was hard to ignore.
The genital mutilation of children made a lot of people upset. That LGBs who wanted to be left alone were now automatically assumed to be tied to the T and Q did not help. LGB sex seems positively tame compared to cutting off genitals and breasts.