If you haven’t noticed, the price of a barrel of oil has fallen below $58. That’s not all that far from the oil prices we enjoyed from the mid-80s to mid-00s. Sounds great, right? Maybe. Keep in mind that in order for the Russian economy to flourish, oil prices need to be above $100 per barrel (or near that mark).

It’s not surprising, then, to see the Russian economy crashing right now. To me, this is a greater threat than Ebola, Avian flu, or any number of issues we’ve been worrying over for the past several years. When the Russian bear is backed into a corner, he’s far more likely to strike out than cower in fear. The world has just become less stable than it was yesterday. Stay frosty.

Prepping and General Interest

1. Prepping 101 – Organize your Prepping Supplies
2. First Look: Ruger LC9s Pro
3. Recover Grip & Rail System now Available for Beretta 92
4. First Look: Viridian Reactor 5 Green Laser for Glock 26/27
5. A Few Thoughts On The M16A4
6. Water Grenades as Muzzle Protectors
7. Levels Of Survival Priorities
8. Shotgun Versus Handgun for Home Defense or Do You Need Both?
9. Finding Dry Wood in Wet Weather
10. 14 Foods You Should NEVER Buy At The Grocery Store
11. FIREARMS WEEK: Three years, thousands of rounds, and lots of fun – the S&W M&P15-22 Carbine
12. FIREARMS WEEK: Budget Home Defense and Survival Firearm
13. 7 Ways to Lighten Your Bug Out Bag
14. Holiday Fire Safety: Tips for the season and beyond
15. 16 Rules of Survival and Preparedness – Backdoor Survival
16. Coconut Oil: A Prepper’s Panacea
17. How to Make Butter with a Butter Churn
18. When Primitive Skills and Prepping Have Sex
19. 3 Amazing Winter Survival Stories – and What you MUST learn from them
20. How Safe Is Your Home? 10 Ways to Defend Your Apartment
21. EDC Contest Winner
22. Survival Gear Review: PureFire Tactical Survival Fire Starter
23. Understand and Prevent 4 Kinds of Heat Loss
24. Think on your FEET!
25. Mobility and Survival

Freedom Issues

1. Apple, Amazon, dozens more rally behind Microsoft in fight for U.S. search warrant
2. LA mayor announces plan to outfit every police officer with a body camera
3. Former Sydney Deputy Mayor: Lift Gun Ban so Australians Can Defend Themselves

Economic

1. Russians dump rubles for refrigerators as currency tumbles
2. Surprise! Guess which currency has stronger fundamentals— the dollar or… ruble?
3. Russia Prepares For GDP Surge As Consumers Scramble To Spend Their Plunging Rubles
4. Western Banks Cut Off Liquidity To Russian Entities
5. Back To Basic Fundamentals – The Dollar Versus The Ruble
6. The Fed Is Sitting On a $191 TRILLION Time Bomb
7. “Oil May Drop To $25 On Chinese Demand Plunge, Supply Glut, Ageing Boomers”
8. Why oil is crashing and the black swan event of 2014: The price of oil is down by 40 percent in six months and hardly anyone saw this coming.
9. A Full-Blown Economic Crisis Has Erupted In Russia
10. Red Flags in Russia
11. This Is What Gold Does In a Currency Crisis
12. Is Ruble Collapse Act of War-Paul Craig Roberts

Science, Nature and Tech

1. The four Mac security options everyone should know | Macworld

Prepper Expos

1. PrepperShowsUSA | Prepper Shows and Survivalist Expos

If you have find a news story or prepping-related article, send it in.

This is a curated list of news stories and articles having interested to the preparedness community. None of the above should be considered an endorsement or an attempt to push any particular agenda by the Preparedness Podcast. They’re simply presented here as an informative source.