Bloomberg.
Conflict is on America’s streets in 2020, and “tactical apparel” has become a lifestyle industry serving militarized law-enforcement agents and the freelance gunmen who emulate them. Less than two weeks before Election Day, orders are rolling in. Since last year, online purchases have driven a 20-fold jump in sales of goods like the $220 CM-6M gas mask — resistant to bean-bag rounds — for Mira Safety of Austin, Texas. “It doesn’t matter who gets elected,” founder Roman Zrazhevskiy said of his new customers. “They think that no matter who wins, Biden or Trump, there are going to be people who are upset about the result.”
Not long ago — perhaps a generation — dressing like you’re going to war was for the veteran who never quite made it back from Vietnam or the angry young men who obsessed over gas masks and combat boots at the military surplus store. (Every American town seemed to have one, and only one.) A shift became apparent with this spring’s Black Lives Matter protests and bitterly resented pandemic lockdowns. Now the gear is everywhere, from camouflage-clad antifa supporters to right-wing extremists who appeared at Michigan’s capitol even after men were arrested in a plot to kidnap Governor Gretchen Whitmer.
In some suburban and rural settings, it’s become everyday wear. A retail chain called 5.11 Tactical, which traces its roots to a friend of President Donald Trump’s adult sons, is even trying to turn the survivalist look into a fashionable national brand. It’s racking up annual sales of almost $400 million with stores in places including Tulsa, Oklahoma, and the U.S. Army’s Fort Bliss in El Paso, Texas. Across the country, gun and ammunition sales have surged as well.
And this is news? I don’t think these writers have ever even visited the South.
5.11 makes good gear. And America knows something important about the state of affairs of its people and government.
The bureaucratic state wants to destroy the middle class, and Antifa/BLM and many millions more want you in camps.
But the picture at Bloomberg has a guy wearing NODS equipment. Not many people can afford good NODS. Most people are going to be cash-limited to firearms and ammunition, and the next step is going to be med kits, tactical gear (like holsters, battle belts, etc.), and then the next step will be tactical vests and body armor.
And most people can only afford the first steps, which is why we see the rush on firearms and ammunition.