Every dictator knows that the first thing they must do to maintain their grip on power is ban civilian firearm ownership and then confiscate all the guns.
No one knows this better than Venezuelan dictator and mass-murderer Nicolás Maduro. The corporate media refers to Maduro as a “strongman,” but there’s nothing strong about machinegunning disarmed citizens or imprisoning political opponents without a shred of due process.
In 2012, Maduro issued an executive order that banned his subjects from owning firearms or ammunition and shuttered every private gun shop. Of course, the Venezuelan Army, police and special paramilitary units were exempt from Maduro’s decree and continued to obtain guns and ammo from government sources. There was a short grace period during which Venezuelans were allowed to turn in their guns, but thousands of firearms had to be confiscated by force. Today, Venezuelans face up to 20 years in a state prison for illegal firearm possession.
Maduro justified his national gun grab by claiming it would reduce crime.
Sound familiar?
The move paid off for Maduro. During Sunday’s national elections, when it became clear that he was going to lose to opposition candidate Edmundo González Urrutia, Maduro sent armed government thugs into polling places with orders to stop the voting.
🚨| URGENTE: Militares y policías de la dictadura de Maduro impiden a miles de venezolanos votar en Prado del Sol en Acarigua, estado Portuguesa. Maduro está orquestando un FRAUDE ELECTORAL MASIVO. 🇻🇪 Venezuela no acepta esto y se rebela. #VenezuelaLibre pic.twitter.com/BoULvJztQX
— Eduardo Menoni (@eduardomenoni) July 28, 2024
On Monday, Maduro formally announced that he had won the election, garnering more than 51% of the vote. But Urrutia’s Democratic Unitary Platform party claimed he won with more than 70% of the vote. The United States and several countries in the region “voiced skepticism” about the election results, according to news reports.
Making matters worse for the Venezuelan people, Vice President Kamala Harris issued a statement supporting Maduro’s claims.
“The United States stands with the people of Venezuela who expressed their voice in today’s historic presidential election. The will of the Venezuelan people must be respected. Despite the many challenges, we will continue to work toward a more democratic, prosperous, and secure future for the people of Venezuela,” Harris said in a social media post.
In other words, Harris said we should accept the election results and move on, despite the cheating.
Lessons learned
Recent events have shown that the right to keep and bear arms is not universal, unfortunately, and that those who depend upon the government to protect them do so at their own peril.
Prior to the October 7th terrorist attacks, Israelis had to serve two years in the Israeli Defense Forces before they could apply for a firearm permit. Today, they can apply after serving one year in the IDF or other national service. In addition, those who work or live in a “qualified dangerous area” can also apply for a firearm permit. Israeli civilians who have no firearms training can also apply. As a result, more than 300,000 Israelis have applied for firearm permits since the Hamas massacres.
“When the war started, we knew that we were right when we said that every person that has a weapon can save a life,” Itamar Ben Gvir, Israel’s National Security Minister, told the Times of Israel. “We need to enable as many people as possible to carry a weapon.”
Israel was not the only country to regret restricting civilian access to firearms.
As Russian motorized rifle brigades streamed across the Ukrainian border, the world watched in horror as Ukrainian soldiers uncrated cases of AKs as quickly as possible and passed them out to mostly untrained recruits. Ukraine tried to mitigate the damage by opening government-owned ranges to the public, but for many it was too little, too late.
Many of their frontline forces had minimal firearm training, which led to thousands of needless battlefield deaths.
Takeaways
Venezuela should be one of the wealthiest countries in the world. It is literally floating on a sea of oil. However, decades of government corruption have forced most of the population into poverty – corruption that was enabled by disarming the people.
Everyone except our Vice President seems to recognize that Maduro cheated – by force of arms – and will now serve another six-year term, his third. There is little the Venezuelan people can do to contest Monday’s election results. They have nothing to fight back with. All of their guns were confiscated and destroyed.
Venezuela is the latest example of the need to protect and defend our Second Amendment rights. Rather than focusing solely on how they intend to disarm us, we should focus on why our politicians – including Harris – want a disarmed populace. It is certainly a question worthy of a response. Venezuela is the latest example of what happens to a disarmed populace.
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This story is part of the Second Amendment Foundation’s Investigative Journalism Project and is published here with their permission.
Knew quite a few guys from Argentina and they would always say as bad as Kirchner’s goons were at least they didn’t have to live with Chavez. It would seem Maduro is not any different and the commies will limp on another decade.
No. The real lesson is to stop flirting with leftists. Stop believing anything they say. In the US, this refers to Democrats. “But the Repugnants suk too.” Okay. What are you doing to remedy that? Not voting? Voting third party? Not being involved in primaries? Not remaking the party? Are you trying to change hearts and minds?
The idea that ideologies can’t be eradicated is mostly false. Look what happened to Nazism. That’s what we have to do with communism. It has to be pushed out of the mainstream. When I went to grade school, we were taught that it would never work. All children should be taught this.
No, we don’t need to teach children how to think. We have to teach them what to think. That’s antithetical to what most Republicans believe. And that’s why we have failed. We have to instill the proper values in children, or that teacher with blue hair will do it for us. Eradicate communist ideology.
Dude,
I commend your sentiments.
I am incredibly pessimistic that good and decent people can persuade people in error to abandon their errors. The first GINORMOUS hurdle for people in error: simply admitting that they are in error. As simple as it may sound for someone to recognize and admit that he/she is in error, it is extraordinarily hard for most people to do. The second GIANT hurdle for people to admit error: they simply like the lifestyle that accompanies their error and do not want to give up their lifestyle.
That last point deserves an example. The average lifespan of male urban thugs is something like 21 years-old. And that is no secret–young urban thugs are well aware of that fact. Young urban thugs are also aware that they would probably live to a ripe old age if they abandoned the urban thug lifestyle and actually started a lifelong dedication to productive hard work. Alas almost all young urban thugs stick with the thug lifestyle–opting for the “benefits” of their lifestyle which is almost certain to end their lives at a very early age. So it is with people who embrace many of the ideologies and lifestyles of the Democrat Party platform.
I appreciate and encourage everyone to do their level best to persuade the masses with simple and constructive truths. I also encourage everyone to recognize that the masses will probably not embrace truth and therefore have a “Plan B” if (when) persuasion fails.
There might be a few more reasons for young people choosing that dangerous lifestyle. Democrats and their propagandists have drilled it into their heads that they can never make it in a “normal” life because they will be oppressed and held back. Dems do this for the obvious reasons of a) getting people to support them to “fight the oppression” on their behalf, and b) to hold people down so they will always need Democrats to “fight on their behalf.” It’s a scam. If you don’t want your child to be successful, then all you have to do is constantly tell them that they can never be that without you holding their hand.
Another reason is that these young people grow up seeing people around them getting killed or going to jail. They end up with a “get it while you can” mentality because they assume they won’t be around long anyway. It becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. It’s a problem that dems don’t want to solve because solving it would turn more people into productive, normal families, with normal/family values, likely to oppose their insane policies.
Agree on all points.
“No, we don’t need to teach children how to think. We have to teach them what to think. ”
This is exactly what the left has been doing and continues to do.
Correct, Hush. They’re teaching them what to think because we failed to do so. Which values do you want them to have?
Values and what is good/right fall under teaching a person what to think. Understanding why and how it matters comes later with learning how to think. The mistake in modern education is the assumption that everyone can get past the first part. And it absolutely pains me to say this.
The article mentioned about the reform of gun laws in Israel.
Before October 7, you could have one pistol 50 rounds of ammunition.
The reform has been to allow citizens to still have one pistol and now 100 rounds of ammo.
Still not very effective against terrorists armed with AK-47s and body armor
Maybe not, but with twice the ammo you just might be able to keep them at bay long enough for help/reinforcements to arrive
As long as morons continue to believe “this time it’ll be different” things will always stay the same.
South America has had plenty of examples to inform them of how this would turn out and they went with it anyway.
At least in the US, gun control is not now, and has never been, about crime, criminals, or public safety. Frankly, the Left doesn’t give a rat’s behind about crime, criminals, or public safety. Gun control is about disarming the general population so they cannot represent a threat to the government once the Left creates the dictatorship they have been working toward since the end of WWII.