On Monday, July 29, 2024, Nicolás Maduro won a third term as President of Venezuela after securing over 51% of the people’s vote. A miraculous win for socialism!
There is one problem, however. If we were to take the “official” election results at face value, Maduro’s victory means that 109% of the vote was divided between all the candidates.
Something isn’t adding up.
Anyone who knows anything about the Maduro regime and his Venezuelan socialist utopia understands that election fraud has reared its ugly head to help the dictator in what should have been a landslide win for the opposition. Despite exit polls showing a clear landslide victory for opposition candidate Edmundo Gonzalez, garnering upwards of 65% of the vote compared to Maduro’s 31%, it seems the ghost of Hugo Chavez swooped in at the 11th hour and deposited just enough votes for Maduro to come out on top. While socialist leaders and allies congratulated Maduro from their ivory towers, the people of Venezuela were not as content with the fraudulent results.
Venezuelans were quick to take to the streets in order to protest the dictator’s victory. Protests turned into rioting, and people soon saw themselves at the end of rifle barrels and batons. The Maduro regime is currently kidnapping, shooting, and killing its citizens in the streets. At least 16 people have been killed in the chaos already.
So much for a socialist utopia.
All this could have been prevented. If only the people had a means to defend themselves and dissuade politicians from crowning themselves dictators. If only Venezuela had a 2nd Amendment of its own.
In 2012, the communist-dominated Venezuelan National Assembly passed the Control of Arms, Munitions and Disarmament Law, which disarmed the entire populace and eradicated the notion of private firearm ownership. As far as the government was concerned, only the military and certain private contractors could hold guns. If you were a private citizen, you were out of luck.
While Chavez’s dictatorship argued that the law was necessary in order to bring peace to one of South America’s most violent countries, the truth behind passing such a law was to gain control over a defenseless population.
Despite the outright gun ban, Venezuela saw a sharp rise in murder. By 2015, Venezuela had the world’s worst homicide rate: 27,875 Venezuelans were murdered that year. Taking into consideration how over 90% of Venezuelan households live below the poverty line, it doesn’t take much to see how disarming people and leaving them at the mercy of hardened criminals, gangs, and outwardly corrupt government officials could lead to a national uptick in murders.
Since the country’s disarming, Venezuelans have suffered under the dictatorial boot of Nicolás Maduro, who tasks his officials with arresting political opponents rather than giving his people adequate food, water, and shelter. People have resorted to eating zoo animals and strays in dilapidated barrios and the neglected countryside while the elites enrich themselves in Caracas.
What can the people do? They have no means to provide for themselves in socialist Venezuela. Especially not when the State can seize private property on a whim. How can the people protect themselves from robbers, gangs, and thieves? They have no access to firearms and would be jailed for years if found in possession of a banned item.
If history has taught us anything, it is that you can vote your way into socialism, but you cannot vote your way out.
How would this 2024 Presidential election have transpired if the Venezuelan people actually had a voice in their government? What if they actually had the right to defend themselves with firearms, if need be? The regime would have thought twice before partaking in obvious election fraud, and they most certainly wouldn’t be shooting at bare-handed protesters in the street as they are now.
Without a second amendment serving as a reminder of the people’s fundamental rights, nothing could prevent the Venezuelan regime from expanding federal powers, seizing private property without cause, and even arresting, torturing, and executing its own citizens.
As Thomas Jefferson once wrote: “[W]hat country can preserve its liberties if their rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms…”
So when politicians harangue on about “public safety” and the need to ban “assault weapons” for the good of the people, show them Venezuela, and ask them what exactly could the people have done to prevent a power-hungry dictator from upending their democracy, and destroying their lives?
If Venezuela has taught us anything, it is that the people’s right to bear arms will save our republic, not destroy it. Let’s take heed of this warning, and remind those flirting with socialist ideas that you can’t vote your way out of a dictatorship.
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