Disarming the people of Venezuela

[Kilroy]

Venezuela is quickly becoming the Iran of South America. Hugo Chavez is doing everything out of the Dictators for Dummies(tm) book. He started with changing the constitution to allow him to remain in office forever. Next comes massive social programs, allowing him to buy the votes of the poor and middle class. Nationalization of companies comes next. This is basically the government stealing a company from a private investor. Chavez has attacked those in the press that oppose him, even closing opposition TV stations. (Radio Caracas Televisión) In a move reminiscent of Iran, Venezuela has spent billions buying weapons from Russia, including advanced air defense systems. Chavez has nationalized the cement industry, oil (re-nationalized by Chavez), and most recently, gold production. The government taking control of so much of the economy has resulted in the population being dependent on the government for their income. Nearly half of Venezuelans (45%) are employed by the government. See any parallels to some people's vision for the US?

Sorry for the long intro, but now that you have some background information, here's the interesting part.

One of the important steps when becoming a dictator is to disarm the people. I found this article in Spanish about how the government is disarming people. I'll translate it for the non-Spanish speakers this afternoon, you guys will probably find it fascinating. Here's another article about the disarmament legislation from 2006, when this started. Another article here.

I think I need to buy some 80% lowers...

 

[WeaponsCollector]

"Tyrants mistrust the people, hence they deprive them of arms."
- Aristotle (384-322 BC)

 

[K31]

He's commie. Big surprise? Friends with Castro and admired by Sean Penn, you do the math.

 

[BlueHeeler]

While you raise very valid points to use Venezuela as a cautionary tale, the opposition does not have the foresight to explore/review the consequence of their idea of ‘progress’. Maybe we can ‘progress’ all the way to collapse just like the Soviet Union.

IME the Americans that advocate bigger government, more government dependency, etc. are poorly educated in history and do not care about world politics. They ONLY want more stuff and for someone else to pay for it.

 

[boricuamaximus]

Chavez is using "The Bolivian Republic" ruse. Basically, Simon Bolivar had a dream for South America. AKA: United States of South America. A constitutional republic with rules outlined for the Federal Government, everything else would fall onto the states.

Simon Bolivar also sent his kids to Thomas Jefferson's university (University of Va).

He has been ruling by Fiat for the past 4 years. As soon as his party lost an overwhelming majority in their last attempt they gave him power to rule in such a manner.
The disarmament thing is pretty old as well. Most of their weapons were bought/sold/traded illegally anyway.

 

[Echo Victor]

Maybe we will get lucky and he will die from his cancer. If not, I can see him becoming a serious problem in the next 3-6 years.

 

[MDFF2008]

While you raise very valid points to use Venezuela as a cautionary tale, the opposition does not have the foresight to explore/review the consequence of their idea of ‘progress’. Maybe we can ‘progress’ all the way to collapse just like the Soviet Union.

IME the Americans that advocate bigger government, more government dependency, etc. are poorly educated in history and do not care about world politics. They ONLY want more stuff and for someone else to pay for it.

I agree with you; but I also think there are some who are very well versed in history, and believe that their attempt at socialism/communism will be the one that works. Despite the 100% failure rate; there's will be the one success.

 

[JOBU]

Ok, let me set the record straight 'cause my cute-as-hell wife is from that toilet of a country.

#1. Small guns are legal. Anything bigger, just go to the police or army and they will sell you what you want from weps they steal from their own arsenal. $$ speaks. Even if Obama/Holder/ATF set up some operation down there, the local police & military will undersell them.

#2. Yep, if you shoot someone, even in blatant self-defense, you're getting charged. But that also happens in boney ol' England and in most of Europe.

#3. Crime? Caracas makes East Baltimore look like paradise.

My wife was held-up twice at gunpoint and other times was robbed by moped drive-byes. She learned how to shoot when she was little 'cause her father taught her. Has loved guns ever since and keeps a loaded .380 with an extra mag next to her night stand.

p.s. Wife wants to move to VA 'cause she can carry there. Gotta love that woman of mine!

 

[Kilroy]

Translation part one

The Challenge of disarming a country like Venezuela
By Juan Paullier
BBC World, Caracas

The Presidential Commission for Arms Control, Munitions and Disarmament has been working since May towards this goal.
For one thing, nobody knows how many firearms are in Venezuela, some estimates put it between 10 and 14 million, in a country of 28 million people.
The amount of guns seized so far this year (120,000) gives an idea of how many don't reach the authorities.
And the vast majority circulate illegally.
The black market, according to Pablo Fernandez,technical secretary of the commission, is fed by legal guns that are stolen and become part of the black market. It is also fed by corruption, when state security organizations misuse weapons intended to protect the population.
"There is the idea among the people that a firearm gives security." That is one of the ideas (insists Fernandez.)
He is also coordinator for the non-government organization (NGO) Network of Help for Justice and Peace, and explained that a large sector of Venezuelan society, mostly the middle class, views being armed as normal or necessary.
In impoverished areas, there are young people who view the possession of a firearm like "a part of their identity, a perverse affirmation of their masculinity."
The work of disarming takes time and education, according to specialists in the field.
The disarming has to come from the mind of the people, from how society resolves conflicts. "I don't think the solution is take a truck into a neighborhood and wait for the people to put their guns in it", Fernandez said to BBC Mundo.

The Commission works on several fronts.
The first is determining the amount of firearms and ammunition, because, according to Fernandez, there are no reliable figures, there are speculations (...) there has not been any reliable scientific investigation on this topic.
For Rocio San Miguel, president of Citizen Control, a NGO that tracks the security sector in Venezuela "difficulty without that information of putting in place a credible disarmament policy."
The technical secretary thinks that the easy access to firearms is an element to correct.
But this is not what worries the more than 20 members of the commission, made up of government authorities, public officials, academics, and non-government organizations.
The heart of the matter is arms control, especially the ammunition.

The Compañía Anónima Venezolana de Industrias Militares (Cavim) [Venezuela's state weapons company] is at the middle of this controversy.
"Of the confiscated guns, almost 80% had ammunition from Cavim. Those bullets made in this country, sold by a state-run military company: Where did they deviate? Where were they lost? This is the big question. There can be a response to this question by regularly marking the ammunition" said Fernandez.
San Miguel believes their should be a transparent system of production and importation of weapons and ammunition (...) the problem of disarming is control of the legal weapons and ammunition of the State."
Citizen Control charges that Cavim is "unauditable", the figures of production are unknown. "Therefore, it is difficult to implement a policy of disarmament."
The commission seeks to emphasize the theme of marking ammunition to determine, for example, if ammunition intended for police in one region of the country are involved in a crime in another part of the country.
In this aspect and others, members of the commission are looking for foreign advice.
They have already received advice from international experts and agencies such as the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) and the Organization of American States (OAS).
They will travel to Brazil to learn from experience on the disarmament policies implemented in Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paulo.
They will also look at the things that have had positive results in other countries like El Salvador, Ecuador, and Colombia.



I'll finish the rest of this tomorrow. Translating gives me a headache.

 

[Kilroy]

Ok, let me set the record straight 'cause my cute-as-hell wife is from that toilet of a country.

#1. Small guns are legal. Anything bigger, just go to the police or army and they will sell you what you want from weps they steal from their own arsenal. $$ speaks. Even if Obama/Holder/ATF set up some operation down there, the local police & military will undersell them.

Civilians are only allowed to have .22 rifles and shotguns. (no slugs) Gun owners must prove a good reason to have a gun, and guns must be registered every three years. People under 25 are not allowed to own guns. You also may not carry more than 25 rounds of ammo. Open and concealed carry have been outlawed.

#2. Yep, if you shoot someone, even in blatant self-defense, you're getting charged. But that also happens in boney ol' England and in most of Europe.

You're allowed to shoot an intruder twice. Once, with an allowance for accidental second shot. Shoot an armed intruder three times, and you're pretty much going to jail forever. You're probably going anyway as defending yourself is more or less illegal.

#3. Crime? Caracas makes East Baltimore look like paradise.

My wife was held-up twice at gunpoint and other times was robbed by moped drive-byes. She learned how to shoot when she was little 'cause her father taught her. Has loved guns ever since and keeps a loaded .380 with an extra mag next to her night stand.

Yeah, crime is terrible there. Corruption is rampant as well. That's what happens when the government tries to control every aspect of the economy and people's lives.

p.s. Wife wants to move to VA 'cause she can carry there. Gotta love that woman of mine!

...

 

[Scott7891]

IME the Americans that advocate bigger government, more government dependency, etc. are poorly educated in history and do not care about world politics. They ONLY want more stuff and for someone else to pay for it.

This applies to socialists worldwide and even to the ones that are so called "educated" (remember educated does not mean intelligent, even monkeys can be trai....mhm I mean "educated"). They do not learn from history, choose to ignore it, or if they do learn from it they take it from a quasi-Marxist view that attempts to rewrite history in their own image that they are right. One area they are known for doing this is trying to portray fascists as right-wing which is ironic when Mussolini and Hitler both admitted they were socialists and adopted left-wing programs that the left here love to say that we need. Never mind the examples of Josef Stalin, Mao, and Pol-Pot who killed millions in the name of "socialist revolution," something they like to leave out of their socialist mantras. Nevermind that useful idiots here love to buy (capitalist much) and wear shirts of Che Guevara who was not only a murderer but a buffoon of a military commander who couldn't even find where the battlefield was during the Bay of Pigs invasion!!

"There is the idea among the people that a firearm gives security." That is one of the ideas (insists Fernandez.)

That is kind of the whole point of them isn't it? Either this guy knows better and is just evil or is really falling for the propaganda that if guns no longer exist then we will live in a world of sunshine and farts.....

 

[fivepointstar]

Ok, let me set the record straight 'cause my cute-as-hell wife is from that toilet of a country.

!

 

[boricuamaximus]

Ok, let me set the record straight 'cause my cute-as-hell wife is from that toilet of a country.

#1. Small guns are legal. Anything bigger, just go to the police or army and they will sell you what you want from weps they steal from their own arsenal. $$ speaks. Even if Obama/Holder/ATF set up some operation down there, the local police & military will undersell them.

#2. Yep, if you shoot someone, even in blatant self-defense, you're getting charged. But that also happens in boney ol' England and in most of Europe.

#3. Crime? Caracas makes East Baltimore look like paradise.

My wife was held-up twice at gunpoint and other times was robbed by moped drive-byes. She learned how to shoot when she was little 'cause her father taught her. Has loved guns ever since and keeps a loaded .380 with an extra mag next to her night stand.

p.s. Wife wants to move to VA 'cause she can carry there. Gotta love that woman of mine!

I dont be trusting Jobu. True boris marry Colombianas. Or so I heard. I ended up with the short straw and pulled an ecaudorian...

 

[teratos]

 

[JOBU]

I dont be trusting Jobu. True boris marry Colombianas. Or so I heard. I ended up with the short straw and pulled an ecaudorian...

....broke my mama's heart when I married my Venezuelan smoke instead of the lineup of Puerto Rican girls from the island she had set up. I told her "....mami, before I marry some loca from back home I'll stay single and live at home."

Mom & wife now talk at least 1 hr per day on the phone. I think I got had!

 

[yellowfin]

Those who are armed in Venezuela should have used their arms a decade or so ago to keep that gremlin from getting into power.

 

[oldman12]

Ha Ha, we have guns here and we let a Gremlin as POTUS.

 

[yellowfin]

Ha Ha, we have guns here and we let a Gremlin as POTUS.

My guess is it's a lot easier to hide successfully in Venezuela after pulling off a 180 grain election recall than here.

 

[EL1227]

Thread revival

But, but, but ... I thought that they were disarmed.

HotAir.com -
Venezuela on the edge of collapse?

Armed vigilantes on motorcycles attacked anti-government demonstrators in Venezuela on Wednesday, setting off a stampede by firing into crowds as the biggest protest against President Nicolas Maduro’s year-old administration turned violent. Three people were killed.

Oh, wait ... the armed assassins were pro-Maduro. I guess they had a G&S reason ...

Before Chavez, Venezuela was a successful petro-state with a significant middle class and stable economics. Then Chavez created a command economy, expropriated private property, and ruled by whim for most of his term as president/dictator. He managed that through brute force and a cult of personality, but his successor only has brute force to use. {The HildeBeast lacks 'personality'.}

Sound familiar ? Coming to a country near you; only if we allow ourselves to be disarmed.