Rant

From Miguel’s substack, with permission.

At least from the regular Venezuelans.

At this writing, the 2024 presidential elections in Venezuela are in the can and Maduro seems to have “secured” his re-election. Protest about the fraud committed did happen, and the government was swift arresting over 1,500 so far who are slotted to go to prison ipso facto without pretty much legal niceties, plus also announced that other thousands of so members of the “Opposition” and protesters are pre-approved to be also arrested and given free “vacations.”

So, what happened to what used to be Latin America’s most vibrant and stable Democracy? What led to Venezuela becoming just another Communist dictatorship? I am going to try to give you a short explanation and for that, let’s begin to kill misconceptions.

Number one: In the 203 years of existence, Venezuela was a democracy (of sorts) for only 3 decades, from the 1960s to the 1990s. Before that and thereafter, the country was run by Caudillos (Strong Men) who fought, bullshitted or bullied themselves into the Presidency. Democracy was a short-lived experiment that was eventually was used by the Left to vote itself into the power they could not obtain by the traditional revolutionary methods of the 50s. Were there elections during those old times? Yes, but again, they were either vaudeville show elections except in one case where the elected President was kicked out by a revolutionary Leninist coalition who were themselves promptly removed by the Military which took over the control of the nation and kept it.

So, the historical DNA of the country is firmly programmed to accept Caudillos and a central government directing every aspect of your life. And with that comes the sad fact that such government will implement and use whatever force and persuasion it requires to remain in power. Scaring and programming people into submission is standard operational procedure: “Violence doesn’t solve anything” and “If you defy the “law”, we will use violence upon you and yours” are not contradictory terms in Venezuela or the rest of Latin America, they are just facts of life we learned to live with.

Number two: I don’t recall when exactly, but in the very late 1980s or early 1990s, there was an article in a major newspaper in Venezuela proudly announcing that the biggest employer in the country was officially the government. More than half of working Venezuelans derived their income to feed their families from the people in power, and that meant voting against the government meant voting against your wallet, voting against keeping your kids fed and a roof above your family and medication for grandma. Politics no longer was about ethereal principles like “Freedom” but real issues like having a job and not going hungry. And even if you were not on the Country’s payroll, more than likely you would be providing goods and services to those who were or to the government companies themselves. And people not only will they not fight against the government, but they will also gladly denounce to the proper intelligence authorities if they suspect anybody wants to do something against their security. Yes, they will snitch you at Warp 5 and have zero remorse about it because you are messing with their lives.

Number three: Historically, Venezuela always had Caudillos that promised radical changes in our way of living, swearing they would improve them. People would throw support at them, but most ended up failures, and a very few were successful, only for the new man in the Presidential Chair to become just another version of the previous occupant. “Mismo musiu con diferente cachimbo” is an old Venezuelan saying roughly translated to: same guy with a different pipe AKA Meet the new boss, same as the old boss. People eventually get tired of broken promises, so when somebody comes along with visions of wealth and prosperity if you join him, the recently burned just ignore them. It takes time, usually almost a generation, to get a fresh crop of hopeful idiots to support a “change” that could end up in a successful transfer of power. The Left tried to get in the hard way in the early 1960s after the transition from a military regime to Democracy and failed because both people were sick of the instability, Castro had shown his colors, and true Democracy was the newest-coolest product in the market for Venezuela. But The Left knows how to play the long game and started to infiltrate universities and the Media with their “light version” of themselves (Me a Communist? Never! I believe in social change and equality like a good Christian!”) but never lost track of the country’s DNA and hence comes Comandante Hugo Chavez and his coup attempt.

The coup failed… and not. Long story short: by the mid-1990s, thanks to a combination of corrupt practices, economic downturns and a very successful long-term campaign to undermine the country’s morale, people were once again ready for a “change” in the hands of a Caudillo. What the failed coup gave Chavez was a constant mention in the Media that amazingly fast went from negative for the people who got killed, to “we understand why he did it” to “Maybe he is the change we need” and people simply agreed with what been planted all along in their minds for many decades.

And not only did they vote Chavez into power but voted to give him more power: He was able to dispose of the Supreme Court by popular vote. The same vote gave him the OK to change the constitution, control of the Election Council and grant himself re-elections for as long as he wanted. I laugh when I hear people now complain about how it was possible that Maduro rigged the elections, since Venezuela’s elections have been worse than a rigged reality-tv show before the Millennium kicked in.

The above is a very simplified summary, and I am going to condense it even more: If the government feeds me and can kill me without consequence, why should I try to depose it to install a new set of assholes that probably won’t do any better?

One last thing:

“You can vote your way into socialism, but you’re going to have to shoot your way out.”

We know this is true. They are willing to kill to remain in power, and killing is the only way to remove them. But then you read this:

Just a couple of reminders: Peaceful demonstrations only work if the targets of those demonstrations are moral and scrupulous people.
The Left mastered the “peaceful demonstrations” and knows its weaknesses.

Until I see the stacks of pro-government bodies piled high on the streets of Caracas, I won’t believe that change is actually happening. And I doubt this will happen in my lifetime.

— Miguel Gonzalez © 2024.

If you are reading this, you are part of the 1% richest people in the world.

I can confidently say that because there are so many people living in object poverty. Not poverty as defined by the government, but actual poverty.

The government likes to define poverty in relative terms. This means that when you are part of a rich society, you can be “below the poverty line” and still be richer than most of the world’s population could ever dream of becoming.

If you are reading this, you have a device capable of connecting to the Internet, that makes you wealthy.

But wealth is not just money, it is also goods. I do not consider myself or my family to be well-off. We struggle to pay our monthly bills, we struggle to support our children’s quest for a collage education. It feels like we are always just one paycheck from disaster.

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The state is constantly looking for weasel words in Supreme Court opinions to further their arrogant subjugation of their subjects. We see this in how they misconstrued the language of —United States V. Miller, 307 U.S. 174 (1939) to claim that the Second Amendment only protects militias.

We see this when they misconstrue —District of Columbia v. Heller, 467 U.S. 837 (2008) to mean that “presumptively constitutional” means that any infringement is constitutional.

We see this when they misconstrue —New York State Rifle & Pistol Assn., Inc. V. Bruen, 142 S.Ct. 2111 (U.S. 2022) to mean that anyplace can be designated as a “sensitive location” where infringements are required. Like defining all of Times Square as a sensitive place.

The state is constantly looking for any words that could be taken to mean that infringement is allowed.

—Opinion, United States v. Rahimi, 602 S.Ct. ____ (U.S. 2024) has far too many weasel words for the state to latch onto. Bad facts make for bad laws.

Schoenthal v. Raoul in Chicago shows exactly this.

After Rahimi was issued, the state in every case rushed to bring that opinion into their arguments. Not because their case had anything to do with individuals found to be credible threat of physical violence to another who had a court of law issue a domestic violence restraining order against them, but because they wanted to use the weasel words.

In Schoenthal the state wanted a status hearing to set a supplemental briefing schedule. This is the official way to get more arguments before the court, regardless of the current status of the case.

The state says it is a joint motion. This is true in fact, but not in spirit.

The state wants to brief the court regarding how wonderful Rahimi is for their case. The plaintiffs (good guys) just want equal time, if the court allows the state to submit additional arguments.

The judge said “No”.

Now, the language the state is trying so hard to get into the record is suggest a law trapped in amber —id.. This is where the Supreme Court explained how to do regulation matching. The state latches on to “it doesn’t have to be an exact match, so our horrible, not even close, matches should be allowed.”

So the state made a second motion to brief Rahimi to the court. This time they included the language they felt would save their case.

The judge said “no” a second time.

So the state, instead of requesting permission to brief the court on Rahimi, submitted a notice of supplemental authority regarding Rahimi. This was not the simple, “We wish to bring to the court’s attention that Rahimi was decided, no, this was a short brief with the state’s arguments.

Therefore, the court said “no” again, a bit more forcibly.

Me or your lying eyes?

For the last four years, the only time I heard about Kamala was when she had messed up, again. It is a feature of her actions, she messes up.

She was assigned to close the border. Joe used Obama’s term, “Tsar”. As in “Border Tsar.”

Today, I’m being told, “Kamala was never the border tsar. That’s just a Trump lie.”

This is where we are today.

As one X pundit put it, “How have you explained the ‘fine people hoax?'” The consensus was that it wasn’t worth the time or effort. That even if you did manage to get them to acknowledge it is a hoax, within a couple of weeks, they will have forgotten.

This is getting crazy.

Ok, but what does that mean? More importantly, what does it mean to us?

To get an example of cognitive dissonance in “practice”, dig up “I Mudd” from Star Trek. At the end, the crew destroys the androids by setting up cognitive dissonance in their “logical” brains.

One such method was Spock saying to one android “I love you”, and to another, identical android “But I hate you.” When the androids point out that they are identical, Spock replies, “Exactly.”

The left has been trained to exist in a state of cognitive dissonance.

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Having watched the video of Trump being shot, my first thoughts were of “Thank God he survived the attempt.”

My third though was of grief for the person in the audience who was killed and the other that was injured. This asshole, shooting at Trump, didn’t give a shit who was hit by his shots. In his zeal to kill Trump, he killed a Trump supporter, and likely considered that “good.”

My second thought was, “Why would I give up my guns now? You evil assholes.”

There are many more. It is always the same, “Now that it happened to YOU, you will ban guns, right?”

This is just as revolting as the idiots that post “Now that “People of Color” are buying guns, Republicans will be willing to ban them.”

There isn’t a single drop of blood these vultures won’t use against us.

For the last week or more, I’ve been watching Paris burn, and with it, France.

This is portrayed as “the far-right” vs. the “left-wing”. Which begs the question, what does it take to be “far-left”?

Right-wing and Left-wing come from where the different parties sat in the German parliament. The communists sat on the left, the Nazi, and socialists and everybody else sat on the right.

So to say that Nazi’s are right wing only refers to them being further right than communists. Which wasn’t very far.

The “right” in these United States are conservatives, not Nazi’s or other socialist scumbags.

Parliaments

“That’s a nice business you have here, it would be a shame if anything happened to it.”

For years and years, I was told to shut up and sit down when the Supreme Court made a 6-3 or 5-4 decision. My side lost. Just shut up.

And once I lost, I was told that I couldn’t fight it anymore.

When the left loses at the polls, they run to the court. They can always find a judge to rule the way they want.

I am reminded of the gay marriage fight in California. The people of California were asked to make gay marriage legal in multiple referendums. The people voted “no” each time.

Finally, they got a referendum to modify the California constitution to codify that marriage was between a man and a woman. The voters approved and the California constitution was amended to add that definition.

The left screamed and took it to court. In court, they got a judge to say that the amendment to their constitution, don constitutionally, was itself unconstitutional.

The court literally said that the constitution was unconstitutional.

When the Dobbs opinion was released, the left protested, violently. When Bruen was decided, the left had a violent meltdown.

Every time they lose, it is always because the other side is cheating.

The left is the party that breaks with tradition, to give themselves more power. Then they scream for the very protections they dismantled, once they are out of power.

The odds of Joe Bidden being the next President of these United States is getting lower and lower as the MSM finally stops hiding his abuse.

If Trump were to win, I am afraid that they will burn this country down. It will make the “mostly peaceful protests” of BLM and saint Floyd look like a small corner protest.

They are currently claiming that the Supreme Court has said that the President can murder people and get away with it. That’s not how it works. But it was another 6-3 opinion, which means that the left will not accept the results.

They lost, they won’t accept a loss.

B.L.U.F.
Senior Circuit Judge Keene wrote the dissent in this case. She is unhappy with the majority opinion because that opinion would find most, if not all gun-control regulations, unconstitutional.

Because this goes against her agenda, she latches onto footnote 9 of the Bruen opinion to justify why any set of objective hoops placed to hinder a member of The People from keeping and bearing arms is constitutional. It doesn’t matter how long it takes nor how much money it takes, nor what those hoops are. As long as the state must grant permission at the end, that regime is constitutional.

(4200 words)

On November 21, the Fourth Circuit court issued their opinion on Maryland Shall Issue’s challenge to Maryland’s “Handgun Qualification License”.

This is a permit to purchase. Before you can purchase a handgun in Maryland, you must first submit fingerprints, undergo a background investigation, take a four-hour-long firearms safety training course which includes firing at least one round. After that is completed, you can submit your application for your HQL.

The state has 30 days to approve or deny the application, after they receive the application. We know that “the state” has a habit of not “receiving” things they want to receive. If they haven’t “officially” received the application, the clock hasn’t started. In addition, the 30 days is not clearly defined in law. Is that 30 business days or 30 calendar days? And how long do they have to inform the applicant of the determination? Or, as one state is doing, they are granting appointments for fingerprinting 6+ months in advance.

The reality of this egregious infringement is that it is likely three months from the decision to get an HQL before you have one.

The three judge panel reversed the district court’s “contrary decision”.

This means that the case is not going back to the district court. It can only move forward to the Supreme Court. The state has 21 days to appeal, IIRC. Reversing a decision is “You got it wrong, we don’t need you to mess it up again, it is wrong, and we are setting it right.” This is better than vacating and remanding a decision. When a case is vacated and remanded, the case is sent back to the inferior court where they do the case all over again, collecting new arguments and evidence.

So the Fourth Circuit panel did the right thing the right way in a reasonable amount of time.

Of course, there is always the thorn in your side in a case like this. That thorn is Senior Circuit Judge Barbara Milano Keenan. Born in 1950, making her 73 years old. She was nominated by Obama in 2009 and appointed in 2010. She assumed senior status in 2021.

Yes, that type of judge.

The Dissent

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B.L.U.F.
Another day, another rogue inferior court scratching for anything that allows them to upload an infringement.

This time it is a CO law requiring a waiting period before taking possession of a legally purchased firearm. The mental gymnastics this Jimmy Carter appointee goes through would make Mary Lou Retton jealous.
(1250 words)

The court profoundly erred in their reading of Heller and Bruen. The first step is to determine if the conduct proposed implicates the plain text of the Second Amendment.

To “have weapons” is the conduct that the plaintiffs (good guys) wish to do. To refute this frivolous argument on the part of this inferior, rogue court, all one needs to do is extend the waiting period from 3 days to 3 years.

Would a waiting period of three years implicate the Second Amendment’s protected right of “keeping”, “possession” or “having” arms? Yes, it would.

Thus, the conduct implicates the plain text of the Second Amendment.

Once the Second Amendment is implicated, the conduct is presumptively constitutional and the modern-day regulation is presumptively unconstitutional and should be vacated.

One of the things we keep discussing is the fight to keep Second Amendment challenges in the legal realm. There is no need for history professors or experts in what the founding fathers wanted or thought. All that is required is an examination of the regulations of the time.

The Government merely needs to bring regulations from the founding era that are a match for the state’s modern regulations to the attention of the court. If they can do that, they will win.

Today, I might have to order a firearm from my LGS. I might have to wait for it to arrive. Or I can choose from something in stock and walk home with it. Professors Spitzer and Roth gave their expert opinion that a three-day waiting period was to be expected in the founding era because people couldn’t just buy the firearm they wanted.

This is irrelevant. If I want a Serbu BFG-50, it will have to wait for it to be made. It will take a few weeks. So what? I can still buy other firearms right now if I wanted it.

This is why the battle of the “experts” is not allowed under Heller and Bruen.

The judge then says that all the case law showing that acquiring a firearm is protected by the Second Amendment is no longer good case law. “Because they happened before Bruen and didn’t examine the plain text”. Of course, he fails to note that the actual methodology was put in place with Heller in 2008, so all those cases after 2008 are good case law IF they followed Heller. I.e., didn’t use means-end.

This judge should be impeached. The Supreme Court ordered the inferior courts to look first at the plain text of the Second Amendment. If the conduct implicated the Second Amendment, the state had the burden to bring forth a history and tradition of regulations that are analogous to the modern regulations.

First, he says that purchasing a firearm doesn’t implicate the plain text of the Second Amendment. Then he says that since the state can’t show a history of regulations requiring waiting-periods, he is going to look for a tradition of waiting periods.

This means that there wasn’t a founding era regulation for waiting periods. The fact that society, as a whole, didn’t have the same level of instant gratification as today, doesn’t mean that waiting periods can be forced today.

The judge relies on the Spitzer declaration of laws from 1623, 1631, 1632, 1655, 1868, 1878, 1883, 1879, 1888, and 1893 regulating possession of firearms by intoxicated purposes to justify a waiting period. Please note the era that is missing from that list of dates. That’s right, nothing from the founding era.

Because this is a request for a preliminary injunction, the Winter factors are being analyzed. That is to say, the likelihood of success on the merits, irreparable harm, balance of equity, and public interest. If the challenge involves the deprivation of a core civil right, irreparable harm is done. If the court finds that it doesn’t involve a core civil right, they can use other means to decide on the level of harm.

In the same way, once the court decides the constitution doesn’t apply, they can balance the equities in favor of the state and use “good enough reasons” to determine the public interest.