It takes a very long time after losing a country before a revolution can start. Every conceivable avenue is exhausted, over and over, even past the point of futility. It doesn't require losing just one election to fraud, or two, but for the fraud to be so bad that it is given up in lieu of brute force. This won't happen until the rulers have horribly damaged the country to the point that the very people who initially put the rulers in charge are demanding change. That will take years, probably decades in a country as rich as the United States, and every passing year that things get worse still offers the possibility of reversing course.

Venezuela is the most instructive modern example. I started reading English-language blogs about Venezuela in the mid-2000s, after reading The Road to Serfdom. I wanted to know by obversational experiment whether the ideas in that book were correct if applied to a country going forward, or if they were merely a means of explaining history. Venezuela turned out exactly as predicted. Chavez was popularly elected, increased government power until his death, and his successor continued that. As the socialist policies inevitably made the country poorer and conditions worsened, the government took ever more drastic measures to continue winning elections. They influenced the media, such as by denying broadcasting permits or rationing newsprint, and many other ways. They changed election rules and took over the electoral commission to rubber stamp these rules. They provided welfare benefits like housing only on the condition of loyalty to the government's ideology. They even published a list of millions of people who signed a failed recall election, denying them benefits and employment.

In this way they maintained power, but as Venezuela descended from the richest country in South America to the poorest, the government lost its popularity. Despite the government having both thumbs on the scale and outright nullifying three seats to prevent a veto-overriding majority, the opposition gained control of their parliament. The government established and funded shadow governments in municipalities that the opposition had won. They packed their supreme court so that nothing the parliament passed would be made into law, eventually even dissolving the parliament in 2017. The constitution was changed by a fraudulent vote, recognized as such by almost the entire world, such that the parliament was replaced with a new kind of parliament designed to be controlled by the government.

Combined with widespread food, water, and electricity shortages, and a lack of employment, health care, and even gasoline, this led to massive protests for months. I remember reading about it at the time and realizing something. Here in the US, we often debate about when and how exactly we will know it is time to start shooting. I wondered that about Venezuela for years. Seeing millions of unarmed people in the street being shot at by both government and para-military mafias, for months, I knew that it was at this moment in time in 2017 that it was appropriate for Venezuelans to start shooting. The same people who elected Chavez were throwing rocks at men who were shooting them with live rounds.

It will be a very long time before we reach that moment in the US. I expect that there will be violence ahead but it will be premature and it won't do anything except accelerate how bad things get. Buy guns now and hide them so that we aren't throwing rocks. Protest, vote, write letters. Then wait, survive, make ends meet. You'll know when it's time to start shooting. We aren't there yet, hopefully we never will be.