Machete y Mate

On Indigenous Peoples Day the whole team is together for another week in Latin America. Pedro Castillo has significantly reshuffled his cabinet  and we try to make sense of what this means for Peru, for Peru Libre, and for the movement. We then discuss the increasing political violence In Honduras, including the attempted murder of the daughter of murdered activist Berta Caceres and the murder of...

The whole team is together and we welcome dear friend and comrade of the show former Independence party city council candidate for San Juan, Paul Figueroa! From class considerations to Union Colonialism, Paul walks us though the energy crisis, its affects and ramifications, and how decades of colonial and neoliberal policy has created the desperate and untenable state that Puerto Rico finds itself...

Welcome back for a Current Events at 2/3 strength physically, but 100% spiritually. We start off by discussing the State violence against the Zapatistas in Chiapas and their strongly worded diplomatic response. If one thing is constant in the US it's the maintenance of a militarized Southern border and we talk about agents of violence playing out their slave patrol cowboy fantasies against Haitian...

With the absence of the self-proclaimed Messi, T & LeRoy are back with a Current Events episode. After a pretty robust and interesting intro chatting about labor law, Mexico abortion decrim, and CELAC, we kick off the main stories with an update on Yaku Perez and Ecuador since Lasso's victory in their election earlier this year. We then dive deep into the roll out of Bitcoin by Nayib Bukele in El...

The whole band is back together! The three of us analyze the calls to scrap the US department of the colonies, the OAS and the otherwise awakening of the players in the region. We discuss Bolsonaro's increasingly blatant and concerted effort to delegitimize next year's election and what it means for the country and region. We finish off with a discussion on the political, cultural, and environment...

With Austin on a post-DSA Convention life hiatus, LeRoy and T lay down an overdue current events episode! We talk about the resignation of newly appointed Peruvian Foreign MInister Hector Bejar, the first domino to fall in Peru's reactionary congress's war against Castillo. We optimistically break down the Maduro/Bolivarian government's recent talks with the opposition as they try to forge a path...

In this Austin-less comrade conversation, we sit down with Cuban Cuba Historian Andrés Pertierra! We always appreciated the way he keeps it 100 and he did exactly that with us. From the great successes of the Revolution to the valid critiques of the post-1959 project to the present day, Andrés breaks down what we as "Leftists" should know and understand from an almost insider's perspective. He doe...

All three homies are together for an important current events episode! We put on our tin-foil hats as we tackle the assassination of President Jovenel Moïse and all the theories surrounding the circumstances and all the fallout. We discuss the protests in Cuba, why they've broken out and how they fit into the greater GN imperial system. We finish off by breaking down the presidential primaries in...

Long overdue, we sit down with one of our dearest and most inspiring comrades, Fern. Fern takes us on a journey into his life as a working class immigrant organizer and father in the US and in Brazil. We delve into the complicated socio-political history of Brazil from decolonization to the military dictatorship to the present and his hopes and plans for the future for Brazil. We finish off talkin...

With Austin on assignment in Venezuela, it's just LeRoy and T this week. They talk about Luma Energy and the predictable disaster that's been the complete privatization of Puerto Rico's electrical grid, the latest regarding Peru's election fallout, and they dive into one of the worst characters you don't know, Carlos Slim. If you support what we do and want access to Machete After Dark, please con...

Austin is back from Peru after observing the election and he tells us all about it. The lead up and fuckery by the Electoral Commission, the militant comrades he met, meeting the man, Pedro Castillo, himself, the day and night of the election, the fall out. Everything! LeRoy and T also give their takes on the ramifications of a Castillo victory for not only Peru but for the whole region and world....

The fellas are back from an unplanned hiatus with a current events episode. We kick it off with a recap and breakdown of the recent history of Chile leading to the massive protests, the vote to scrap the Pinochet constitution, the Left winning in the Constitutional Assembly and local/municipal elections and the forthcoming Presidential election. We discuss the societal breakdown in Colombia and th...

Meant to be a comrade convo but change of plans. This is a sort of sneak peek into the After Dark format and style Compas Oficiales get access to, so if you like the more casual style consider donating to the Patreon to also help us bring attention to the struggle in Latin America. Here we talk Australian labor laws, the European Super League, the Derek Chauvin verdict & growing towards abolition,...

Back with a current events episode featuring friend of the show and MyM veteran Matt K. Matt helps us debrief and breakdown Ecuador's shock electoral result in which RW neoliberal banker Guillermo Lasso came out on top. On a similar note, we analyze the ramifications of Peru's first round of presidential elections, pitting Left-wing albeit socially problematic candidate Pedro Castillo and now 3x s...

Quick turnaround from Comrade Convo to Current Events this week. We break down the ramifications of Bolsonaro's biggest support base, the military, increasingly abandoning him as his Defense Minister and the top guys in three of the Armed Forces branches leave their jobs leaving Bolsonaro increasingly isolated. Austin then gives a really thorough rundown of almost everything one would need to know...

The band is back together this week to talk to a dear friend of the show about what's arguably the crown jewel in Puerto Rico's decolonial struggle. "Arepa Libre", as she is known to protect her identity, gives us a thorough breakdown of the history and struggle of her home island of Vieques. She goes into detail about the military occupation of the island, the island's existence as a proving grou...

The homies are back this week with a LeRoy-less current events episode. Austin and T draw a line between the Argentine Junta responsible for the disappearance of tens of thousands of people and the the January 6 Capitol coup attempt by way of a participant, Trump State dept. official and nephew of the Junta's top Economist, Federico Klein. They go on to talk about AOC's Self-Determination Bill for...

What are we fighting against if not the oppressive forces of Capital, particularly Capital in crisis? We sat down with Comrade Brendan O'Connor to talk about his amazing new book Blood Red Lines: How Nativism Fuels The Right. Brendan eloquently breaks down the concept of "Border Fascism", the behind the scenes history of the nascent Nativist Right in mainstream politics in the US, and how we fight...

Back with a current events wrap-up from around Latin America. Early but important, we discuss the polls showing Daniel Jadue and the Communist Party of Chile leading the field and what this means within the context of Chilean history, before talking about the protests in Paraguay, President Abdo, and covid vaccine corruption in the region and we finish off with a recap and debrief of our interview...

On the first day of Women's History Month and in the fallout of the legislative election in El Salvador, dear comrade Blanca Estévez graces the show with the detailing of her family's journey to Arkansas from El Salvador, her experience and struggle navigating and reconciling her identity and ideals in a society not constructed for "us", and her take on Nayib Bukele and his future as ES President...

Back this week with a current events episode. The homies discuss their recent interviews on and give their latest takes and updates on the first round of Ecuador's recent election, the formation of a Left-Wing political coalition in Colombia to battle the hegemonic US backed Right-Wing, and they finish off with a discussion on Bolivia's return of the IMF loan taken out by the golpista government....

On this episode MyM welcomes two South America based comrades, journalist Denis Rogatyuk (Jacobin America Latina, El Ciudadano) and frind of the show Matt Kierkegaard of the Progressive International, to shed a bit of insight on the election in Ecuador: what went down on the ground in the lead up to the election, on the day, and the tsunami of controversy that has been fabricated since. In an unpl...

Back at it with a Current Events episode! This week we cap off Ecuador's (pre)-Election, discuss the civil unrest that is boiling over in Haiti and historically what's lead up to this moment, and declassified FBI/CIA intelligence on Puerto Rican Nationalist/Independentist activists. If you support what we do and want to help support what we do (and get access to fresh bonus content) consider showi...

Comrade, host of Midwest Socialist Podcast, and friend of the show Matt Tapia joins the show to talk about odious Chicago mayor Lori Lightfoot, the power of Teachers and their unions, machine politics in Chicago, and how he has navigated his Latinx identity. As usual if you support what we do and would like to help some projects materialize please consider showing your solidarity on Patreon and fo...

Austin, T, and LeRoy are back this week with their usual Current Events format. They break down the important upcoming election in Ecuador, give an update and analysis on the fallout of the failed autogolpe in the US, and then tie it into the most recent migrant caravan and the contradictions inherent in US immigration policy generally. LeRoy caps it off with a few words on the upcoming "Australia...