Trillbilly Worker's Party - Episode 346: Tunnel To Al-Andalus (w/ special guest Alexander Aviña)

Episode Date: June 7, 2024

This week we're joined by returning guest Alexander Aviña (@Alexander_Avina) to discuss the recent elections in Mexico, as well as Joe Biden and the Democratic Party's border policies. You can find our previous episode with Alex, as well as our entire premium catalogue, over at Patreon: www.patreon.com/trillbillyworkersparty

Welcome to the show this week. We are joined by returning guest, Alexander Avenia, a historian, professor at, are you at Arizona State, Alex? Arizona State, yep. Hell yeah. Go Sun Devils. The Sun Devils, yes. It's really kind of the best mascot.

Yeah. You know, it's. Yeah, well you can't really piss off anybody, so it's good. Yeah, and also, you associate a devil with the sun. You're not gonna like an angel with the sun, You know you can't really piss off anybody's it's good. Yeah You associate a double with the Sun you're not gonna like an angel with the Sun is like that's a contradiction in terms No, what we're gonna find out we're gonna dig a little too far and find out Sun Devils a slur of some kind Brother it's always it's always the the six degrees of racism man. That's good. That's one of the good ones Brother it's always it's always the the six degrees of racism man. Yeah, that's true

You're never too far from racism Speaking of that I wanted to open this show before we got into actual substantive things I was doing a little bit of research last night. Do y'all know who the writer robert lewis stevenson was Yes, didn't he write treasure Island? Treasure Island, yeah. Treasure Island and Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Yeah, he was big in the 19th century. I think he might have died the widest death I've ever seen. He- Mognum overdose?

You said the widest death, not the widest, but the widest death not the widest but the whitest The whitest the least melanated death possible Least melanated death because there's a lot of ways to die white people do crazy shit all the time So there's a lot of ways to I mean you just set us in the chat of what we got go I don't know if she was white, but I'm assuming got gored by a buffalo or bison Can happen anybody I sent you to there was an 83 year old woman who got gored at Yellowstone and then a hundred and two-year-old man who died on the way to I guess do a reenactment of D-day in Dodges going places, You know what I mean?

I don't know. What is this? Is this like the 80th anniversary of D-Day? I think. I think so. Snuck up on me this year. I did see an AI generated post where it showed

the soldiers marching into the sea and someone's like wrong way lads AI wins again, I guess What they I saw like they were doing recreation like they were doing so in the south you get like Civil War reenactors all the time, but like they were doing Civil War reenactors all the time, but like they were doing World War two reenactments And so they had that sounds horrible. They actually are they had British paratroopers Dropping into Normandy and they had like French customs officials waiting there so that they could like stamp their passports Cuz of Brexit

That's why yeah Shit um oh Robert Louis Stevenson though. I have to point this out real quick I think he might have died the most Anglo death possible. He was in the middle of making mayonnaise in the In the Samoan Islands. He was in the Samoan Islands. He was in the Samoan Islands on a research trip, like a colonial research trip, and he was making mayonnaise

among the Samoans when he suffered a fatal stroke. So I don't know. That's pretty- I mean, I didn't know the mayo meme went that far back. You know. I mean, like, I mean, I didn't know. I didn't know, like the male mean went that far back. You know what I mean? Like, I thought that was like a recent development, but I guess like Robert Louis Stevenson is pioneering, you know, the. I love that I'm secretly like mildly offended at the Mayo jokes. Yeah, I tell you another effect because I'm just like,

I don't really eat that much man. I do. I love. Hey, I'm you another effect because I'm just like I'm not trying to front. I do like mayo. I'm not trying to front man I just remember I just remember being like a kid man and going to what you know, some of my white friends houses You know being like yo what you got in the pantry is if they were gonna have just just filled with mayo nothing else but mayonnaise mayonnaise pop tarts. I think I remember going over, so I live in Mexico from like the age of like four till seven, something like that.

And when we came back to the US, I remember my first time ever going over to like a white friend's house and it's time for lunch. And the mom gave me the sandwich on white bread. So I'm already confused. And it ended up being like, it was like a tuna sandwich with an immense amount of mayo. Like, it traumatized me to this very day. I had to eat it. Like the tuna swimming in mayo. Oh my god, it was so awful. But like, I was like, I got to eat it. I have to be polite.

Like you got to eat it. And it took me a good 10 years to kind of work that out of my god, it was so awful. But like I was like I gotta eat it have to be polite like you gotta And it took me a good ten years to kind of work that out of my system I can appreciate Mayo now, but it took me a long time. Yeah It's like your first beer. It's like you're like But then you come to love it. Well, I mean it's like it's like it's like a ritualistic thing You know when the white when you come to the white man's home and he offers you mail is disrespectful to not. That's the side of his respect for it. It's a side of disrespect.

Robert Louis Stevenson took Mayo to the Samoans. He was like, I'm going to show you. Let me show you guys a little culture. Oh, my God. They suffered a massive stroke. Oh, man. Maybe not unrelated to the Mayo Consumption. Yeah, right.

I'm going to use this when I teach like the conquest, I always make sure to tell students like how these conquistadors died because so many of them suffered like terrible, but sometimes funny deaths. Like one guy who I think he was Cortez's second in command died when he was on his horse trying to put down an indigenous rebellion and he fell off the horse and the horse fell on top of him and crushed him to death. Or the guy who was credited with so-called discovering Chile. One story is that he was captured by the Mapuches and was forced to drink molten gold. And that's how we got I really hope, which is one of the best.

Like, I really hope that happened. Yeah, Alex didn't didn't Christopher Columbus, didn't he die broke and marooned or something on Jamaica? You know, any incredible pain? I forget what disease it was. He was definitely broke, right? Because he was a criminal. He got sent back to Spain and chains

when the king and queen found out that he had been lying and he was a man because of slavery and all other stuff But yeah, that is so emblematic. It's Columbus was not only like, you know What Howard's in you know, like the genocide in? Enslaving monster, but he just also was fundamentally just a grifter. He was just like a con man He was just like give me money. He was just like, give me money, I'll do your job. No, and like so much of what Americans know about Columbus is from 19th century US myth making, right? Related to Italian immigrants to the US, right?

So that's why we get things like that Sopranos episode, which is like. Yeah. It's anti-discrimination. It's anti, but it's so, what Americans think most Americans think they know about Columbus comes from like the late 19th century US myth making, not like, you know, actual grounded historical research. He was the total grifter.

But he's also like a sailor. He had that skill, right? Like he had sailed for under various flags and he benefited from Arab and Jewish technology that had been created in the Iberian Peninsula. Right. It was Alan Dallus. Right. But yeah, didn't wasn't that like as a side tangent, didn't like an Israeli politician recently, like when Spain said they were going to recognize Palestine, they were like, this is just like the Inquisition. Like he said, he said it was just like Al-Andalus.

And it's like, bro, that was like the golden age of culture in Iberia. Like it was the Christian kingdoms who expelled you guys in 1492. Right. Al-Andalus, right? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, that's that was nuts. Yeah. That that in like the moment, that moment was pretty funny online. The other recent one related to Mexico is people saying that the current president-elect of Mexico, Kalei Ashenbaum, is not Jewish because she thanked Jesus. It turns out that her husband's name is his.

I will. I'm going to laugh about this for a really long time. But that was so good. It's like a broader like it's like a metaphor I will I'm gonna laugh about this for a really long time Like a broader like it's like a metaphor for like American misunderstanding of Mexico, I think it really is in general Yeah, it's what I think the guy that said that he was like the executive director of like Democratic majority for Israel or something Yeah, I'm back spin-off. Yeah. Yeah, just incredible Well, let's maybe it's a good place to start actually Alex Israel or something. Yeah, backspin off. Yeah. Yeah, just incredible Well, let's maybe it's a good place to start actually Alex We wanted to have to have you on to talk about several things that are currently going on in the border region of the United States and also our neighbor to the south

As you were saying before we just got on every six years Mexico gets to slot in as the topic du jour And that is certainly the case right on cue right on cue There's recently been elections held in Mexico. There's also recently elections held in India And we can maybe even kind of compare the the reactions to those two elections here in America But there's there's some elections that just happened in Mexico and there has been predictably an outcry Against them I guess you could say so I guess like maybe maybe the best place to start is like who is this new person? coming in to replace Amlo and

And and why was her victory such an overwhelming? landslide even though like all the polls had Basically losing it was like it's too. It's too much democracy in Mexico. That's the Much yeah, it is interesting like so it is interesting to see this moment every six years from the US side, because in between those six years, we usually get that sepia filter movie filter, right, that about drugs and violence and the way that Americans tend to see Mexico is very restricted, right? It's very limited to certain topics. If it's not a beach resort, then it has something to do with drugs and violence and migrants, right? So, yeah, so there's too much democracy in Mexico. This president-elect, Claudia Sheinbaum, won last Sunday. I think she's at 60%, I think 61% of the vote. Her nearest rival, Xochitl Galvez, kind of the candidate for this freak political coalition

of former rivals that all just got together because they had nothing else, no other chance to win. She finished with under 30%. So this is like a blowout. This is a bigger blowout than what Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador won in 2018. Claudia Schoenbaum is an environmental scientist. She was part of a Nobel Prize winning climate study from a few years ago. Before she ran for president, she was the mayor of Mexico City. And she had interesting record as mayor of Mexico City that we can get into if you guys want. Before that, she was the mayor of a borough in Mexico City. In the 80s and early 90s she was a student activist, you know, standing up to the PRI, the political party that ruled Mexico from the 20s up until the year 2000. And she's been a, you know, she worked for Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador when he was

mayor of Mexico City in the early 2000s. She was a secretary of the environment. I can't remember exactly what her title was. So she's been a part of Lopez Obrador's political career for a long time, right? But she's also surprising to a lot of journalists that I've read in the US. She's her own person, right? She has her own talents.

She's very, she's brilliant, right? In terms of what she does, she's a good politician. She did some really interesting things when she was mayor of Mexico City. I think a lot of the reporting, particularly in the English speaking world, tends to reduce her to some sort of acolyte or appendage of Lopez Obrador, wherein, which I think is kind of like a message, misogynistic, right? She's not like a duplicate copy or servant or whatever of López Obrador. And there was the congressional elections, it was also overwhelming in the lower, Mexico has a two house, a two tiered congressional system, so they have their version of the House of Representatives, Morena, the party that that Lopez Obrador

and Claudia Sheenbun belonged to, they won them and their two other political parties that that form part of the coalition won a supermajority. In the Senate, they they're within like four or five seats of that supermajority. They didn't get quite get it. But they're probably gonna be able to pick off a senator here or there from the political opposition to be able to push through pretty ambitious political program that both AMLO presented last year and then Shane Baum modified it and presented it as her own political platform. Part of AMLO's political coalition is a labor party, a long existing labor party called the Partido del Trabajo and this really shady like a green party.

Like if there's one really bizarre political party, like if you really wanna do a deep dive into like Mexican politics to find like the freaks, go read about the green party. Like this political party, like I think was started in the late 90s by like rich Mexicans who were concerned about the environment, but they've been really good. They're like Ramuras, like they're really good at attaching themselves to whatever political

party has the power. And they're just totally like, just they're attracted to power. That's their ideology. And they'll just sell themselves out to whoever is in power. They're really problematic. There's some really problematic individuals within that party. But they've been a loyal member of the Morena coalition and they unbelievably are going to be one of the more powerful political forces, at least in Congress, which is really frightening to me. How problematic we talking now. It looks like they're getting some birth rates frequently or population control. No, no, no.

They're not that bad. I mean, they're not like American Greens. No, no, no, not necessarily. No, but they're just individuals within that party who are pretty problematic. Like one guy can remember his name, but he at one point was the mayor of Chiapas and Chiapas is a heavily indigenous state in southern Mexico. This dude is the whitest Mexican you're ever going to see, right? And you're like automatic. You're like, wait a minute, what is going on here? Like, yes, something suspicious going on. And then he would go and dress up. Like he would go to

communities and they would, he would like dress up in indigenous garb and like, and I think he was the one who was married to like a famous telenovela star. It was, or yeah, it's really bizarre. It's a really bizarre party that is, yeah, started by wealthy people who wanted to do weird environmental stuff and now they just attach themselves to whichever political coalition is in the ascendancy. What are some of the, this is a side tangent kind of, what are some of the environmental issues facing Mexico? What are some of the this is a side tangent kind of like what are some of the environmental issues?

Facing Mexico cuz like I mean it is an oil I mean there is oil there But I don't think as much as there once was right and then I think I saw something the other day that like Mexico City is On the verge of running out of water soon. Yeah, that's it's pretty apocalyptic I mean, I think they said the estimate is that Mexico City is gonna run out of water By like June 26 if they don't get rain. Mexico's been, Mexico's been suffering a pretty horrific drought for years now. And in the last two to three weeks, they've had this crazy heat dome that like won't leave.

So like you have instances of like howler monkeys in southern Mexico like dropping dead because it's too hot. Mexico City. So famously was a city built on top of a lake and the Spanish conquistadors and all their wisdom decided to drain most of it. And then the rulers in late 19th century Mexico decided to like drain even more of it. So Mexico City has. No, no, I just it's just it's just so interesting how this like, I guess, environmental racism, for lack of a better word, like it's not like people use it as if it's a newly developed term or concept. But this goes back like so far.

I mean, this is endemic to the history of this country, right? To settler colonialism, to racism, genocide, you know, all of that, man. Listen, Aaron, you would drain the lake too if you had to build, dude. You can't build on water. You can't build on water. Well, well, the Mexica or the Aztecs built a city of 200,000 people that floated on water. Well, I take that back. So you can not those guys, though, not those guys.

Yeah, yeah. Yeah. So it there's it gets a lot of its water from underground aquifers that are starting to run dry and it also has to import water from reservoirs outside of the valley of Mexico is like 7,000 to 8,000 feet up in the air, right? If you've ever been to Mexico City, greatest city in the world, I love it. If I got paid in dollars and lived there, that's where I would be right now, despite the horrific earthquakes. So they have the infrastructure that has been used for decades to bring water from outside of the valley is terrible.

It's not working, it's breaking down, and the reservoirs that it used to draw water from are practically empty. So I would say this, when people say like Mexico City is going to run out of water by the end of June, certain parts of Mexico City is going to run out of water by the end of June, it's certain parts of Mexico City are going to run out of water. And it's going to be the working class boroughs that are going to be the ones running out of water and the wealthier neighborhoods in the West and the Northwest, they'll continue to get water or they'll just have trucks bringing water to them. I want to talk a little bit about this article in the Atlantic I've mentioned to you and I know you've read it

but Reading it myself. I was kind of astonished at the the tone Generally, I've just been sort of astonished at the tone towards Mexico in the last I astonished at the tone towards Mexico in the last I don't know obviously in the last like since I've been alive right like since You know since I've been alive like since the 90s since the 2000s

but definitely in the last year as this has all been bundled together with what's going on in Israel and in Ukraine the The tone towards Mexico has become definitely more How shall I say like maybe pugilistic like definitely more aggressive? definitely more like They are out of control over there and someone needs to intervene The article I'm talking about is in the Atlantic. It was written by David Frum, never Trumper, David Frum, who, you know, coined the Axis of Evil speech. Strap in, boys. Going to the rubber room.

David Frum writes, President Joe Biden's next big foreign policy crisis was waiting for him at his desk this morning, a southern neighbor heading fast towards authoritarianism and instability. this is a this is this is written after a presidential election in which the winner won by a massive landslide and her predecessor also won by a massive landslide and one party ruled for 70 years in an authoritarian like arrangement the pre so like yeah, that's like I love people like you would call it go job as a dictator and so he's

democratically elected I don't know I mean also to you know in America here We have two geriatric candidates that nobody wants You know you know what I mean, and that we're being forced to vote and that's called democracy I I read this article just again as a side tangent There's an of fucking incredible article in Harper's called Masters of War by Thomas Meany where he went to the Munich conference this year, which is basically like a trade show for like all the various like Atlantis is military diplomats and leaders. And at the very end, it has a very funny image of JD Vance standing next to a Michael Jackson statue and like Scandinavian journalists calling him the Antichrist and

But like On this image of like an Applebaum being at yada, you know who an Applebaum is she writes for the Atlantic? Fortunately, yeah Yeah, do you know who an Applebaum is she writes for the Atlantic? Unfortunately, yeah, yeah like she was Talking to a diplomat. Let's see if I can find his name. She was talking to a diplomat Anton Hoff writer who said that like Europe could soon face three autocracies Russia China in the United States and it like totally fucked up an Applebaum She like she was like oh my god

You're so right like America is also heading for like authoritarianism But like any time like you frame it that way It's like you'd never get like David from and those people to see it that way You know what I'm saying like they they see it like us as a selective Authoritarianism when one guy's in office that they don't like, I know, I'm preaching to the choir here, but it is just an interesting thing that made me think of that. Also usually gets applied to certain,

the swarthy folks of the world too, right? Right, exactly, exactly. So it's a selective application of who's authoritarian, who's democratic. I mean, yeah, and I, David Fromm, man, like I'm obviously I'm abolished ice abolished Border Patrol But if there's one person I want deported like from the US is David from Deported into the sea brother

Where we're deporting him to the primordial ooze He's increasingly been, like in the last maybe three years, maybe even back to the beginning of the AMLO administration, 2018, 2019, like he's been writing a series of articles about Mexico. He's obsessed. And about AMLO. He is. And it's, there's one article that he wrote where he actually talked about who his quote

unquote Mexican sources are, and they're the members of the political and media opposition in Mexico right now just losing their fucking minds. Like they are, they've had a terrible last three, four days. And I've been loving watching it. Like I wish there's one, I think they're just like an online TV station called Atypical TV. And it's just basically like the richest people in Mexico who gripe about the country. It's like the most effective exercise in like consciousness rate awareness raising.

Like if you set like a working class person, tell them to watch these rich people bitch about Mexican democracy is going to radicalize the whole country. Yeah, the teens are are gonna come out. But David Fromm, yeah, he's got this, it's just, I don't know how to describe it. One, like in this article that you referenced, Terrence, like he gets basic, like historical facts wrong. Like he talks about the Mexican Revolution of 1913. I'm like, bro, just Google it.

Like, it's not that hard. It's 1910, not 1913. But it's, yeah, it's how to frame too much democracy as authoritarianism and how to scare gringos into thinking that they have an autocratic authoritarian government that's on the march south of the border. So on the one hand, I'm kind of,

I'm glad that he's writing about it because we actually need more attention in the US when it comes to Mexico and Latin America in general, like I think. But the way he does it is pretty awful. And it's kind of it's trying to forward a certain political agenda that is anti democratic that is authoritarian on its own terms, right? Because what he's doing is denying the democratic will of the masses who overwhelmingly have elected two members of the same political party, Morena, since 2018. But there's also a brought like a longer thing where, you know, I will say it, every like bold, progressive, radical leftist idea that we've seen in the last, let's say since the beginning of the 20th century, since the Mexican Revolution 1910, has not come from the U. man, it's come from Mexico and it's come from Latin

America. Right. Mexico had its first elected black president in like 1824. Holy shit. Like, in the like, come on, man, it's not even close. And now Mexico has his first elected woman president and first Jewish person president. Right. Like, so, but the American policy elites and so-called intellectuals see it in reverse,

right? Because of American exceptionalism, they say that the opposite, everything good, everything quote unquote advanced, everything progressive, actually comes out of the U.S. and then it's supposed to be spread and emanated to the people who need it. When in actuality, if you actually know your history, it's the other way around. And Mexico is one of these case studies. And I think it's, you know, I think, I guess, one of my missions, I guess, as a historian of Mexico and a person of Mexican descent is to to push that line, right? Like we have to understand this country that we share a 2000 mile border with in a way other than authoritarianism, other than drugs, other than narcos, other than spring break.

Because it's the single most important geopolitical issue of the US in the sense that what happens in Mexico has a very immediate, direct impact on the United States. This is what happens when your sources on Mexico are two native-born sons, George Romney and Brett Stevens. Louis CK is the third. I was Louis CK. I think he is also Mexican-born. There's also an editor of the Wall Street Journal, David Ludnow, who says he was, he's in his Twitter bio, it's like the opposite of a Chicano,

a gringo born in Mexico, born and raised in Mexico, who wants who became famous on Twitter because he was complaining that Amuro was increasing taxes and the violence was increasing on his second vacation home in Mexico. Wall Street Journal editor who works in Mexico and complains that his vacation home is Being attacked and taxed by the poor's I love it. It's perfect Well, you know, that's that's one of the greatest affronts on democracy ever, you know and freedom, you know When the vacation home is threatened when you're having your vocation vacation, but that's it. Yeah Yeah, well, I want to talk about some of the stuff that from like levels at

Amlo and about Shane Baum in this article, I mean Part of it. I mean he talks about like Omlo's record and we can talk about that because like I do want to know partially What it is that has made Marina so like popular right like it has made shine mom Shane bomb such an attractive candidate It's it's obvious that it's these progressive reforms that people like David Frum would hate. But why is it also being packaged with this scare, this specter of the cartels and the violence? Because David Frum doesn't give a fuck about the violence.

He talks about murder rates in Mexico, and it's like, and compared to America, it's like, dude, you don't give a fuck about like the he talks about like murder rates in Mexico and it's like doesn't care and compared to like America it's like dude you don't give a fuck so like do you really think they believe that shit that like I read that Osvaldo's a follow book about you know about drug cartels do not exist and it's basically it's kind of a fiction of the American imagination do you guys think that they that a guy like David from is just pushing that or do you think he's like a true believer that drug cartels exist as they're constituted in Breaking Bad and shit like that?

He's got to. Probably. He's probably got to. I mean, has this motherfucker even been to Mexico? You know? He goes to a very particular part of Mexico City. He goes to Polanco, which is like a very ritzy part. And he goes to. Yeah.

And he goes to the homes and of wealthy media figures and politicians, opposition politicians. That's what he talks to. Right. He's not he's not even doing like the Thomas Friedman, like getting in a taxicab talking to the driver. That would be exactly exactly. Imagine David from I would love to imagine David from in the Metro. So Mexico City has this amazing Metro system, right?

Like, I don't know, five million people a day use it. Like, it's an amazing, it's subsidized, it's cheap, everyone can afford it. It's got to be updated and modernized, but it's still like a very effective way of getting yourself around, particularly with like the horrible traffic that characterizes the city. I would love for David Fromm to spend a day in the Mexico City Metro and just riding around talking to people. Just, yeah, with pen and paper, just like,

on the beat, man. Yeah, I would love it. He'd be so scared, he'd be scared. He would be scared. Oh my God, he'd be, yeah. What is, like, what, I don't know how to answer this question because maybe it's packed into, maybe there's two ways to split this off. Why is he so obsessed with seeing Mexico in this very specific way? And like maybe a separate question is like how should we see it? Like why there is obvious violence here, right? Like there

is obvious like covert ops going on. There is like what you would consider some trafficking cartel activity going on, probably not in the way that like the Western imagination conceptualizes, but like how should we view it as opposed to like a guy like from views it? I mean, Mexico has the fortune and the of sharing a 2000 mile long border with the world's biggest narco state and the world's biggest arms state. I mean, I think, you know, this is one of the, if we start with the issue of like security, which was a huge issue in this election, right? I mean, Mexico has a national, right now it has a national homicide rate of like 23 to 25 per 100,000. It's during Amlo's six-year tenure had over 160,000 homicides, which is insane,

right? It's insane. He did manage to, it's over 30,000 homicides a year. Now his predecessor, I think 2017, 2018 might've been the highest. It was like 35 or between 35 and 37,000 homicides in one year. And I think halfway through Amlo's administration, it started to come down a little bit, but it's still above 30,000. It's a real issue. Like it's also localized in certain spaces, right? Like it's not the entire country. The entire country is not a failed state. Like from seeing, and a lot of people in the U S seem to explicitly or implicitly say it's not a narco state. You don't have narcos controlling the Mexican state. But that violence is localized in certain hotspots and it's horrible, man. And it's being driven by drug trafficking organizations that

began as moving weight into the United States because there's massive amounts of demand. And this has been the case for more than a hundred years like you have direct, I mean I I have a found a record from like 1809 of a Spanish colonial militia officer in Oaxaca who got busted for bringing an opium from from China or from India right this this issue of narco trafficking has existed for a long time and Particularly in relation to the US and Mexico since the early 20th century, it responds to US demand for these drugs and we see cycles of it, right? It'll be marijuana.

Marijuana got legalized, right? So there's no more market for that. So then it was meth and then heroin has gone through, I don't know how many cycles at this point. And then the emergence of synthetic opioids essentially ended the livelihoods of opium farmers in Mexico beginning 2016, 2017. And that's the biggest issue now. It's fentanyl, right?

But then they've also diversified their activities, right? So they're not just drug trafficking organizations. Now they control human smuggling. Now they control contraband, like copyright illegally, you know know contraband that violates like copyright infringement It's like like DVDs movies all that right? City Marvel movie or some shit like that Yeah, you can get you can get anything that's in the theater in Mexico City like on the street real cheap men That was the way I used to watch movies when I lived there, but

That was the way I used to watch movies when I lived there. But yeah, season 11. So and part of it in these groups in certain aspects have fragmented and become even more dangerous to deal with because for a long time, the strategy, the bi-national strategy between the US and Mexico was to go after the kingpins, right? But when you take out a kingpin, that just creates a power struggle within a particular organization. And many times those organizations will then split and then go their separate ways, but they're still going to fight for the same smuggling routes or the same drug producing routes or the same ports or the same drug markets within Mexico. So this drug, this approach to,

militarized approach to drugs that Mexico and the US have followed for decades creates more violence. Particularly when they're able to turn certain kingpence to snitch on their former rivals, within that creates levels of distrust and hatred and acts of revenge that then also heighten the violence. So that's a very real issue. It's not something that's made up by Netflix.

But again, we cannot just view it in a national context that's only particular to Mexico. These things are responding to transnational processes and drivers. And the two that I see is, again, US demand for drugs and the flooding of Mexico of US weapons since the end of drug control, gun control, sorry, in the 90s. And this is also not just particular to Mexico. Like Haiti is flooded with American weapons as well. And that's had a huge role in destabilizing that country. And then, well, we don't have to talk about that, but it creates the conditions and to justify certain forms of intervention.

So that's one of the big issues, I think, that is not treated in an honest way by people like David Frum. And it does have, and it impacts everyday people in the US and it impacts everyday people in Mexico. And as long as both countries don't find a way to collaborate on these issues in a productive progressive way, that deals with the structural causes and factors as opposed to just policing and militarizing everything that we're gonna continue to see what we see. Massive amounts of death in Mexico

and massive amounts of overdose in the United States. Yeah, and I think that like, I think it was like maybe like Peter Del Scott that said like there's three commodities globally that just like oil, guns, and drugs that like generally in the trading and movement of those commodities require massive amounts of like security

and who's going to, you know, and to do that, you have to be able to control local politics. And so who's on hand to do that? Well, usually it's US intelligence, covert ops, and anti-communist forces, and that kind of stuff. So it's like, I think we would, I mean, surely that's even partially what we talked about. Last time we had you on, we talked about Sicario, but it's even kind of partially partially what we talked about. Last time we had you on we talked about Sicario, but it's even kind of partially what that movie's about.

Weirdly enough, I think Taylor started it, man. He just swung and hit a foul ball and I had to get on base for something. With that one, I don't know. Yeah, he also had tunnels in that one. He did have tunnels in that one. Tunnels are a big thing right now. Yeah, and I think one of the things that Amlo tried to do, and will be interesting to see if

Shane Bomb continues, is Amlo, I mean, he kicked out the DEA. And he, in a way, he recognized the limits of this militaristic approach to drugs and the kingpin strategy. And he made the argument that the DEA was actually exacerbating the violence as opposed to ending it. So he kicked them out and the DEA hates his guts for that. Now, that being said, he campaigned saying that they were gonna end the militarization of that conflict and he campaigned on something called

abrazos no balazos, like hugs, not bullets. And they were gonna address the structural issues that push young men, particularly, to join these, to become the cannon fodder in these different drug trafficking organization wars. But by and large, he's continued the approach of his predecessors. And the Mexican military has become even more powerful. Now they're like operating ports, they're running airports, they're running the Maya train, this mega project that was developed in the Yucatan. And I think that's a real issue. That's a serious issue, more so for the people of Mexico than the people of the United States.

I think it's scary that he invited US special forces to come and train Mexican forces late last year. The very same US special forces unit that trained the group that and the Mexican Special Forces that that deserted and formed the set this cartel in the late 90s early 2000s. So it's so I'm like, that's not good. We shouldn't be doing that. Yeah, I know. Can I ask you a question?

What's like to expand on that a little bit? So what's the tension like between the military forces, the police, and this political party, Marana, because I mean, you know, if it's a progressive reformist party, I'm pretty sure that like, you know, the cops in the military are not, you know what I mean? They hate the fucking guts, you know what I mean? And maybe even don't want to see some of these reforms and these reforms go through. Yeah, that's a really good question. I mean, he, when Amno took office, he, I think he did believe that he was going to be able to implement

this different approach, this hugs not bullets approach. But in certain parts of the country, I think the thinking was, well, we still have to send the military in there to establish some sort of control. And then that'll set the scene for socioeconomic programs and social welfare programs that can help out the local communities so people don't turn to joining these groups. And then he also disbanded the federal police, which was like thoroughly corrupt, right?

Like thoroughly corrupt. The head of the federal police in the 2000s and 2010s, Genaro Garcia Luna, was on the take of the Sinaloa cartel the whole time. And he's actually, I think he's, I don't know, I can't remember if his court case ended or he's awaiting sentencing right now in New York. But once you go to these different localities

and you realize that political power is always in mesh, it's always a mesh of like local landed elites, local political elites, local narcos, local police, local military garrisons, it's a really thorny problem to deal with. And instead of trying to unpack that and disentangle that, that configuration of power at the local level, he continued to rely on the military.

And he's become very close with the generals, right? He's protected them from prosecution. He's protected them from researchers like me who are investigating the Mexican Dirty War of the 1970s. He's protected them from researchers like me who are investigating the Mexican dirty war the 1970s He's protected them from the lawyers and the investigators of who are following up on the 2014. I'll see Napa case were 43 male college students Trained to be teachers were disappeared So it's you know

It's I think one of the contradictions of his project That I think we continue we needictions of his project that I think we continue, we need to highlight also the fact that he's handed them control over mega projects like the Maya train, prevents them from any sort of, protects them from any sort of transparency because it's deemed a national security interest. And then that protects, that protects that project from, from transparency demands from whether it's media or from whether you miss from civil society.

But for me, it's like a really contradictory thing, but it's also not something that begins with AMLO. This militarization begins probably in the late 60s, or even before. The drug war in Mexico has been going since the end of World War II, but it really ramped up in the 1960s. So there's long historical antecedents to these processes. And that's going to be one of Shane Baum's challenges, right? Whether she's going to continue this cozy relationship with the Mexican military, will the Mexican military continue to

increase its economic and political power, or whether they will be, you know, disciplined in some sort of way. I don't know. It remains to me seen. I think that the image that you just painted, like the portrait that you just made, seems very much at odds with this statement from Frum's article, which as soon as I read it, like the kill Bill sirens went off. But he pointed to a statement made by Secretary of State Anthony Blinken last year

that the Mexican state is losing control of its national territory. And it feels like this is very much like the gist of his whole article, basically, that like Mexico has gotten out of control and it's losing control of its national territory, which is like, like I said, just like what you just said, it's not a state that's losing control of it. If anything, it's consolidating control of its national territory. Yeah, I mean, or maybe not. I don't know. What do you think? No, I think I mean, that argument of Mexico becoming a failed state goes back to like 2008, 2009, when like military officials in the US started to place Mexico alongside Pakistan as potentially failed states. Yeah. And that was a particular moment because then President Felipe Calderon,

he's the one who in 2006 orders the military out of the barracks and unleashes them on these different drug trafficking organizations. And that's when you see the homicide levels like skyrocket, because the military is not out there arresting people and then taking them to court. Like they're just taking their right. And everywhere the military gets sent into there's not a there's not a reduction of violence. There's an exacerbation of violence. So by 2008-2009, you had military officials writing like op-eds or writing little internal reports saying like,

is Mexico on the verge of becoming a failed state? It's kind of like Gordon Chang with China. Gordon Chang has been saying since like the 90s that China's on the verge of collapsing. I feel like this failed state argument with Mexico is one that is definitely going back to like 2008-2009. If we stretch it even more, this goes back to like this late 70s, early 80s, except the fear then was that Mexico was going to become another Iran. There was going to be another revolution in Mexico and that was going to affect US oil supply. Mexican ayatollahs. We need Mexican ayatollahs. That would be so sick. Well, that like Red Dawn is kind of is shaped by that moment, right? Where you have conservatives and neocons making that argument that, you know, Cuba, the Sandinistas in Nicaragua,

and the Soviets were going to invade the U.S. through Mexico. Right. But they needed Mexico to fall first. And if you watch Red Dawn, one of the title cards at the beginning is like, Mexico is plunged into revolution. And that's what allows the invasion of the US. And honestly, I think that's like a long standing fear of a lot of this political or media class in the United States. Right. Is this idea that it's, the one thing that I constantly come across reading these

op-eds throughout the 20th century is that the US-Mexico border is the US's Maginot line and if we're not careful, if we're not bolstering the border in a variety of different ways, then that's our soft underbelly and the US is gonna fall that way. Right, because elites in the United States, they see Mexico and Latin America as almost like this is in our backyard, you know, as if to denote some kind of property or ownership, you know what I mean? As if like this is our house and we can't have you guys fooling around and like um and um you know fucking up our interests, right? So I mean like that's that's like that's

the that's the prime reason why they're so concerned, but it's just interesting. You mentioned something earlier, Alex. It's always when the swarthiest of the people, right, who are deemed the ones that are not able to be in control of their own state or government, right? Yeah, that's another through line that goes back to the early 1800s with John Quincy Adams saying that democracy was more fit for the fishes than for Latin Americans, right? Like.

That is an insanely racist quote. Holy shit. I mean. Yeah. Go to like George Kennan. If you really want, see what George Kennan wrote about Latin America after World War II.

I mean, since the Soviet era. Cold War, yes. It's, and the racism's never quite gone away. I mean, that's why we have to step in. Well, that's always usually been like the pretense too, right, like security. Just how many times that's invoked to intervene in these various states.

Yeah, I mean, the other guy who, thanks to the technology of audio recording, Nixon, I mean, you should hear what Nixon says about the Latin Americans, right? He's like, you know, Latin Americans can't are incapable of democracy. They're good at autocracy, you know, but they're not good at democracy coming from Nixon of all people. Yeah. But he has a hierarchy, right? So he talks about Africa first, like, no, no shot. Africans have no shot at democracy or even governance. And then above that, he says, well, Latin Americans can do authoritarianism, but not democracy. And

this is something that you know, so. So I think that's a through line. I think that the racism, it's baked into the analytical and conceptual frameworks that people like David Frum used when they try to understand Mexico and Latin America. They also, another thing is they don't want to have to think about this region because as Aaron said, this is the backyard, although thank you, President Biden, he upgraded us to the front yard. So, but they don't- Seat at the table. Yeah. When you get shot, you get shot trying to come into the front yard, not to the backyard. But it's taken for granted that this is an American sphere of influence that should be

subject to US geopolitical interests. Therefore, we don't have to worry about thinking about this region. Let us go do what we do in the Middle East. Let us go do our pivot to China. But there should be no question that Latin America and the Caribbean obviously belong to the quote unquote backyard. And we don't want to even have to think about it. And they get really mad when they have to think about it, whether it was the pink tide in the early 2000s or whether it's now

two consecutive presidential elections in Mexico, where you have, let's say a progressive political party winning, overwhelmingly winning democratic elections to start to create some, recreate some form of a welfare state that may, or probably will, contradict with the economic and the geopolitical designs of the United States. Right, right.

You know, they've also just never forgiven Fidel Castro for getting an insane amount of pussy while thumbing his nose at the Empire. Leaving illegitimate kids like Trudeau up in Canada. Yeah, they've never forgiven that. I mean, they've never forgiven Haiti, man. Yeah, they've never forgiven. I think about that a lot, man.

I think about that a lot, man. I think about that a lot, you know? Yeah, they never and I think, you know, and again, it's it's this idea that the beacon, the city on the Shining Hill, the beacon of civilization is the US and Latin America is supposed to soak that up and learn from the US when the history actually bears a relationship in reverse. Right? If we talk about like the abolition of slavery, like the US US was third to last to get rid of it, man. They're on the other end when it comes to radical or progressive ideas, even though they want to think that they enshrine it. But yeah, I think it's in moments like

this during these elections in Mexico where you see some of the longstanding, polite racism that forms their conceptual and analytical frameworks, it comes out. And when we see a democratic process for them for people like from it's like, no, no, that's authoritarianism. That's bad. I know this is probably a broad question there. But, um, you know, we're talking about Miranda's this progressive performance party. What, like, what kinds of, I guess, attempts are they going to make to sort of, I guess, get themselves get Mexico out of this sort of neoliberal machine, you know, that it's been in for the past, and I guess all of Latin America, the Caribbean for the past, like

how many of her years, like what steps is is is is shine bomb going to take to kind of remove Mexico from that? You know, I mean, that's I don't think it's possible, honestly. I mean, even though like even though Amlo famously declared the death of neoliberalism, it's obviously alive and well. And this is a point of contention within the Mexican left in terms of how to categorize a morena's economic platform. Is it actually anti neoliberal something on the left? Or is it just like, you know, Mexican capitalism with a human face? And I think it's, I would probably fall, you know, totally just weasely

and weasely fashion, like somewhere in the middle, probably. Right. Because one of the reasons that Morena has become so popular is because they have managed to make an immediate economic impact in the everyday lives of the vast majority of working Mexicans. So they did, I'm not did things like, you know, I think that triple the minimum wage it had, it had the minimum wage in Mexico had lost power from like the late seventies, all throughout the neoliberal era,

up until they took power in 2016, 2017. So immediately, right? People who are working for a minimum wage in Mexico see an immediate improvement of their economic livelihood. They also did things like they banned subcontracting. So now workers who were forced to be really in an informal subcontracting. So now workers who were forced to be really in an informal subcontracting role, now the end of that allows them to be formal workers

and that entitles them to all sorts of social security and welfare programs from the state. There's been a reduction in extreme poverty. There's been an increase in wages. There's been all this within the context of zero to maybe zero to minimal economic growth, particularly because of COVID. So there's been there's these immensely popular cash transfer programs where, you know, something like seven or every seven or eight, seven or eight of 10

Mexican families are somehow benefit from one of these cash transfer programs. Again, though, this is one of these things being debated within the Mexican left one of these cash transfer programs. Again, though, this is one of these things being debated within the Mexican left, whether these cash transfer programs are neoliberal, or whether they harken back to a more developmentalist 20th century model of social warfare. Whatever it is, people like my elderly family in Michoacán, they like those. They like getting that cash, man. And so again, they made an immediate, important, drastic improvement in the quality of life for the vast majority of Mexicans that had been discarded or disregarded at least since the 1990s, probably before and during the

1980s during that last decade of neoliberal austerity. And the other, you know, so these economic policies have made an impact. Now, is that neoliberal or is that it's definitely not socialist? It might be considered social democratic. I think the other issue that might lead to that kind of elicits this discussion is what to do with energy sovereignty. So both AMLO and President-elect Sheinbaum talk a lot about energy sovereignty. But this is in the context, again, of Mexican oil production has been declining for decades now.

Pemex, a state oil company, is losing money right there and investing tons of cash into it and not getting much for it in return. So one of my hopes is that Sheinbaum as a climate, as an environmental scientist, kind of builds on AMLO's nationalization of lithium and starts to think about energy sovereignty, not in relation to things like oil, but in renewables. But to do it within the context of a nationalized framework where the benefits go to the vast majority of Mexicans and not to some private transnational company

that is in there to make a profit, not to provide clean, renewable, and cheap energy for everyday Mexicans. So it's an open question, man. This is a really contentious point of debate within the Mexican left in terms of where on the political spectrum Morena's political, economic, and social project exists. And for me, it's,

project exists. And for me, based on what Shane Baum said in her inauguration speech, she says that she's looking forward to things like energy sovereignty, the revitalization of a welfare state. I mean, so this hints at a more progressive, maybe social democratic approach to some of the most pressing issues. But there's, of course, there's a ton of contradictions, right? Amlo has got really chummy with most of the wealthiest men in Mexico, like Carlos Slim. So maybe he has this idea, like old mid 20th century idea that he can work with the nationalistic progressive bourgeoisie of Mexico. Right, the economic royalists, right? Yeah. Yeah.

So I mean, I think that's like a, he might have that idea and I wouldn't be surprised. It's been a constant in parts of the Mexican left throughout the 20th century, but there are definitely contradictions, right? And the militarization aspect, the one that we talked about is one. And another one that we can talk about is his approach to migration. And that's another thing that I'm hoping that Shane Baum kind of changes tack on, but we'll see. Well, I mean, I'm glad you brought that up because it's another reason why I wanted to

have you on this week because this week Biden has released his long awaited, what would you call it, executive order on the border that allows him to essentially shut down parts of the border whenever a certain amount of asylum seekers have passed through the border. I just need to point out that this policy is essentially to the right of anything Trump was doing. But I also need to just contrast it with several previous statements that Biden has made in the past. For example, November 22, 2019, Joe Biden said,

"'This election is about who we are and who we want to be. "'I believe we are a nation that welcomes "'those fleeing persecution and seeking asylum seeking asylum not a nation that turns her back on them He then he also said we must take urgent action to end Donald Trump's draconian Immigration policies in my first hundred days. We will end his inhumane asylum policy You see you know Terrence he had he had at least a billion more neurons then He had at least a billion more neurons then at least

Like his brain wasn't yet like it was becoming aged tapioca, but now it's just swishing around his skull You know what I'm saying? Yeah I mean It's it's interesting that like if you read between the lines and I can't remember maybe from actually explicitly says it but another reason why David from doesn't like omlo is Because omla has signaled that he likes working with Trump more than he likes working with Biden And I I don't know what to really make of that I mean who knows but Trump from obviously hates Trump and it's a big part of the impetus here but it definitely seems that

the Democrats and we've been saying this for months have co-opted some very interesting planks of the MAGA political world co-opted it went above and beyond Yeah, I'll see and raise you Yeah, I mean What I guess what are we to make of this I saw one of your tweets Alex you Had one of my favorite clips of scarface when they're like talking on the phone like organized crime like talking about Biden's new border patrol Policy, and they're just like yes like the money printer is fucking

running man like i mean but like what are we truly like what are we to make of this um Biden's new uh platform on the border is it a pivot is it something new um yeah i don't know what are we to make of it this is a long-standing democratic tradition of when they get into trouble domestically, they attack migrants. I mean, it's happened at least since, let's say, since Clinton, right? It's part of that triangulation, right? So the Republicans will play up this issue that we're being invaded by, you know, you can imagine, I'm not going to use your language, but we're being invaded by undocumented peoples, and American people

demand border security. And the Democrats, instead of offering like a radically different, more actual, factual approach or counter argument, they accept the premises and the terrain on which that debate, that argument is being made by the Republicans. So they'll start to talk about things like border security. And this has happened. I know it's like the annoying historian thing to be like, well, there's a long story behind

this. But like this has happened before. It's just right now, it's, I think, based on the way that Democrats behave during the Trump administration, right, like going to cages and crying and taking pictures of themselves crying and tweeting about, you know, Kamala Harris tweeting about no one is illegal, no human is illegal. And then when she assumes power, she goes to Guatemala and says, like, do not come. Right. Or it literally do not come.

Something like that, too. Didn't she like go with like the like the pristine white like pants That's the way Holding the chain link fence and she's like crying Or you know and then Kamala right like she's got like immigrant right links Majorca's like the DHS guy. He's like Cuban like kid of Cuban exiles man man. He's out there telling people, do not come. So it's really, it's just the switch again, it's so obvious and it's so Trumpian, right?

Once again, this is just one more issue where there is no daylight between these two parties. It's exactly the same thing that he's using. Biden's using the same legal authority to quote unquote shut down the border that Trump did when he shut down the border or when he did the Muslim ban. Like they're using the same laws, the same logic, the same reasoning.

It's just the Democrats sometimes use nicer language and they will still pay homage in a really Like just cynical way to that. We are a nation of immigrants, but not the ones of today Well, I mean the ones from like decades ago They would be the perfect this is something that we've talked about when it comes to to Palestine But they would be the ones to carry out these draconian Immigration policies because like you said they can do it with a nice face right? They're Democrats, they're not Republicans you know.

They believe that no one is illegal. So the foil blankets you know that migrants get are just going to be a little bit nicer you know what I mean? Yeah. You know what I mean? Yeah yeah all those yard signs that says in this house we believe those things are like they're in the garage right now. They've been taken out by now. They're gone.

And now it's interesting, man. It's just seeing like, you know, Democrats, like so-called liberal Democrats posting like crazy anti-immigrant shit, right? And again, they don't learn the lesson. You cannot use the same premises and the same logics and arguments that the Republicans do. What you're supposed to do is advocate for something different. And that's how you create political coalitions and majorities around this issue. But instead, you're just giving them the same thing that the Republicans are

saying just in a lighter version, rhetorically, but materially, it's the exact same thing. And Clinton did that shit. Obama did that shit. And now Biden's doing it. There's a reason why, like, Obama's at the border in chief. Right. Like they've all done this. And now what is Biden going to be remembered for? Closing the border, right.

Border Biden. So it's instead of being out front and there are members like I will be I'll give credit to someone like Julian Castro, like Julian Castro and certain members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus have come out really strongly against this. And I think they offer a different way out of this conundrum for Biden. But at this point, they're so freaked out about their polling that they're just gonna and because of Palestine and because of other issues that they're just gonna go, they're gonna just're going to just press the pedal and keep going with this shit. We've talked about it before, but it really does seem like this issue is like kind of the lifeblood of this country, especially when it comes down to an election, because it's almost like they have to reassure white people and Americans, right? And they're quote Americans, right? They're never talking about like immigrants who actually live here, black and brown people, but it's to reassure them that, okay, we're stopping the hordes at the gate, right? We can all unite and unify, right? Around this one issue because it's a matter of existentialism. You know what I mean? And it's just, I mean, like you said, just the way that they flip immediately, people that were a couple of years ago crying about kids in cages that are now

a threatening, threatening immigrants and saying well if you don't or saying to the left at least or progressives that well if you don't vote for Joe Biden then then what is Trump going to do to all these migrants you know what I mean and this is happening right fucking now you know so even in a hypothetical right even in a hypothetical, right? Even in a hypothetical, right? Migrants are used as like kind of like a cudgel, you know? Almost like a human shield. Yeah, like a human shield. Exactly. Yeah, like, you know, it's just the same people who during Trump finally watched Alfonso Cuarón's

Children of Men and they're like, horrified, this is Trump. And now they're advocating, like, that's why I keep referring to that that bill as a children of men I know because like they're doing the same thing now like they're in and why because they're freaked out about an election I mean, that's the crits. It's it's really it's it's upsetting man. Like it's it's it's They it's acne You know loony-toot shit. They fall for the same trick every time they were like on the third or fourth iteration of it now They just turn up the racism bill the racism, you know button man the dial, you know, I mean Well, what's crazy about it though is it's on even more like decayed and degenerated

assumptions than the previous iterations because The reason they feel so threatened and vulnerable in the election is because they are presiding over a genocide and they know it, but they can't, they either can't or won't or whatever, do anything to maneuver their way out of it. And not only that, but the guy that would theoretically be able to get them out, he's in the pages of Time this week saying Hamas could end this tomorrow Hamas could say Unintelligible and done period and but and the last offer Israel made was generous in terms of I don't Anyway, can I just say something real quick dog? Can I tell you how how how insane this country is or the media classes? I mean the entire country

But when somebody says something that you don't understand and you're interviewing them what you usually do is ask them to fucking repeat themselves bro if this is such an important issue but because this is a foregone conclusion it doesn't matter what the fuck he says he could read off in the back of a bubblegum rapper dog and it would be fine if they would print that shit you know I'm saying so what kind of fucking democracy is it when you can't challenge the king right there that that whole article I don't know if you guys read this I couldn't read it dude I felt like I was like like it was hard to read that shit it's incoherent in a way that's like I

mean I don't know there's so many different things he says like when he talks about like Macron's brain drain thing like he's I don't know if you guys like say there's like so many weird tangents it's like it what it is it's a fascinating like anatomy of how a degenerating brain functions because you can see that he grabs phrases and words and stuff from his environment and then just tries to like pack it all in like water to see dog it's like trying to hold water. He was also like really ornery, right? Like he was like, to go back to Tony Montana,

he was like, I built this, you know? Like he was like, I don't get credit for this. I did this, I did this. And then it'll be like in parentheses, unintelligible. That happened like a couple of times. It's like, what are you saying? Oh yeah, it was weird. It was hard to read. It was, the whole thing he was trying to distinguish between like values based and practical base

policy was like just, yeah, yeah, I don't, and now he can't find a chair to sit in. Like, is it, it's weird, you know, it's, yeah, it's just, we still have, you know, 800 military bases around the world, but like it's there's there's a decline going on. And yeah, it's embodied in him. It's embodied in Trump. It's embodied against that other guy who's got brain worms. It's like the perfect comment, man. And and this is why I get mad at David from when he's talking shit about the Mexican elections

where you had, you know, two women running and a guy in his thirties. Right. Right. Like we have we have two guys over 80s and one who's a convicted felon now. So it's like one guy who's committing crimes against humanity. Right. One guy who has a worm in his brain. One guy who's got a worm in his fucking brain. Really cool falconry contest though.

I almost wanted to apply just to see if I win a day of falconry with He does falconry you didn't see that no, that's actually He's he's a fucking rapscallion he's like, you know what I mean, he's swashbuckler swashbuckler a swashbuckler Politics strange. It's I guess where I'm going with all that It's like I guess I find it what I find so interesting about it and they even mention it in that Harper's article that I Mentioned earlier we're at there at this Munich conference and all these there's a very there's a very fascinating irony going on because

there's a very fascinating irony going on because For the past 40 years 50 years 60 years really since the end of World War two the atlantisist ideology has basically been like America runs the show We're gonna build Germany up through Light manufacturing, but they can't rear or anything like that But they're going to be the fiscal backstop of Europe What that meant in the context of the ukraine-russia war was like all right you all got to fucking get in line Germany says it's gonna be energy independent on Russia energy, but like no more. It's gonna buy American energy and You are out of your mind if you think you can rear the rest of Europe

Basically they go to these conferences and they say you have to pay your fair share to Ukraine so that it can fight Russia But we can't do that anymore because the border we can't because what's going on at the border and so you get this like fascinating examination of how America's kind of spread thin but like not really like it does Janet Yellen is correct Like we do have the quote-unquote money for two three four wars, but like Ideologically and karmically we just don't he going on Extended we're over Yes, and so and you see that like you see those

Constraints coming in into tension with each other in this very fascinating way that you mentioned it earlier, like if you've got like Red Dawn and like the fear is that like, oh, Soviet Union's invading through Mexico well now we have this weird degraded version of that where we're fighting like these residual battles left over from the the end of the Cold War and it comes into conflict with our you know like border policy that like it's it's it's like it's like Red Dawn recapitulated but like I said on extremely degenerated well wasn't wasn't there wasn't there that that shit going around about Hamas Hamas fighters

coming through tunnels in Mexico that the cartel had using shit like that coming across the border Watch the first two minutes of Sicario 2 Blows himself up. Yeah Like Lubbock, Texas. Yeah Repping the prophet Taylor Sheridan foretold all this that's a terrible movie Know what Tom like references while those have Sabala this book this is a scholar The cartels do not exist. He just published a really good article in Baffler in these times where he talks about these we talked about tunnels and this argument that was made like in the late 2000s

That the Mexican narcos had learned tunnel technology from Hamas. Oh my god. And Hezbollah and that they had been they had sent militants to Mexico to teach them how to do tunnels. That's a perfect union. That's a perfect holy union of both of their deranged fears, right? Well, it's also just emblematic that the fruit of Islam still exists in the Latin world vis-a-vis the Moors, you know. Alan DeLuz lives, man. Yeah, that's right. They're going to win the Battle of Covalonga this time.

That's right. Also remember the border bill, the way they kept presenting it in Congress was to link Israel, Ukraine and the border. And I thought that was really illustrative. It really, I think, showed everyday Americans what was at stake and hopefully to get them to think about why these three things were linked just beyond like legislative budgetary procedures. Because I think the Biden people all saw them as interconnected and linked.

I think it's obvious and that's the way they've acted. But the thing about Biden with the shutting down the border is that usually what Democrats do is that they on the one, it's like the carrot and the stick, they'll say, OK, the stick, we're going to do border enforcement. We're going to like build more, you know, walls on the border made out of helicopter landing pads used in Vietnam like Clinton did or Obama did like the Dreamer Act at the same time that he deported three million people.

Biden is not offering the carrot. Right. Biden is just offering we're shutting down the border. We are violating American law on asylum and we're violating international law on asylum. So you have this internal contradiction where they're going against their own laws to do what? To implement a policy that one, according to most expert is impractical. They can't do it. You can't shut down the border. What you're going to do is you're going to make you're actually gonna create more undocumented migration because people still wanna come. And if you're shutting down legal avenues for that,

then people are going to find a way to come illegally. And who loves that? Well, that was the tweet that you mentioned, Terrence. The people who, the criminal organizations who control the smuggling, they're gonna love that. They're gonna make more money. They can charge more money. And they're the ones who are gonna profit off of this

It's a similar dynamic also with drugs with drug prohibition, right? Like you you you make these things these commodities illegal Well, the people who benefit from that then are the people who are smuggling them in right? They can charge more and they're still making a ton of money off of it. I think you hit on something that's very interesting, which is that the Democrats have stopped offering the carrot. In the few instances that they have, like in Gaza, the pier, it's fucking just detached and floated off into the ocean. It's just like they-

Yeah, soggy ass baby care is what they offer, bro. They soggy ass baby care. It's so fucking sad. They're just like, I don't know. I hate to even laugh Did you guys see the Department of Defense tweet today though? They were bragging about how the pier was going to actually result in cost savings dude I read it and I'm like this cannot be the official Department of Defense account and I clicked on it. Nope

Sure enough. It was the actual Department of Defense account. What's crazy is all these things just keep in that time interview Biden said two insane things first of all Hamas can just end this tomorrow if they unintelligible, which is like, okay Okay, that's you talking about? There's no answer there. Okay, that's insane. Second of all, he literally said in an interview, the United States does not recognize the International Criminal Court. Like that's, I mean, like, yes, we all know that. That sounds like something Trump would say, bro.

You know what I mean? Like that literally sounds like something that he would say. Well, I think he got the name of Claudia shame shame bomb right when he called her though at least he didn't call like call like president Alcisi or something that was bit is your boo toe my old friend is here but is your boot oh she's back president Godawfi is Yeah, but we're going to see, you know, the reason why we've had rap, like drastically reduced what they call encounters of migrants at the at the US Mexico border is because Mexico is doing the dirty work of the US and the past three, four months, right? So they've

been using their National Guard that was established by AmLO to essentially play a migratory police. And they're not allowing migrants to get to the US-Mexico border. They're using checkpoints, they're using raids, and they're kind of keeping them away. They're doing the bidding of Biden, which is what AMLO also did with Trump. They had some sort of informal arrangement

to control migratory flows. And as long as AMLO did that, then Trump would try not to interfere with internal affairs. I think that's the same arrangement that Biden had with Amlo. And we'll see if it continues with Shane Baum. I hope, I mean, she has a different political style. She has a different outlook on some of these things. And I hope that's another thing, in addition to energy and the environment. I hope she provides a rethinking of this policy because the US empire generates all of its own contradictions and one of its own big contradictions, its migrants and asylum

seekers, right? Like these people are coming mostly from Haiti, from Cuba, from Venezuela. Cuba and Venezuela are under horrific sanctions. So what are people going to do? Where are they going to flee? Where are they going to flee? Where are they going to come to? To the United States, the place that generated the misery that denied them of the right to stay home.

Because that's another thing. It's not just that refugees have a right to stay here, to come here. They do, according to U.S. law and international law. But what U.S. empire has always violated in the Caribbean and Latin America is people's right to stay home. People don't want to leave their homes in their communities. They do it out of necessity. Right.

So as long as Americans, both political parties act like these migrants miraculously appear into existence on the U S Mexico border, then we're going to have, we're going to see a replay of this bullshit over and over again, instead of thinking about how U S empire in Latin America and the Caribbean is generating the very people that they don't want to come to this country. Right, and you know what? Last thing I'll say too, I'm thinking,

I think a lot about climate change, right? And people having to leave, right? And the fact that the United States, as like the largest, one of the largest exp largest exporters right of all this fucking filth man And forcing people to leave their homes, right and then being told that they're not allowed in right, you know It's just you know, a lot of the times I just think about like, you know Not even to be funny really but just a situation in which there are climate refugees trying to leave the United States You know in trying to go to countries that they've, you know, that they've essentially

Isn't it true that more people are trying to get into Mexico than the other way around? I think I'm not sure. I did see that AMLO like kicked out a bunch of Americans because they didn't have papers last week or two weeks ago. I know. But there's, there's, there's a how the tables have turned. Yeah. What is that movie, apocalyptic movie where there's climate change and Americans have to go into Mexico and Mexico doesn't let them in. The day after tomorrow. The day after tomorrow. Yeah. Yeah.

I watched that movie on a bus in Mitrocan in December when a lot of migrants from the U.S. go to Mexico to celebrate Christmas, the holidays. And when that scene flashed up on the bus TV screen, man, the clapping, the whole bus. Yeah, yeah, it's our turn now. But yeah, Aaron, the climate, this is the most, according to a lot of experts, we're in a moment of, in modern history, this is the most mass movement and mass displacement that we've seen. And obviously a lot of it has to do with climate change. So how are our global North countries going to react? And we're really at one of these socialism or barbarism moments. And we see this being played out, whether it's the Mediterranean

Sea, whether it's the US-Mexico border, we're seeing this play out and the barbaric, you know, the barbaric elites seem to be winning, right? And this is why the president of Colombia, Pet Gustavo Petro keeps making that link between climate catastrophe and climate induced movement with what's being done to Palestinians in Gaza. Like he sees it as same as he sees Gaza dress rehearsal for the future. Right. And he says, you know, and he has this line where he says it's because because middle class Americans and Europeans have allowed Nazis into their

homes and now they're acting like Nazis when it comes to dealing with migrants and refugees. And so I think this is going to be. It's going to be one of the main struggles that we'll see in the upcoming decades. Right. And what Biden just announced is it's it's not going to be one of the main struggles that we'll see in the upcoming decades. What Biden just announced is it's not going to work. What it will do is increase the barbarism, the brutalization, and the type of brutality that's become normalized against migrants or even called for by certain segments of the American population.

Yeah. Well, I think that's a good spot to end it. called for by certain segments of the American population. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I think that's a good spot to end it. I think that in many ways, it is a supplement to the previous time we had you on. I feel like these were the themes we were definitely working towards. That's on our Patreon.

If people would like to go check that out, we encourage you to go check that out. That was from like February or Of this year. It's when we had you on Alex. Yeah something like it was earlier this year So, um, but I like the title you guys came up with I like it. What was the title? Is the gringo heart of darkness Yeah, that was a lot from Alex. That was great. That was a great title.

I laughed when I saw that. That was so good. We did go there. So please go check that out on our Patreon. Alex, do you have anything you want to plug? If people would like to find you, find your writing or anything, please tell us how to do that. Yeah, I'm on Twitter, X, whatever it's called, Alexander underscore Avina. I'm working on an article for foreign exchanges now talking about Mexico and the Mexican elections

and what we can expect or look forward to. I kind of, you know, practice some of my ideas on you guys today in terms of what I ideally what I would love President Schoenbaum to do when she assumes office in October of later this year. But she's got this, you know, she's got a huge democratic mandate and we'll see what she does with it. The final thing I mentioned, I forgot to mention, is I hope she takes more of a stand on what's going on in Palestine. AMLO has maintained a stance of neutrality while calling for a ceasefire and peace. And Mexico did join the ICJ case on the side of South Africa, but it would be really powerful, right? Because she is a secular Jew who has in the past made

some comments supportive of the right of Palestine to self-determination, right? So it'll be interesting to see what kind of stance she takes on that. So it'll be interesting to see what kind of stance she takes on that. Absolutely. We'll be on the lookout for all that. Go check out Alex on Twitter. And we'll have to have you back on pretty soon again. Anytime man, this was fun.

Thanks a lot, anytime. Thanks again Alex. We'll see you next time. Thanks. The So Thank you.