Find a comfy chair or get ready for that drive...this is a long one! Today we have Geoff Baker and Catalina Lobo-Gerrero to discuss the complex subject of Venezuela and it's "El Sistema." If you remember my episode demystifying Cuban propaganda, you will know I have a deep suspicion of programs that emerge from undemocratic regimes.

Catalina, a prominent journalist and author of Los Restos de la Revolución, will be our guide to understanding the context of Venezuela's political disaster and why it is a failed state generating more refugees than Syria. This one-hour political primer will set the stage for my conversation about "El Sistema" with Geoff Baker.

Geoff is a phenomenal musicologist and the author of El Sistema: Orchestrating Venezuela's Youth, which documents the problematic political and philosophical nature of El Sistema as an engine of social change.

Hope you enjoy this long episode, the juice IS worth the squeeze!