Friday Night Comedy from BBC Radio 4 - The News Quiz - Friday 2nd October 2020

Episode Date: October 2, 2020

A satirical review of the week's news with Andy Zaltzman and guests Simon Evans, Jena Friedman, Mark Nelson and Zoe Lyons.It's been a big week for America - even before the Trumps tested positive - and Britain has been doing its best to keep up in the highly satirisable news stakes too.Written by Andy Zaltzman with additional material from Simon Alcock, Max Davis, Alice Fraser, Natasha Mwansa and Mike Shephard.Producer: Richard Morris A BBC Studios Production

This is the BBC. This podcast is supported by advertising outside the UK. BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Hello, I am Andy Zaltzman and you are about to listen to the News Quiz. We recorded this show before the news broke that Donald Trump had tested positive for Covid-19. We actually record these shows 12 months in advance and usually the BBC's News This Time Next Year predicting megacomputer is incredibly accurate,

but it did miss this story by a few hours. We hope that the president not only recovers, but also gets considerably better in general. On with this week's news quiz. On with this week's news quiz. Yes, those people you can hear there are our online live audience joining us from the comfort of their own homes and or castles via the pimped-up yoghurt pots and supertech string that is the internet. And what a clash they will be audiencing this week.

Is that a verb? Yes, it is. There's nothing that cannot be verbed these days. What a clash they will be audiencing this week. Is that a verb? Yes, there's nothing that cannot be verbed these days. What a clash this week. We have Team Shut Up against Team Shut Down and on Team Shut Up we have Jenna Friedman and Simon Evans. And

lining up against Team Shut Up we have Team Shut Down, Mark Nelson and Zoe Lyons. Right, it's time for question one, and don't worry, I'm not expecting anyone on the panel to get any questions right this week. This is the BBC. I'm just going to try and trick them into getting the answers wrong with a classic BBC ruse,

asking them questions to which they should obviously know the answers. That kind of gotcha trap that ministers so often fall into. Question one. Our first question this week is to Team Shut Up, to Jenna and Simon. And the question is this. Imagine that American democracy is a dog. A. What is the state of health of that dog? And B. What is the condition of the carpet it has been lying on?

Simon, take it away. Wow. If it were a dog, I guess I'm thinking it might be a labradoodle because I think it's going to be a brief trend. It's unstable. It's unsustainable. It's insupportable. Because despite looking like it might be a fun

and entertaining idea, it turns out to be extraordinarily unpredictable. And on the other hand, the state of the carpet, of course, with the Labradoodle is generally pretty good, isn't it? That's why people like them, because they don't molt. I'll tell you what else doesn't molt, incidentally. A nice Bang & Olufsen stereo doesn't molt for about the price of a Labradoodle, but that's another matter. Part of the house train, then. Yeah, definitely. I mean, people have been talking down American democracy for a very long time now,

in a very slightly serious mode. I have a book called Amusing Ourselves to Death by Neil Postman, a sort of linguistic scholar and media expert, who wrote that in 1985, basically saying that the American political experiment had come to an end because we now had a Hollywood actor in the office, Ronald Reagan, who everyone felt was basically the end of the road. You look back now and Reagan shines like a sort of 20th century Lincoln, doesn't he, by comparison. He's a sort of marble edifice of propriety, nobility and intellectual heavyweight, you know, for the ages. But despite all that, you know, this is what you get.

If you want for universal suffrage, then, you know, the lowest common denominator is going to gradually descend. If you want Lincoln-Douglas standard debates, then you've got to keep the vote, you know, restricted to the properted classes. So you've got to decide sooner or later how you want your country run, America. I'm sorry, you can't have it both ways. If you want people who go and watch monster truck rallies at the weekend to also have a vote, this is what you're going to get. So Jenna, we had the first debate this week. You are joining us from Los Angeles today. How did you enjoy it, if that's the right term, over there as an American?

Thank you for calling it a debate. Right. How would you describe it? It was like a fever dream of just, like, slipping into fascism. And there was one clear winner. That was Russia. But I think, I mean, so actually the Presidential Debate Commission is now retooling their rules to accommodate a man who does not know how to, like he has no impulse control. And I just think it would be so much, such a more quick fix if we just took away the nuclear codes.

Because that's the thing that really, I'm trying to laugh as I'm shaking. Because that's the thing that really... I'm trying to laugh as I'm shaking. I'm shaking at the fact that someone who can't even restrain himself from interrupting a man who clearly only has three years left. Mark, I was Scotland presumably looking at maybe taking over the USA when it goes independent from the UK. How did you enjoy the debate? I thought it was entertaining,

very entertaining to watch two old white men discussing racial equality. And genuine, like incredible. When you kind of watch it from this country and you realise that of a size of America, that's the two best people that they can find. Like that's their two... It'd be like next year at our elections if we put up groundskeeper Willie against the Crankies.

Well, the Crankies are the incumbent at the moment. Yes. But like Jenna was saying, the age, the age of... So you had Chris Wallace, who was 72. He was the spring chicken of the whole operation uh joe biden 77 and donald trump late 70s well basically all of them have a combined age of one rolling stone just to give it some perspective zoe trump was heavily criticized for failing to condemn white supremacists.

Have you ever been in a situation where you've been asked to condemn white supremacists and have elected not to? I mean, every day, Andy. It's just an everyday thing for me. I'm like, you know, stand back and stand by, Proud Boys, is my motto. I've got T-shirts with it on, I've got a mug with it on. But, I mean, I don't even know who the Proud Boys are, it's just something I say. He did later come out and say he didn't know who the Proud Boys are. He's like, maybe you should just...

Maybe a bit like Ronan Keating, Donald Trump, you just say it better when you say nothing at all. Like Mark said, this is the debate of two men who are going for the most powerful job in the world, a presidential debate. It looked more like a sort of poor episode of Judge Judy with two old duffers who were slightly drunk on supermarket-bought beer fighting over who owns the hedge that divides their property.

It was just... There is something wrong with having people of that age. And obviously, Trump got the job. But you think the Democrats have had four years to find the best possible candidate with which to expose his complete inappropriate, every fault that he has, every catastrophe for which he's been responsible, every degree to which he has debased and ignobled the presidency they've had four years three and a half of which they've spent trying to pursue russiagate and then have basically gone what about that guy who was vp last time he's 78 in november youtube is full of videos of 78 year olds that have learned to line dance and they're popular because it's heartwarming to see people at that point of life, you know, taking on a new challenge.

You look like a man who was pleading Donald Trump not to trash his legacy, not a candidate to take it up from that point onwards. I think the reality is if the Democrats can't find a better avatar for their proposals, for their policies, for their initiatives than Joe Biden, they should literally create an avatar and like an artificial reality, you know, a cinematic creation, a CGI model of an ideal candidate who could be just like roughly the age Jack Kennedy was, you know, clean cut. And they could just stand there and somehow or maybe like the sun in the T Jack Kennedy was, you know, clean cut. And they could just stand

there and somehow, or maybe like the sun in the Teletubbies, you know, just that beaming sort of baby face could just float in the sky and communicate ideas about how to reduce the deficit. In the Democrats' defense, it might be the only way we'll get a female president in 2023 it's called grandfathering her in very true yes i think that is exactly what's happening and we will then have a kamala and a camilla which will be quite interesting so you know i found out this week uh because i've never really heard proud boys do you know what they're named after it's from a song in the disney musical aladdin that is what they're named after i got you a song in the disney musical aladdin that is what they're named after i catch it like because i was sitting there thinking there are far more racist disney

films that you could have picked a song from biden described trump's performance in the debate as quotes a wake-up call to all Americans, which does slightly raise the question, how has anyone slept through the last four years? It's like not noticing Led Zeppelin doing a gig in your bathroom whilst you are in the bath. I promise you, in 30 years' time, you will look back on last Tuesday as a high point of civilisation. We're only heading in one direction from here on in.

That was said with a look of glee in your face, Simon. A kind of look of glee that can only be had by someone over the age of 50. Yes, so this story is the story of the first presidential debate in Cleveland. This week, in the red red corner we have President Donald Trump and in the blue corner, Joe Biden. If you're a fan of unedifying slanging matches between incoherent septuagenarians squabbling like five-year-olds and of the unavoidable feeling that democracy is imploding under the weight of its own idiocy,

it was all good, harmless fun. If you're not into those, well, it was like watching your favourite childhood teddy being slowly eaten by a naked Vladimir Putin. Deeply, deeply unsettling, but you just couldn't take your eyes off it. All in all, it was further evidence of the

decline of the United States of America as a nation, a slide which began, oh, well, around about the 5th of July 1776. Maybe, maybe, maybe Boston 1773 when they started trying to cold brew our British tea in salty waters. Hipsterism gone mad, wasn't it? Different for the sake of it.

The whole debate was played out to the sound of kind of whirring, drilling, banging and whizzing as the likes of George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, Harriet Tubman and Martin Luther King spanned so fast in their graves that they blasted their way out and are now circling the world in a low orbit, shaking their fists and shouting, no, no, America, you can be so much better than this.

I should point out that Abraham Lincoln would be spinning in his grave not merely out of despair but also out of jealousy that someone got to be president while all the theatres are closed. Too soon. Right, at the end of round one, team shut up have got three points and the controller of the game now goes to team shut down.

Mark and Zoe, and the question is who has been getting in a muddle about their own rules? Oh, well this is our very own cluster clown that is Boris Johnson. And his various ministers who have brought in new restrictions this week that are, let's be honest, a little tricky to understand.

He got confused in a press conference, as did Gillian Keegan, the education minister, who was on a radio show and couldn't answer the question, what do the new restrictions in the North East mean? It's beautiful, actually, if you watch it on YouTube, she's on camera on this radio show, and you can see her looking at her assistant going, get me the answers now, get me the answers. The assistant's going, well, I don't know, nobody knows stuff. I mean, six in, six out, three together, three come in the end the sister's going well I don't know nobody knows stuff I mean it's six in six out three together

three hide in the cupboard I don't know I mean nobody actually knows anymore what the restrictions are I think if you live in the northeast you can meet in the group

of six as long as there's at least one womble and a toad somewhere near the vicinity you can't meet outside in the garden because of course

it's now October and cold up north so you will die because none of them have got a coat if you live down south you can meet different families because, of course, it's now October and cold up north, so you will die because none of them have got a coat. If you live down south, you can meet different families, but only if you want to and only if they're from the same class.

So it's a very confusing situation. That's been in place for a long time, that rule. I think we've been a bit unfair on Boris Johnson, saying that he didn't understand the rules because he's a man that doesn't really understand much at all. He kind of carries the air of a man who's just realised he's put bubble bath in the dishwasher all the time.

He just kind of... Oh no. What a mess that's going to make. You've got it good up there though. Nicola's not taking any prisoners, is she? I mean, that is, she basically comes round your house, doesn't she? And does a head count.

Well, she has taken prisoners, but they're all students. I've got to say, I feel quite reassured by the level of incompetence that's on show in the government, because I think if this level of authoritarianism was coming from a government which also had competence, we would be in serious trouble.

But the reality is Matt Hancock in particular gives the impression of a man whose most important decision-making tool is a little sort of cellophane fish which he puts on the palm of his hand. If it curls up at the edges then that means the pubs are closed but the creches are open whereas if it starts spinning on the top we can only dream This was the story that

Prime Minister Boris Johnson admitted that he misspoke when incorrectly stating the latest rules about who could meet whom and where in the northeast of England this week. Misspoke, in case you're unaware, is an old English term for didn't have a clue but took a swing at it anyway.

There have been people contravening the rules. 2019 electoral catastrophe of the year. Jeremy Corbyn had dinner in a group of nine whilst Johnson's own father Stanley went shopping with an uncovered face, although that was legally fine, he simply exploited the age

old, I know the Prime Minister, legal loophole, which is I think one of three clauses still active from the Magna Carta in 1215 alongside freedom for the City of London to do whatever it likes and the right to leave a fridge freezer in a field if you can't be asked to take it to the tip

Now lockdown clearly is still splitting to do whatever it likes, and the right to leave a fridge freezer in a field if you can't be asked to take it to the tip. Now, lockdown clearly is still splitting opinion like a banana, and whether or not you think that lockdowns are a sledgehammer which we're using to crack ourselves in the nuts, it's important to know the latest rules that are balked out daily onto our national breakfast table by the Westminster Confusocrats. So, there's a challenge this week for our news quiz panelistas. Can they do any better at remembering rules than our embattled and embaffled prime minister? I'm going to give you guys three COVID rules.

Now, I've made them up, but that doesn't mean that in between me making them up and telling you them, they haven't accidentally become law. But I'm going to tell you them now and then test you at the end of the show to see how well you've remembered them. So rule one is stay six feet away from animals with two feet but you can be three feet away from animals with four feet and 18 inches away from spiders.

Rule two is you can't meet with your maternal uncle in the same postcode as your paternal grandmother unless one of them is on a ten metre diving board and rule three is that people with even numbers of letters in their surname the same postcode as your paternal grandmother unless one of them is on a 10 metre diving board and rule three is that people with even numbers of letters in their surname can only go to restaurants during odd numbered

hours of the day and on even numbered days of the week if you count Monday as 12 Tuesday as 7 and Friday as the square root of Sunday and Thursday combined so those are the rules we will test you at the end of the show to see if you can do any better than our Prime Minister. Two points there to Team Shutdown. Another question for Team Shutdown, for Mark and Zoe.

Who has been accused of milking a cash cow and who is cheesed off about it? about it this would be uh the scottish university system correct who have sent students back without realizing that a lot of people congregating at once might cause a problem with spreading the disease and i've now locked them in in some kind of gestapo type situation and i heard one mother kind of going oh yeah basically what's happened is my son is now locked in his room all day watching tv and that's pretty much every single day i was at university to be honest so it's not it's not a new thing i mean they've been told students have been told not to have sex as well which is quite comforting to find that I was that ahead of the curve while I was at university.

I really, really nailed that. But yeah, it's not. Or didn't nail it. Well, yeah. But they're going to be allowed to go home for Christmas now, aren't they? Is that the new ruling, that they can now go home for Christmas? So parents around the country went, Oh, God, really?

Fire at the washing machine. It is hilarious, this, the kind of official line on how much people look forward to getting together with their families at Christmas, isn't it? It's an extraordinary mass delusion that seems to be driving policy, that this is the headline. Can we see our families at christmas honestly that's not in the top 20 of things that students are worried about getting done while we're on the subject of lockdowns we have an audience from an audience we have a question from one of our audience members uh helen curry are you there helen can we can we hear from helen hello there hello helen what is your question for our panellists? My question is,

who are you most looking forward to not seeing this Christmas? I would assume it's going to be Father Christmas, who must be the original super spreader. I'm going to say Michael Bublé. Yeah. Right, you going to show us you're working on that? Yeah, because there is no way that they can cryogenically unfreeze him again this year to fire about the place.

Although, they could call it a social boobly if you were one of his close family. Right, well, that's a point to team shut down, purely for the Michael Bublé pun from Mark there, so that makes the half-time score. Five to team shut down, three to team shut up. And a question now that goes out to both teams. It's an odd-one-out question.

Which is the odd-one-out from the following list? A clapped out ferry, a knackered old oil rig hundreds of miles out to sea, St Helena, Napoleon's non-voluntary holiday home where he had a six year compulsory staycation after the Battle of Waterloo or the moon.

What is the odd one out from that list? Is it St Helena? Well, why are you saying that? Is this to do with what Priti Patel has suggested we should do with asylum seekers in this country, send them to St Helena? Well, why are you saying that? Is this to do with what Priti Patel has suggested we should do with asylum seekers in this country, send them to St Helena? Well, that's the correct reason, but the wrong answer. OK. So I'm going to have to deduct a point from you for that.

It must be the moon, then. Correct. Mark, that is the correct answer. Because that's the only place that she's not suggested so far that we send asylum seekers. Yes, that is entirely correct. Two points. Two points for that. The only one. There was a Whitehall brainstorming session and all of the others were suggested

as potential receptacles for asylum seekers. The ferry, disused oil rigs, St Helena and Essential Ireland as well as Morocco and Moldova. Which is other countries! Anywhere, largely under the out-of-sight, out-of-mind rule of international diplomacy. The other options suggested in the meeting were reinstalling the ice sheets that used to keep Britain nice and uninhabitable back in our glory days of the last ice age,

an invisible force field, bouncy castles or other currently unused buildings such as sports stadiums, theatres, comedy clubs, nightingale hospitals, job centres, the Houses of Parliament and the British Institute of Administrative Competence. So that brings us to the end of that round and we're into the final round now

and this is called Cheer Me Up Before You Go Go. We're going to end with some quick questions about some hopefully more optimistic news news that does not involve a two angry men shouting at each other while a third old angry man angrily shout to them to stop shouting angrily being an increasingly cocky virus that is frankly playing us off the park at the moment or c people arguing about a and or b so answer questions. Negative sentiments will be penalised. Firstly, who is going to come flying to the rescue? Father time. That's a negative sentiment, Jenna.

You lose a point. This is the jetpack medics who have taken, I think it's the Peak District or the Lake District, some sort of beauty spots, hiking and hill walking spots where a jetpack assisted medics are now able to fly up to walkers who've twisted an ankle or done worse to themselves. And it might possibly be a crucial half hour that saves them from hypothermia or whatever while they're waiting for assistance, which is genuinely fantastic. And I've seen video footage of this and it looks amazing.

and I've seen video footage of this and it looks amazing. In fact, I now predict that within 12 months, 90% of the injuries which these jetpack-assisted medics will be attending will have been caused by other jetpack-assisted walkers flying into overhanging rocks. That could be a dangerous trend, but apart from that, it's good news. Jenna, you live in los angeles the first time i saw a jet pack was the opening ceremony of the los angeles olympics 1984 that's 36 how have we got to this point in human history 36 years on that we are not all wearing jet packs

all the time i mean america's let us down yet again. I don't know. I think a jetpack is a good thing to give an adrenaline junkie. In our country, we just give them guns. So you guys, it could be worse. Also, if you've checked the news, you can't really see outside anymore because of the fires. So a jetpack wouldn't really help. 1984, though, makes you think, doesn't it? That was four years before Joe Biden's first candidacy for president of the United States. That's true, by the way. That isn't a joke. He was knocking on a bit then already, wasn't he? This is the story about a jet suit for paramedics that could see patients reached in minutes.

A spokesman for the Air Ambulance Service said this could save lives and added, well, I don't really care if it does because, look, I'm a pterodactyl. And the final question. What wants to get rid of our plastic bottles for us? This is a combined enzyme, isn't it? It is. It's an enzyme that eats plastic. Yep. And they've combined it with isn't it? It is. It's an enzyme that eats plastic. Yep.

And they've combined it with another enzyme that also eats plastic. And by combining it with a bacteria, it eats plastic six times quicker than any other pre-existing plastic-eating enzyme, which is a sentence I never thought I'd say. And I don't know how it works. I have no idea how the science works, but I hope when it is eating it, it's going, yum, yum, yum, yum, yum, yum, yum, yum, yum, yum.

What if an enzyme goes, oh, that's lovely, that is nice. I'll wash that down with a bit of acid. That'll be nice. Yum, yum, yum, yum, yum, yum, yum, yum, yum, yum. And I don't know. I don't know whether it poops it out. I'm not sure how an enzyme works, whether it vomits it up, poops it out, but an entire new bottle comes out the other end, apparently.

So, so... LAUGHTER Would a plastic eating enzyme be dangerous not to humans, but, like, to Kardashians? Yes. LAUGHTER You say that, Jenna, as if we're completely different species,

but actually the latest research has said that the Kardashians do actually share 83% of the same DNA as humans, if we're a completely different species. But actually, the latest research is that the Kardashians do actually share 83% of the same DNA as humans. So we're not actually that different as people say. And this is the story of scientists making a breakthrough, taking a break from working out how many

pianos could have fitted inside the Trojan horse or whatever crucially important bit of research they had been doing. And they've done something useful for once. They've developed a super enzyme that degrades plastic bottles at six times the normal rate. The enzyme is derived from bacteria that over time have evolved to have the ability to eat plastic. There you go. Watch and learn, fishes.

It's not pollution, it's your dinner. Stop complaining and read your Darwin. Well, that brings us almost to the end of this week's news, because we just have to finish our Can You Remember The Rules challenge. So, can our panellists remember the three made-up Covid rules I gave them

earlier on? I'm going to go first to Mark. Can you remember any of them? I think there was one that you're only allowed to see your paternal grandmother if you push someone else's uncle off a diving board.

It's close. Jenna, can you come in with another one? Yeah, lick a doorknob if when in doubt. Zoe? There was something about a dog, but the details left me. Right. Simon? I think gatherings of up to 30 if it's officially a funeral for the turkey.

Is that right? Well, I think we've just learned how difficult it is to be Prime Minister. You're all wrong, and in any case, the rules have changed. The rules I was looking for was two people standing close together wearing wide-brimmed hats means they're technically meeting indoors. Jurgen Klopp counts as two people in any group of six. And you can only get ill from COVID if your hand or arm is in an unnatural position.

So that concludes the News Quiz this week. The final scores. Team Shut Down have 10. Team Shut Up have 8. But of course, in this week, there are no winners. No winners this week. There are no winners anywhere. Thank you for listening, everyone.

Please show your appreciation for our panellists. This week we have had Mark Nelson and Zoe Lyons and Simon Evans and Jenna Friedman. I've been Andy Zaltzman. Thank you for listening. May the news be with you. Goodbye. Taking part in the news quiz were Simon Evans, Jenna Friedman,

Mark Nelson and Zoe Lyons. In the chair was Andy Zaltzman and additional material was written by Simon Alcock, Max Davis, Alice Fraser, Natasha Mwanza and Mike Sheppard. The producer was Richard Morris and it was a BBC Studios production. John Holmes curates twisted topical comedy. The Secure. A woozy unsettling concept album of news and current affairs flowing in a satirical river of sound. Award-winning satire you've never heard before.

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