The Bugle - Bugle 231 – The Queen should play poker

Episode Date: April 19, 2013

Andy and John mark the passing of Margaret Thatcher, discuss their Aussie race-hate controversy and try to make sense of the gun laws fudge. Plus – who will love longer, Andy or John? The answer is ...revealed this week. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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Starting point is 00:00:00 Dancelaguard fans, you will be thrilled to know a book is coming out if you fund it via Unbound. We are publishing the Dancelaguard Reader by Alice Fraser and Dancelaguard, a glorious insight into the world of Dancelaguard, self-published romance maven, and online bestseller. If you would like to find out how to support it, go to thebugelpodcast.com. If we get enough support, we will publish the book. That's a real thing that's going to happen. Thebugelpodcast.com to a real thing that's going to happen. TheBuglePodcast.com to support the Danciler Guard Reader. This is a podcast from TheBuglePodcast.com. The Bugle, audio newspaper for a visual world.
Starting point is 00:00:49 Hello, Bugleers, I can't believe she's gone. And welcome to Issue, I see a cobbly issue 231 of the Bugle for the week beginning Monday the 22nd of April, 2013 with me and his ultimate and live in the renowned city of London, England, where there are absolutely loads of people and even more molecules. And I think that's, that makes you think. And in New York City, it's the man who walks into room for a pair of underpants, but walks out of rooms in a suit of armour. Enough said, it's John Oliver.
Starting point is 00:01:20 Hello Andy, hello, buglers. Okay, Andy, before we start, there is probably something I need to address. Most non-osy-bueglers will probably not be aware that I inadvertently caused a minor shitstorm to blow across Australia last week. In this opening bit to last week's Buegl, I described Australia as, and I quote myself, the most comfortably racist jokes I've ever been, And someone, I don't know who Andy. Seem to think of it a good idea to transcribe what I said outside the content of this podcast and unleash it upon Australian journalism,
Starting point is 00:01:53 or it seemed essentially to be reported as, Daily Show Reporter calls Australia the most racist country in the world. And all manner of internet hell seemed to break loose. It was a truly deeply demoralising experience to watch it all blow up. It made me hate the internet, modern journalism, and myself, not necessarily, in that order. And first, let me be clear.
Starting point is 00:02:18 I was not saying that Australia is the most racist place I've ever been, not by a long shot. I was just pointing out that it was the most comfortable in that racism, to be fair, that's almost a compliment. Sure, it's still technically an insult, but it's a complimentary insult if that helps. I've said so when you say a long shot, I think, you know, the long shots were one of the reasons
Starting point is 00:02:41 why Australia doesn't have quite the diversity of race that other countries have. So, you do not want to be a part of this, aren't you? Sorry, don't get sucked in, believe me. Sorry. I'm from a minority, John, I'm fine, I can say what I like. My people have suffered so much. I hope we'll ever pass this around, got what they wanted Andy, if what they wanted was
Starting point is 00:03:06 hysteria and my slight melancholy, because if so, they should be deeply pleased with the results. Also, it's just, it's not a good idea. I think you'll agree with this. If the bugle is going to become an official public statement to the world, we're in trouble because we're going to cause weekly international incidents and we're probably not going to be able to do it anymore. And finally, some of the comments that got through to me, you could argue, did not help the case that Australia was trying to make back at all. One guy said, we're not racist, we've just got similar problems with lebos that you have in the UK with Pakistanis and West Indians. I mean, you're not helping your argument with that level of logic.
Starting point is 00:03:49 Now, for what it's worth, Australia, the pieces always shooting for the show are nothing to do with races and anyway. They're all about gun control, but frankly, now I'm wondering whether one of them should have been about it. Anyway, I will say, Andy, in conclusion, I will say that, now the week I had in Australia, outside of that, is still one of the most enjoyable weeks of my life, and I actually meant to mention that last week,
Starting point is 00:04:14 there was this one point during the shooting, during our shoot, that a farmer I was interviewing, after we finished the interview, asked me if I wanted to help him hurt his sheep back in, and I said, oh yeah, yeah, I'd love to do that. So as the crew were packing up the interview, asked me if I wanted to help him hurt his sheep back in. And I said, oh yeah, yeah, I'd love to do that. So as the crew were packing up the equipment,
Starting point is 00:04:29 I went out with him into the field and as the sun was setting, I helped hurt these sheep back into a pen. And it was about as calm and as happy as I felt in months enough, I was even looking up at the orange sky and feeling the clear air in my lungs and thinking, I could do this. I could be a sheep farmer.
Starting point is 00:04:47 I'd be happy. I'd be relaxed. I'd be interacting with sheep. I could do this. And once we were done, I went over to the farmhouse. This really nice, rugged, craggy, faced, unbelievably friendly man. And I said, did I do well, Jack?
Starting point is 00:05:02 Did I do OK with the sheep? And I've never before felt such a deep desire to get approval from a man I barely know. And he looked at me with his kind eyes peering out from underneath his hat and he said, you were less good than a dog. And that's just not the answer I was looking for. And that's not the answer anyone looks for in anything.
Starting point is 00:05:24 No one wants to be told they're less good than a dog in any activity that doesn't involve eating food out of a bowl or shitting in the street. It's just not a resounding compliment. Certainly, at least the most you'd wanted a probe from a man you barely know since your days are auditioning for the National Youth Theatre. I imagine.
Starting point is 00:05:41 So, but you also said last week, and this didn't come across in the bits of the coverage that I read, that's, you thought Australia was a wonderful country and you had a great time there, but you also did describe it as comfortably racist. I did do that. I did all those things. And I stand by all of them. Suggested. I don't know. You are comfortably racist. You got to live there. Let's not follow that through to the end of the episode. That's not the point I was making.
Starting point is 00:06:10 Oh, right. It's a different point. So this is Bugal 231, the first week of the beginning of the footnotes to British history. And as always, a section of the vehicle is going straight in the bin, this week a home cosmetic surgery section including how to fill in those wrinkles on your face with a relatively harmless domestic grout, why too golf balls in your cheeks is just as good as collagen implants and how to bonsai your facial features to ameliorate
Starting point is 00:06:39 the ravages of age. We teach you how to pull out those expanding appendages such as the nose and ears with a free microchainsaw to help minimise the lacerations and a complimentary sponge coated headband to soak up the blood loss. Plus, in another section of the bin, the latest in our tantric sex guides. More suggested tantrums to help you and your partner to achieve erotic nivana. This week we help you throw a total wobbly about who lost how the car keys, who was supposed to play the electricity bill, and the ethics of having your favorite dog put down
Starting point is 00:07:10 over its refusal to wag its tail during the National Anthem. Those sections in the bin this week. B-B-B enforced mourning. And now I must admit, Andy, that the funeral of Margaret Fatcher this week did not get much attention here in America at all, might need you to the fact that they were little preoccupied with absorbing the latest example of terrorist, Twartary, that brought horror to the streets of Boston, followed by the arrest of an Elvis impersonator who apparently sent rice into the president. So they've had a lot on their crazy plate here and it's rather distracted them from the death right of an 87 year old stateswoman.
Starting point is 00:07:53 Otherwise, Andy, I have no doubt that the US media would have dived headfirst into the overblown coverage like a lactose intolerant lady into a soy milk swimming pool. But I'm guessing that in England, Andy, it was wall-to-wall coverage of the funeral with more hysteria than when a pigeon lands on the tennis courts at Wimbledon. Did you watch the funeral or did you stuff straw into a box, poke some air holes in it
Starting point is 00:08:18 and fully hibernate the 90 minutes away? Well, sorry to deal with my own personal teleportation, clearly John, but I did watch the funeral and I did some live Twitter commentary on it, which is the really the only way to get through the state of cases. But as you said, there was wall-to-wall coverage, literally wall-to-wall in town squares in places like Edinburgh and Leeds leads where they were showing the funeral on a big screen and there was no one between the big screen
Starting point is 00:08:49 and the wall on the other side of that town square. Great photographs. Just like one person staring up at this screen so I would to say the weather forecast. Yeah, could you put it on sky sports? But, yeah, so I was, I was, you know, as we suggested last week, it was a very divisive funeral, very much put the FU into funeral, but at least now, you know, we know the speculation is over. There was no resurrection, there was no opening of the fiery boughs of hell to welcome in their newest in mic. There was no even, most disappointingly, no classic prank of that ju- bursting out of
Starting point is 00:09:32 the coffins, they got- yeah. She had the living ship funeraled out of her, and Britain seldom felt odd, I did leave me with an extremely queasy feeling about the British state and the nature and purpose of British democracy. It seemed, but was this one of the greatest acts of his history controlling state propaganda in this country? It was the Bayer tapestry showed Willian the Conqueror personally scoring an overhead kick-pass King Harold from 45 yards in the last minute of the Battle of Hastings.
Starting point is 00:10:00 It felt that way. Well, that way. Now, for what I've gathered, Andy, the atmosphere was a little different from the blowout funerals that Britain has stased in the past. You think it, your princess Diana's, your queen mothers. Now for Margaret Thatcher, it seemed to be less good by England's rose and more farewell England and more for Fallas Titanium. That's what, sort of for all your botany fans out there. It meant Andy what I'm trying to say is her career was spectacular, but occasionally had a horrific smell about it again.
Starting point is 00:10:30 Again, one more for your botany fans. Oh, it's a flower joke. Isn't the internet great, John? I mean, without it, we're nothing. We're, I mean, nothing. Nothing, there is nothing in my head that facts that go in, stay there for a second and then go out again.
Starting point is 00:10:49 I'm nothing. So why was she, again there's a lot of discussion over her legacy and why she was quite so divisive after all, she did some things that a lot of people thought were great for this nation and maybe someone that were with a problem is John. She threw a lot of babies out with the bath water and not only did she do that but before
Starting point is 00:11:08 she did that she boiled the babies down for stock and then poured the stock down the drain in front of some starving northerners. So it was um it plans now to build a FATCHUM museum uh which uh what Margaret FATCHUM museum in the style of... Look at a presidential library. Oh, that's Latin. Let's not do that. Yeah, some would argue they're already plenty of Fatcher Museums. The High Street in the Northern town of Stockton on Tees, for example, to be a temple to Urban Decay and the failures.
Starting point is 00:11:40 And a heartlessness of the Fatcher years. Also, the City of London. That's very much the opposite side of both sides of the Stockton on the fact she is. Also, the city of London. That's very much the opposite side of both sides of the Stocktonon Tees Museum. So I don't know if there's actually need for this. I had a special simulation run, John, on what would have happened to Britain if that chair had never actually existed.
Starting point is 00:11:59 And I went to two, because I wanted to get some balance. I went to two different political organisations, the right wing, that's right, think tank, the claw hammer of practicality institutes, and the left wing pressure group, Marxist, Mark, and the fund bunk,
Starting point is 00:12:14 and one of these, I thought that needed more work. One of these simulations. No, no, no, Andy. No, without that, yeah. Even Masterpiece Painters, Andy, need to know when to stop stop and you stopped at the right time. It was finished.
Starting point is 00:12:28 Without that, yeah. Apparently Britain today would be a cultural, industrial and ethical wasteland haunted by the post-imperial ghosts of the nation it could have been. And the other show that without that, yeah, Britain would have been a thriving financial setter centre with highest standards of living than it ever had before. Consumer choice and unprecedented commercial freedoms and opportunities. Oh no, sorry, sorry, those are the wrong reports. Those are both just reports and what has actually happened after such. But from different parts of the nation.
Starting point is 00:12:56 There had been real concerns about protests during the funeral procession, but these luckily were limited to a few people shouting, booing, and then others lining the streets only to turn their backs. And that seems to be a quintessentially English insult, Andy, standing outside for hours in the cold and rain, only to then snub the procession with the devastating gesture of poor manners. But there was also one, my favourite process. It was just a guy standing by the roof, And similarly, he must have waited there for hours.
Starting point is 00:13:26 And he just held up a placard about, you know, a foot of crotch and a foot high with the word boof written on it. LAUGHTER But that was it. That was it. Yeah. That was it.
Starting point is 00:13:40 But I like the fact that by turning you back, essentially what you're saying to the former parliament is there is good day to your Margaret, I shud good day! Well, I mean, that was, I guess, you know, in some ways. It's just, I'm just, there's two sides to every coin, John. It just depends which way you look at it. Some people might say there was, there was a massive protest and it was all a protest against the fact that she died.
Starting point is 00:14:05 And I'd have liked to see the police react in the same way they've wrecked with other protests and start kettling the crowd inside St Paul's Cathedral and firing water cannons at Henry Kissinger just to see if he dissolves. Thousands of people lined up the street of London along with 2300 as you mentioned inside St Paul's Cathedral including Prime Minister David Cameron and even the Queen. And the fact that the big q-tip herself was there was a big deal. And yet all the cutaway shots of her face showed her wearing the same expression that
Starting point is 00:14:41 she always has Andy, that featureless empty-scal somewhere between bored and uncontempt. She has the same detached facial projection of nothing, at every event she goes to Andy, whether it's watching a funeral or her grandsons wedding or herself jumping out of a helicopter during the Olympics opening ceremony. Her face is the same during everything Andy, absolutely everything. In fact, she would be a world-class poker player, Queen. I think that's the way we should fund the Royal family in the future. Once a year, the taxpayer doesn't just give her money, we lend her money to go to Vegas for a week and hit the poker rooms. And our guarantee within a few
Starting point is 00:15:20 days she'll come back having quadrupled it. She had a very similar face to the one that she had during much of the Olympic opening ceremony that some. Yeah. And for me, I think, you know, that's written, have shown what it can do with a big ceremony. And to me, this was too traditional. Should have embraced the new modernity that the Olympics opened. I'd have liked to see Margaret Fetcher escorted to St Paul's Cathedral by James Bond in
Starting point is 00:15:44 a helicopter before having her coffin dropped from 2000 feet through the famous stone. We know people like it so why don't you do it, it doesn't make any sense. Now what one of the great things about funeral is that you sometimes get to find out little snippets about someone's life that you weren't aware of. And apparently Margaret Factor found the queen a little too left wing for her, which means one of two things, is that the queen is a lot more liberal than anyone knew, or Margaret Thatcher was even more right wing than physics thought was even possible.
Starting point is 00:16:18 The relationship between Thatcher and the queen was heavily spanned by people, with one pundit saying both women shared a love of people being punctual. And if that is your go-to comparison for common ground, I think you might as well just say both women really didn't like one another. Well some efforts made to keep the funeral as unpolitical as possible, but it didn't really succeed in a lot of ways. Just the mere fact of having it as essentially a state funeral was a great political gesture
Starting point is 00:16:50 and increasing suspicions, John, that David Cameron is fully delusional, such as the grief that has struck him and his party. Last week we just hooked up how he said Margaret that just saved this nation and I'm doing this for your other lovely moments. I was watching it on the BBC news channel with their little news ticker underneath and as the coffin was wheeled Into St Paul's Cathedral on its magic cart. The little news news flash came up on the little ticker saying unemployment up by 70,000 and you thought that's that is what she would have wanted on that day of all days. David came in on national radio that morning, having pledged not to make the funeral political occasion
Starting point is 00:17:31 said we are all thatcherite now. And he might as well have just put a balaclava on, leapt on top of the coffin and said, I'm hijacking this funeral, take me to the next election or else. Ha, ha, ha. It was a spectacular send off, and the Dean of St. Paul's, the Reverend David Ison, said that that's replayed a large part in planning the funeral herself over the last six years,
Starting point is 00:17:53 and that it would be relatively humble in line with her wishes. And I think it was relatively humble and in comparison to a rapper or Donald Trump or an ancient Egyptian king. But otherwise, I think I had a little more pizzazz than he is giving it credit for. When you have a full military procession, a flag-drape coffin, and in the front pew of your service, it's the fucking coin. I think if you claim it's relatively humble,
Starting point is 00:18:19 you're stretching the toe relative to breaking points. Well, that's a classic British understatement job. That's what we do. That's a lot of stuff. If there's one, he can accuse this funeral of being many things, you know, politically divisive, you know, unnecessary on its scale. Well, he could not accuse Adolf John was being, as you've suggested, insufficiently military.
Starting point is 00:18:39 You would have thought from the amounts of armor on this blay and amount of uniforms that Margaret Thatcher had personally head-botted Napoleon and Hitler to death simultaneously. And a lot of the comments they're saying, well this has been being some protest around the country but this is a very somber occasion. I think this really shows what this is all about. Well of course, it was a sombra occasion, John. If you took a trampoline in goldfish and put 2000 soldiers in shiny uniforms around it walking slowly and got a priest in the kind of robes that suggest his organisation is probably trying to hide something, it would give it gravitas. If you chuck 10 million quid and 700 soldiers and you ludicrously an appropriate garb, that one of the tasteless
Starting point is 00:19:23 but understandable death parties that were going on at the same time in shatter-form and mining towns in the north, you'd have had something similarly serious. And I think the BBC coverage of it would have been well worth watching. And a respectful silence falls across the town square now, a silence reflecting the absence of hope that descended on this place when the mines were closed down.
Starting point is 00:19:44 Some would argue prematurely and replace not with new industries but with absolutely nothing. And just as of course Lady Thatcher would have wanted and did want and did. And that silence now is punctuated by the distant sound of a single London city trailer snorting cocaine off a prostitute's back. LAUGHTER Respectful applause there, both for Nigel Polk, the trader and 23-year-old Olga, both in their different ways, products of the that she is.
Starting point is 00:20:17 And well, here comes the effigy now born on the gun carriage by six horses of the North Snutterbridge Third-Rolled Regune, followed by platoon of the North Snutterbridge Third Royal Drogoon, followed by platoon of the long-term unimportant as defined by the conservative Dorian Charles Moore this week. And in front of them carrying you ceremonial match for lighting the effigy is 56-year-old Gavin Wish, who's been unemployed now for 28 years. That's exactly half his life, which from the looks of him after the physical and mental health problems he suffered over the years is going to be bad as much as he can hope to get.
Starting point is 00:20:49 Crowd now bang their heads in silent disrespect spoiled by a handful of dissenting voices, protesters are the silentness occasion I think I can see one million air there holding up a black card saying I raked it in in the 1980s I don't know what your problem is, much minority of you on this occasion of solemnity and dignified reflection. And I think one of the pro-thetti protesters just threw a credit card at the horse, no one wants to see that. Approach the pyre, built from, couldn't lose me royal forests in the Stant Sanjum Estate of course, with one single piece of coal, and it's been kept on display in the nearby British Museum of Welfall Industrial decline.
Starting point is 00:21:28 This ceremony really has flayed in with history and meaning and has to send a single tear for the Stauld Mr. Huish's cheek, even though he only actually met Mrs. Thatcher once, could be grief, could be joy and yes, the effigy is now lit and polite of laws breaks out and that really shows what this woman meant to these people and this nation. Farewell. That's beautiful Andy. We do do pomp and so do our best. We do. We do. We do. We do in this country. And another thing that we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we do, we essentially she came over for the funeral and I've already seen her in this country before and as you can expect from the kind of press that Britain has and I know if you're not aware of this
Starting point is 00:22:30 go of the daily wear mail website and look for the beautiful juxtaposition of articles complaining about the left-wing bias in British politics and media and women without makeup or in bikinis and women without makeup or in bikinis. Um, and the reaction to Amanda Fatcher being, well, it was extraordinary, John, I don't know if you picked this up in the States. I'm afraid I did that. It's almost the only thing that did make it over here. 19-year-old Amanda Fatcher, new Pippermiddleton.
Starting point is 00:23:01 It was, absolutely. I'm just don't know how comfortable I am with that at all. And it's borderline okay for nation to lust after a 28-year-old bride's maid at her sister's wedding. It is a significantly greater area to do the same over a 19-year-old girl mourning at her grandmother's funeral. That is really creepy, Andy. But really creepy. We'll take you on most of the press that we're doing this last thing. Well, the ones who'd been saying
Starting point is 00:23:26 how important it was to mark this occasion with the depth of seriousness that it deserved. And again, the reaction was all along the lines of, well, what a grace, honor, and occasion this is for a woman who represented everything great about this country, Margaret Thatcher. Of course, the greatest prime minister in the history of the world. And there's her granddaughter, her man,
Starting point is 00:23:49 that's huge. Oh, my, oh, I would put it in that. Oh, would you look at, oh, do you think it, she'd let me call her Margaret? Oh, yeah. I've written this safe. Written this safe. Not telling those things, aren't the only thing at half-mask now. Oh, actually they are again. Oh, in a heartbeat. I would in the nation would. Do you think she could bleach her hair and comb it upwards? Yeah.
Starting point is 00:24:16 Oh, it's all coming back. It's all, it's all got control yourself. And, uh, coffee now passes into the cathedral. Yeah. At the moment, this can't be to reflect on the greatness of its most glorious... Oh, no, single protester has a downward thatured t-shirt on. That is completely inappropriate! I don't know, Amanda.
Starting point is 00:24:37 Oh, Amanda. That's... Yeah. It's much of the praise. It was clearly... they knew it was inappropriate. So they had to try and focus it around her reading, the lesson that she read. And you don't really have to read too deeply between the lines to see what was really going on.
Starting point is 00:24:55 They would say that she read beautifully and confidently and arrestingly and athletically and sumptuously and troublingly. Oh, Amanda, naughtyptuously, and troublingly. I know a man, naughty a man, no. One newspaper in the UK even described her as the star of the funeral. No, no. Do funerals get to have stars, Andy? Is that appropriate? And if they do have stars, are they supposed to be the people in the f***ing coffee?
Starting point is 00:25:23 LAUGHTER have stars, aren't they supposed to be the people in the f***ing coffee? Well, it must have been a very awkward for the family this occasion, particularly for a man of fact, you know, it's never been in the public eye and it's obviously just for a grandmother's funeral and it's found what really ought to be a private family occasion turned into a festival of state propaganda. And it's not the first time this has happened, the Neuronburg rallies actually started as a memorial service for Hitler's pet, the hamlet's denigel.
Starting point is 00:25:48 Now let me say I'm not equating with your stature with Hitler's hamster. Let me make that very clear. Other than they both help curb the excesses of totalitarian regimes, such a helper in the cold water around the night already kept Hitler's more extreme views under wraps until his sad passing in the mid-1930s.
Starting point is 00:26:06 It must be so weird from Amanda Fattu though. She's at college here in Texas. I just cannot imagine how she's going to articulate what happens to her college friends. Oh Amanda, welcome back. How did it go? It was fucking weird. go it was fucking weird it was it was very weird I'm gonna stay off the internet for a while I was not expecting that I'm glad I live here I was so interesting also seeing that the Conservative Party embracing this kind of public toxicity of the Fatcher brand once again after kind of realizing that maybe that will be enough to see them through to an election I guess sir as the old saying goes one man's poison is another man's pinnard That's I mean I don't know what that means but I like the way it sounds and they got so I mean that's much more
Starting point is 00:26:59 And that was whipping Stein, wasn't it? Was that a wick in Stein? It sounds like him. He loved a pinn'll look good with it. Cautsy, did he? He's not an idiot. After the funeral, I was getting the bus through the city and I saw like a bunch of fresh, faced, young,
Starting point is 00:27:16 conservative types, all about at 19, 20 years old. They really stuck out like a sore thumb so I pulled my camera phone out to take a photo. And just after I took it, I looked both to the left and the right of me on the bus and two other people were doing the same thing. It was incredible. But there were a lot of highlights.
Starting point is 00:27:35 I think George Osborne, the Chancellor, who shared that single tear. There was a moment when I thought he was just gonna hurl himself into the coffin screaming no take me take me And But you're 10 million quid John not spectacular enough for me for 10 million quid I don't want it at least to have hunter-stomps and style firework across the sky At least we could have had a repeat of part of the opening Olympic opening ceremony
Starting point is 00:28:01 But with the factories magically disappearing against the ground to symbolise everything that that's yours. That's yours. US re-ups its season tickets to the gun show. And so we like about that, Andy, at least she got things done. Even if, in many cases, you'd rather she'd been significantly less effective. In the US, the gun debate has been going on for years, but particularly intensely since the tragedy at Sandy Hook, where innocent children were gunned down in a horrific mass shooting.
Starting point is 00:28:33 And in the immediate aftermath, politicians lined up to say something must be done and never again, only for the gun legislation to get gunned down this week in a hail of self-serving cowardice bullets. And I've spent the last few weeks putting together a few pieces on gun control, the first of which I think went out yesterday. So I've been looking at almost nothing else other than gun control over the last 21 days or so. And I've got to say this is possibly the single most pathetic piece of politics I've ever seen and I've seen some pretty disparate things in what time on this earth. Essentially America has once again successfully
Starting point is 00:29:14 protected itself from any government attempt to protect it. It's fucking pathetic. A lot of um American politicians make excuses over their abject failure to stand up to gun lobbyists in the interest of the great good, saying that taking on gun lobbies is political suicide. But here's the thing, Andy. A lot of things seem like suicide, like you know, eating a Japanese bluefish, doing a bungee jump or you know, choking yourself on masturbating. But once you do do them they turn out to be a real thrill not to mention profoundly worthwhile. The Senate had previously announced that they would officially consider the possibility of thinking about voting on heavily watered down gun regulation
Starting point is 00:30:00 and then like any fine butcher said about cutting the most desirable parts right off the bone. Semian automatic gun regulation and magazine sizes were the first to go weeks ago, followed by on Wednesday background checks, which was the most low-hanging of low-hanging fruit, which had 86% of support from the American public, which is pretty amazing seeing as it's probably the only single issue 86% of Americans can possibly agree on, and which, therefore, obviously, was subsequently voted down after being blocked by most Senate Republicans and some Democrats. Background checks failed by being voted for in favour 54-46, but just falling short of the 60 vote majority necessary. So it managed to fail while the majority of the country and the majority of the Senate
Starting point is 00:30:51 votes were in favor of it, which is the cluster f*** to end all cluster f***s and f***s and f*** isn't democracy fun. Oh my god. No one is suggesting banning guns in America. That is never going to happen. The second of emin is always going to protect people's rights to have some kind of gun. The only suggestion is whether it's necessary to have a **** military grade assault rifle, which see, and so much the reporting around the world has been, oh, Americans are crazy. Please understand most
Starting point is 00:31:21 Americans understand and want some kind of gun control. And yet, imagine how more frustrating they are by the fact that it's clear they're not going to get it, as they were voting, as they were voting for these background checks. And as they were going down in flames, one by one, these senators folded like origami arseholes. Even democratic senators, Mark Beggich of Alaska, Max Borkers of Montana, Heidi Heightcamp of North Dakota and Mark Pryor of Arkansas voted against the measure. Coincidentally, Andy, Beggich, Borkers and Pryor are all seeking re-election next year. I'm sure that is not remotely connected to their self-serving vote, And the best reaction of all of this came immediately
Starting point is 00:32:05 after the vote in the Senate, when a petition, Producent Manch, who's a survivor of the 2011 Arizona shooting, that killed six people and severely injured Gaby Giffords, shouted shame on you from the Senate gallery. And, you know, there was a little bit of murmuring
Starting point is 00:32:22 of discontent at this outburst. And should there have been Andy, because I think that was pretty heroically restrained, shame on you. She would have been well within her rights to scream out, you fucking, fucking quits have fucked up the easiest fucking thing you could possibly fucking do.
Starting point is 00:32:40 You cowardly fucking bunch of complete fucking, fucking, I literally think that description of the mandate would hold up in court. LAUGHTER OTHER NEWS Other news now, and well, an international study has come out, John, that's very important implications for both you and me. It has revealed that people who enjoy successful
Starting point is 00:33:06 entertainment careers tend to die younger. Researchers found that film, music and stage performance died an average of 77.2 years compared to an average lifespan of 78.5 for ordinary creative workers. Now John, now, you know,'ll create some taken fairly divergent parts in the last six and a half years. That will be, and there'll be a course correction. We both know that. But I've getting an extra 1.3 years on you. Ah! Oh shit, you're two and a half years younger than me. Oh, bollocks.
Starting point is 00:33:45 Oh, balls. Ah! Vanity smurf wins again. And it's your birthday next week, isn't it, John? It is? Yeah, well, happy birthday. I can't remember what day, but it's happy birthday. And Tomock, Tomock, the occasion, we've got an awesome party.
Starting point is 00:34:06 For you here, we've got a band, we've got cakes, food, all your favourite fruits, I know you love beer. And it's just waiting outside the studio. Oh, I really haven't thought this through. Oh, there. No one. Oh, it's the thought of counts. It's a lovely. It is the thought and a lovely gesture. Yeah, it's solid. It's really great. Well, I hope you enjoy your special day. Apparently the merch is going to be live next Friday the 26th. Don't believe you.
Starting point is 00:34:46 Yeah. It's first very heart-to-believe. I don't know why it's taking so long. I mean a lot of the reason why it's taking so long is because we took a long time about it. But now, I don't know what's happening now. I don't think we can take full responsibility. It's going to be awesome, the retail of Ender Millennium.
Starting point is 00:35:07 Your emails now, and thanks for all the emails you sent in, quite a lot of you have alerted us to the story of John offending an entire continent with a few offhand comments. Thanks for that, and most of think seem to take it as a compliment Yeah, yeah Fair enough and a lot of you On our fature coverage seems everyone thought it was either too soft on fature or too hard on fature So that is I mean, that is the ultimate testament to the woman Yeah, yeah, see she was she was a natural polariser job.
Starting point is 00:35:48 We have Tom for a quick email from Nick Best who says a dear John Andy and F.U. Chris, a lot of people outside Iceland are vaguely aware that Icelanders all descend from a small group of Viking colonists. Brackets already knew that, close bracket. Well, I didn't realize it's the effect this has on their dating scene. And he encloses a link to a new story about a new app available which prevents Icelanders from sleeping with their relatives. Nick continues, am I sleeping with or dating my cousin? And Icelander might ask, the answer is, of course you are, but how close exactly are you
Starting point is 00:36:24 related? He says, my favourite bit is the review of the app, saying, if I had this app last year, I probably wouldn't have gone home with my cousin, saying, probably. So, I'm sure similar apps will be released in West Virginia, Tasmania, and whatever part of the UK you like to insinuate in incest about Cornwall question mark, the channel islands question mark, both answer. Regards, Nick included in Indiana. Well, there you go, that's a very useful app Andy.
Starting point is 00:36:53 And as we were just talking about with Chris before we recorded this, that is an app you wanna look at before a date, not 20 years into a marriage. It's also an app that could have been very useful for royal families in Europe through a marketing European history. Just to make sure they weren't too distantly related. They had to make sure they were at least first cousins.
Starting point is 00:37:15 Thanks for all your emails on all those various subjects and this one from someone disgusted that there was a story about Vladimir Putin getting attacked by a topless female protester and we have not covered it. But that's fair, that's a fair criticism. That is a fair criticism. And this email said, I know that Margaret Fochett has only died three times, once as
Starting point is 00:37:36 Collegula, once as Marilyn Monroe, and most recently as the Sudanese NBA star Manuti Ball, I have it on solid French authority. The Iron Lady possess quotes the thighs of Manuti Ball in I have it on solid French authority. The Iron Lady possessed quotes the thys of Manuti Ball in addition to his uncanny shot blocking ability. He was good at shot blocking. He was. He was good at shot blocking. And he was expressing that. So I'm not going to do that. But in disgust that Putin was attacked by a topless Russian woman in capital letters and responded by giving her two thumbs up and we did not cover it. So I can only apologize. Yeah, it's fair. But it's fair. Criticism well issued.
Starting point is 00:38:08 So that's it for this week's Beagle to send us emails. Info at thebeaglepodcast.com. Check out our soundcloud page, soundcloud.com slash the hyphen Beagle. Don't forget, if you have not, if you have already forgotten, stop forgetting to take out your voluntary subscription to keep the bugle alive and able to insult large swathes of the world's prominent land masses.
Starting point is 00:38:34 And we'll be back next week, in the meantime, happy birthday, John. Thank you. All your dreams come true. Thank you. Maybe Australia will send you a card. Please don't. I don't want to know what's inside it. Bye! Bye!
Starting point is 00:39:03 you

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