The Bugle - Ou Est Le Buffoon? (4206)
Episode Date: September 28, 2021Boris is at a conference and his chances of a deal with Joe are UNbelievable! Also, trillion dollar coins, British panic and sex, loads of not a lot of sex.We are funded entirely by you, the listener.... Listeners who sign up via OUR NEW WEBSITE thebuglepodcast.com have long enjoyed the opportunity to get: mentions on the show (in the form of lies), merchandise and general sense of wellbeing for supporting this fine work of art. As of this week you can also support the show directly via Apple Podcasts. Our new channel ‘Team Bugle’ also includes The Gargle and Tiny Revolutions, shows which currently carry ads - but they will be completely ad free on this channel. So if you love The Bugle, and it’s siblings, then please support The Bugle via our website or Apple Podcasts where you can subscribe today.Buy a loved one Bugle Merch - COLD AND WET WEAVER T SHIRTS ON SALE NOW). Listen to The Gargle here: https://pod.link/GargleFollow us on YouTube or Insta and see parts of this episode with actual video.The Bugle is hosted this week by:Andy ZaltzmanTiff StevensonJosh GondelmanAnd produced by Chris Skinner Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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Chris, when's our live show in November?
It's the 13th of November at the Leicester Square, Odian.
Right.
Tickets via our shiny new website. The Bugle, audio newspaper for a visual world.
Hello Buglers and welcome to issue 4206 of the Bugle audio newspaper for a visual world
with me and his ultimate coming to live from the shed.
And this is despite having to very bravely negotiate an extremely large spider's web in the shed
this morning. And I can't tell you how astonishingly courageous I was in getting past
the spider's web and then moving the spider from inside the shed to outside
the shed with a cardboard tube. It was frankly heroic effort because I wasn't going to let
a spider stop me getting in place to rant to you lovely people. I don't know what would
stop me recording in Google but I reckon it did take a lot more than a spider But I want it up. I'm not gonna silk about it. Not now. Maybe
maybe
Maybe later. Oh for our podcast has been recorded and published on the web
And what is it?
Asked a report. There was an ask reported and there wasn't there.
Snick, snick, snick, and of course when I've had the transcript read back to me.
But
I only had to have a coffee to calm down.
I took my coffee, but I was a bit discombobulated.
I took my coffee in a very strange manner,
no milk, no sugar, but with a mixture of flour and water
added, I took it black with dough.
Black with dough, anyway.
Oh.
This bit has legs.
Yeah, I did.
Oh, there we go.
Well, I mean, I did used to go to fancy dress parties.
This is the influential artist Marcel Duchamp on Stilts
is going to have dad our long legs out for.
Oh.
Right.
And that is an appropriate way to mark.
What is officially the 500th full episode of the beautiful 294
in the four times with some guy
rather is doing something else in showbiz these days.
And I think it's just had to build an extension to his flat in New York for all his Emmy awards.
And 206 since re-launch. So this is the 500th full bugle. So what was the start-of-the-moment?
And we only just remember that just before we started recording.
So the celebrations of the official 500th episode have been delayed. We may have said celebrate the 501st episode
to also mark the same number of reps and the number of runs scored in the highest first class innings in the history of cricket.
So we'll see. Anyway, here we are, this is issue 4206.
I am Andy Zoltzmann, as I said, joining me this week from A, over there and B, quite
near to here, respectively from New York City.
It's Josh Gondromann from here in London, Tiff Stevenson.
Hello, hello to you both, how are you?
Hi!
Hello!
So nice to see you, happy 500.
Thanks, thanks, well I thought you start with, I'd usually save the puns to later in the show but you know 500th birthday. I don't get them any of
them do. Yeah I'm planning to this is good because I'm planning to cry
genetically freeze myself and come back in 500 years. Right. So I like that as a
number. Yeah. I think that's probably a pretty good plan for you know everyone on
the planet. We could freeze the whole planet.
I feel like that would kind of counteract
our biggest global existential question.
I'll honestly just the ice caps.
Maybe we can cryogenically freeze
just parts of the ocean at the poles.
And there was a one woman who paid to have her spent all,
her kids were annoyed because they said she'd spent their in
Heritants on having herself cryogenically frozen right, but you know waking up in a cold hostile environment surrounded by your family. That's Christmas. I'm alright guys
There we go. I'm this is the thing if Christmas jokes are getting earlier and earlier every year
We haven't even done our Halloween jokes yet.
We are recording on the 27th of September 2021. On this day, 955 years ago,
William the Conqueror set sail from France on routes for England on the
what must be described as confidently named Norman Conquest 1066 tour, recently discovered
missing panels from the Bayer Tapestry of Shed Light on what Billy LeConc, as he'd like
to be at home, said in the pre-invasion press conference, and we have to fall transcript
of actually what he doesn't, sadly, he doesn't have the journalist's questions because
they were slowly off-mic for the embroiderers, but this is what William Conquest said.
Yeah, no, so well, yeah, no, well, we know there are no easy conquests these days.
Obviously, whoever wins the semi-finals, damn for the bridges, it's going to be a tougher opponent.
How on the English, what else is good on home soil?
Obviously, we know all about the Vikings, but we've just got to focus on what we're doing.
Just try and get out there and don't we do best to conquer places.
Try and get a result for all the Norman fans in Normandy and of course,
our global fan base as well.
Alphonse. So, can you speak up please? Well yeah now obviously we're all aware of the
research into the risks of head injuries and medieval warfare but we can't worry about that on a
day can we and yeah the rules of the rules and we're going to do whatever it takes to get a W for
this franchise. Yeah Marcel yeah well now we can't we can't let ourselves be distracted by the media.
The embroiderers are going to embroider what they're going to embroider.
We've just got a focus on the process and the result take care of itself.
So how am I planning to celebrate if we win?
Yeah, well, I don't want to look beyond the final,
but I guess probably the usual bit of a coronation,
build a load of castles, love castles, brutally express the locals, maybe do a spreadsheet of everything you know
how it is and then die and explode at my funeral. Thanks sir, thanks everyone. Thanks.
There we go, bit history for a bit history, 955 years ago, today and on that subject
our section in the bin to commemorate this historic 955th anniversary is a free audio tapestry
in which we offer you the chance to commemorate your own chosen historical event
with a construction own audio tapestry to tell the story of a significant moment for the planet
in the form of an audio tapestry and to get you started some things to put in your audio tapestry,
a man, a big weapon and another man. That should have a most
of the major events in human history. Could we also add in a woman just being slain or snatched
against her will? Okay. It's all going to be there with the next 300 weeks on the bugle.
We'll be able to build the audio tapestry. That section in the bin.
The audio tapestry falsection in the bin. BELL RINGS
Top story this week.
The 76th session of the UN General Assembly is go go go.
Having kicked off with a week long chinwag in New York in which the Leeds of the World's
Nations, Pig and Small, Rich and Poor, sensible and proudly, unreconstructedly, idiotic,
progressively collaborative and myopically, ego-monicly, twattish, banged onto each other,
hoping that the 76th time of asking,
everything everywhere will be sorted out.
Now, obviously, the opening of the UN General Assembly
is one of the highlights of anyone's yearly calendar.
How did you guys enjoy this one?
I've been doing build-up frages.
We got flags with all of the nations on them.
A lot of flags.
A lot of flags outside the house cheering. Come on, you, you, and yeah, it's been great.
So I've been really looking forward to it. I mean, I got pretty hot listening to Joe Biden's
climate crisis speech, which, you know, we're supposed to be calling the planet down Joe.
Come on.
Yeah, so I believe that I'm going to make sure I pronounce his name, is it Guterres.
Yes.
Guterres.
Yeah, Guterres said that we know we're near the Paris climate agreement, which is where Trump demonstrated
that for once he actually knew how to withdraw.
It's fun.
But yes, we are, we're in a bit of a sticky situation.
He said we're facing the greatest cascade of crises in our lifetime, which I'm not going
to lie, makes it sound a bit cool.
Like a fruit machine I'd like to play.
Like, are you going to have a go on cascade of crisis?
Sorry, the greatest cascade of crisis.
Yeah, so he said China in the US
with the world's two biggest carbon polluters
and they need to repair a completely dysfunctional
relationship in order to salvage the dire situation.
I feel like if China were a character in a team movie,
she'd be the rich girl with diamonds in the souls of
issues, literally leaving a massive carbon footprint.
He said a couple other things, the Secretary General, Guterres, he said, he can play about
billionaires joy riding into space whilst millions starve on earth to which the world's billionaires
responded, just give us time, Give us time, Antonia.
In 30 to 40 years, we'll have millions of people
starving in space as well.
This is like the Secretary-General's statements are like
very startling, right?
He said we're on the edge of an abyss, as a globe,
which I think feels, I mean, that's like a little off, right?
Like we are squarely in the middle of an abyss
by this abyss.
We're dead center of this.
And he said in terms of the world's vaccine development
and distribution, right?
This really stuck out to me.
He said we got an A in science and an F in ethics,
which those are strong words,
and they are Lockheed Martin's company motto.
Which is that sort of barter from there.
I really am, I get stressed out because it is really bad news when the UN Secretary General
is this pessimistic about the state of the world because he's taking a look at conditions
all across the globe, right?
That's his job.
Consider the good and the bad, wait all our options going forward and decided after a period of somber deliberation,
we're f**ked, we're f**ked.
That's it, that's where we are.
I mean, in terms of the global vaccine role,
I said that global vaccine inequality
is a moral indictment of the state of our world,
and obscenity, but, you know,
I can't remember, solid, patent law
is more important than human life.
Shops, you know, if you learn nothing,
have we learned nothing?
It's like a real festival of a day laid in the dollar short,
right? Like Joe Biden vowed to double financial support
to development countries to fight climate change,
as Tiff was talking about,
but where are the ones making the climate change?
It feels a little bit like throwing a wad of cash at a cyclist.
You just hit with your car, like, good luck recovering from the thing I just did
to you. And honestly, instead of having the US give money to developing nations,
we should just have developing nations pledge like $100 each to the US.
And that's all our budget for fossil fuels for the year.
And that would be more helpful
than whatever Biden's doing.
He also promised Joe Biden, he promised to engage in a period of relentless diplomacy, which
is not the attitude you're supposed to go into that activity.
It is a little like saying you're intending to practice merciless yoga or that your meditation
retreat will continue until you will continue until you've
worn your anxiety down to a bloody stump. You already said it. Not just relentless to post but he's
saying this is going to replace relentless war. It's going to replace a relentless war with
relentless diplomacy. Prompturing shut us through the global film industry because I mean that
is going to be really artimataise. Cheapimataise. A lot of people sat round at a boardroom table.
Yeah, I mean Silvesta Salon is going to be there saying I don't even know what I've put a bandana on anymore.
Very sad to see.
But Relentless War has picked up a bit of a patchy track record for the USA Josh Nett. It remains to be seen whether America fully commits to this change in priorities to Relentless
diplomacy.
I guess the proof will be whether in 20 or 30 years time there are thousands and thousands
of homeless ex diplomats living on the streets begging for money to survive after being abandoned
by the country they served.
Surely that will then know that diplomacy has truly replaced war in American
society and politics.
Biden also promised that America will become the arsenal of vaccines.
That's another one.
Yeah, I mean, I'm not sure, I mean, I assume it's a football reference.
I mean, Chris, I mean, I'm not sure I mean I assume it's a football reference. I mean Chris I
Don't know today Andy
Is it does that mean it's one shot and then just defend defend defend?
Just one one mill all star. We're going back to George Graham's
Yeah, I mean, yeah, if he's planned to be the Arsenal of vaccines basically aiming to be kind of okay
But a pale shadow of what they want to her at vaccines, underachieving, spending their money quite
wastefully, questionable leadership hierarchy, but maybe a little bit better than their local rivals.
It's better than nothing. The double, double thing to go from Chris there.
The environment, obviously, a huge amount of focus on the environment, and will the world's leaders
we think finally persuade the world at the time has come to wake up and smell that the coffee machine is on fire?
And, you know, we're going to kind of better late than never.
So, you know, they're kind of late and never and not really prime options when it comes to dealing with stuff like this.
I mean, early and often, we're moving.
But I guess it's like eating in a restaurant when all that's left is a battered badger and a syringe spider and strengthening salad. You'll take the badger,
but you don't have the way to debulch at you that is actually one of the chef's signature dishes.
You could see Blumenthal pushing the boundaries. Biden offered the world a kind of customer
service's questionnaire. How are we going to answer these questions? He said, and the questions were paraphrasing slightly, will we work together to defeat COVID and prepare
ourselves for the next pandemic, or will we fail to harness the tools at our disposal?
Will we meet the threat of climate change, or will we suffer the merciless march of ever-worsening
climate disasters? Will we affirm an uphold human dignity and human rights, or not
****ing bother, and will we apply and strengthen the core tenets of the international system,
or allow these universal principles to be trampled and twisted in the pursuit of naked political power? or not a f***ing bother. And will we apply and strengthen the core tenets of the international system
or allow these universal principles to be trampled and twisted
in the pursuit of naked political power?
If you answered mostly all A's to those congratulations
on being a hopelessly naive idealist, your dreams will be crushed by the dead hand of history.
If you answered B's or mostly B's, well done, you're almost certainly correct, well done
for seeing the world as it truly is.
Yeah I don't know he phrased those like I don't think he wanted the answers like if people
were like oh yeah we're going to do the second one for sure that's like he's like hey
Jack that's supposed to be a rhetorical question right.
That's going to be in the trailer for relentless. Coming to a theater near you in 2022.
I do think that we could get one,
we could get that kind of an all-star action cast
for this movie, right?
We get Stallone, Asiore St.
We get Statham, Dolph Langerin,
get just a star's action starts from all over the world
and we call it the debatable.
I will say the a bunch of the assembly was conducted through pre-recorded statements, right? Not everybody traveled to attend in person, which I think is fair given the COVID concerns
and everything, but it did give a lot of the speeches kind of the same gravity as like a virgin Atlantic
pre-flight safety video.
And it did have the same content in a lot of ways,
which is just like, hey, it's gonna get bumpy in the future.
Buckle the fuck up. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha about the future of the world was our very own Boris Johnson who I mean a lot of people
say Boris Johnson is not a details person tiff. So I mean this is many ways him and his
natural habitat just glathering on without having to show his working and there is no better
way of confirming your status as being not a details person than by quoting a Muppet.
And Boris Johnson cited the song it's not easy being green by
Kermit Thelonius frog. It probably was sure for Thelonius, but it is. I mean how
did I mean is this the kind of level that you know is this the best we can
hope for now just Muppet quotes from our Prime Minister Tiff? Well it's that
or Fronglais. Yes, so you know, there's
took like Boris, Boris came in hard with the fronglay. Wish.com church, you always
at it again, basically, isn't it? As I always call him, I mean, this was when he was
foreign secretary, this was, you know, it was almost like kind of brushed off
as like, it's embarrassing, isn't it?
And now that's, you know, the person who is leading
are one's great nation.
So, I mean, I did you hear any of the phrases
that he kicked out?
I didn't know about the firm at the Frog one,
but I, he said,
Donemois Oonbreak, which is... Yeah, well I think, yeah, this was, this was in a, one, but he said, Donemois in break, which was...
Yeah, well, I'm not sure this was in his speech,
but this was in a separate bit of shade
thrown in the direction of France over the Orkest deal
that we talked about in the Bugle last week.
It was Donemois in break.
Which presumably is, give a Break. Yes.
Which would be, that wouldn't be Fonglei, that would be Fongcian, would it?
French-American, I don't know how you know what the combination would be there.
And Plenne Gripp, again, get a grip, very American.
I don't know why it thinks.
It will annoy the French, though.
The purist, the French purist are very upset about, you know, these kind of phrases and words creeping into the language like Les Socces, Les
Oddes, and Les Weekends have crept in serratissues like Pepele Pue, in a deeply problematic fashion.
But apparently in 2013 the French government banned the word hashtag Replacing it with mot I think it's mot deus
De deus I'm not sure my friend Jean-Nipp
Nothing that says it all
Jean-Sépa
Yeah, but yeah, I want to know how they police that I mean whether officials at school
Leaning over teenagers Instagram apps like Mondia
when you're popping a picture of your derriere
using Mondia's Zibad the gum?
I don't know.
I mean, basically, it's Boris trying to get under
under Macron's skin, isn't it?
And I think he thinks it's a charm offensive,
but we all think it's just hugely embarrassing.
It's no different to Del Boy doing his munch two rotters, you know, or cremdiments to
mean awesome infalls and horses.
Yeah, I mean, it was quite extraordinary.
So yes, he said Donnie Martin, break and print it and grip.
Now, the bugle would like to issue a statement on behalf of the non-Borish Johnson-Worshping
section of the UK population addressed to our friends in France new som trade
as a Lee not to premier mini strip Monsieur Johnson it's a come or say a few on francey cringing
using national embarrassment Ele Ele Ele playing to his crowd it also be as
you Ele desperately trying to deflect attention
away from a litany of broken promises, non-existent trade deals, a total f***ing chaos across
the whole country.
Ile and Odult Kiya, sank on set on, a Kiya le pared approximately six children.
But Biazhu would never know it to look at how he behaves on the international stage, the
willful, perform stage, the willful performative buffoon.
I will say there is nothing that is less details oriented than barely knowing how many
children you have.
I feel like we started with a quote from Kermit the Frog and then like, Dunham Wattland
Break.
That's like discourse at the level of Bart Simpson.
So you have to take it a level back or a level down rather. and then like, Dunham Wantland break. That's like discourse at the level of Bart Simpson.
So you have to take it a level back,
a level down rather.
But I do think we can all agree that Fronglay
is the best brand of box wine.
I think we can all open that up,
but it's a compliment.
It's...
Yes, so he quoted it,
that it's not easy being green song
by Cermitts at the frog,
they Cermitt the tadpole, of course, although
the unusually ferriskin Dan Fibian who famously overcame a debilitating thio muscle wasting
condition to find fame and fortune is a he's widely thought to have been singing a thinly
veiled satar on racial discrimination rather than a self-excal patriarchy peon to consumerist
success, but all art is of course open to interpretation. But it's interesting that Johnson insisted that it is contrary to Mr. Frog's
protestations easy
being green, but I mean, it's not really the case that it is easy
being green, for example, if you want to pull off the tricky byathlon of going to the supermarket and
not ending up with a bin full of unnecessary plastic, then it's a little bit tricky when you want something even vaguely representing fair
representation in parliament at general elections, then you certainly don't want to be green in the United Kingdom, you've got absolutely no fucking chance.
And other time, it's not easy being green.
If you're wearing a Pakistan National Cricket Teams kit and you're waiting for England to
bother showing up to play you with some actual cricket rather than pulling out of a tour
at very short notice because they're feeling a little bit sleepy. And of course, you know, this is not the first time that, you know, a conserved, conservative
prime minister who've been educated at Eaton has done something like this. I mean, other
previous Eaton educated prime ministers have focused more on Kermit's co-star and gone with and
it's not easy being a pig vibe instead.
And he told the, this is one of the fascinating things, he told the the world to grow up on climate change. This is Boris Johnson, yes that Boris Johnson,
to the world to grow, which to me that was akin to being told to stop being buried in Westminster
Abbey by King Edward the Confessor, it's been doing it very well since the aforementioned year 1066, the 11th century anti-Shaggy
whose death sparked the conflict at the end in the Norms beating the Saxos as discussed.
Earlier on, and he said the world has reached a turning point, all but the kind of turning
point of car reaches when you've deliberately wangged it down an unlit road at 70 miles
an hour and an outrunner skid to a halt on an icy car park before you plunge into a disused quarry.
So good luck, world. You were f***ing needing.
Elsewhere on Johnson's trip to North America, you have meetings with Joe Biden and various
other people and it does seem that a full trade deal between the UK and the USA is not
looking like quite as much of an open goal as we have been promised by the Magic Brexit fairy, which I mean basically told us we just have to waggle in an inflatable
Queen Elizabeth off a 20% off on bunting fox peltes and mead and chucking the couple of those whiskey.
We'll be waltzing off with an all you can trade smorgasbord of economic benefits.
Sadly, you feast only bucks, such as America having other more important shit on right now
than hacking out a deal with an island nation that offers access to Gibraltar and Norfolk.
So, uh, uh, Josh added out of Johnson's visit to the US go down and it's North America excited by this.
People have talked about Britain joining North America essentially as a trading force.
We're excited to welcome us into the fold.
Like, it's nothing personal.
It's a welcome assent of the fold. Like, it's nothing personal.
But I feel like the Britain pondering
joining North American trade deal,
that I don't know.
I feel like you had your chance and you blew it.
You let us walk out of your life.
And you think you can just let two and a half centuries go
by and rejoin trade packs, not likely, Bob.
This truly feels like all of Brexit,
like this mad scramble of the leaveside
to solve a problem that they themselves created.
And leaving Europe and just assuming they'd be welcome
in a North American trade agreement
is like if I left my wife under the presumption
that I could just be recognized
as a sovereign Asian nation.
It is too big.
He did.
He stuck around to Boris Johnson's, stuck around to me with Joe Biden and talk about a free
trade.
And like you said, Biden has other priorities.
Johnson actually said that Biden has a lot of other fish to fry, which truly to me as
an American sounds like Boris Johnson tried to bribe Joe Biden with a plate of fish
and chips.
That is just what it sounded like to my dumb American years.
So now, much like a third grader with a lunch box full of celery sticks, Boris Johnson
in his country finds himself desperate for someone to trade with.
I'm sorry, Boris Johnson.
You shouldn't have cut ties with the countries who have better snacks.
He does have a lot of other fish to fry and that's because the US have fishing rights
actually in Blake, which has been one of the key issues here during the Brexit negotiations.
One of the exciting things is that the trade in meat is set to resume British beef and lamb are set to be allowed back into the American market,
which is so short of meat. I've been going hungry. If it's not British lamb, I'm not eating it.
Yes, they're getting beef lamb with a side-order of double vaccinated humans are also going
to be allowed to in.
And bear in mind the competence of the British government, given that basically they announced
that double vaccinated Brit's going to be allowed to go to America, and also they're going
to start exporting beef and lamb to America at the same, just if you are going for f**k's
sake, check the paperwork, you do not want any mix-ups on those forms.
It's sort of embarrassing, isn't it?
To be told, your relationship is a special one and realise your last and a thruple with
Australia.
And that the US has been seeing the rest of Europe on the side.
Like Biden's just not, not like, it's not at the forefront of his, it's
not the most important thing. And then Boris is going, the Americans do negotiate very
hard. And Biden's kind of concerned about the Northern Irish Accords, which is what he
referred to them, which is very American, by the way, because we all call it the Good Friday
Agreement. But, you know, in the UK, I mean, here, we already got into the bed with the
DUP when we gave them a bang, an, like a worried spouse has been sniffing the sheets and they know
something's up. Smells like orange. So, yeah, I feel-
Very, very disappointing Nirvana song that was.
Yeah, apparently a senior at official, government official in the UK said UK said I love this the ball is in the US court
It takes due to tango because if there's one thing this Tory government is good at its consistent mixed metaphors
And actually since Brexit are metaphors have been 38% more mixed than they were when we were part of the EU
Yes, another benefit the people of this nation.
American news now and a trillion dollar coin could save the world.
Josh, you are an American economics and coinage correspondent.
That's true.
This is sensational.
I mean, it's not always going to happen,
but if it did happen, it will be incredible, wouldn't it?
It would be amazing.
So the idea is the US Treasury Department
would mint a platinum coin, because they have some extra liberties
with what you can do with platinum.
And the coin would be worth a trillion dollars.
They would deposit that coin in the Federal Reserve
and reduce the national debt by a trillion dollars.
This plan raises a lot of questions.
Like, can we do this without consulting Congress?
And if we can just make a coin worth a trillion dollars,
doesn't that prove that poverty isn't an insoluble dilemma
or other conditions that the government chooses to perpetuate
to keep the will wheels of capitalism spinning.
And also, would the Queen be shiny or would it have a more understated matte finish?
I think on economics, this plan like, sure, let's try it.
Let's do things to boost our ability to give our citizens social services and relieve
the horrors of this pandemic, right?
I do think, however, my one concern,
it doesn't seem fair to mint a trillion dollar platinum coin
and just deposit it in the Federal Reserve
without letting the rapper Rick Ross wear it
as a pinky ring for at least a little while.
He's worked too hard for this.
The whole thing really proves a longstanding belief of mine,
which is that economics is bullshit.
The whole field is so arbitrary to me.
It's just philosophy with more frequent showers
and a standardized haircut.
Can we mint a trillion dollar coin
to reduce the federal debt?
It's basically, can an omnipotent god create a boulder
so big that even they can't lift it?
Except the answer to the first question reveals whether you think people deserve social
services or rather retirement and clean drinking water are fine in theory but could never work
in practice.
Trillion dollar coin is my favorite intergalactic wrapper though.
I'm looking forward to the drop, the next trillion dollar coin drop.
I feel like you, Josh, I don't get it, but I suppose I don't need to because money isn't real anyway.
I mean, like it's an idea, right? It doesn't exist. I mean, yes, I expect to get paid for this
podcast. But you know what I mean? Like actual money. Like on our tender, it says, I promised to pay
the bear on demand the sum of 20 pounds. And that used to be the weight of 20 pound of gold or silver
Standard which doesn't even exist anymore. So what are we promising to pay the bear on demand 20 pounds of sugar?
Water lies lies. That's what it is like so it doesn't money
It doesn't exist like fairies at the bottom of the garden or universal credit under a conservative government
Just is not there. So it's just an IOU, isn't it? We're all just walking around with these IOUs
that you then take to the bank and you say, could I have my 20 pounds worth of gold and they're
going, well now I can give you two smaller IOUs, I can give you two tenths, or I can get, you know,
like, and in America it says, you know, like, because you have to believe in it, don't you have to
believe in money, otherwise it's all belief, otherwise the whole thing would know, like, because you have to believe in it, don't you have to believe in money otherwise, it's all belief, otherwise the whole thing would collapse.
Like, so why not have a trillion dollar coin?
In America, your tender says, in God we trust,
and it cracks me up the atheist still have to use that money.
So, I mean, why not a trillion dollar coin?
It's just all ridiculous at this point, isn't it?
It's a lot.
I do think we should have, for the atheists,
we should have another, it should say,
in God we trust, slash, I don't know, is this anything?
Well, so, when you look at America,
it doesn't just trust in God,
it trusts in overwhelming military and economic fire power as well.
So, they don't entirely live by their own, by their own mortars.
So, I'm slightly disappointed that he said,
it's gonna be just a platinum coin,
which is gonna reduce size,
cause I worked out that a $1 coin
is basically 26.5 millimeters in diameter
and two millimeters in thickness.
So based on that, a $1 trillion coin would be 20 meters high
and 265 meters across,
weighing just over 8 million tons
and needing a small nuclear warhead
where it to be used for a coin toss
at the start of a sporting fish.
Maybe that could be another stimulus plan, right?
Like the way FDR had the kind of federal jobs
and highway building, this is Joe Biden
just setting America to work,
smelting this coin.
I don't know, I don't want to, I want, I said,
I said no, I want to lose, isn't it?
We all lose coins.
And also, it's quite a crypto, Andy.
Exactly.
A tough one to spend as well.
No, sorry, I've lost my card.
Can I pay cash?
Have you got changed for a trillion?
No, I do not want 999,999,999,999,98080,5 cents in vouchers. Thank you.
Britain news now and this country is at panic stations. It's panicking. People are
queuing up for fuel at service stations, queuing up for panic
stations in case all the panic gets used up. People are panicking, I think, it's all getting
very, very confusing. I mean, it shows what we think of our government. The government
said there is no need to panic by petrol. There is no shortage of fuel. And within about
20 seconds of them saying that 68 million people were
queuing up at petrol stations, thinking we've got to get this, there's obviously none
left. That sort of shows the stage or relationship with our politicians has reached. Tiff of you,
have you panicked bought me any petrol?
No, I've witnessed panicked buying. It's like beyond Thunderdome out there. I mean, it's
like Italy. I was driving back from the countryside
and my mum rang me first thing in the morning
to have a little panic on the phone about the panic
that had been reported panickedly in the papers.
So yeah, she was like, I was gonna run out of petrol
and I went past the first place in the new forest
and I was like, oh, okay, well, that's got a huge queue.
That's ridiculous, but I've got you know over half a tank, so I'm just gonna drive home,
and then on the way back I saw two that were normal, probably should have stopped then, didn't.
I'm just one of those people who's like, I don't always need to have a full tank, I'll drive around on half a tank.
And then risk taker.
Risk taker, yeah.
They're on the edge. And then risk taker risk taker. Yeah, and then the next thing I sort of get back to the next day
I have to take my dad to the dentist boring admin stuff
But basically I drive back and then everything sharp and then I witness like absolute chaos at my local petrol station
where someone's out literally like wrestling with someone
Someone else rowing with a bus driver and I just went I'm just not going
to bother because I'm pretty sure today they'll have topped them up, maybe they haven't,
I mean maybe I'm the fool but there were pictures on social media of you know and it's
hard to sometimes kind of blame the people when the media sort of whipped this up but someone
had filled their car and had like eight little petrol canisters on the floor
and was filling them and I just I don't know how that's allowed surely some but you
could anyone is working in the petrol station for cockle money is not going to come out
and try and you know I mean they could turn the pump off but you know we've entered into
this like kind of mad so people have got bog roll and petrol coming out the wazoo.
It's um, you know, clearly some people didn't need petrol for their work or you know, for
you know, necessary journeys and then you know, there's a difference between panicking and
taking sensible precautions. If you're not sure what that difference is, it's panicking
when other people are doing it and it's sensible if you're doing it. Remember, remember what that is also a report of people just, you know, just, just,
just chugging it, just swallowing stomachs full of petrol to then puke back into further
vehicles at home, like a, like a, like a, like a bird of prey, you're checking the
worm into its...
What is it they call that?
There's a name for that, isn't there?
Were you like trying suck petrol out of someone else's tank
with a hose?
Am I?
Yes, but you don't keep it in you.
I think that's a big difference.
Siphoning, siphoning.
That's it.
It's siphoning gonna be a big thing
because then you don't want to keep a full tank of petrol
because you don't want people like tapping your.
Going out at night wearing ostentatious jewelry
so people will rob you.
They see your tank up to the F and they're like,
oh this guy is looking to get robbed.
It is a kind of, it's like a kind of full loop though,
isn't it?
It's like if the media like create a panic about this,
then people go out and panic by and then they can report
on the panic buying.
So it's like a story that just relentlessly feeds itself.
So do you think we can exploit that then?
And so you need to sort of spread more positive room.
The trouble pet was running out that's,
oh, there's this terrible thing that big businesses
aren't paying enough tax. And I hope that it leaves the panic tax playing in a couple of seconds.
That work.
Yeah.
Yeah.
You know there's been like a weird shortage of people just sending me $25 on Venmo.
There's no need to panic and send me $25 on Venmo right now.
But I read that there are other shortages too,
because this isn't something I've been seeing.
It's not like as thoroughly covered in American news.
I saw that the energy crisis means
there are shortages of food, drivers,
and Christmas trees, possible,
which means that it sounds like Brexit has ruined Christmas.
Is that...
Brexit is the Grinch.
Oh my gosh!
But I do think if things keep going the way they are.
Here's the the lighter side.
Britain will be eligible to receive Joe Biden's
Pledge Grants to fight climate change.
So that's exciting.
You're gonna kind of shoot the moon economically.
Josh, I'm not kidding.
My wife, when all this news broke at the end of last week,
when and bought our Christmas tree.
This is a real problem in the UK right now.
Oh my gosh, this is terrible.
If in the US, fossil fuel was harder to come by
and Christmas was harder to celebrate,
there would be like a Fox News conspiracy theory
with an hour that's like, this is Antifa.
They're trying to stop us from driving.
They're trying to stop us from saying Merry Christmas.
I think here we just blame it on the woke, basically.
Just the daily telegraphs woke conspiracy correspondence of which I think are 25 on blame it on the woke, basically, just the daily telegraphs woke conspiracy
correspondence of which I think are 25 on the staff of the likes.
You know that that well-funded woke lobby.
I think everywhere.
You've got a tree though, at least you've got a tree, Chris, you know.
Now, I think we should, we need to put out the story saying there's an abundance of Christmas
trees.
Is your tree
Is it up already or is it lying in weight somewhere? No, so what is it is a plastic tree?
So the theory goes like this that first the real trees won't materialize
Then the panic buying will come in for the fake plastic trees now are 20 pound fake plastic Christmas tree on the futures market
It is surely up to 8090 quid already.
You're going to flip that?
I like this.
Then you're going to have the best Christmas in this dream your family's household.
Because I was truly thinking like, if you put up your Christmas tree in September, that
is a world of questions from your children for the next three months. One final bit of British news.
Tef apparently COVID has ruined British sex lives.
Is it COVID or Brexit or I forget, I mean it's basically it.
I think it's post-COVID and there's a few things into it.
I think fear of intimacy and spreading of disease, alongside the effects
of long COVID and stuff as well.
During COVID, a sex life was sort of flirting with your neighbours through the window by
pulling your mask down and learning more scode with your eyebrows. I mean, because flirting was very limited.
And one of the things they're saying is lockdown
has shaken our body confidence
because something like 58% of people
put on weight during lockdown.
I mean, and that I would say is true
because nobody flattened the curve in my house.
Like, I put on two stone.
And the reason during lockdown, the reason I, I, I knew
I'd put on two stone is that I turned up at my parents house in a pair of shorts and
my mum answered the door and went, your brave. Yeah, like, mums are the OGs of the passive
aggressive nonpliments, I called it nonpliments, because I guess not a compliment. You know,
they do the ones that contain the ingredients of a compliment, but call it nonpliments, because it's not a compliment. You know, they do the ones that contain
the ingredients of a compliment,
but the rug's pulled away like a,
that is a lovely pattern, but not with your skin tone.
That kind of thing.
So yeah, so I know I've put on,
I know I've put on weight.
I think also as well, we've all got a bit older
during the pandemic.
That's one of the big things, you know,
and as we know, sex changes as you sort of get
older, and I think like sex in your teens is like quick, get it in before it's too late.
Sex in your twenties is, look how many amazing positions I can do, I'm amazing.
Sex in your thirties is like, it's my turn on the bottom, leave breaking bad on.
Sex in your fouries is, I need water breaks and nothing that hurts my knees.
I'm not there yet but I presume sex in your fifties is complete and
equipped it crossword together. Do you see what I mean? Like it changes.
And sex during COVID is wash your hands and wank at me from six feet away.
So it's it's changed how we approach the act itself. So I think
Boris Johnson did suggest that as one of the government's
messaging banners initially.
I just, I love that we're stating this to the dollar
because it's like, look, we are in the midst
of a pandemic that has killed millions worldwide.
We are still not out of it.
We're still kind of really having trouble figuring out
how to work and live and socialize safely, but like, are we fucking, what's going on?
I like that the reports, the one of the, the reports suggested one of the things that
is putting people off is quotes, nebulous feelings of pessimism.
A terrific get out, isn't it? That is the opposite of horny, is nebulous person.
That brings us to the end of this week's Beugal,
huge thanks to Josh and Tiff,
anything to alert our listeners too,
that you're up to at the moment.
Old rope, which is once a month at the comedy store.
So the next one I think is an October 11th, and November 8th I think Andy you might be doing one coming up.
So just follow me on Twitter or Instagram for any of the details of that and also my sort of
tour dates that were moved about 17 times during the pandemic are finally happening in November
in Scotland. Well actually new castle Glasgow and Edinburgh. So those three, I think around November 16,
17, 18th, but you can again check my page for all of the details. Oh, I've got one more
I remember, sorry, House of Games, which starts next Monday. Is it the fourth?
The fourth of October, every day at 6pm, you watch me play some games.
But I feel like I have to think.
I'm at Josh Gondelman on Twitter and Instagram. I'm doing some stand-up mostly around New York
for the time being. But if you're here, come see me. JoshGondelman.com, I should update those dates.
I have a podcast called Make My Day. It's a comedy game show where there's just one contestant, he's guaranteed to win.
And I think, oh, and Dizic and Merrill returns
to Showtime in October.
We've been on a little break, but we'll be back soon.
You can hear me currently on the news quiz
we're about halfway through the current series.
I will be touring the UK in March next year, details
to be announced soon. We will now play you out.
As always with some lies about our premium level voluntary subscribers to join the Bugle
Voluntary subscription scheme to make a one off or occurring donation to help keep this
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Nora Murdle is not convinced by the theory that Leppards never changed their spots.
I mean I understand they probably don't change their spots because what's the point
says Laura, and Leppards she adds are fundamentally quite lazy as far as I can make out from
all the nature programs that show them having a keep in a tree. But frankly, if they did change their spots, how would anyone know speculates
Laura? I reckon they probably do swap spots at night just for the hell of it to see if
anyone noticed his. I know I would if I was a leopard, which regrettably, I'm not.
Oliver Bandkett meanwhile is intrigued by why there's only leopards that are accused
of an aversion to and or inability to achieve spot changing. Think of all the other big cats with spots, notes Oliver, Jaguars,
Cheetahs, Ocelots and Dalmatians which are of course dogs, not cats which probably makes
it even worse. No one gives a flying one whether they can, do or want to change their spots,
but leopards get all the grief and I want to know why. I reckon it's a collective memory
of our early days as a species when we kept seeing leopards
in trees and mistaking them for fruit with understandably disastrous consequences.
David pick up chips in by suggesting that maybe the lack of phrases such as a jaguar never
changes its spots means we can deduce that these animals do in fact change their spots
and that leopards are the ones worth remarking on and aphorising
about because they are the exception, not the rule. In which case says David, it's fair
to call out the leopards for their changeless spottery, when their evolutionary near-nabors
peltwise have got off their polka dotted back sides and done something about it, which
I admire. David Salmon also notes that there are precious few complaints about zebras never
changing their stripes, nor about giraffes, never changing their blotches, nor more to the point, about
any non-patterned animals not changing their monochrome pelts, whether to try a different
color, or even to try leopard-style spots for once.
The more you think about it says David, the harsher it looks on the leopards, I'm not just
defying their refusal to spot change as and when they could or should for one minute,
but I think it would be fair on the Leppards if we occasionally heard the odd
a line never tries being spotty for a change as well.
Gloria Lintel points out that it is extremely selective of us to pick on Leppards in any case.
Blue spotted Salamanders, how spots says Gloria, as their name very definitely suggests,
and they slough their skins regularly through their lives.
So I reckon you could say that blue-spotted salamanders do quite literally change their
spots.
So why not use them as an example of how people can in fact change, rather than banging
on about the leopards as a bullshit irrelevant metaphor for human intransigence that feeds
amongst other things into retrograde criminal justice policies, it makes me sick.
And finally, overhearingness, someone who apparently goes by the name Dick Swinging
wonders whether Leppards malt their fur like dogs do, and if so, whether this would count
as changing their spots anyway, even if the spots look the same.
I mean, I don't want to get too philosophical, but what is a spot?
If all the fur is new, philosophizes Dick, but the spot is the same shape, is it still the same spot?
I don't know how this affects the original saying, but I reckon it's something the philosopher
has ought to be thinking about, rather than wasting their time on things like axes and
the pop group of sugar baves.
The whole meaning and validity of the leopards never changing their spot phrase could depend
on it.
Get to it, you're naval gazing time wasteers, rages dick.
Here end if the lies, goodbye.
Get to it, you naval gazing time-wasters Rage's Dick.
Here and if the lies, goodbye.