2018, Part One: Kangaroos, Kim & corruption

The Bugle, audio newspaper for a visual world.

Hello Buglers, and welcome to part one of the Bugle Review of 2018.

I'm Andy Zaltman and what a year it has been for our world-famous planet.

It has been an unalloyed pleasure to have been able on the Bugle to bring you exclusive coverage of our renowned species' continued exploration of the outer recesses of political lunacy.

Don't forget you can see my efforts to digest the year's news and regurgitate it as a vaguely edible comedic club sandwich at the Soho Theatre.

Andy Zoltzmann's 2018 The Certifiable History continues 27th to the 29th of December and then the 2nd to the 5th of January.

The perfect Christmas present for absolutely anyone alive, dead or otherwise.

Also starring Alice Fraser, provided neither of us gets trapped by an anti-bugle activist controlled drone or shut down because we look like the US government or mutter something under our breath that may or may not be a suggestion that someone we think has just said something patently stupid may also have some kind of gender.

Oh, world, you are a bit of a tool.

Anyway, enough from me.

Let's hear instead from me, but the old me, earlier in this year with various members of the Bugle co-hosting squadron, as we take you through January to June of a year that will unquestionably go down in history, as indeed do all years.

Month one, any guesses?

Yes, it's January 2018.

Top story out of Australia now.

Tourist unable to poo after sexy Rue blocks her from Lou.

Award-winning

John Forest National Park just outside of Perth, a French tourist was blocked from using a public toilet by a sexy kangaroo striking a seductive come hither pose in the toilet's entrance.

This is all anybody's talking about in Australia.

It's the most Australian story in the world.

Have you seen the photo of the roux in question, Andy?

Oh, God, yeah.

Yeah, I've seen the photo.

Not that I can Google it now because I think it would be shut down by a safe search function.

The sexiest goddamn kangaroo I've ever seen in my life.

It is off the charts.

That is the hottest piece of sexy roux tail out there, and he wants it too.

He's not skippy.

He's slutty, baby.

Oh, I haven't been aroused since this aroused since reading Blinky Bill as a kid.

Oh,

the things I'd do to that rule if he'd let me into his pouch.

Oh, damn, baby.

Let me be a dirty little joey boy.

I want to hop all over you all night long.

Oh, you like that, baby?

Yeah.

Sorry, fellas, it's been a while.

What's been a while, Tom?

Just anyone.

Just anything.

It is warm-blooded.

Since you last committed a sex crime.

No, I just, it's not a real country, Tom.

You can't tell me that Australia is a real country with this sort of country.

We have real news stories.

It was a really sexy kangaroo, Nish, and she needed to get to the toilet.

Come on, mate.

I mean, I think, I think

it's a very.

Shut up about the cricket.

This show is over.

I've already had to do one podcast about the cricket this week.

That was

more than enough.

I'm very concerned about this kangaroo story.

To me, it shows that the animal kingdom is getting more confident, more cocky.

They've seen the divisions within our species and they are thinking this could be our chance to get rid of those imperialist pigs.

And it was interesting what this French tourist said.

She said,

Australia is such a beautiful country with perfect weather and I would move here if I could.

Well, I think she should give it a go because with all due respect she does look like she has all the required paperwork not to end up in a cell on Manus Island or Nauru with 60 other people who also think Australia Australia is beautiful and would move there if they could.

And by paperwork, I mean white face in a t-shirt with the I'm Definitely Not a Refugee slogan.

That's all we ask of people.

It's not too much to sort out.

Nish, if you get a chance to have a look at that, you're welcome back anytime.

The tourist moves, she's a 30-year-old French lady, and she said afterwards, it was so funny, I couldn't stop laughing when I saw it, was posed like that.

I wouldn't have been surprised if it had said, hey girl, what's up?

What the hell are you talking about, you sick French weirdo?

It's a kangaroo.

You wouldn't be surprised if a kangaroo said English words to you and not just any words, creepy, flirty, disturbing words.

That's sexual harassment.

Hashtag me ru.

Hashtag me ru.

That is unbelievably strong work.

I didn't realise that the film Titanic was so huge in the kangaroo community.

It was just looking at that photo.

It is absolutely a homage to Kate Winslet's infamous

from that movie.

I assumed the caption was paint me like one of your French animals.

Very hot at the moment in Australia as well.

That's a huge story over here.

And here's a.

How hot, Tom?

How hot?

How hot?

How hot?

We're frying the brains of bats.

Oh, right, okay.

That's that hot.

Hundreds of fur-covered flying fox bats, which lack sufficient canopy cover and shade in Australia's suburbs, died outside Sydney over the weekend as temperatures soared to 117 degrees Fahrenheit, the hottest it's been since 1939.

Check out this sentence, okay?

The Candon advertiser reports as of Monday, 204 dead bats, mostly babies, whose brains had been boiled, had been collected in Campbelltown.

It feels like something out of revelations.

Fake news.

Those bats weren't cut out for it, mate.

They're not cut out for our new globally warmed worlds.

But I tell you, it's so hot in Australia right now, guys.

It is so hot, Nish and Andy.

It is so hot.

How hot, Tom?

How hot?

It's so hot, no one can even be bothered being racist here anymore.

Oh,

it's so hot in Australia right now.

How hot, Tom?

How hot?

It's so hot, Nicole Kidman's nose has melted.

Oh, it's so hot right now in Australia, Dish.

I tell you what.

How hot, Tom?

How hot?

It's so hot, we're becoming delusional and finding kangaroos fkable.

That's how hot it is right now.

On the subject of this,

the French kangaroo blocks blocks toilet lady

describing.

As I believe her full name is.

Describing Australia's perfect weather.

I mean, how perfect can weather be if the brains of bats have been literally boiling in their heads because it's so f ⁇ ing hot?

Well, this is lovely weather if you'd like to be able to brew a nice cup of green tea without having to use anything other than the ambient air temperature to heat your water.

And it's lovely weather if you like bats to cook themselves.

It's a bloody good thing Gotham City isn't located in New South Wales.

I believe that woman saw all those baby bats with boiled brains lying all over the ground and she thought, these bats are trying to f me right now.

Moving on now to February.

Barely a week goes by in Britain now without some idiot saying something idiotic about Brexit.

And I mean,

really, there we go.

And straight out of the traps today, David Davis, God rest his soul,

if it is ever located.

He said, he's promised us all that Brexit will not be some kind of Mad Max style dystopia.

Stop betraying the will of the people, Brexit.

That is what we voted for.

Yeah, David Davis, a man who was once a baby so boring that his parents gave him his own last name as a first name

has disappointed the nation by saying Brexit will not be a Mad Max style dystopia.

What is the point of a dystopia if it's not a Mad Max style one?

All the other dystopias are either boring or terrifying.

I mean, he's right, of course, it's not going to be a Mad Max style dystopia.

It's far more likely that Brexit will be an H.

G.

Wells time machine-style dystopia.

You know, H.

G.

Wells' Victorian science fiction novel, where increasing disparities in wealth between the rich and the poor will lead to humanity evolving into two different species, you know, the Eloy and the Morlocks.

Yep, them.

Yeah, yeah, so the Eloi are a fet, fruit-eating rich people who just sort of waft about being beautiful and useless, like Gwyneth Paltrow.

And the

Morlocks are ugly underground poor people, and the hideous Morlocks, aka poor people, have basically eat the rich.

Right, that is our future.

Yeah, it'll have served rich people right if they don't have their act together in time for the future.

Rich people on superfood diets are basically prepping themselves for delicious lunch.

You know, the trend towards superfoods and expensive acai smoothies mean rich people are hogging all the nutrients and leaving the bad food to the poor.

It's an excellent development as we move inexorably towards this dystopian future.

It is good to know who will be the most nutrient-dense.

I'm sorry, this started with Brexit and went off track into a delicious dystopia.

Look, I don't...

I'm not saying I want to eat Wynneth Poultro.

I'm just saying I'm just going to leave the words grass-fed

and let you do the rest.

Yeah, of course it's not going to be a Mad Max style dystopia.

I've seen the Mad Max films.

There's people of colour in them.

I don't think anyone.

What are you oohing about?

I don't think anyone.

Nigel Farage's idea of Brexit is not Tina Turner in the Thunderdome.

Also, it's the specificity of it.

Like, it's not like anyone has specifically said in public.

I mean, we've all thought of it in private, but it's not like anyone was saying, oh, this is going to cause a Mad Max style.

It's worrying that David Davis was that specific.

It's like if you lend someone a cap and they give it back to you and go, I didn't it.

you're just immediately like well you definitely f this cat and now I have to burn this hat

hat

hat I thought you said cat

and I know I know how rigorous you are about doing all the empirical research for your jokes.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah.

I'm the Daniel Day Lewis of cat f ⁇ ing jokes.

Nish Kumar would never talk about pussy.

No, no, no, I'm sorry, that was too far.

You're right.

Boris Johnson.

Oh, yeah, what's that?

That's going to be the title of series three of the masterplay, isn't it?

Basically, work for any topical news show, wouldn't you?

This week on what's that up to?

or the extended edition, what are those up to?

That's later in the week.

Sub-category of nude with niche.

Boris Johnson said,

well, last week now, he insisted that Brexit was not a V-sign from the cliffs of Dover, which, as I pointed out in a radio show last week, is my favourite Vera Lynn song.

But actually, that is what a lot of people did vote for.

It was in some of the UKIP literature, a 300-metre-high V-sign on the cliffs of Dover made out of pure British oak.

The Sinn Fran president said the government does not have a viable plan.

Again, that was laid out perfectly clearly before the referendum.

If they suddenly come out with a viable plan, that will again be betraying the will of this nation.

Yeah, I mean, it's all going about as badly as we thought it was going to go.

And just to go back to that V sign,

Boris Johnson said that it isn't a V sign from the Cliffs of Dover, but we actually did that.

I know that you have just bullshit about it, but do you not remember Paddy Power erected a giant statue of Theresa May flicking the Vs dressed in a Union Jack dress?

Like, it literally looked like an EDL member's wet dream come to life.

Like, it was...

It was really...

Put it with a Thatcher face instead of the Theresa May face.

Poor old Teresa.

Well, I think if you get a big big enough V sign and a large bit of elastic, then you could use it as

a catapult

to fire all the illegal asylums back to wherever they came from.

Andy, in this conversation, we have come up with a more specific plan for Brexit than

the entire government catapulting immigrants off the white cliffs of Dover.

At least it's a plan.

Because they've gone for an away day in checkers.

As we record today, they're currently at an away day to sort of hammer out a Brexit policy.

Sort of the thing you probably should have done before you started Brexit.

And it's classic procrastination.

Like, I recognize this from any time I have a deadline for anything.

You go away, you put it off.

If the government are anything like me, within a couple of days, they'll all be collectively masturbating themselves into oblivion.

My working method is my working method.

That would be the perfect metaphor for Brexit.

Just an enormous conservative circle, Jack.

It's March

in fiction and weaponry news now.

Young anti-gun activists in the US are fighting for their right to not be shot, but also doing it with a lot of Harry Potter placards.

And they are facing increasing criticism from the right for using Harry Potter analogies in their protests, speeches, and placards.

Many on the right wing are calling out the young protesters for taking he who must not be named's name in vain, reminding us all that Harry Potter is a work of fiction and not a blueprint for how to organise your life, to which everyone else says, Yeah, duh, at least it's better than organising your life with reference to sex in the city, where everyone was all like, Oh my god, you're such a Miranda, and I had to pretend to know who Miranda was.

I mean, running your life according to a long-running serial work of fiction is as good a way to do things as any, though I'm not super keen on the current trend among Conservative politicians to choose as their guiding work The Lord of the Flies, which

while a seminal coming-of-age novel and brutal reflection on the nature of young masculinity outside the confines of civilised society, is not a great roadmap for, for example, healthcare funding.

Well, I guess it's you know that, or the Bible, which is

similar long-running fiction in some ways.

There are the huge marches in America, the march for our lives across America, hundreds of thousands of people marching in favour of people not being gunned down as they go about their daily business.

And it does seem that America has finally reached a tipping point where there's a generational shift where enough people now do not want to be gunned down as they go about their daily business.

And that's now started to critically outmass

those who do want to see other people gunned down as they go about their daily business and simultaneously be able to protect themselves from marauding dinosaurs.

I guess there have been similar marches before in the past, but perhaps this could be the moment when America finally has some vague vestiges of sense blasted into it.

The gun lobby, or the pro-death lobby, as they're also known,

quite literally won't go down without a fight.

And

you hear them chanting out their catchphrases.

So USA, USA, USA, for example, which stands for unbelievably stupid anachronism.

I do understand that it is, you know, it's an awkward thing.

Historically, you want to respect the founding philosophies of the American nation, the eternal truths and wisdoms of the amendment squad, as they may or may not have meant them in 1791.

And you don't want to abandon those nation-defining thoughts.

But at the same time, you're not entirely comfortable with the deaths of innocent people.

It's kind of a kill 22 situation.

Obvious answer.

There's no obvious answer, especially if you continually ignore the obvious answer.

I mean, the problem for me is that the Harry Potter books were that bandwagon that everyone jumped on that made nerds and book reading cool.

And I was the kid that was nerdy before it was cool to be nerdy.

You know, I read books in trees like an Enid Blight and an asshole.

It's not cool when becoming a nerd becomes cool when you're a nerd, because then you lose the one thing that makes nerd life tolerable, which is feeling superior to the idiots who are bullying you.

I also just missed the Hermione window.

So when I was a frizzy head know-it-all who couldn't keep her mouth shut, it was less, oh, cool, Emma Watson, hashtag I'm with her, and more, let's throw sandwiches at it.

As sure as night follows day, what follows March?

Correct, April.

Let's introduce our third co-host of today's bugle.

We attempted to introduce him last week and he didn't entirely work.

So let's hope for a better this week.

All the way from the United States of America.

Your friend and mine, as printed out cell by cell

on my 3D printer, here is the fully functioning brain of American President Donald Trump.

Amazing that you have that.

You were considering.

Are we going to bump him?

Because we've run out of time.

Anyway, Donald, are you alright?

Hello, Andy.

Hello.

Hello, Donald.

You want to say hello to the audience?

Hello, Bugles.

Hello, Bugles.

Yeah, that's nice.

Right, here we go.

So, Donald, it's great.

It's love to have you on the show.

It's my great honor to be a guest on the bugle.

Right,

do you think

it's not really your target demographic, a podcast listening crowd?

They will not like me at all.

And that's okay.

You've left the liberal losers.

Okay, so...

So, anyway, Donald.

Yes, and

just I think it's time maybe to reflect on your first year or so in charge.

What what do you think

your first

year and a quarter will be most remembered for?

Reforms that lower the freedom, choice and opportunity for the American people.

Thanks, Louis.

And I mean what's the ultimate goal now of your first term in office?

We must fire all Muslims into space.

Well it's all starting to stack up now and and the recent

bombings in in in Syria, there's been some claims that they were not in accordance with international law.

Stupid fucking laws.

You just don't like laws.

They make my fucking life very, very difficult.

That's been clear throughout your presidency, Donald.

And what do you think, you know, if there's one, you know, maybe one thing you'd be more remembered for than anything else so far, what would it be?

The hands.

Oh, the hands.

My frankly disgusting.

The hands.

And what's your proudest achievement so far?

We've made historic progress in crushing the spirit of the American public

at a faster clip than ever before,

by far.

And you know, what other

things that you think you'll be most defined by at the moment?

Russia.

Russia.

Yeah, anything else?

Peep, peep.

Okay.

But if there was one thing so far, the defining aspect of your presidency, what would it be?

Me being a total gravity-defying uranium-level

total.

Anything that's a appropriate way for an American president to behave?

I keep my campaign promises.

Yeah, I guess you did lay that card very firmly on the table.

So um

um uh Donald, um uh there's been s many people have claimed that you're rather loose with the truth.

Do you know a single fact?

Only one.

One fact?

And what is your one fact?

Hello.

What's about Halloween, is it?

And could we like share your Halloween fact with the audience here in Australia?

Did you know that

Queen began when Hillary Clinton turned a totally innocent little child into a very bad quality wooden desk?

Hillary Clinton turned a child into a desk.

Yes, yes, yes.

Definitely happened.

To the best of my knowledge, yes.

To the best of your knowledge, it's very different to what actually happened.

And then what happened after that?

She ate the whole fucking thing in one huge mouth.

Hillary Clinton ate the desk child.

And it was a horrible thing to watch.

I don't doubt that for a second.

But I mean, at least, I mean, many people wish Hillary had become president instead of you.

I mean, she had more experience of the international world that you struggle with a bit.

I mean, how are you getting on with your neighbours in Canada right now?

I don't know fucking anything about Canada.

Nothing at all.

What is Canada?

Is it a disease?

Well, it's not a disease.

Or maybe a type of motorbike.

No, it's not a type of motorbike either.

Can I put my cock in its?

No!

You cannot put your cock in Canada, as Johnny Cash famously sang.

A shame.

Really a shame.

So we.

Fancy battle.

Right, okay.

Tom, I think.

So, well, maybe it's time for you, you can meet our co-hosts, Donald.

Firstly, Tom Ballard here.

Hello, Tom.

And

Tom's been doing

his own satirical daily TV show here.

Wow.

Quite patronizing, Donald.

Hard to believe.

But oh, no.

So,

you know,

you've got to enjoy this more.

Just imagine Eddie practicing this in front of the mirror.

So

you're not a fan of Tom's work?

I like Tom.

You like Tom?

I mean, we have a lot in common.

You have a lot in common.

Wow.

Right.

What do you have in common?

Neither of us likes women.

In our own different ways.

Have you got any questions for Donald?

Yes, Mr.

President.

Mr.

President, it's a pleasure to meet you.

I was just wondering, you know, you've been very successful in politics, having had no experience at all.

You've become the President of the U.S.

I just wonder if you have any advice for people out there who want to get into politics themselves.

It's a great question.

Thank you.

Simple, fair, and easy to understand.

So what's your advice for people who want to get into politics?

All you have to do is just abandon your voice, your hopes, your dreams, and above all else, your values and principles.

So, I mean, just to boil that down, what do you got to do?

You must act like a complete barstood.

And

hang on.

You couldn't get a clip of him just saying bastard?

No.

No, no.

Somebody else said, no.

Anyway,

it was late.

And our

Donald, I know you're a massive fan of our other guest as well.

Aditi.

Middle.

Did I pronounce that right, by the way?

I'm not sure you did pronounce it right.

Have you got anything to say to Aditi?

We do not, under any circumstances, attempt to move to America.

Anyway.

Oh, this is my job.

And now it's on to May.

May.

Sorry.

May, bit of a trigger word for me at the moment.

Cheating news.

And there has been some glorious cheating in Indian education.

Now it is a highly competitive country.

It's doubled in population size in what, 30 years?

Yes.

I think it's, I mean, there is some heroic levels of cheating in Indian education.

Correct, Andy.

And I think you're specifically referring to an incident in a particular part of India where some students decided to staple some currency notes

to their answer papers as a means of connecting with their examiner.

Yes.

And Andy, you seem to have a small moral issue with this.

Whereas

where I'm from,

there is no way to stand out among 5,000 examinees

by just your answers.

No.

Right?

No, that's fair.

So I think some ingenious students, and this is why entrepreneurship is thriving so well where I'm from, decided to put like a 500 rupee, thousand rupee note, staple it, along with a a poem and a joke Because you may go to jail for that Andy, yeah, but you will admit the examiner will remember you

gotta make an impression You know, I've always been impressed by cultures Andy where when you bribe stuff things got done You know one of the difficulties in the culture I live in is when you take away bribery nothing gets done right

Because that would just be expecting the individual to do their job for the salary they're getting right that makes it a very boring world Andy I guess I cannot function in a system where there is not a parallel system.

So I don't know about your culture, but I suppose your students write the answers and then hope to get in.

Well, yes.

I mean, we're not averse to the odd bit of cheating ourselves.

And there was a story this week about

prominent YouTubers.

Yes.

Which is

people who...

apparently earn huge amounts of money from advising children to cheat in their exams, apparently.

Excellent.

So, yeah,

it's just each culture has its own different way of

doing it.

It was interesting as well that writing poems to examiners was a rather more kind of romantic way of

going about this, appealing to their

soul and their heart rather than their wallet.

I guess, I mean, it again depends on

what exactly you're writing, you know, what

exactly you're writing in that poem.

Yeah, some of them were romantic,

but some combined.

They had a poem, they had some jokes.

So they wanted to show the range of talents.

So they did not know what a differential equation was yeah but they're like you know here's a limerick there was a man from madras who had both of grass

here's a thousand rupees yeah yeah and here's a joke you know 12 people walked into a bar and so i'm saying isn't an examination

the point of it is to show a range of who you are as a human being yeah so he and also i mean it again i mean this what you've just said shows the one of the issues india is facing in terms of overpopulation that generally here it's a man walks into a bar and you've gone with 12 men walk into a bar.

Yeah, right there.

Right there.

It is crowded.

That's the Mumbai version.

Correct.

A bars are larger.

They have Italian names and you, 12 people walk in right there.

Everything is bigger, Andy.

And, you know, this, this, I think, this archaic system, honestly, of ethical exam taking.

Yeah.

You know, I think that it's boring for the examiners as well.

Well, it is.

And also, I mean, you look at the future.

What skills are our children going to need?

Everything's going to be done by robots, by computers, you know, knowledge.

No one can possibly be as knowledgeable as

even a medium-sized memory chip these days.

So, teach them the skills they will need.

They're going to need mental flexibility, they're going to need, you know, as you say, bribery.

Correct.

And most importantly, the element of surprise.

Yeah.

Because, say, if you're a GCSE examiner, you open a paper, I assume it's still done on paper.

Yeah.

Everybody else has just answers.

Right.

This guy's put in a small marsupial.

You have the

element of

full attention, Andy.

And that's what we're exploring, Adi.

This is why we are the future of the world.

We're exploring things that you've traditionally introduced to us, like exams in the English language and playing with it.

They're hoping that perhaps the examiner is a lonely, pathetic,

underpaid individual in a small town in Uttar Pradesh.

And for a second, there'd be some glimmer of love

from an 18-year-old boy.

It's very Plato, actually.

It's very sort of for a second, it's like, oh.

You've done very well to find so many positives in this story.

I'm impressed.

Andy, the summit is off.

The Frost Nicks and a f ⁇ ing wittery.

The coffee shop scene in heat meets dumb and dumber.

But when Harry Met Sally of International Crazy Men is officially off, Donald Trump cancelled his proposed meeting with Kim Jong-un via a letter yesterday afternoon.

Devastating blow for international relations and a real surprise.

in the same way that a surprise party is a surprise in that it's not really a surprise, but everyone's pretending to go through the motions.

Yes, I think we've heard enough about you going through your motions on the show already.

So the yeah, I mean, the talks that were scheduled for Singapore

coming, I mean, it's a huge, huge disappointment.

I mean, probably the biggest disappointment of all is,

you know, there's always hidden losers in this.

And

a commemorative coin

glamorising and vindicating and validating a murderous despot, which is really what these kind of talks are all about, is now no longer valid.

I mean,

they were selling...

Basically, Donald Trump had had a special coin made to commemorate this glorious occasion

of the supreme leader.

Not even an inverted comma.

So even Kim Jong-un doesn't really think he's f ⁇ ing supreme, to be honest.

These coins are now obsolete.

Disaster.

Very much like the commemorative mug marking the coronation of King Edward VIII.

It never happened.

I may have bought an eBay some years ago.

Love a bit of history.

Love a bit of merch.

But to give Kim Jong-un his own...

I mean, it's one thing to butter up the missile waggling bastard and mass poverty fan for the practical purposes of making a nuclear war marginally less likely, but to give him his own f ⁇ ing coin.

Yeah, I mean, it's...

It was a bizarre move.

I mean, issuing a commemorative gold coin for an occasion that hasn't happened is a really bold move.

It actually reminds me of an ancient proverb that my grandmother used to tell me when I I was growing up.

Now I'm translating directly from the Malayalam, so do bear with me.

On the verge of success, the wise man waits while the foolish man commissions a f ⁇ ing stupid, f ⁇ ing pointless gold coin that's not even a coin and makes himself look like a complete f ⁇ ing c.

So, I mean,

what is the strategy behind it?

Because it does seem this whole thing is essentially some kind of improvisational, ego-driven whack-a-mole politics.

Or is it a game of clever political chess, albeit a version of chess in which the only pieces are the penises of the two players slunked onto the chessboard?

Your move.

Oh, nice.

The Napoleonic opening.

F you, it's way bigger than Napoleon's.

Donald Trump sent a letter which expressed regret that he would be unable to carry out the meeting,

but also included some thinly veiled threats.

When I say thinly veiled, I mean there was no veil.

It was just a threat.

He said this, this is a direct quote from the letter.

You talk about your nuclear capabilities, but ours are so massive and powerful that I pray to God they will never have to be used.

This is the ultimate break-up letter, Andy.

What Donald Trump is basically saying is, it's not me, it's you.

And if you say it's me, I will blow you to Kingdom Come with my massive nuclear arsenal.

I mean, again, that's when Bob Dylan was very much the master of the break-up.

Yes, this is Donald Trump's blood on the tracks moment.

Jeffrey Lewis from the Middlebury Institute of International Studies described the situation as a total goat rodeo.

I mean, Nis, you are under the age of 40, so you know how young people talk.

Is this a common phrase?

Yeah,

I believe it's common pilots amongst the rappers, Andy.

Total goat rodeo.

Also, my favourite Xbox stroke PlayStation, stroke, numbskull idiot console game this year, total goat rodeo.

I mean, could

I mean, I guess, is it one of those phrases that just almost makes sense by its sheer lack of sense i mean it does seem to fit the trumpic presidency yeah absolutely concept of a total goat rodeo yeah it it sounds like one of his failed businesses yeah it's like stakes casinos goat rodeo like it wouldn't be out of place yeah in the list of things he has completely f ⁇ ed up it could possibly even be a merging of his steak and casino businesses

yeah and yet somehow he still comes out that's the problem that i have with the coin because the White House dropped the price from $24.95 to $19.95, which I would argue is still $20 too expensive.

It should cost minus $0.05.

Also, numismatists, which I believe is the name for people who

like coins a lot, say it should be referred to as a medallion because it has no denomination, so it's completely f ⁇ ing worthless.

But so many people bought it when the price was slashed that the White House gift shop website cracked.

And it's like the most American thing ever, like a celebration of absolute stupidity.

But it's typical of Donald Trump in that somehow, no matter how badly he fks up, he still makes money.

It's a genius.

And rounding off this week's Bugle compilation, June.

In baby jails news now, Trump has declared his intention to end the inhumane separation of immigrant families, a policy that ended up in mass outcry after the creation of what are being called tender age facilities, aka baby jails.

I love babies, they are adorable.

It's their only survival mechanism is being so adorable, you can't put them in the bin.

But that is why this policy is so inexplicable.

How detached do you have to be from reality to think baby jail is a good idea?

Babies need hugs and love and someone to puke on.

They don't need tiny prison tattoos and a bucket to puke in.

This is a

bizarre story.

And

Trump has, well, he's

ridden to the rescue of his own dark fetid soul by rowing back on his own policy I'm not sure that gets him many credit points to be honest behind this also Mike Pence man of the year yet again from the influential magazine The Christian hypocrite

Jeff Sessions or to give him his actual full name Jefferson Beauregard Sessions

And the Jefferson and Beauregard

those two names have passed down through two generations of the Sessions family both Confederate war heroes.

So they've stuck with that through several generations of the Sessions.

But anyway, let's not judge him on his family names.

He's even been criticised by members of his own church for using the Bible to justify caging children.

He quoted Romans 13.

Romans 13, of course, sounds to me like a disappointing effort in a game of Empire v.

Empire snooker, when the Romans ran out of position after putting red, black, and red, had a run-up to Bolt to take the green, but then left themselves poorly poorly positioned for the next red, which, although bottable, left them with no angle to get on another colour, leading to an ill-advised long put on a tricky pink and a break, letting the Assyrians in with the red spread and an opportunity to clinch the frame in one visit.

Romans, 13.

I mean, Andy.

It's had a long train journey.

Political satire does not equal imaginary snooker games.

Why did you not tell me that 15 years ago?

My career could have been so different.

There was this bizarre policy to separate children from their parents, which, as a parent,

I know is not generally a good idea in terms of not ending up with screaming children.

And particularly if you then put those children in, as you describe it, a baby cage.

I mean, the tears will flow.

I mean, there's not no one likes a break.

And not the cool little ones that you tattoo on your face, like proper tears.

It suits you very well, Alec.

But he's sort of benevolently moving to end this state of affairs that he directly brought about himself while demanding congratulations and blaming all the bad stuff on the Democrats.

We have always been at war with Oceania.

Like,

I used to think you watched the news to find out what was going on in the world, but now I watch it to find out what side I meant to be on of an argument I didn't know existed yesterday, but is now fundamental to my self-conception and moral status that I need to argue for on Twitter while I'm on the bus today.

So it's been replaced with this new, sort of vaguely worded executive order to slam up families together.

Or maybe

are they going to sew them together end to end?

We don't know at this early stage.

Or maybe strat them together and catapult them back to Latin and Mexico or wherever they come from.

More than 2,000 children were separated from their parents as a result of the so-called zero-tolerance policy, zero-tolerance for immigration and basic human decency and simple manners, really.

And I mean it looks bad for now, but let's try and find the positives in this, Alice.

Think of the joyous emotions when just a few of those 2,000 plus children are reunited with their parents.

Surely those inspiring, heart-lifting moments are worth the slightly gillyaddish awkwardness of seeing screaming children locked in cages.

Sure.

We'll get back to you on that one.

This is looking on the bright side in the way that you refuse to put a piece of paper in front of your eyes when you're looking at the sun during an eclipse.

Also, it helps us appreciate our own lives and our own offsprings more.

Because, as they say, freedom is never truly appreciated until it has been taken from someone else's child and shown on telly in a cage.

And of course.

Yeah, I heard that one as freedom is never truly appreciated until it's shat on by cs.

That's my favourite male fragrance as well.

Chaton.

The problem, politically, I guess, Alice, is that ripping children away from their parents and putting them in cages might be fun, but it has a tendency to produce what media wonks might describe as bad visuals.

And to be fair to Trump as well, from his own personal background, he had no way of knowing that people might actually like their own families.

Even love them rather than viewing them as just expedient persons.

He probably thought he was doing them a favour.

I wanted to get rid of all of my families.

There you go.

Half the year bagged up and put in the freezer to be forgotten about, discovered again in 20 years' time behind a bag of extremely out-of-date frozen peas and thrown in a bin.

The bugle will be simultaneously carrying on exactly as normal and slightly relaunching in the new year.

Details still to be confirmed, but we may be calling on your support through 2019.

A quick reminder that if you've forgotten to buy Christmas presents for your friends, family, or foes, come to my Soho Theatre show.

It runs until the 5th of January on and off.

Also there will be a bugle tour of North America.

That's coming in late February and early March.

There are some dates already on sale and we'll have a full announcement over the next couple of weeks.

Also I'm doing a live bugle show at the Glasgow Comedy Festival on the 19th of March.

Roll up, roll up into a ball in the corner of a darkened room and think about what the world has done this year.

By which I mean happy Bugle Christmas.

Tune in next week for all the thrilling action from Planet Earth July to December 2018.

Until then, as the 1970s glam rockers Wizzard should have sung, I wish it could be Christmas once a year.

I'm learning to set achievable goals.

Watch and learn, Britain.

Until next week, goodbye.

Hi Buglers, it's producer Chris here.

I just wanted to very quickly tell you about my new podcast, Mildly Informed which is in podcast feeds and YouTube right now.

Quite simply, it's a show where me and my friend Richie review literally anything.

So please come join us wherever you get your podcasts right now.