Bugle 4058 – Donald the Bastard

The Bugle, audio newspaper for a visual world.

Hello Bubers and welcome to issue 4058 of the world's ongoing weekly updated official last will and testament of the planet Earth.

The official audio document chronicling the legacy of this planet between now and the end of the world, somewhere between three months and five billion years from now.

It's a ballpark figure.

Might be a bit either way.

I haven't built in a contingency.

I am Andy Zoltman, and if you cut me, I say owl.

Here in London, we are today, the city where 500 years from now to the day, we in Britain will be holding a referendum on whether or not to rejoin planet Earth.

after we leave it in a referendum 470 years from now to join a new trading block with the the 18th century after time travel enables us to trade with our former selves, which could work out very well for both sides.

Joining me here today in London, a welcome return to the Dougal

to a man I lost saw flying a helicopter into a crowd of screaming children.

They deserved it.

Well, they paid to see it.

It was in a pantomime.

It's Al Murray.

Hi, Andy.

That was sensational.

The helicopter in your pantomime.

That was the theatrical extravaganza of the millennium for me.

Well, it was a bizarrely high point in the show as well for me.

And when I got the script, you know,

reading it and thinking, oh, there's a joke about a cow here and, you know, the magic beans and all that.

And then turn it, and

there's a bit where one of the other cast members says, where is Al?

And then in the stage, he says, Al appears upstage in a helicopter.

I think, right, I'm doing this.

I'll take this kick.

But yeah, I had to be strapped in properly.

It was an actual fuselage of a helicopter

a scrapyard, apparently,

and it had crashed the helicopter in

real life.

It had been repurposed as a prop.

But they had to strap me in properly and everything.

How badly had it crashed in real life, actually?

I didn't inquire.

I didn't want to know.

You didn't want to know.

You didn't want to.

Was it haunted?

That's all I wanted.

Well, it was a haunting experience, but I don't know that it was haunted.

But every time I'd get in and we, because we did 64 shows, you know, straight through, each time me and the stage manager strapped me in, we'd go, okay, time for flight number 32,

and

yeah, it was a sensational thing to have done.

Yeah.

And since you were last on the bugle, you have had a baby.

Yes, that's right.

Well, yeah, yeah, I have.

I've been involved in the baby-making process.

And that just shows the amazing fertility power of the bugle.

That is the bugle, yeah.

I mean, you were on in

August for the first time.

Well, August and Eve,

with the live crowd.

That's a very fast gestation period between coming on the bugle and having a...

Are there two biologically wrong?

I can never remember.

They're not biologically.

I'm a bit out of the loop.

And also.

Are you saying

going on the bugle gets you late?

No, no, I'm saying it makes you feck up.

Oh, right, okay, okay.

Because that'd be quite a boast, wouldn't it?

Hey,

Yaz on the bugle this week.

Showbiz has changed, Al.

Also, joining us here today

for the first time on the Bugle, It's comedian, writer, podcaster, and no-time American ski jump champion.

No shame in that.

It's Jen Kirkman.

Thank you.

I really hope it doesn't make me fertile.

All right.

Because I'm not in the business of having a baby yet, so I'm nervous now.

It is a business as well.

If you want to monetize it.

Yeah, they're hard to monetize.

I've had mine for 11 and 9 years now, and they've been an absolute financial drain.

Yeah, I mean, my eldest is 18, so I'm waiting for her to actually return a profit.

Yeah.

We're a long way in.

You never know, she could win

a contest.

You know, like a.

The lottery.

Like Britain's got talent or something.

Yeah.

Take on a prize.

My daughter's.

She's talentless, that elder.

Does she listen to podcasts out?

I think it's important to be honest about your children, isn't it?

If you've got a child who can't sing, you've got to tell them they can't sing.

Yeah.

Yeah, or they'll end up on a talent show making a fool of themselves and disgracing their family.

So, Jen, you've been doing your stand-up show at the Soho Theatre.

How have you enjoyed London?

I've loved it every time I come here.

And it could possibly be that I

am getting better at my job, but I feel the audiences are getting better.

Oh, right.

Do you know what I mean?

I feel like they're getting more loose and loud laughing.

I swear years ago when I came here, it was a different feeling.

I mean, that's Brexit, isn't it?

Where we just laugh more.

We're set free.

That's what we've done.

That's what's actually happened, Jenny.

Since

we've become free people.

You've been liberated from being part of Europe and getting intelligence that you might need and other important things.

So this is the Bugle for the Week beginning Monday, the 5th of February, 2018.

We're recording on the 2nd of February, making it 3,000 years to the day since the 2nd of February, 982 BC.

Way back at a simpler time when Wi-Fi signals were really bad, but people didn't mind.

There's a more patient time.

And on this day in 982 BC, the Greek fitness guru and inventor, Arkloptios of Megalognosos, created the world's first balance board

when he was discovered by King Agakloptikos standing on an upturned tortoise and claimed he was researching a new product.

And just the next week, he invented the fitness ball when caught in Flagrante with a large watermelon.

On this day, the 2nd of February in 1848, the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo was signed.

Classic treaty.

That's brought an end to the Mexican-American War.

Treaties are interesting, aren't they?

Because at the time, they obviously seem like a really

the right thing to do, don't they?

And then a couple of years later, everyone's going, oh, I don't know, I'm not sure about that.

Yeah.

Well, so I think it's partly name, isn't it?

They raise expectations.

You think they're going to be full of treats?

Mostly full of complicated subclauses.

I've just been reading a book about

the Norman conquest and the French king in the mid-11th century.

He used to do this thing called the Peace of God, where he'd say, right, the peace of God is now hereby instated.

You're supposed to stop fighting.

And people basically would ignore it.

He'd turn up.

He'd turn up in an area like Normandy or Anjou or someone go, right, peace of God from now on.

And they'd all be like, fk it off.

It's really funny reading this.

This guy, Henry,

one of the French Henry kings, not reading it close to this book.

He'd turn up and he'd go, right, knock it off, you lot.

And then they'd go, no, sorry, it doesn't apply here.

Right.

Your peace of God does not apply here, which I think is really fantastic.

Like naughty children.

Yeah.

It's so sweet.

I mean, it's a noble attempt.

Yeah, it's a nice attempt.

Why not start there?

Yeah, well, yeah, yeah, exactly.

And

they had a real problem with people building castles illegally.

They just put up a castle without permission.

Wouldn't you, it seems like, I mean, I've never built one, that it would take a while to put one up.

So how far do you get before someone goes, wait, are you building a castle?

That is illegal?

That is an excellent question because it seems that, you know, our idea of a castle, like a big stone building, basically, if you put a mound up with some, with a palisade, some logs on the top of it, that's a castle.

Right.

And

that sounds like a tax dodge to me.

Is there some tax break for castles and not houses?

Well, I mean, this is the cause of most of the unrest in northwest France in the 11th centuries, illegal castles.

Right.

Well, I mean that's what you get on the bugle.

You get up-to-the-minute topical stuff about 11th century French castles.

Top story this week and Donald Trump has banged on for 80 minutes

about

the

well let's say the state of the union, the perceived state of the union.

It was

an interesting speech.

I sat up and watched it very late at night, and that is not a healthy thing to do unless you are an aficionado of Trump.

Jen,

you digested it in transcript.

I read the transcript, and I saw a clip.

So he was supposed to say to everyone still recovering in Texas, Florida, Louisiana, Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, California, and everywhere else, we are with you.

We love you.

He says love a lot, and we will pull through together.

He didn't say California because he's mad at us.

He doesn't like it.

So he just dropped that off and didn't actually say it because he's mad that we didn't vote for him.

So

everything that he, so I couldn't bring myself to watch it.

And then when I so but I have seen some clips and it's we got the sort of drugged Trump, the one that is very slow and seems like he's on Zanak.

So I don't know if they have better than the Trump au naturel?

It's less unpredictable, but it should be alarming to people that he seems heavily medicated.

I don't know if they give it to him because they don't want him to go off, or he's twilighting, or whatever they call it, sunsetting because I think he's early dementia.

I don't know what it is, or he just has a drug habit.

This is completely my opinion.

But if you are a real estate.

Might as well.

It's 2018.

It's the era of Trump.

Opinions are facts.

That's true.

Reading this, it sounds like a child's book book report.

I mean, and he has speech writers, so they have to write it to his stupidity.

I don't know how he gets through the teleprompter, which makes me think he has an earpiece in, and that's why he goes so slow as well.

Well, that'll be interesting.

So these are my theories.

If that is ever...

I mean, maybe that proves that he's not under

quite as controlled by Moscow as some people have said, because surely if someone in Moscow is controlling that earpiece, at some point he'd have said, dust Vidonia.

Spussy blah, bolshoy.

Well, that's the other thing.

He should have said our union is completely being torn apart from the inside because Russia's tactics are working.

But

I don't think you can say that right now.

No, he can't say that out aloud without getting a certain element of it.

Is it regarded as a good performance?

Because I always think the thing the interesting thing about Trump is he's made it his business to set the bar so low.

Yeah, it's clever, that is.

So when he goes to Congress and reads an auto-cube without a stumble or shouting at some journalists or complimenting someone on their hat or

impersonated disabled person, person.

There's like a ripple of, oh, didn't he do well?

In the same way that someone squeezing one tiny turd into a potty halfway through a dirty protest should be congratulated.

It's that sort of by lowering the bar, if he turns up and just reads a thing from beginning to end, even if it, like you say, it's sort of

gibberish, Janet and John level, reading level gibberish.

Yes.

People go, oh, you know,

stable Trump, or what do they call it, or good, good Trump.

They always say that's today he became president.

Yeah, presidential.

Presidential.

I think they've stopped doing it because every network that does it gets attacked on Twitter now when they dare to say something like that.

But

it just, he says love a lot.

It's such a strange thing.

It's this almost glow of humanity that comes through him.

But he just keeps saying, we love you, we love you, to different

to different states.

He's got a lot of love, you know.

Well, he called the bill that he didn't end up passing

the DACA bill to not deport people that have lived here forever a bill of love.

He wants to have a bill of love.

And that's what he said.

And then the Republicans took him aside and they didn't let him do the bill.

But he almost did a good thing.

And he did describe Cole as beautiful, beautiful, clean Cole.

I mean, with all due respect to Cole, I mean, even Cole doesn't find itself sexy.

I mean,

that is not a sexy bit of rock.

He had his his big boy face.

He just kind of like he puts his chin out and puffs out.

Very proud of himself.

I also think that's sort of a vanity thing where he's trying to look minimize his chins.

Yeah.

I think he's trying to look thinner and make his eyes less prominent.

But yeah, I couldn't watch it.

I can't see his face anymore.

I thought this would be over by now.

I thought he would be out by now.

It's hurting me.

I don't think he's ever going to leave.

I think he's going to be president in about a hundred years' time.

He will declare martial law, I'm sure, and be the king.

But I thought maybe he'd have a heart attack.

I thought maybe they would make him resign because he doesn't want the job.

And so, I feel like he would resign.

He can do anything, and his people will believe him.

So, if he resigns and says, oh, this is a crap democracy, you know, I don't want to run it.

I was better serving America as a businessman.

He could just make that up and say, oh, they made me leave.

They're being so mean to me and start, you know, I don't know why he doesn't just do that.

I still thought he would do that.

Joining the seniors golf tour is the most likely way out.

Putting the hours.

That would be amazing.

What I was really struck by,

having watched every second of it live, was the number of standing evasions.

Now, I know a thing or two about standing evasions.

I've had two in my career.

One of which was when I left the stage early at the gig in Manchester in 2002.

But

there's a lot of pretty old people watching that speech, and that's a lot of exercise.

The number of standing evasions for those old Republicans to give Donald Trump.

And I've just

been checking the latest injury reports.

Mike Pence, he's been ruled out of vice presidenting for two weeks after straining both his hamstrings after standing up and sitting down again 7,000 times in 80 minutes.

The Republican senator Cuerville Plaketic, he suffered a double wrist dislocation and a fractured sclapheoid in his ulterial node.

That's part of the wrists.

Clapping a record 11,921 times in Trump's speech.

That's the most by a single representative in a president's speech.

An average of 56 claps per applaud and 2.4 rounds of applause per minute.

He even applauded a cough at one point.

And on the Democratic side, Streville Jark, the senator for New Wessexhire, was hospitalized with a compression fracture of the frontal headbone after a frown penetrated his skull after an unbroken 76-minute scowl.

So

it was physically demanding.

I mean the pictures that I saw of it with the Democrats having to stay stony faced.

So

Bernie Summers and his crew all having to whatever they and that must be that in itself must be quite difficult.

Well his face is always like that.

And by the way, he's not a Democrat.

I just want to make it very clear.

I have a dislike for Bernie Sanders.

Okay.

I am not saying it to you.

I'm saying it just to anyone out there.

He does not represent

his behavior does not represent that of my people.

Okay.

Although I am a socialist at heart.

Right, okay.

Okay, anyway.

But yes,

those pictures of them, like, you know, because it is very hard.

If you've been in an audience where half the audience, they're really into it, it's very hard to maintain that.

Nope.

I'm not.

Nope, no, no, no.

I'm not enjoying this.

There's no redeeming, you know, like...

Just a tiny little ripple.

I mean, also, the other thing, I mean, because Trump's other, he's got got this balancing act hasn't he has to say everything's great now and it was shit before yeah but if it's great now there's no there's nothing left for him to do yeah right so there's still so that's why I'm going golfing exactly so so sort he's got to maintain that some things are still shit otherwise there's no point to it's so it's that it's that having to think two separate things exact at exactly the same time and present them to people I think is really interesting but he's clearly not troubled by being illogical

no he's laid that card very firmly on the table exactly but that's really interesting because because most people will go, no, f this.

I can't maintain these two impossible thoughts at once.

Well, yeah, I think he also,

well, sorry, to your point about them sitting there stony-faced, they're getting complaints now from the Republican side that they behaved that way.

But that's the grand tradition, is whatever the opposing side is, they sit there stony-faced.

And at one point during Obama's State of the Union, one of the Republican senators yelled out, you lie.

And it wasn't even a lie.

It was just he was upset that Obama was black and just had a freak out.

But Donald Trump tweeted a complete lie about the ratings.

Oh yeah.

That is the prime club in his bag, isn't it?

The ratings lie.

Oh my God.

He said, thank you for all of the nice compliments.

It's like me after a show when I tweet to the audience.

And reviews on the State of the Union speech.

Reviews.

Well, reviews, you can...

I mean, five stars in one paper is one star in another.

Well, the thing is, I mean you can if you I mean I'm trying to sort of treat the Trump presidency like he's a sort of Andy Kaufman deep cut, deep character comic who one day will emerge out the other end of it and go, come on, I was joking.

Or die in a wrestling ring or something.

I don't know.

I don't really know anything about Andy Kaufman except that but because I watched the Piers Morgan interview where he was obviously trying out some of the everything's great, the economy's better than it ever was.

Oh, okay.

And he did that thing where he sits bolt upright in the chair.

Yeah.

Like, because he, again, because he, because then he can put his, then he can put his jaw out and he's obviously got this,

I'll do my handsome body language now, like my dreamy body language.

And he sits up and he did that.

He did all that.

The economy's better

has been.

The trillion dollars.

Did we put a trillion dollars on the stock exchange and all this sort of thing?

The stock exchange is better than it has ever been in all American history.

And he was rehearsing all this stuff very much like a comic trying his stuff out at a club gig.

I was just going to say, before you host the Oscars,

you try out some of your jokes.

Because no one watched the Piers Morgan thing, so it's like doing a small gig.

I can't believe those two sat together.

It's the two, literally, the two most terrible white males that exist on the planet Earth, I think.

Well, there's probably worse people, but.

Well, there certainly have been worse white males in the past, I think.

Yes, maybe not.

As the early to mid-20th century would testify.

And some that build illegal castles.

Don't forget that.

Well, he's terrible.

You know that he would have been one of the illegal castle castle builders.

Absolutely.

Everything he has built.

Colm is an illegal castle built.

Colm is the bastard.

He'd have been caught.

As you say about the ratings, he claimed it was

the most watched state of the union in history, which

was impressive and would have been even more impressive if it had been true.

But still, still impressive.

As we know, in the 21st century, you don't let the facts get in the way of a good fact.

And he complimented Fox as well for

their big share of the, I think, what, 12 million of the 46 million

who watched it.

And he's basically moonlighting as President of the United States from his main job as head of PR for Fox News.

And Fox News seems to me to be a blend of kind of American capitalism at its ultimate height and Soviet-level propaganda.

Oh, yeah.

Kind of the devil wears Pravda.

Yes, I love that.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Thank you.

That was a really good one.

That's a good one.

Oh, you sound genuinely surprised, Al.

Sorry, actually, after all the years we've been working together.

I need to recover from that one.

That was a serviceable joke and everything.

It is distressing to me that he did get even that many because the ones that have beat him out were only a few million more.

48 million, 46 million.

Why did he have 45 million?

We go around on Twitter and say, don't watch it.

Don't give him the ratings.

Don't watch it.

And people still watch it.

Right, yeah.

So I'm upset with Americans who watched it ironically.

Right, yeah.

What if you watch it like a Medusa?

If you're looking at it in a mirror, does that count to the ratings?

I don't know.

That's

through a shop window.

That's all right.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Just like in the 50s.

Crowds of them stand outside.

Democrats outside TV shops going, boom.

He said these words I found

particularly

moving tonight I call upon all of us to set aside our differences to seek out common ground and to summon the unity we need to deliver for the people we were elected to serve which is rather like a hyena calling for better table manners

guys how about some decorum at meal times wait your turn you'll all get your bit of the zebra and would it be too much to ask you fing hooligans to use some fing cutlery

Aftermath of shock democratic results part two now and uh on this side of the Atlantic um

well the Brexit uh schmozzle continues to uh rumble on um amidst continuing confusion over what the f is going on, what the f was going on when we voted and what the f will go on.

Um and um Al Angela Merkel's been uh been cranking up the uh cranking up the burns.

Well, what we've discovered is that it's going to be a shock

to many people that Germans have a sense of humour.

Because the laws of comedy, as we all know, dictate.

Comedy is all about surprise, that's Rule A.

Rule B, the Germans have no sense of humour.

That's Rule B.

C, the British have the greatest sense of humour in the world.

Testify.

D, because we can laugh for ourselves.

That's the reason, right?

So it would come as no shock to buglers who long ago turned their backs on comedy to learn that

it is.

Comedy is A, no surprise at all, that b the germs have a sense of humor c the british don't think it's funny and d it's because they're laughing at us

and the story is

um and news has emerged from germany via journalists writing about it in german newspapers and then a british journalist reading those newspapers which is an extraordinary means of transmission for information angela merkel has the brass neck sheer neck and gebras in german to have joked with journalists about the irony lady pm theresa may um basically Basically, her riff was, this is comedian talking Andy, she was riffing on the

this

Brexit deadlock.

Basically, she says she ran, Merkel says she ran into Theresa May and they had a conversation that went this way.

And she did this for some journalists in a room as a routine.

And where Merkel says to May, what do you want from the Brexit deal?

May replies, make me an offer.

Right?

So Merkel then says, I don't need to make you an offer.

You're the one who wants to leave.

What do you want?

May would then say, make me an offer.

And apparently they, she says they went round and round in circles doing this.

And May Merkel did this as

her hilarious routine for German journalists.

I mean, I wouldn't open it with it, but this is

a comedy of repetition.

It's all designed first.

Absolutely, yeah.

Yeah, and I mean, and this, of course, is outrage people who shit on about Germans not having a sense of humor and how much they like 633 Squadron and Sun Loungers and all that stuff.

And I think it's really, really interesting because

an endless theme of the whole Brexit thing is no one has considered for a minute that we're doing this in public

and it's our little secret

it's our little secret that that that Europe Europe that there's in this negotiation that's been pitched by the Brexit

pro-Brexit people they've just never ever taken into account that there are other people involved in this thing right and that they might they might

even if they don't agree you know they obviously they don't like it and the Germans said they'd rather we didn't didn't do this but they're laughing at us.

It's sort of, it's just the, it's, it's like the absolute

hard burn for your, uh, these

Germana monomaniacs, these people who still think it's the war.

And then the other thing we had with this, of course, is the German ambassador said that the British are obsessed with the Second World War.

Um, to which I say, who do you think you're kidding, Mr.

If you think old England's done?

I mean, it, it's, I mean, Jen,

I don't know what this must look like to

the outside world, this Brexit thing, but we we've this whole situation has arrived as a completely internal problem, and now we're having to deal with the external ramifications.

And we look, I think we look, we run a real danger looking like complete fing twat.

It's a relief as an American to go, oh my god, people as ridiculous as us.

Yeah, we were the John the Baptist to your idiotic Jesus.

So for one minute, for maybe a month, we looked like we would be

superior to you.

I just mean in that sense of

bragging rights about not being stupid.

And then we joined in.

And now it's just, it terrifies me, to be honest.

I feel like I'm watching two countries completely get taken over by Russian propaganda and thinking that they need to split from within their own selves.

That's us.

And then you guys splitting from Europe.

But the really, I mean, I think I find really amazing about this is, all right, let's say leaving.

leaving Europe is

the right thing to do.

Then do it, do a good job of it, rather than go, oh, the Germans are having a go at it.

It's like this sort of it's this really weird.

I mean,

we didn't vote to do a good job of it.

That wasn't on the ballot paper, was it?

We just voted for Brexit.

No one said it would have to be a good job.

Clearly the you know the problem is that we just didn't we we voted not having discussed for more than about a minute what the f would happen afterwards.

So the whole thing's being uh being riffed.

I guess you you can't discuss it in advance.

That's showing weakness.

It's like a drop of blood in a shark tank.

And then the hippie in me goes, you can't really leave Europe, man, because you're technically can still channel to Paris.

I mean, you're all one big blob of

that's what

anti-EU people always say.

Well, we're not leaving.

We love Europe.

We just don't like the EU.

We're not leaving Europe.

Of course we don't.

Why do you always deliberately confuse the two and think, well, because that's exactly what you've been doing.

The fact you don't like having to talk to Belgians.

Well,

it's like racism against other white people.

I've never seen it with it.

We're specialists.

We can conjure racism out of anything.

You know, that white cup,

I don't like the look of that white cup.

That mug on this table is white, and already it's got different customs to me.

Don't like it.

Neat little summary of British social history there.

But, well, it

might not need to tunnel to Paris, so it could be a bridge coming soon.

Boris Johnson,

who is essentially the improv foreign secretary, just riffing out

one of the most important jobs in the country,

said that there will be a bridge.

And those on the Brexit side clearly responded by saying, I think you missed out the syllable draw there, Boris.

I think Americans kind of think of Angela Merkel as a rock star, too.

There's a lot of popular memes that go around of her sitting with Donald Trump.

Rock star.

I mean, I've heard many things said about Angela Merkel, but I think she's sort of like...

I thought that she's the new Kurt Curbain.

We look to her as almost this like, save us, like maybe Germany will adopt us or something.

The way that she sat with Trump in the Oval Office, and there's a famous picture of him looking down like a little boy, and it looks like she's scolding him.

And one of the memes is like, What did I tell you about Nazis?

He's like, Don't invite them in the Oval Office.

You know, it's something like that.

And we just, we love when she turns her back on him.

And so, I don't know, I'm sorry she's making a fool of Theresa May, but

we think she's cool.

Just breaking actually on this subject, a new report from the CBHAWMRH, that's the Committee for Brexiting Hard, and we mean real hard.

Brexit will produce an average 0.2% rise in the vague feeling of national independence, a 0.4% increase in the average perception that we're controlling our own destiny, and a 0.07% upward bump in the average sense that we could now become a multi-millionaire Nobel Prize-winning scientist because all the Romanio wholly bulk irrigants have stopped coming over here to plumb our toilets for us.

And that report has been verified by the Cross-Party Committee on Indefinable National Emotions, which is very, very influential in this Brexit age.

Obviously, there's two sides to interpret these figures.

The National Institute for Liking Hypothetically Nice Things in a Vague Kind of Way countered by saying that although on average British people are 0.4% more in control of their destiny, or that's how they perceive it, that is due to a hardcore of hardcore, hard Brexit hard ears feeling around 13,000% more in control.

And the overall 12.9% fewer people feel in control.

So it's, you know, you can interpret these things in any way you want.

Or indeed, just make them up.

We need to move on to some extremely

pressing

technology versus the natural world news now.

And this is arguably the greatest story of the millennium so far.

A peacock that has been thrown off an aeroplane.

Not just any peacock, but what was described by its owner as an emotional support peacock.

The

a

harrowing story.

It was in a flight in America.

Of course.

Of course, of course.

Of course, of course.

The airline claimed the bird contravened its size and weight guidelines.

Body shaming a peacock.

Is there no depth of insecurity?

To which we will not stoop.

The bird named Dexter, presumably because its majestic plumage is reminiscent of the majestic batsmanship of the former England cricketer Ted Dexter,

apparently generally avoids public transport

as

its owner, who's an artist, says it would be too traumatic for it.

Well, public transport was too traumatic for humans, but we've learned to endure it.

And it's that kind of resilient attitude that gives us the edge in the evolutionary race.

And explains why there are so few peacocks on the boards of

FTSE 100 companies.

The peacock was originally bought,

this is a charming backstory, to be part of an art installation.

I mean, no wonder this peacock's got big ideas.

Frankly, if it's been

molly-coddled as a.

But this peacock is going to be really big-headed now, isn't it?

He's going to be going, yeah, I'm literally showing off even more than a peacock would normally.

Yeah, I'm the one that got banned from that flight, yeah.

Yeah, I'm literally peacocking.

It has its own Instagram account.

Does it?

He was, or she, I don't know.

I guess it's a man.

Hang on, hang on.

Yeah, so it's a peacock.

Isn't it if it's a peacock?

A peacock is better at using social media than I am.

I've already got a long-ass barf in my head.

He perched atop a luggage cart at the airport and wrote, spent six hours trying to get on my flight to LA.

And he said, tomorrow my human friends are going to drive me cross-country.

So he has friends, an Instagram account.

I don't know how many followers I'll take a look.

All right.

I'm starting to get peacock jealousy here.

Obviously, this was a decision that has caused considerable unhappiness, particularly from Dexter the Peacock himself, who gave an emotional press conference after he was turfed off the flight.

The decision to bar me from this self-proclaimed flight is aviorist, peacockist, and above all sexist.

Whilst I understand you humans' understandable embarrassment at allowing a bird to go on a powered artificial environmentally destructive fake Enormo bird, that does not make it acceptable.

Regarding the injustice towards me as a peacock, well, look at you f ⁇ ing lemmings sitting there like sheep in your cocoons.

Watching some half-assed piece of Hollywood shite on your 8-inch screens on this aeroplane when you could be watching my unbelievably awesome feathers.

Seriously, look at this shit.

It's f ⁇ ing sensational.

Moreover, without downplaying in any way the history of prejudice against females, have you ever seen a pea hen thrown off an aeroplane?

Of course you haven't.

Sure, I'm not a perfect peacock.

I have been a bit of an absentee father to some of my pea chicks, chicks, and I have fluttered my feathers without asking permission on occasion.

But I feel that this is now a witch hunt.

One last thing regarding me being quotes too big, it's mostly feathers.

And finally, have some fing respect.

Without things like me, you flightless fkers wouldn't have even thought of trying to fing fly.

I will not be taking questions.

Quick bit of tech news.

Elon Musk,

Bugle favourite,

the obviously fictitious entrepreneur,

absolutely no way he exists, has apparently made.

He sold $21 million of flamethrowers in a day.

I mean, that's...

How does that sentence even exist?

And he also sold a lot of fire extinguishers as well.

I mean, that is the definition of a captive f ⁇ ing market, isn't it?

Oh, you've got this.

You might also like this.

That is capitalism.

I didn't even know it was legal

to have a flamethrower.

Of course it is.

It's protected by your Second Amendment rights, isn't it?

Sub-Amendment 3A, the right to throw flame.

Of course, back in the day, that referred to lighting fires in winter to ward off bears and wolves and British people.

But now the flamethrower lobby is so powerful that it's been twisted beyond its initial images.

I think this is a good test bed for that.

You know, that thing when people say, oh, you know, guns don't kill people, people kill people.

Let's find out whether flamethrowers kill people.

Right.

Yes.

It's like a perfect test.

It's like a controlled experiment for that adage.

You know, it's a chance for America to put it to the test.

So, if a flamethrower kills someone, then obviously guns kill people as well.

You know, logically.

It's like a logical test bed.

So, I think he's doing us all a favour here.

Well, it's not guns that kill people, it's the fact that not everyone has been dipped head to toe in the river sticks to be given immortality that kills people.

Everybody knows that.

A quick other showbiz story: BBC Review found no gender bias in its on-air pay decisions,

despite there being

what might be described as obvious gender bias in its on-air pay decisions.

And well, this is just the latest example of sexism in Showbiz.

As evidenced, just a couple of weeks ago, Minnie Mouse finally given her own Hollywood Walk of Fame star 40 years

after her male co-star and former lover Mickey Mouse.

Rumours are that the reason, part of the reason it took so long was that Mickey briefed against Minnie

after she complained about his habit of shitting everywhere he went on set and then laughing it off by saying mice will be mice.

Also

rumoured that Minnie was offered a payoff of up to 10 kilograms of cheese in exchange for not revealing that Mickey had a clandestine interspecies relationship with Melissa Duck, the then girlfriend of Mickey's cartoon rival Daffy Duck,

who was from the rival Warner Brothers stable, which, of course, Disney frowned on big time.

You know, I have some hot news.

I was at the BBC

the other day on the Woman's Hour, and they had to have the woman that was

going to parliament the next day to talk about it.

Kyrie Gracie.

Yes, she wasn't allowed to read the statement herself because she's not anything to do with being a woman, but because she's the one

protesting it.

So ironically, just a man had to come in and read about it.

And the BBC is insisting on calling it fair pay, not equal pay.

And they're denying, really, that it's happening.

I mean, the BBC are going to have to explain why there seems to be a gender pay gap.

Are they going to end up saying, yeah, but all the women are worse at their job than all the men?

That's what they said in the statement.

Basically, they said a lot of this is based on

work, you know, experience and output.

And it's like, but that's the systematic thing.

But I saw, I sat there in the studio while they read that ridiculous.

When will there be men's hour?

Amenza!

All right, you've had that fair night 70 years now.

When will there be

men's hour?

Men's hour.

When will that happen?

Hey,

what I want to know

is why Kirsty Walk,

outstanding TV journalist, presenter of Newsnight and various other things, still paid less than Great Uncle Bulgaria out of the wombles.

Doesn't make sense to me.

In another

gender wars story,

science breaking news this week, apparently the number of men dying from prostate cancer has now overtaken female deaths from breast cancer for the first time in the UK.

Well done, boys.

There you go, Mrs.

Pocker Hodenhurst.

You got what you wanted.

But I read...

I'm going to lower the tone now.

I read that

you reduce your

possibility of prostate cancer by cancer by orgasming every day.

I've heard that.

So, like, what's going on there?

If the male rates are going up.

That's right.

And how, that certainly explains why Prince Philip has lived so long.

So, is there a crisis that men are not

enjoying themselves?

Sounds like it.

Sounds like it.

We can't even summon up the gumption to wank.

Maybe because all these women are squawking about their rights and we are not attracted to them anymore, their fantasies.

Thank you for joining the dots for me.

It would have been completely out of order if I'd suggested that, but you know, here we are.

Go on, woman's hand.

Tell them

we've just about run out of time on the bugle.

So, the results of the win-your-place in the Bilderberg Group competition have sadly been postponed until next week, but you will get an extra week on your term on the Bilderberg inner sanctum for the winner.

And do keep your your emails coming in to hellobuglers at thebuglepodcast.com.

So, well, Jen, thanks very much for coming on the

on the bugle.

How long is your running Soho?

It'll be over Saturday night.

Oh, right, so probably by tonight.

Absolutely no point plugging it.

No, but just to let people know that

they could have seen it if they missed it.

Yeah.

Next time.

Consider that a retrospective plug.

Al, have you got anything to plug at the moment?

No, no.

I've got nothing on this year at the moment.

I mean, I plans to do things, but nothing certain.

I turned 50 this year and I'm feeling like I might do fall

to celebrate.

Brexit, innit?

Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

Well, I'm free now, you see.

Don't need to work anymore.

Land of Milk and Honey, Solar Uplands.

You can just lie back and enjoy the feeling of self-determination.

Jen, you have a podcast of your own.

Do you want to have that?

Yes, it's called I Seem Fun, the Diary of Jen Kirkman podcast, available at all podcasting uh places out of the ether just grab it out of this guy and again and especially it's it's not available in europe only in uh england now because of brexit right yeah i won't let any other europeans listen to it so yeah you don't deserve to listen to us sweet taste of freedom yeah

not being able to go somewhere else

um thank you uh for listening buglers don't forget there are still some tickets available for the bugle live show on the 22nd of february it will feature Nish Kumar and Alice Fraser.

And come to all of my Saturdays for High Show tour dates coming up this week.

Take one.

Can I remember them?

Take two.

I think.

Oh, my dear.

Oh my dear.

I'm sure there's one other.

Oh, f ⁇ 's sake.

Do you want me to Google it?

Yeah, if you want to go to your website.

Hang on.

If it's not happening in the next six hours,

I don't know what is going on.

Take three.

Also, come to all of these Saturdays for Hire shows.

And please, if you are coming, do submit your email requests for topics to satirise this at satiristforhire.com.

Wednesday in Brighton is sold out, brackets, tiny room.

Leicester on Thursday is not sold out.

Brackets, also tiny room.

Do come along.

I have Galway on the 10th in Ireland.

Dublin on the 11th.

Belfast on the 12th the following week.

Monmouth, Worcester, Exeter, Canterbury, and then there's some more after that, all details at andysoltsman.co.uk.

Any further questions?

Comments?

Right?

Let's call that a wrap.

Thank you for listening, Buglers.

We'll be back next week with Mr.

Anuvab Powell, who will be in America,

which is very exciting.

A new time zone for him on the bugle.

Until then, 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.